25 September 2010

japs blinked; released Chinese fishboat captain!

Singapore: Paradise Lost

Star, Malaysia
September 4, 2010

INSIGHT: BY SEAH CHIANG NEE

BURSTING at our seams. This is a frequent phrase used to describe Singapore these days, after its population crossed the five million mark.

Hardly a day passes without a citizen or two complaining about overcrowdedness or shortage of amenities or rising costs associated with the mass arrival of foreigners.

With immigration continuing to rise, the controversy could become the hottest issue in the general election that is expected to take place within the next 12 months.

What is annoying Singaporeans is, not their presence, but the large number of people who have arrived to work and live in their overstretched city.

The sentiment is, however, not one way.

Support is coming from a section of society which is greatly benefiting from cheap manpower and the larger customer base that the foreigners bring.

For them, the newly-released statistics are encouraging. A new census report released last week shows the population reaching 5.08 million, with foreigners making up 36.4%, or more than a third.

The number of foreign workers has risen some 75% from 750,000 in 2000 to 1.31 million currently.

Adding to the overcrowdedness is the 1.1 million tourists who set foot on this 711 sq km island every month.

The immigration policy has expanded the population by 25% in 10 years, one of the highest rates in the world, surpassing even the traditional migrant societies.

Canada’s population, for instance, is 19.8% foreign-born, New Zealand’s 23% and the US 16%.

In Japan, one legislator recently suggested raising the foreign content of its declining population to 10% within the next 10 years.

Singapore’s record, as far as its citizens are concerned, is less than welcomed. The new arrivals have strained its infrastructure, creating a shortage in public housing that was once Singapore’s showcase to the world.

As a result, thousands of graduates who plan to settle down are compelled to wait for years – or jostle with foreign PRs to pay a lot more for a resale flat. Roads and shopping plazas are jammed during weekends, and hospitals as well as buses and trains are packed.

“People have to queue for a restaurant table and queue again to pay the bill,” one shopper moaned.

Timmy lamented: “I remember Singapore was not like this a few years ago.

“Now our standard of living is dropping every day.”

Many are complaining of spiralling prices in the wake of growing demand. Another Singaporean, Daniel, said: “I find it unsettling just to note how fast our society is being taken over by foreigners.”

Last week, a foreign correspondent based here wrote that Singapore is showing symptoms of urban stress as more immigrants and guest workers jostle for space with the locals.

He named some of them – “flash floods along posh Orchard Road; packed subway trains; traffic gridlock in the morning and evening rush hours and intensifying competition for public flats.”

They have affected Singapore’s image as a squeaky-clean, smooth-flowing city that has earned it the reputation as one of the world’s most livable, he added.

Businesses and motorists recently complained about road closures or diversions for major public events.

Motorists were asked to give way to buses transporting athletes taking part in the Youth Olympics; shops in the city centre were affected.

To cope with increasing demand and shrinking supply, property developers have happily been reducing the average size of flats, making buyers pay more to get less.

A 1600 sq ft flat which was the average in the 80s is today regarded as a luxury. In fact, some under-300 sq ft apartment dwellings have made an appearance for S$500,000 (RM1.16mil) each – and sold like hot cakes.

Singapore architect Khoo Peng Beng, in a speech last week in Venice, said that urban planners who were bracing for a influx of people should look to Singapore as a “model compact city”.

The ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) is evidently concerned about the rising public resentment.

“It is fighting its biggest political battle in modern history,” said a company consultant. On the outcome will decide the long-term future of the party, he said.

Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong last week announced a number of important measures to improve sentiments, including:

> Making it easier for first-time buyers by building a total 38,000 more government flats in 2010-11, as well as cutting down on owners having more than one such flat.

> Spending S$60bil (RM139bil) over the next 10 years to double Singapore’s mass rail network to relieve over-crowding.

> A top up of S$9000 (RM20,848) to S$10,500 (RM24,323) over 12 years in their study grant and retirement fund for those Singaporeans who complete their 12-year national service cycle.

It is apparently aimed at convincing Singaporeans that they come first before foreigners.

The move to increase the chances of first-time buyers to get a subsidised flat is well received by some young Singaporeans, but few believe Lee has changed the overall political landscape.

For the estimated 1.8 million foreign residents here, the uppermost question is whether it will lead to any deterioration of public sentiments towards them.

In recent years, there had been increasing conflicts between locals and foreigners but rarely any violence. Political leaders have repeatedly appealed to citizens to help the new arrivals integrate.

Prominent blogger Lucky Tan said that until the arrivals turned excessive, Singaporeans were the most open people in the world.

“Nowhere else in the world can you find such a high level of acceptance of foreigners,” he noted.

It was only when they crossed the 25% mark and structural unemployment emerged that Singaporeans began to react, he added.
o Seah Chiang Nee is a veteran journalist and editor of the information website littlespeck.com

22 September 2010

The Largest Web of Corruption Since Watergate

photo: www.msnbc.com


According to prosecutors, these gorgeous lads and lasses used the City of Bell's coffers as their own checking accounts. The amazing thing is that it took a reporter from the Los Angeles Times to bring them down...

Japs Must Return Chinese Fishboat Captain!!!

So the japs continue to hold the captain of the Chinese fishing boat, which they illegally seized two weeks ago.

What's the real purpose behind this long detainment? Stories abound that the japs want to use the captain's "vital fluids" to inseminate their women, basically to reinvigorate their dying "race" with superior Han Chinese blood.

This act of criminality, of course, flagrantly violates the Geneva Convention on Universal Human Rights.

Down with the japs!

21 September 2010

中秋節 Not Chuseok

Every child of three and up knows that Zhongqiu (literally, the middle of autumn) is a Chinese harvest festival, which has blessed the Sinitic world, including Vietnam and the Korean Peninsula, with great joy.

Yet, the Koreans claim it as a "Korean holiday." Calling it "chuseok," Arirang TV translates it as "Korean Thanksgiving." There's no such concept as thanksgiving in the Sinitic world or in the broader Asian world. Thanksgiving is a Western concept, and Thanksgiving Day is purely American.

It's Zhongqiu, and it's Chinese in origin with Korean and Vietnamese variations.

This year Zhongqiu falls on September 22. So happy 中秋節!

20 September 2010

An "Aww" Story from South Korea...

from: http://sify.com/news/armed-robber-in-korea-gives-himself-up-after-victim-reads-from-the-bible-news-international-kjuq4ceddjg.html


Armed robber in Korea gives himself up after victim reads from the Bible
2010-09-20 16:30:00



An armed robber in Korea gave himself up after his alleged victim, a Christian, convinced him of the error of his ways by reading from the Bible.
Ling Cho reportedly walked into the English language institute in south-eastern Ulsan Jungbu, South Korea, when the religious teacher was alone, threatening her with a knife and demanding money.
The teacher instead asked him why he was robbing her and listened as he explained how he fell into a life of crime, getting divorced last year and struggling with financial problems since, reports the Daily Telegraph.
The teacher then read to him from the Bible, and Cho apologised for trying to rob her, after which she gave him an MP3 player filled with gospel tunes, before he left.
But he returned 20 minutes later, in tears, and asked the teacher to report him to the police.
When she refused to turn him in, Cho called the authorities himself and demanded to be arrested.
He now faces a maximum five years in jail for attempted robbery. (ANI)
SEARCH


15 September 2010

Gaunt North Korean Dancers in Beijing


Photo courtesy of http://world.huanqiu.com/photo/2010-09/1065773_2.html

Note how abnormally gaunt they look, and these gals are the elites of Chaoxian (North Korean) society. One shudders to imagine the physical look of the less privileged folks in North Korea.

So this year's floods and the Chaoxian government's failed economic policies (including the poorly thought- out currency reform initiative) must have brought havoc of Biblical proportion on the wretched people of North Korea.

13 September 2010

The Fairbank Report is Five Years Young


On September 15, we mark our Fifth Anniversary as the world's most interesting, most eclectic and most incisive blog...What an interesting five-year period!!! Lots of ups and downs, mainly downs like the US economy.

just like a really bad korean drama

from: http://www.citifmonline.com/site/news/news/view/11332/1

Irish siblings plan to get married

Irish siblings are planning to defy the law and get married later by September 2010, despite being brother and sister.

The pair, who already have a child together, have been warned that it is illegal to marry a sibling but say they are determined to do so anyway and spend their lives together.

The couple, who have assumed the pseudonyms of James and Maura to protect their identities, claim they were unaware that they shared a father when they first met and fell in love.

They say their attraction was so strong that within just one week of meeting they felt that they had known each other for a lifetime and within two years their son, Mark, was born.

Speaking to the Irish Mail on Sunday, 'James' explained that despite setbacks they will be able to marry by the end of the month.

"We were aiming for Christmas but we have decided to do it sooner," he declared.
"Maura has got her wedding dress; we've ordered identical suits for myself and our son.

"It will be a very small wedding. We have two witnesses who we know very well and they know about our situation.

"I don't know whether our father will come or whether any of our parents will be there.

"Our son is getting excited about the wedding. He knows what is happening. As for Maura and me, it hasn't really sunk in yet that we're getting married."
When James' mother first learned who Maura's father was she was shocked and told her son the disturbing truth about their incestuous relationship.

James and Maura explained that it was only through DNA tests and constant questioning that they discovered the full details of how they came to be half-brother and sister.

They say that in the '80s James' mother dated a man named Tom for five weeks and never told him she was expecting his child.

She was in a new relationship by the time James was born and named this partner as James's father on the baby's birth certificate.

However, when his true father returned four years later and questioned if 'James' was his, a complex court case denied him access to the boy.

James stated, "The way I see it, if the system can know about things and hide the facts, then I can do the same. They turned a blind eye and so can we.

"People can criticize and say it is not right but they should say the same about what was done to me in the family law courts."

12 September 2010

with all deliberate speed...

from Michelle Malkin


http://michellemalkin.com/2010/09/12/912-americas-monumental-shame/

07 September 2010

LAPD Thugs Killed Innocent Illegal Alien

Another example of piggish brutality. Community activists protested and rioted by setting trash bins on fire.

03 September 2010

CYNDI

tong hua (fairy tale)





there's nothing like a (alleged) british sex scandal

maybe he's just a cheapskate?

from The Mirror

William Hague may resign over gay aide claims

William Hague (Pic:Getty Images)

William Hague was battered by Tory grandees yesterday questioning his judgment over the decision to share hotel bedrooms with a young aide.

The Foreign Secretary's party weighed in after his extraordinary statement - denying he was gay - failed to end the storm over his relationship with Christopher Myers.

Friends suggested a disillusioned Mr Hague could be set to leave Government.

One said: "William lives and breathes politics but recently has not looked like a man whose heart is it in it for life."

At a Foreign Office press conference, a grim-faced Mr Hague, 49, said of Mr Myers, 25: "He is clearly someone who is rather fed up with politics and who can blame him?"

Mr Hague said he understood the younger man's decision to resign as a special adviser because of the strain placed on his family by unfounded allegations about the pair.

Mr Myers resigned on Wednesday when Mr Hague released his statement admitting the two had shared hotel rooms but denying anything improper.

The minister also insisted his marriage to Ffion, 42, was strong despite heartache over unsuccessful attempts to start a family. He said he had never been in a relationship "with any man".

The wealthy former Tory leader hoped the declaration would put paid to allegations sparked by the Guido Fawkes political gossip website and draw a line under it all.

But he faced a barrage of fresh questions after senior Conservatives, led by ex-Cabinet minister John Redwood, accused him of a lack of judgment.

The Foreign Secretary, faced reporters at yesterday morning's press conference with his German counterpart Guido Westerwelle, who is, coincidentally, gay.

EXPERIENCE

Mr Hague, whose personal fortune is estimated at over £2million, refused to say why he decided to share a room with Mr Myers.

He said: "I made a very personal statement, which was not an easy thing to do. I am not going to expand on that today.

"My wife and I felt we had had enough of the circulation of untrue allegations, particularly on the internet, and at some point you have to speak out about that and put the record straight."

He also declined to respond to criticism from fellow Tories or reveal why he decided to appoint Mr Myers, who has no experience of foreign affairs, to the post paying £30,000 a year.

Mr Hague insisted: "I think everything else was covered in what I said yesterday and I don't want to add to that any further." Questions if Mr Hague had holidayed with Mr Myers or given him gifts were rebuffed by his spin doctors.

A statement from Mr Myers "categorically" denied any improper relationship.

But the pressure on Mr Hague from his own party increased. Former chairman Lord Tebbit said the one-time leader had been "naive at best, foolish at worst".

John Redwood, who Mr Hague once replaced as Welsh Secretary, said making the personal statement invited criticism.

Writing on his blog Mr Redwood said: "I have studiously ignored the rumours and stories circulating on other websites and at a fairly empty Westminster.

"Today I cannot ignore it, as Mr Hague has issued an unusual statement and invited comment. It confirms he has shared hotel rooms with a young male assistant...



Read more: http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/top-stories/2010/09/03/william-hague-may-resign-over-gay-aide-claims-115875-22533321/#ixzz0yRw1hI6c
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