Happy birthday~

Attached is the birthday gift! The ugliest fish I've even seen. Please enjoy~ Happy birthday~~~~~~~~~~ to Jaivir~ haha

Origin of Chinese National Day

It's been 60 years. So much has happened in the past decades in China. It would be concluded by a certainly magnificent military parade in 3 hours' time.

But does anyone know why the communist party established the new regime on this day?

You may say, there is no reason why. Because they felt they were ready on that day. Yeah, you are right. But communist troops had occupied Beijing since Jan 31 without fighting. Why didn't they pronounce their success earlier?

You may also say, because they didn't announce until they finisht the war. But on Oct 1, 1949, 50% of Chinese territory is still either under KMT control (southern and southwestern), or controlled by local government (Tibet, Xinjiang). We could well say that the war was far from over (which was verified by the division along Taiwan strait later).

I believe, as the tradition of communism, symbolism is always important. The first communist country, Soviet Union was established during October Revolution (though it's November 7 on Gregorian calender because Russian Orthodoxy used a different calender). As a continuation of great communist campaign, being established on October is a important.

Also, there was a negotiation with Soviets underway. Stalin wanted to continue controling Mongolia, Xinjiang and Manchuria. As a nationalist, Mao wouldn't allow this kind of humiliation for the new regime. The negotiation was so fierce that Soviet embassy even moved with KMT government to Guangzhou (the very south of the country) while the American ambassador refused to move and wanted to talk to new regime. The bargaining finally resulted in independence of Mongolia for the return of Xinjiang and Manchuria but a lease continued in Dalian. Without ensuring the Soviet support, any proclamation would be premature (Soviet established diplomatic relations with China on Oct 2, before any other country).

Any delay after October 1 would be risky because a cold snowy winter day wouldn't be a good one for a communist regime to showcase its power in a military parade (which was a problem for Soviet leader to stand in bleeding cold Red Square for several hours, which was a touch job for elderly Soviet politburo members).

Hola? Hola? Hey, greeting to the United Nations

This year's UN General Debate finally ended. This year's conference attracted the most important leaders in the world. Obama did a good job as he spoke in this chamber for the first time. Gordon Brown tried to make himself closer to President Obama. Sarkozy demanded a permanent Security Council seat for African Union. Hu promised to cut CO2. Medvedev suggested Russia could support a fresh sanction against Iran. The only one missing is Chancellor Merkel, who is busy with the election celebration.

Many controversies made this year's conference interesting. Murmarr Qaddafi and Hugo Chavez's long speeches were real fun. Ahmadinejad continued his reputation built last year. Robert Mugabe even made an appeal to lift sanction against his extremely corrupt government. But most important, this year is not a good one for coup leaders.

Madagascar's coup leader arrived in the chamber, but was blocked to speak by African countries in a rare confusion of rule and chaos when the President of General Assembly wasn't sure what to do. The Southern African country bloc succeeded by getting 23 positive votes out of 192 members because the majority of them didn't understand what they are going to vote on and they are yet to receive instruction from the government. This shows African countries' determination to tackle the longstanding history of military coup, but how this could help Madagascar back to normal is anybody's guess.

On Monday, Honduran Foreign Minister used cell phone to let deposed President Zaleya make a speech in front of the world from Brazillian embassy in Tegucigalpa, where he sneaked in unnoticed. He definitely is not a popular leader in the world, but he received the support because nobody could accept the way he was forced out of office -- fleeding in pyjamas. What he is doing now actually is worsening the situation, but the international community is in a dilemma of whether to support him. The puzzle of Honduras seems to have just started.

No divorce on Oct 1!

China is going to celebrate the 60th anniversary of people's republic on October 1. According to the Chongqing municipal government, they divorce appointment could be made for that day, while the wedding registration will still be working.

Of course, divorce is in contrast with the harmonious society. At this sensitive moment, the government would try to prevent any potential threat to the harmony, either Tibetan separatist movement or domestic conflicts, from disrupting the rosy atmosphere in this country to celebrate the huge achievements and forget the negligible disasters in the past six decades under communist rule.

On the other hand, this day is so proud for the nation that so many people want to make it their happiest day in their lives by setting the wedding day on Oct 1. This would possibly overwhelm the capacity of the government, simply rendering it incapable of accommodating people who want to divorce. Having lived under the same roof together for several years, one day is not that hard to wait, isn't it? Probably seeing the country is so strong and prosperous, some couples would change their minds, and the society would be one step closer to "harmony".

Election watch:

Ther result of German federal parliament election has come out. Christian Democrats (CDU) led by Chancellor Angela Merkel won by a larger margin than last time, thus ending the uncomfortable "Grand Coalition" with center-left rival Social Democratic Party (SDP). Actually, out of the five main parties, only social democrats lost seats, and all the other gained significant number of seats. The biggest winner is the third party, natural ally of Merkel's party, Freedom Democratic Party (FDP), surging from 61 to 93 seats. Together with the CDU and its partner in Bavaria CSU, they won over 50% of the seats, sufficient to form a coalition government without the leftist parties.

This is certainly a good result for German people because Merkel government has performed well in the past four years. The country is moving out of the recession, faster than most of the other developed countries. Plus, a grand coalition turns out to be quite inefficient and slows down the necessary reforms in this country. A period of opposition status can also help the SPD reform itself to compete with CDU in the future.

The incumbent Socialist Party won the parliamentary election in Portugal, but its leading margin is reduced and it needs to form a coalition with other parties to get a majority in the parliament. A grand coalition with center-right PSD is likely to happen, though allying with two smaller leftist parties is also possible. But forming a coalition government is not insurmountable and José Sócrates is set to remain in the office.

Party	Votes	%	Change	Seats
PS	2,068,665	36.56	-8.4	96
PSD	1,646,097	29.09	0.3	78
CDS/PP	592,064	10.46	3.2	21
BE	557,109	9.85	3.4	16
CDU	446,174	7.88	0.3	15

The presidential election in Somaliland has been delayed again due to the "current political, economic and technical conditions."

Trip to Switzerland? Trapped in Switzerland!

The world-renowned director, Roman Polanski, has been arrested by the Swiss authority when he tried to enter Switzerland to receive the Lifetime Achievement Awards at Zurich Film Festival. He will be extradited to the United States where he was charged of unlawful sexual intercourse with an underage girl.

Oh dear. He could've made a movie about himself which could easily win Oscar Best Picture. Though the sex law in the United States is extremely harsh, Polanski did commit a serious crime in 1977 (more serious than it sounds because its current charge is part of a plea deal). Actually raping a 13-year-old girl is more accurate. But the way of arresting him is very interesting.

Knowing he could be extradited back by any country who has the treaty with US, he has been cautious for the past thirty years, restricting his traveling in very few countries. He canceled several trips for fear of being arrested. But this time, facing an option of getting a lifetime honor, he wasn't so careful. Probably he thinks the US government is forgetful or forgiving. It turns out to be neither.

Clearly the arrest has been planned for a very long time. A provisional warrant has been issued to the Swiss authorities beforehand. The determination to implement laws is certainly applaudable, but trapping an extremely famous celebrity by sneaking would not be that popular after all.

Hey, I took a picture with President Obama!

There was a news orgy about Obama snubbing British Prime Minister Gordon Brown in both coasts of the Atlantic. It's said Obama refused to meet with Brown while he had meetings with Hu, Medvedev and other leaders. They questioned the spokespeople for White House and Mr Brown himself. Both governments seemed impatient for those questions and reiterated the special relationship between them.

The media suggested this was a result of U.S. anger over Britian's decision to release to supposedly main plotter of Lockerbie. This is very unlikely that U.S. government would try to display its anger by this kind of ignorance. Expressing disatisfaction to the most important ally can only be done by closed-door way in order not to be explosed to the enemies and the media. An open argument or embarassment would only hurt both sides. And what's more, I believe before releasing the Libyan, UK government had consulted the Obama administration and got a green light, but they simply cannot admit that for fear of angering those victims' families.

This incident also shows how desperate Brown's situation is right now. He is very likely to leave the office in the next election before June 2010. The media would very much like to make fun of this lame duck cabinet. Simply seeing the once-proud British PM trying to maintain his relationship with Pres Obama and claiming they had a meeting even if they only had a short chat and exchanged pleasantries is really funny.

But more importantly, this shows those 24-hour news networks really lacks substantial contents to report. Probably next time they will report the homosexual tendency when Obama spends too much time with David Cameron.

History of long speeches

I still got the readings to do, so haven't got the chance to watch today's UN session. It's said Chavez's performance today was not bad. He even broached the Kennedy assassination, as His Excellency King of Kings Colonel Qaddafi did yesterday. But he ended with singing. That would be pretty cool! I will try to update as soon as I view the clips.

There is a pretty cool article of long political speeches. The historic long speech in General Assembly belongs to Comrade Fidel Castro in 1960 (considering the speed of Spanish language, that would be even longer), but the longest one in UN is Indian's speech in Security Council about Kashmir in 1957 (dunno about Hindi, but its transcript in UN website is 160 pages long).

It also talked about how a guy was arrested because he stopped first after 11 minutes' applause when they are toasting Comrade Stalin. That's a cool example for game theory, isn't it? How to stop together so nobody gets arrested? haha....

Also, Brezhnev was so old that he would read the same page twice but nobody would notice because it was so long even without it.... or even they did, they couldn't say anything without being executed.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/8272473.stm

Hey, here comes my first person of the week!

Here we are, seven days! Finally, my first POW (not POW the prisoner, but POW the awesome guy) is here. He has been a joke in the past 40 years, and today he once again proved that great reputation. Colonel Qaddafi, congratuations! You really deserve this honor. I wanna say sorry to Ahmadinejad. To be rediculous, you still have so much to learn from the Colonel.

I always love the annual General Debate of UN General Assembly. It is not only an annual photo op for the world leaders, a good cure to insomnia (China's speech is especially good for this), but it's a way to see the absurdity of politics.

I will review what's happening in New York in the next few days. But for the first day, Qaddafi is the "king of kings" and "leader of revolution" (this was how the president of General Assembly, who is from Libya, introduced him).

15 minutes is clearly not enough for him. Instead, his speech took about 100 minutes. But it was never boring. For the most part, he attacked the Security Council. His country tried so hard to get into SC for the first time, but after this experience, probably he felt unfair to not having a veto power. I support the abolition of veto, which is extremely out-of-date, but the way he did it was simply as the man he has always been -- a joke.

His speech includes:

* Swine flu may have been created in the laboratory as weapon. "Perhaps tomorrow we will have a fish flu."
* Rejects everything in the UN Charter, except the Preamble.
* Compares Security Council veto to Julius Ceasar being made emperor.
* General Assembly is "like Hyde Park"...."nobody implementing our decisions...you just make a speech and then disappear."(that's why he wanted to make a sensational speech)
* Says Security Council is "terrorism itself". Doubles down comparing Security Council to Al Qaed. "It should not be called the Security Council. It should be called the terror council."
* Gives shoutout to Silvio Berlusconi for apologizing for World War II crimes.
* "We would be happy if Obama would stay forever as president."
* Arguing against having the U.N. in New York:" Is this Jerusalem, is the the Vatican, is this Mecca? All of you are tired with jetlag, are very tired. Physically speaking you are very low. All of you are asleep." Says he was up at 4 a.m. last night.
* Calls for release of Manuel Norieg.
* Iraq war: "Mother of all evils"
* Questions the official record on the Kennedy assassination.
* Rejects two-state solution. Calls for democratic state. Era of Sharon and Arafat is over. Says Arabs will give Jews protection. "Look at what everyone else did to the Jews. Hitler is an exmaple. You are the ones who hate the Jews, not us."
....

Haha. I really enjoy it! Hey, you deserve this honor, Mr. Qaddafi.

Beijing-like Sydney

A dust storm hit Sydney. Please check the astonishing pictures in the city supposed to be beautiful.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/talking_point/8270107.stm

Sorry, no visit on birthday!

Foreigners have been barred from travelling in Tibet in the next three weeks, possibly due to the sensitive timing of 60th anniversay of the republic. (New York Times)

This is part of the huge campaigns to prepare for the grand celebration, in order to quell any attempt to disrupt it. Since the entry has already been very selective and the procedures deliberately complex, the impact on the tourism will be minimal.

Also in the news, China raised to 57th place on the failed state index. This is far from the successes in other indices right now, but congratulations anyway.

Democrats gained, but a long way to democracy in Macau

Democrats, who call for a universal suffrage in this Chinese special administrative region, won 4 seats out of 12 elected seats in today's Macanese legislative election. But the other 17 seats were selected by the Chief executive, which was appointed by the central government in Beijing.

The gaining hardly reflects a growing support of democracy because this is a result of changed strategy by the democratic movement. Because of the highest average method, the democrats split into two party lists in order to maximize their vote.

The pro-gov politicians still believe Macau is not yet ready for a universal suffrage. So when can they be ready? When they are more pliant to Beijing? If China really wants to have at least a minimal chance of having Taiwan back without a war, he should shows how a special administrative region works. It should be no less democratic than how Taiwan is right now.

End of the Star War?

Obama administration finally scrapped the plan to install anti-missile defense system in Eastern Europe. The plan was put forward by the previous administration, which they claimed to be a precaution to potential Iranian missile threat, but actually stirred Russian government's strong objection.

Some politicians and analysts voiced their concerns. They believe this move, clearly aiming to appease Russia before Obama's meeting with Pres. Medvedev in a few days, is a damaging precedent. The growing-aggresive Russian government will certainly be encouraged to take a more hawkish and less cooperative foreign policy. Moreover, this will anger Poland and Czech Republic, indicating U.S. will abandon their interests whenever necessary.

I applaude this move, because this serves the best interests of the United States, Eastern European countries and the international community.

The plan was based on a non-existent Iranian threat to Europe. Iran's long-distance missile technology still has a long way to go, and whether he wants to threaten Europe is also disputable. But what we know is this installment will certainly make Russians angry. Of course, Russian's assertion of sphere of influence in Eastern Europe is objectionable, but showing off power in front of Russia's front door is not a good way to quell Russian's growing ambition, but to stimulate it.

Realists believe the states will always ask for more if they are given what they want. That was possibly true during the time of Cuban Missile Crisis, but whether it would be the case now is questionable. No longer a superpower, Russia understands his capability and limitless demand wouldn't help his dream of reemergence. On the contrary, Obama administration's new plan strips Russia of his excuse of non-cooperation. Russia now will face a massive pressure from international community to work with other countries in forcing Iran to terminate its nuclear program. It also weakens the popular support of hawkish foreign policy in Russia. This is not a surrender of power, but a correction of a non-starter in the first place.

On the other hand, this plan doesn't mean that U.S. forsakes its right to install any missile system in Eastern Europe in the future if necessary. And military believes the new plan will work more efficiently.

We should also remember the fact that Polish and Czech governments and public didn't like that plan proposed by the Bush administration at first. The high cost and a clear provocation to Russia is hurtful to both of them. The implication on the relations with those two countries won't be so distrastrous as many predict.

Flexibility in foreign policy is always important. Setting too many things as non-negotiable would hurt the foreign policy-making process and the result is unlikely to be pleasing. Being tough will never bring an ambitious Russian back to the table, so why not try something new? The end of the star war is a good news for everyone.

Nigerian government launched a war on District 9

Nigerian military is busy fighting rebels, and their government waged a new 'war' yesterday. (BBC)

Nigeria's government is asking cinemas to stop showing a science fiction film, District Nine, that it says denigrates the country's image.

Information Minister Dora Akunyili told the BBC's Network Africa programme that she had asked the makers of the film, Sony, for an apology.

She says the film portrays Nigerians as cannibals, criminals and prostitutes.

The Malawian actor, Eugene Khumbanyiwa, plays a gang leader with the nickname of Obasanjo, also the surname of former Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo.

I'm still yet to see this movie, but the critics gave it good reviews. I saw the trailer and felt this must be a good one. No matter how it was made, the idea of plot is new. The allusion to political issues in Africa is applausible (most notably, apartheid).

Of course, this information minister was overreacting. But her accusation is not totally unfounded. Making his first movie, the director should learn the lesson that before picking a name for the villain, he should check the names of the national learders. Mugabe sounds better for a typical antagonist, doesn't it?

Fairy tale = One night stand?

Still have 200 more pages to read for tomorrow's class, but I really wanna leave something here for today. I didn't have the time to read through today's headlines, but yesterday, a video shocked me. I really wanna share it with you guys.

Remember, this "mother" actually is an actress, making an ad in a desperate attempt to boost tourism in Denmark during difficult time. Of course, one night stand is always attractive to men, and women. I believe it will definitely work. Besides lifting the tourist avenue, it can also help resolve the problem of low fertility rate. Wow, it sounds more intriguing than Anderson's fairy tales.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S-SSHxGGpjM

I'm back! Hope you can join me here!

I'm finally back after finally settling down in my new home in Rosslyn. It's been a long time since I last wrote here when you-know-who started blocking this wonderful blog site. Feeling the free air now, I feel compelled to continue my daily report here to share my personal thought about my life and the events around the world.

The life in DC is fantastic. It's such a privilege to meet so many wonderful and excellent guys lately. But schoolwork is unbelievably tough. I haven't been working so hard since 1st grade but I'm still struggling to keep up with the pace of the five courses, each of which requires substantial readings, writings, and more importantly, thinkings.

There is always so much happening around the world that is worthy of being talked about, and I will try to cover those interesting, or even funny topics. Moreover, I will focus on the elections around the world since this is the one issue I'm extremely attracted to.

"Who is the hero? It's you, who is reading this post." I borrow this from my favorite Stephen Colbert. I hope you can enjoy this blog. You guys have your own distinctive experience and knowledge, so I'm imploring to hear your perspectives. Please point out my mistakes whenever there is any, and I believe, there will be a lot.

I know it's hard to find a time when there is so much work to do, but nothing can stop me from writing here. Not the government, not the readings. Hope you can join me here! Thank you~