Titus has just applied to the State Department

 

Ace of Spades HQ had the ridiculous story that China has been anally probing our dipolmatst to see if the have the Kung Flu. 

When one protested the Chinese said "Oh tee hee So sorry big mistake."

The Biden administration did not protest as they intend to give it up the ass to the American People for the rest of the next four years. 

PS What ever happened to Titus?

China industrial explosion believed to be so strong it caused an earthquake (Video)

Link to NYT brief story.

Faraway explosion from r/gifs

Drone picture

China awaits Trump's inauguration

"“China has so far practiced restraint at Trump’s provocations as he’s yet to enter the White House,” the Global Times said. “But this attitude won’t last too long after he officially becomes the U.S. president, were he still to treat China in the manner he tweeted today.”

For all the noise from Trump’s Twitter account and elements of the Chinese press, Beijing appears to be holding its fire at least until after he takes office next month. That means prolonging the stance of “strategic composure” articulated after Trump questioned the U.S.’s policy of diplomatically recognizing Beijing instead of Taiwan.

...Beijing will “strike back firmly” if Trump as president openly challenges China’s core interests like Taiwan, Tibet, the South China Sea and the East China Sea, said Shi Yinhong, director of the Center on American Studies at Renmin University in Beijing and an adviser to China’s State Council, the cabinet. Options include recalling the ambassador, stopping international cooperation, fighting a trade war -- even severing diplomatic ties.

...The fallout from worsening ties threatens a two-way trade relationship that reached $627 billion in 2015, more than U.S.’s combined commerce with Japan, the U.K. and Germany. While some policy makers in Beijing initially hoped that Trump would bring a more pragmatic approach, that view is quickly fading..."

https://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2016-12-18/as-trump-tweets-china-quietly-considers-options-to-retaliate

China accuses US of hyping underwater drone issue

""Through direct engagement with Chinese authorities, we have secured an understanding that the Chinese will return the UUV to the United States," he [Pentagon spokesman Peter Cook] said.

China earlier had indicted it would return the unmanned device, while accusing the U.S. of having "hyped" the issue.

"Upon confirming that the device was a U.S. underwater drone, the Chinese side decided to transfer it to the U.S. side in an appropriate manner," said the spokesman for the Chinese Defense Ministry, Sr. Col. Yang Yujun, according to CNN."

http://thehill.com/policy/defense/310872-china-says-it-will-return-us-drone-it-seized

Philippines seeks U.N. ruling against China's South China Sea encroachment

Which may earn China a rebuke.

After causing Japan to scramble jets to intercept Chinese jets approaching their airspace 200 times in three months and provocatively moving a warship right up to the Senkakus islands, how will China ever live down a U.N. rebuke?

Beijing responded that Japan is bringing up a lot of junk to the U.N. that they don't care to talk about.

Wall Street Journal article here.

Racist Chinese commercial

Link to video

Link to source where the top voted comment is a link to another video... (below)

"Chinese couple spend wedding night copying Communist constitution"

The Guardian:  In what may rank as one of the least romantic wedding nights in history, a Chinese couple reportedly spent their first night of marital bliss transcribing the Communist party’s 17,000-word constitution as part of a campaign designed to shore up support for President Xi Jinping’s administration.

Photographs posted on social media showed the newlyweds – both civil servants from the eastern province of Jiangxi – perching next to a balloon-covered double bed as they copied out parts of the 11-chapter text.

Li Yunpeng and his bride, Chen Xuanchi, saw the task as a way of creating “beautiful memories” of their wedding night, their employer, the Nanchang railway bureau, wrote in an online message. (more)

Choking The Chicken

Should Trump win big later on today, the reaction to watch is not the media's meltdown -- it will be China's reaction. They are watching very closely.

I wish I knew more about economics in order to predict the fallout of a Trump Presidency.

Does Apple trust China above the United States?

France 24: Apple was hailed as a champion of digital privacy this week after refusing to help the FBI hack into an iPhone belonging to a suspect in the San Bernardino shooting. But the firm hasn’t always been so scrupulous about user data, especially in China.

Apple’s new role as a champion of digital privacy must be making the Chinese government smile. According to an article by the US news website Quartz, Cook’s intransigence apparently depends on geography.

Citing reports by Chinese daily Beijing News and the state-run People's Daily, the article claimed that Cook agreed in January 2015 to allow authorities in China to carry out “security checks” on all iPhones sold in the country to make sure the US had not installed any spyware. But, Apple has never confirmed or responded to the allegations.

The article reported that analysts believe Apple likely handed over its operating system source code as part of the agreement. If true, this would mean that the Chinese government knows how Apple’s software works, including its security system.

"China asks world to impose 'code of conduct' on Internet"

Watch out for the wolf in sheep's clothing.

"It is highly necessary and pressing for the international community to jointly bring about an international code of conduct on cyberspace at an early date," said Wang Qun, director-general of the Arms Control Department of the Chinese Foreign Ministry, in comments to the U.N. General Assembly.

"China, for its part, will continue to commit itself to establishing a peaceful, secure, open and cooperative cyberspace and pushing for an early international code of conduct acceptable to all," Wang added...

In the wake of high profile hacks into the U.S. State Department, Department of Defense, and the Office of Personnel Management by China and Russia over the last year, officials have expressed a desire to establish norms on the matter.

However, at the same time, President Obama has been moving forward with a plan to transfer control of Internet domain name functions to a multi-stakeholder body. Along with Russia, China has been the most vocal in urging a quick conclusion to that process, and for a management structure that ensures governments retain power over private stakeholders. As a result, observers will be watching to see what China's conception of a "code of conduct" entails.

"Woman gets pregnant 13 times in 10 years to avoid jail sentence"

"A Chinese woman sentenced to life imprisonment for corruption in the Xinjiang Autonomous Region was able to evade a prison sentence for a decade by adopting a novel, if slightly extreme, tactic - getting pregnant 13 times before finally being sent to jail by a court."

She actually claimed 14 pregnancies in 10 years, of which, one was false, and the remaining 13 were true.

When Zeng knew that she would be put in prison, she said she was pregnant again. After the probation decision, she went for an abortion.

Reddit comment...

Well, ya gotta have a hobby...

Huge explosion of Chinese "dangerous materials" warehouse

This occurred in an industrial northern port city, Tianjin Tanggu. The first brief clip of the explosion  does not look survivable, as if the phone was picked up from the ground in the aftermath. It's that close. Other recordings at distances look like an attack on the city. Google videos: [explosion, tianjin tanggu]

Ship Building

"News of this magnificent architecture broke when a Star Trek fan spotted a satellite photo on the internet. Drone footage shows the view of a relatively ordinary building on the ground but an impressive aerial view of the replica."

 

"Beijing police warn 'strange outfits' on subway may cause stampedes"

"Costumes and masks are likely to attract the attention of other passengers, Xinhua quoted Liang Jianwei, vice head of the Beijing municipal traffic administration corps, as saying."

"When a lot of people stop to watch, the risk of stampedes increases," Liang said.

Passengers should avoid forming flash mobs, the article quoted Liang as saying.

"Although such behavior is not banned by law, passengers should not be too wilful," Liang said.

Police will warn against "problematic behavior" when they come across it, Liang said.

Last October, state media cited Beijing police as saying that people face arrest for wearing Halloween fancy dress on the subway as it may cause crowds to gather and create "trouble".

Obama pledges to hobble US economy for ten years and to ask nothing from China for 15 years*

That's the plan: Link
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*He will ask them off the record to keep financing his Cloward-Piven debt and to give generously to his personal coffers and to those of the DNC.

"I'm doing great"

China's First Lady Refuses Putin's Blanket

 

What was that about?

 

Would Michelle Obama handled that differently?

"No more weird architecture"

"Chinese president Xi Jinping has called for an end to the "weird architecture" that has come as a result of China's construction boom."

"No more weird architecture" said Xi, reports the website of Chinese state newspaper the People's Daily – whose own new headquarters building came under fire last year after being compared to a giant penis.

 

"Fine art works should be like sunshine from the blue sky and the breeze in spring that will inspire minds, warm hearts, cultivate taste and clean up undesirable work styles," he said.

Like a Supreme Court Reenactment?

Maybe not.

Bob Beckel to the Chinese: Get off my lawn

"A California state senator on Saturday called on Beckel to resign. Ted Lieu, who represents suburban Los Angeles and is running for the U.S. House of Representatives as a Democrat, called himself "one of those 'Chinamen' with 'Oriental' eyes" who immigrated to the United States and majored in computer science.

"I also served on active duty in the United States Air Force and continue to serve my country in the Reserves," Lieu said.

"Mr. Beckel's comments are more than just racist and stupid. His ignorant views are dangerous."

Beckel also told his co-hosts that Americans should be worried about Chinese people because "there's billions of them. All they do is hack into our stuff. They send us cheap toys, all of which have lead in them so they kill the kids."

A liberal political pundit working for a conservative-leaning news network, Beckel last year said on "The Five" that his eyes look "oriental" after he swims."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Beckel  is the token liberal of The Five, which airs late afternoon on Fox News. I don't care for the show, too much schmoozing, but I do appreciate Beckel. Not the typical pushover token liberal. Do you think he should go? Do you think he will go?

They're coming after the chicken legs now...

Chinese territorial claims spark violent protests in Vietnam*

Years ago, I worked for a Bay area start-up. We hired a young Chinese guy who worked for us for about a year.  He was a hard worker but contributed no patents or publications (intellectual property), and left, returning to China.  He ended up (according to my former boss) appropriating a decent chunk of alkane activation technology back to China.

Zhu-lin (I recall his name) spent what little time he socialized talking about how the map of the real China resembled a giant chicken, with the Korean peninsula as the wattle and Vietnam being the feet and legs.  You can see this rightward facing chicken if you look at a map and use a little imagination. He said (ca. 1998) that it was only a matter of time before the chicken was whole again.

China has ancient enemies in Asia who have historically been weaker but who may not wish to remain so, though that may be inevitable.
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*h/t Legal Insurrection