News Stories

[ganbaru]

Originally Posted by Zakoo

I would be in their shoes, I wouldn't really want people to pay their debt and well ... stop being indebted to me.

The obvious issue is the possibility than the indebteds end up being unable to pay the interests. If that happen, you end up being screwed as well.

[Zakoo]

Well the day when that happens for a country deeply rooted in the world's economic we can all say darn. Though for such country you can make it continue living through artificial means.

There's not a sane politicians who wants his country to be labeled as the responsible for the "destruction of the system which contributed the most to human progress" (lol) for the next three centuries. So we all continue retreat forward.

[Ithekro]

But there are plenty who would want to label someone else as responsible for such things. Especially if they can discredit an entire political party.

[ganbaru]

Elizabeth Warren Proposes Replacing Payday Lenders With The Post Office
http://thinkprogress.org/economy/201...cial-services/
A interesting idea for helping poor American and the Post Office. I wouldn't be surprised if the GOP will hate the idea.

[JokerD]

Dads' rights activist jailed for defacing queen portrait

Thoughts? On one hand I believe that vandalism is bad, on the other, I'm sympathetic to the cause of parents unable to see their children.

[TinyRedLeaf]

Originally Posted by JokerD

Dads' rights activist jailed for defacing queen portrait

Thoughts? On one hand I believe that vandalism is bad, on the other, I'm sympathetic to the cause of parents unable to see their children.

Welcome to real-world dilemmas.

The judge made the right decision.

The vandalism was a deliberate action, not done at the spur of the moment. If the man had the time to plan something like this, why couldn't he think of a more constructive way to solve the problem?

Second, the activist group is known for using shock tactics to grab headlines. I don't feel that such activism should be encouraged. I feel the same way towards groups like Peta and Greenpeace, for example.

Thirdly, why was the man denied access to his children in the first place? Was it for the kids' protection? What kind of father was he to them? Dunno. The story doesn't say.

[NoemiChan]

China is like Nazi Germany

"At what point do you say: 'Enough is enough'? Well, the world has to say it -— remember that the Sudetenland was given in an attempt to appease Hitler to prevent World War II," Aquino told the New York Times in Manila on Tuesday.

Aquino was referring to the failure by Western nations to back Czechoslovakia when Adolf Hitler-led Nazi Germany occupied western parts of the European nation in 1938 ahead of World War II.

[Fireminer]

Originally Posted by NoemiChan

China is like Nazi Germany

Everything is getting ugly.

[Ithekro]

Who gave China what to make that statement have meaning?

[KiraYamatoFan]

Well, well, well... First, it was pre-WWI Germany. Now we have Nazi Germany. Can't say I disagree with Aquino there when both patterns of bullying with neighboring countries have a good share of similarities with what we see here.

"But his latest reported attack against China, in which he senselessly compared his northern neighbour to the Nazi Germany, exposed his true colours as an amateurish politician who was ignorant both of history and reality."

Typical gobshite of a reply.

[maplehurry]

All these analogies, I feel sorry for Germany

[SaintessHeart]

The education gender gap is bad for girls as well as boys

More girls are applying to university this year; 62,000 more of them to be exact. To anyone who has followed the steady rise in girls' educational achievements over the past few decades, this should come as no surprise. While boys may be gaining ground in recent years (notching up more top A-level marks), overall girls now "outperform" boys from the early years through to postgraduate qualifications.

No surprise either, the headlines about boys being disadvantaged and "left behind". But could the new gender gap in university admissions point to how our secondary schools are failing girls as well as boys, albeit in more subtle ways?

No one would decry the rise in girls' achievements, or take pleasure in the relative failure of boys. Exam success lays down a first and important marker of, and template for, intellectual development throughout life. It confirms the importance of effort and celebrates the productive mastery of difficulty.

However, exam success is not so good at developing the equally important skills of experimentation, challenge and risk-taking. It is hard to convey to those without children of exam age just how fact-choked and test-obsessed schools have become. For some boys, the resulting boredom and frustration provokes them to make the "wrong" sort of challenge to the school's authority. But many girls, faced with the same pressures, respond by becoming too compliant.

In Tough Young Teachers, the riveting new TV series on Teach First graduates, we witness the tensions between Charles, a slightly stolid RE teacher, and the articulate Caleb who just won't jump through the hoops. Dragged into the head's office, reduced to tears, Caleb just won't play the game – even for a B. And in another often chaotic classroom, who walks across the desks? Boys. I don't recall a single girl sashaying along the tops of the tables. Pretty much all of them had their heads down.

There are successful and not-so-successful versions of the heads-down scenario, and it's the least successful we should really worry about. But conducting interviews for my recent book, it was striking the number of parents who worried about the side effects of their daughters' exam efficiency.

The following example is typical: "She methodically went through every syllabus for every course, discovered what the 'assessment objectives' for every relevant unit were … and exactly how they would be marked." Those same parents also report that it is still often boys who dominate classroom discussions, if and when those conversations happen.

What many parents of high-achieving girls worry about is the wholesale caution, a kind of female compliance that feels horribly familiar and that too easily leads teenage girls to crush and suppress their own questions, uncertainties, furies, hunches and passions. In short, all the things that make individuals interesting.

Mothers, in particular, know that too much obedience won't serve our daughters well later in life. Talented, hard-working women often flounder in work because they haven't been taught to think or fight for themselves, psychologically, professionally or financially. Even the Girls Day School Trust, a chain of independent schools, has instigated "failure weeks" in some of its schools because they think girls have become too risk-averse, obedient or unhelpfully modest.

Who knows? It could turn out that some of those 18-year-old young men who have decided not to continue into the rather depressing world of modern higher education could be making a bold decision to get going in the jobs market. Let the good girls sit in overcrowded lecture halls – with their heads down.

[HasuMasu]

As a society our system of producing food and energy are very efficient and at the forefront of modernity, but education has been left in the dark ages.

Employing the use of computers and the internet in schools is only superficial. The attitude of educaters and in a different way even students is grossly lacking in advancement.

Look at the way we mass produce almost anything important like integrated circuits. There is a distinct lack of anything superfluous.

That's what educaters and students need to learn. For the modern age everything superfluous is removed.

[kyp275]

Originally Posted by KiraYamatoFan

Well, well, well... First, it was pre-WWI Germany. Now we have Nazi Germany. Can't say I disagree with Aquino there when both patterns of bullying with neighboring countries have a good share of similarities with what we see here.



Typical gobshite of a reply.

We all know you hate China, but you should probably tone down the rhetorical stuff, otherwise you'd just come off as little more than an extremist on the other end.

If attempting to assert a regional hegemony alone makes a nation just like Nazi Germany in your mind, do you also regard Russia and the US the same way? If anything, Russia has been far more overt and blatant(and successful) in its effort, why aren't you comparing Russia to the Nazis?

TBH, most of the time when people start bringing out Nazi comparisons, especially in a political context, its usually unwarranted/inaccurate, and little more than an attempt to inflame and grab headlines, I see nothing different here.

[KiraYamatoFan]

Originally Posted by kyp275

If attempting to assert a regional hegemony alone makes a nation just like Nazi Germany in your mind, do you also regard Russia and the US the same way? If anything, Russia has been far more overt and blatant(and successful) in its effort, why aren't you comparing Russia to the Nazis?

TBH, most of the time when people start bringing out Nazi comparisons, especially in a political context, its usually unwarranted/inaccurate, and little more than an attempt to inflame and grab headlines, I see nothing different here.

Who said I didn't? The Russian government under Putin is as much of a nasty piece of work as those who lead the show in Beijing. About the US, I even called Bush a cnut when he was president; I would send the bastard in Holland to be judged for war crimes if I could.

For your information, WWII is something I read and studied through and through since I became interested in reading history books long ago. The episode with Czechoslovakia was mostly forgotten and yet significant because the Society of Nations showed its failure one time too many back then by doing nothing while the takeover became the prelude to the invasion of Poland.

A few weeks ago, people brought up the pre-WWI analogy: same old shit-stirring diplomacy, massive investments into weaponry, looking for trouble with virtually all surrounding countries that have a different political ideology than theirs... you see the pattern. What's wrong with the calling out when several signs are not in China's favor? If one country calls out, it might not be relevant. But when you have 2 or even more countries calling out the same thing, questions have to be asked very seriously. Unless China stops investing into military hardware, changes its diplomacy away from the current stance, or even changes government following a coup d'état, it's near impossible to find any credibility in anything they say.

[SaintessHeart]

Originally Posted by KiraYamatoFan

Who said I didn't? The Russian government under Putin is as much of a nasty piece of work as those who lead the show in Beijing. About the US, I even called Bush a cnut when he was president; I would send the bastard in Holland to be judged for war crimes if I could.

For your information, WWII is something I read and studied through and through since I became interested in reading history books long ago. The episode with Czechoslovakia was mostly forgotten and yet significant because the Society of Nations showed its failure one time too many back then by doing nothing while the takeover became the prelude to the invasion of Poland.

A few weeks ago, people brought up the pre-WWI analogy: same old shit-stirring diplomacy, massive investments into weaponry, looking for trouble with virtually all surrounding countries that have a different political ideology than theirs... you see the pattern. What's wrong with the calling out when several signs are not in China's favor? If one country calls out, it might not be relevant. But when you have 2 or even more countries calling out the same thing, questions have to be asked very seriously. Unless China stops investing into military hardware, changes its diplomacy away from the current stance, or even changes government following a coup d'état, it's near impossible to find any credibility in anything they say.

With regards to the segment about investing in military hardware, I think it is due to the need to sustain employment for the "unemployable" - aggressive people with that can't fit into society, into the military so they would stay out of the sights of the mafia recruiters.

China has been influenced by the US. They WANT to be like US, or be greater than them in the same aspects. They are imitating as much as they can, American penchant for war and their industrial pride, etc.

All for what? For face.

[KiraYamatoFan]

Originally Posted by SaintessHeart

With regards to the segment about investing in military hardware, I think it is due to the need to sustain employment for the "unemployable" - aggressive people with that can't fit into society, into the military so they would stay out of the sights of the mafia recruiters.

China has been influenced by the US. They WANT to be like US, or be greater than them in the same aspects. They are imitating as much as they can, American penchant for war and their industrial pride, etc.

All for what? For face.

Yeah, but then anyone could say that every country has its share of unemployables. Still, there are several ways to keep them into a frame; it doesn't have to be exclusively the army. And even so, it's not like there are that many totally unemployable people.

It could be a very worrisome trend if it keeps on going.

[SaintessHeart]

Originally Posted by KiraYamatoFan

Yeah, but then anyone could say that every country has its share of unemployables. Still, there are several ways to keep them into a frame; it doesn't have to be exclusively the army. And even so, it's not like there are that many totally unemployable people.

It could be a very worrisome trend if it keeps on going.

If we count things by percentage, that is alot of people for China because of its large population.

That is what our corporate barons are doing to keep us occupied so we don't become a mass of vigilante action against their greedy exploitation.

[SeijiSensei]

Renowned Japanese Composer Admits Fraud

The extent and durability of his deception is impressive. It's hard enough to get people interested in "classical" music these days; stories like this won't help.

Originally Posted by ganbaru

Elizabeth Warren Proposes Replacing Payday Lenders With The Post Office
http://thinkprogress.org/economy/201...cial-services/

Anything that can curtail the scourge of payday lending gets high marks from me. Many countries have national savings plans run through their postal services, Japan and the UK to name just two.

[Anh_Minh]

Originally Posted by SeijiSensei

Renowned Japanese Composer Admits Fraud

The extent and durability of his deception is impressive. It's hard enough to get people interested in "classical" music these days; stories like this won't help.

Won't it? I mean, I'd never heard of the guys before this. Bad publicity's better than no publicity. Maybe.