Miscellaneous News

GulfLander said:

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

....

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

Click to expand...

Shenyi had some good points on this. If you look at all the RE efforts since the REE card with Trump, they're mostly concentrated into two types:
1. Mining, which this pulling up mud from 6000m under the ocean falls into as well
2. Turning the refined RE powder into finished products like magnets

Those two steps China are dominant in but not overwhelmingly. The key step between those two where China is actually overwhelmingly dominant in is turning the ore into refined (the #N stuff) powder. There doesn't seem to be much serious effort going on here, only small experimental scale projects.

If you think about all the pitfall of this extracting mud from ocean floor business:
1. This is an experimental ship doing an exploratory thing, it's very far from actual commercial scale mining
2. Can you actually mine REE rich mud from 6000m under the ocean, what is the point when REE mines elsewhere already exist and on land?
3. Once you pull this mud up to the surface, it's at best 0.7% rare earth, how are you going to concentrate it?
4. Even if you do solve the above 3 problems, how would you protect this technology from US who will surely try to take it for themselves with any means, up to using kidnapping

siegecrossbow said:

I think Trump might know something we don’t — either the economy is about to blow up or he doesn’t have much longer to live. If he can’t live, us mere mortals can’t live either. Maybe nuclear annihilation is the ticket to heaven in his mind…

Click to expand...

Didn’t the idiot say that he doesn’t think he is going to get into heaven. Maybe he’s doing this to get at least one more screw you to the world, although like all his other schemes, he’s going to epically fail once again, only that this time, the USA hopefully will suffer some consequences this time.

Interesting in general. I’m not into boating so I imagine I don’t come across stuff like this that much. It’s not just the engines but also I saw something about yachts also. China is making them at around half the costs compared to their Western counterparts. I haven’t seen them make billionaire yachts yet but I imagine it’s coming. I just saw Wheelsboy review of the Zeekr 9X. He starts the video asking “Why ask for ‘enough’ when you can have ‘too much’?” That should be what people should associate with China. Same thing going on with motorcycles too it seems.

siegecrossbow said:

China must be some sort of Satan nation then…

Click to expand...

Exactly.




Assertion/Ideology
Kuboki Osami 's doctrine was that " Japan is a beautiful nation , and its mission is to win communism" and "Victory over communism is the holy mission of Christians . "

American NGOs have been working to promote the progressive western leaving people's party. Seems to have worked last time as they got the most votes, but Thailand conservative prevailed. This party literally repeats US talking points, although I would doubt them mentioning "rules based order" anymore.

China should keep a close eye. Should encourage them to label NGOa as foreign agents.

Temstar said:

If Takaichi loses election, then the next person inline will have to fix this so not her problem.

More likely (since this is why she's calling for early election), she gets re-elected, and she will use the result as mandate to go even more hard line under the reasoning that's what voters voted for, which for China works just fine too.

Click to expand...

While I think there will inevitably be more pushback from Japan, I actually think the core driving factor for this is disaster preparation for her now. If she is just looking for a mandate for further escalation, she should have been talking and acting tough all this time to build momentum for herself. Instead she’s basically been AWOL with essentially no major public appearances or policy announcements.

That sounds to me like she is in full panic stations now that the full magnitude of how badly she fucked up is becoming clear. She is starring down the literal abyss right now and thinking of ways to survive what is to come.

Calling snap elections before a major precipice is actually a commonly used political trick in western style countries for incumbent governments to cling to power longer, where populist leaders seek to cash in on the brief polls jump they gained from a rash but bold move before the consequences become fully manifest. The reasoning is obvious, as the crisis unfolds, calls for them to go will inevitably grow, and at that point calling a snap election would be pointless as the people would realise what the consequences and costs of your earlier self serving actions were and will absolutely not back you with a fresh mandate.

This is the equivalent of a husband (or more accurately wife in this case) who just blew their annual salary on ridiculously priced bottle of wine on a night out realising how badly they fucked up when the bill came and asked her partner if they had a good time and if it was worth it before telling them what the financial damage is. Only the husband drunkenly replying that it was ‘totally worth it’ before seeing the bill doesn’t really mean much in the morning, but in this case Takaichi will have a fresh new mandate and be safe in power for years to come.

Phead128 said:

On one hand, West is supporting a democratic transition in Venezuela.
On another hand, West is supporting a monarchist transition in Iran.
and finally, some Western country is supporting annexation of a democratic country.

Make it all make sense for me...

Click to expand...

The regimes in question are all enemies of theirs, regardless of whether they are democracies or not. That is what matters the most. It has nothing to do with wanting democracy in targeted countries.

Weaasel said:

The regimes in question are all enemies of theirs, regardless of whether they are democracies or not. That is what matters the most. It has nothing to do with wanting democracy in targeted countries.

Click to expand...

I think that was the punchline to the joke.

America under Trump is going full mask-off and not even trying to pretend anymore.

India seems eager for a combined spanking by China and Pakistan.