The Mitchell Report was ho-hum. None of the prominent names mentioned were surprising. The only question I have is "What about Sammy Sosa and Mark McGwire?" Basically this is just a small percentage of the people who used steroids and HGH. If people like Ricky Bones used steroids then probably a high percentage of players used it. So if that is the case what do we think of the records of Bonds and Clemens? They faced pitchers and hitters who used steroids also. Are their records valid? Well, I would have to say no because if Marion Jones had to give up her medals then the records of the highest achievers in baseball should not be recognize if they used steroids. After all Jones' competitors probably used sterois also. Ultimately everyone can have his own opinion on this. I may be cynical but I am beginning to view sports as similar to a Jackie Chan movie; very impressive athletism but in the end it is just entertainment.

Very few people on the list responded to the report. The only two prominent names denying the allegations were David Justice and Roger Clemens. I believe Justice a lot more than Clemens. First of all Justice came out swinging right away but Clemens took 5 days before responding. If you are not guilty, why wait? Justice also retired at about the right age where Clemens kept going and kept going. Just like Bonds, I find it hard to believe that a player can improve in his forties. Like Bonds, Clemens also looks a lot bigger than you would expect by aging alone. As for the few that admit guilt they usually use the excuse of using HGH to recover from injury. This include Peitite and Fernando Vina. I don't believe these excuses. These are very good players who were probably trying to be great players. Now I would have sympathy for the life time minor player who just want to get into the majors. It is a wrong thing to do but very understandable.

Now that a new intelligence report says that Iran had stopped its nuclear weapons program back in 2003 people are asking if we should change our strategy toward Iran. To that I say -what strategy? Calling for sanctions and threatening war is not a strategy. Iran was never a threat to start world war III as Bush claimed. Iran can't threatened us, just as Iraq was no threat before we invaded. I am tired of people who talk about not backing down from Hussein or Iran because Europe once appeased Hitler and he ended up causing WWII. But Germany was the strongest nation in Europe. If England and France were to try to preempt Hitler they would have lost quicker. It is always easier to defend than to attack. Iran and Iraq had no power to attack us. Even if they had nuclear weapons they would not have used them because they would have been destroyed quickly afterwards. Hussein and Ahmandinejad were not suicidal.

Bush says that there will not be any strategy changed since Iran is still dangerous. Well, it does not matter what Bush says because hard sanctions are not going to happen. Russia and China has a way out now and will not go along with tougher sanctions. The question for me is "is this report even accurate?" Given the previous reports on Iraq turned out to be way off the mark, who would believe that this report is correct? My view has always been that Iraq and Iran would not use nuclear weapons but they may still try to get them. While Iran can't win a nuclear war, nuclear weapons is a deterrent against American attack. See North Korea. So I do not believe that they have no nuclear weapons program at all. If Bush was smarter, I would have thought that by going public with this report, it gives him a chance to back up from his WWIII comments and be able to start a diplomatic course. But I doubt it that he even thought about this.

The thing that frustrates me is that we believe that any one intelligence report should have great influence on our policy. We should focus on the long term, not react to any change in intelligence. I would not have gone to war on Iraq based on those false reports nor will I change my thinking about the Middle East based on this report. The number one priority in the region is always Israel and the Palestinians. Unless peace is attained there terrorism from that region will always be a threat. Seven years into the Bush administration there is finally an effort to bring the two sides together. This should have started in 2001 right after his election, even with 9/11. Afghanistan was a necessary move but Israel-Palestinians negotiation should have restarted at least 5 years ago. If we were to be scared of nuclear attack from a Muslim nation, it was going to be from Pakistan. Iraq and Iran would not have helped terrorists with nuclear weapon even if they had them. But Pakistan has them for sure and there are religious fundamentalists who are not controlled by the government. So what do we do? Attack Iraq and worry about Iran while paying Pakistan to help us in the war on terror. If terrorists get hold of the bomb in Pakistan, are we going to bomb our ally on terror? Is that a policy that will make us safe?

The LA Times have an article today about the supporters of the top 3 democratic and top 3 republican candidates. It only gave 4 examples of the supporters of each of the candidates. Obviously it does not give a complete pictures of who is supporting whom but it does give some insights of where the candidates are seeking support. I will rate each supporter from -3 to +3, depending on if I like their views and if they are good for the country in my opinion. Take it with a grain of salt because I generally don't like union and corporate supports because they are all about self-interests and not about the good of the country. There are no corporations like Countrywide on this list so it would appear that I am against liberals a little more. Also I don't have much respect for the opinions of entertainers or athletes unless I have heard of their views and find them intelligent. With those cautions in mind, here are the lists:

Hillary Clinton supporters: 1. Walter Mondale-- a far left liberal who got destroyed when he ran for president. rating -2
2. Jan Perry-- African American LA city councilwoman, again a strong liberal. Rating -2
3. Barbra Streisand-- Far left liberal who doesn't make much sense. Rating -3
4. American Federation of Teachers--Big union which doesn't help the education of our children. Rating -3

John Edwards supporters: 1. James Denton--actor, don't know much about him. But I hate Desperate Housewives, which he is in. Rating -2
2. Lar Ulrich--The drummer of Metallica, don't know much about him Rating -2
3. United Steelworkers and United Mineworkers of America. Rating -3
4. David Obey--Chairman of House Appropriation Rating -2

Barack Obama supporters: 1. Eric Garcetti--LA city Councilman and son of Gil Garcetti the prosecutor who blew the O. J. Simpson case Rating -3
2. John Conyers Jr.-- Michigan Congressman and a strong liberal Rating -2
3. Zbigniew Brzezinski--Former national security advisor and one of my most respected man in foreign policy. Obama is often criticized, including by me, that he lacks experience. So this means a lot that an experienced diplomat like Brzezinsi endorses him. Rating +3
4. Oprah Wifrey--Influential but I don't think she really knows what she is talking about. Rating -2

Rudy Giuliani supporters: 1. Pat Robertson--Crazy televangelist Rating -3
2. Steve Forbes--Conservative rich guy but I like his flat tax idea. Rating +1
3. Pete Wilson--former Calif. governor. Moderate Republican who wasn't much of a leader. Rating 0
4. Bo Derek--Come on! Claims to be a conservative republican but took off her clothes in the movies. How hippocritical! Ratings would be a -3 but since she was good looking when I was young, gets upgrade to a -1

John McCain supporters: 1. Republican for Environmental Protection. Sounds like an oxymoron! I would like to learn more. Rating 0
2. Former Prisoners of War--Supports McCain for obvious reason. Rating +1
3. Sam Brownback--Conservative Kansas Senator who dropped out of the race himself when he realizes that he doesn't know any issues except for abortion and creation of the world. Rating -3
4. Curt Schilling--Rich athletes are a big minus in my book. Plus he was for the war. It is easy to be for the war when you don't have to fight. Rating -3

Mitt Romney supporters: 1. Rick Caruso--Mall developer. Rich guy and I hate malls. Rating -3
2. Orrin Hatch--Utah Senator who is Mormon. I think Hatch is a fair Republican most of the time. Rating +1
3. Meg Whitman--Chief executive of e-Bay. Rich person made money on shopping. Not my cup of tea. Rating -3
4. Bob Jones III--Chancellor of the university of the same name. The university finally ended its ban on iterracial dating in 2000. Rating -3

So if my tally is correct the following is the final score: Clinton -10, Edwards -9 Obama -4 Giuliani -3 (although should have been -5, see Derek score) McCain -5 Romney -8

This is of course an exercise of no importance. But with all the negative scores, either the country is in real trouble or I am too much of a cynic. Feel free to give your opinions.

Last week in the business section of the LA Times there were 2 articles next to each other that caught my eyes. One was about Yahoo going to pay families of two Chinese journalists that were jailed after Yahoo had given their names to the Chinese government. The journalists had used Yahoo services to share material advocating democratic reform. Yahoo caved in to the Chinese government and as a result Jerry Yang received a tongue lashing from a Congressional hearing the week before this article. Yahoo was called moral pygmies by a Congressman. It is difficult to defend Yahoo but Yahoo is not first U.S. company to kowtow to the Chinese government in an attempt to gain market share in China. I am sure that bribery, kick backs and technology transfer by U.S. companies are frequent happenings in China. What happened to the old saying "When in Rome, do what the Romans do"? Sure, China's legal system are not up to standard, but what is Yahoo suppose to do? Risk going to jail themselves and lose the market? Didn't the Chinese journalists think that their e-mails are not so private?

The article next to it was about privacy in America. Donald Kerr, the principal deputy director of national intelligence said in a speech "Protecting anonymity isn't a fight that can be won. Anyone that's typed in their name on Google understands that." Well, that's interesting. If you use Google in America and you can't be sure of your anonymity, then why would a journalist in China believe that he is safe by using Yahoo in China? Kerr also said that "Privacy is a system of laws, rules and customs with an infrastructure of inspector general, oversight committees and privacy boards on which our intelligence community committment is based and measured." Wow, so it is basically up to the government to decide what is private for us. The Bush administration is asking that telecom companies should be granted immunity for assisting the government in its warrantless spying program. Mark Klein, a former AT@T technician, said that the program involved domestic communications, not just foreign, and the numbers were enormous--much higher than the government leads us to believe. If this was true, wouldn't these telecom companies be moral pymies as well?

I have always believe that the west someday will meet the east. A country like China, while still authorative, will gradually be more free. The economy is almost totally capitalistic today. It is a more open society than the one I saw 10 years ago. It still has a long way to go but is coming toward us. Our own society on the other hand, is becoming more restrictive. Due to fear, at least some of it unjustified, we are willing to become a less free country. Whether you believe that warrantless spying, secret detention locations, or the torturing of suspects to get information is justified or not, it is obvious that we are moving in the direction of China. I predict that in 25 years there will be little difference in the freedoms of the two countries.

Lee Corso of ESPN got it right by warning that Michigan may be upset by Wisconsin. Dah! That is not an upset pick. Michigan is probably the worst team in history with an 8 game winning streak. The talent level of the two teams are about equal and Mike Hart and Chad Henne are injured. The game was played in Wisconsin and Mich. is the favorite? If Appalacian State can beat Mich. in Ann Arbor, how can losing to Wisconsin on the road be an upset? The talking heads would be more impressive if they predicted that Illinois beats Ohio State.

I don't know what is an upset anymore. The Big Ten teams are the easiest to upset. Of course Mich. losing to Appalachian State was the worst but what about Mini-soda, which has no fiz on offense and no pop on defense. They have won one game. They lost to Florida Atlantic, or is it Florida Pacific? Afterall Florida is not very good in geography. South Florida is located closer to central or north Florida. Miami might as well move to Ohio and see if it can beat the other Miami. But I am going off subject here. The Big Ten teams would finish in the bottom of the Pac Ten. I mean who would beat USC except a power house like Stanford? And who would beat UCLA, except for Utah and the one win wonder Notre Dame? Having been sunk by Navy ( I waited 40 plus years to write that) and bombed by Air Force, will ND ever win another game? When is the last time ND, Mich. and Ohio State all lost on the same day? This sure is one crazy season in football. Can't wait till basketball to start to get some normalcy in the world.

What? Mich. State loses to Grand Valley State? Ohio State loses to Findlay? And Kentucky got raked over by a gardner named Webb? It is not even March Madness yet! You think maybe tennis players and NBA referrees have money on these games? The world is going crazy in sports. Pretty soon you are going to tell me that 250 million people in the world watched an NBA game because two Chinese guys are playing. I think I will watch more predictable sports like horse racing.

Couple of authors wrote into the LA Times supporting the idea that pharmacists should be able to prescribe medicines. They say that pharmacists know more about pharmacology than physician assistants and nurse practitioners who are allowed to prescribe. The flaw of this reasoning is that pharmacists don't examine the patient. Making the right diagnosis is the most important part of prescribing treatment. I don't know how you can make the right diagnosis without examining the patient. They point to the morning after pill which someone can purchase without a prescription just by talking to the pharmacist. According to them the next logical step would be to allow medicines for migraines and cholesterol to be sold behind the counter. This does not seem logical to me. If a woman comes in and say that she needs emergency birth control, there is no need to examine her to see if she really had sex last night. But over the years I have had many patients who come in and tell me that they have migraines but upon further questioning and examination, I found that the cause of their headache was not migraines. Treating cholesterol requires ordering and interpreting test results. This is not something pharmacists are trained to do.

It is legal for doctors to dispense medications. I choose not to do so for two reasons. First I believe that pharmacists play a very important role in assuring the safety of the patient. Just like any human being, I make mistakes. When I make a mistake on my prescription a pharmacist usually would point it out to me. If I dispense the medicine myself, this layer of protection is lost. So if a pharmacist prescribes and dispenses, wouldn't that layer of protection be lost? The second reason is that it gives an appearance that I may prescribe more to make a greater profit. Most of the doctors who dispense and most pharmacists who would prescribe are probably honest. But some would be dishonest. If the government and the patients think that one step shopping is the best way to go, then I guess I may have to dispense as well to keep up with the times. I hope it won't come to that.

The authors of the article are economists. While I understand that economics teach us that free market usually works the best, it is not the case here. When the person who provides the product is able to tell the buyer what and how much to buy, free market forces are not at work. More people prescribing and dispensing will lead to higher and not lowe healthcare costs. Believe me if you can walk into a pharmacy and get medicine without being examined, you will see more advertising by pharmaceutical companies to encourage people to do so. These companies will also pitch to the pharmacists who unlike most doctors who only prescribes will have more incentive to sell more. With more medicine taken, more complications will certainly follow and there will be more healthcare spending. So the economic calculations by these authors are totally wrong.

Now that Al Gore has won the Nobel Peace Prize, there is more interest to the idea that he would run for president. I don't think that it is likely that he would jump in now. It would be difficult to build a campaign team strong enough to knock out front-runner Hilary Clinton. It would also be awkward to go against his former boss. Gore is more popular than ever now that he is not running for any office. Once he gets back into it he becomes a target more than an admired statesman. The only way I can see him getting the nomination is if Obama and Edwards can make a race out of this, to show that Hilary is vulnerable. That way as a compromised candidate who can unite the party, Gore may be drafted. I think he would beat the Republican candidate easily. Most people like him better now and many still think he got robbed last time so he will get sympathy votes from independents.

I would vote for Gore is he declares. I don't like Hilary and Edwards. I think Obama is too inexperienced. I don't buy all the science that Gore puts out there but I applaud his effort. Even if things are not as bad as he paints it, there is no reason not to try to improve the environment. Anyone who sits in traffic behind a bus knows that fossil fuels are not good for us. Having been to China recently I am convinced that the energy policy of world is heading for a disaster, it is only a matter of when. So, yes, Gore gets too much credit and awards. But who else have any better ideas?

Of the declared candidates, I like Joe Biden the best. I think he is the most qualified and he is a moderate. Of course, he has no chance of winning. So if Gore doesn't run I don't know who to vote for yet. Biden is the most experienced, having been chairman of the judicial and foreign relations committees. He supported the war, as did just about everyone else. But he did try to delay the Bush administration from starting the war by joining with Republican Richard Lugar to try to use diplomacy first. While I don't agree with him totally, he does present a reasonable solution to the war by dividing the country into 3 parts with a weak central government. He got himself into trouble in 1988 when he ran against Michael Dukakis. He made a speech which was almost identical to one a British politician gave before. He had given credit to that person every time but he forgot once to do so. He was accused of plagerizing and lost all steam. I think he would have beaten Dukakis in 88 but probably would have lost to Bush I. He got himself into trouble right away this campaign with his remark about Obama which I think was way overblown. But he does not generate any enthusiasm which is too bad. I think he is more respected around world leaders than any of the other candidates. Maybe he will be secretary of state under a democratic administration.

Clarence Thomas is finally coming out of hibernation. He is speaking out for the first time since his confirmation hearings. Of course, he is doing so because he is promoting a book! I am not a fan of Thomas and I think he got out of trouble during the hearings by using the race card. Nevertheless I watched his interview of Sixty Minutes and I found that I agree with some of the things he said.

Thomas was brought up by his grandfather, a no nonsense guy who would not accept excuses for failures. Thomas graduated from Holy Cross near the top of his class. Then he was accepted at Yale Law. Thomas described himself not as a liberal but a radical in his early years. This gradually changed after he got into Yale. He thought the white liberal establishment believed that given the chance blacks can succeed as well as whites. What he found out was that he was treated as a token under the affirmative action program. Even though he believed that he got in based on merit, he felt that others believed that he was not qualified. He had trouble getting a job even with a Yale diploma. I believe that Thomas was right on this. When I went to college there was a strong push to recruit more blacks with the idea that leveling the playing field was the reason. But I got the sense that the powers in the universities were just trying to fill quotas so as to not make their institution seem racist. I don't think that they truly believe that blacks had the ability to compete academically on their own. I mean if they truly believe that they are just trying to even the playing field, then they should do it by economic standards. There is no reason why a black doctor's child should have preference over a poor white kid. By using race it makes people believe that all blacks at the school were not qualified. In reality some were excellent students and should be recognized just as that. There were others who did get in by affirmative action only and they would have been better off at a lowere level school. By admitting these students the school was reinforcing the stereotype of the unqualified black.

Thomas was also right in that his critics had no business saying he is an uncle Tom for being on the conservative side. When he couldn't get a job it was a Republican, Senator Danforth of Missouri, who helped him find one. Danforth was his mentor in Washington and introduced him to the powers of the Republican party. Thomas was also comfortable with the change because he was brought up by his grandfather to be self-reliant and not accept the victim's mentality. These certainly are values closer to the conservative side than the liberal side. So it is understandable that he switched parties. He should not be vilified for that. Afterall, Hilary Clinton swithced from Republican to Democrat.

While it is all right for Thomas to be against affirmative action, it is undeniable that he benefited from it. Sure he was a good student but it is unlikely that if he was white and graduated in the middle of his Yale class, he would have caught the eye of Danforth. He certainly would not have moved up in Washington so quickly. And there was no chance that a white man would have been nominated to the Supreme Court after one and half year of undistinguished service on the Appeals Court. To replace Thurgood Marshall at that. There were many more candidates that were more qualified and Bush was not being honest when he said that he picked the best man and it had nothing to do with his color.

Thomas also would have more trouble getting confirmed if he was not black. While the whole Anita Hill situation probably was leaked illegally, once it was leaked, the Senate had no choice but to investigate. By using the word lynching, Thomas was using the race card that many liberals have used. By using the word lynching, Thomas insulted all those blacks who suffered that fate. It was not a lynching. If a white man was accused of the same thing, the senate would have acted the same way. Well, except once Thomas used the word, all the liberal senators, in particulary Ted Kennedy, shut up right away. White guilt or liberal doctrination had made little boys out of these supposedly powerful men.

So I agree with Thomas on somethings and disagree with him on others. Usually I do that with liberals also. I think it is good to listen to all side and make judgment on each issue based on its merit. That's why I think dangerous and crazy men like Ahmandinejad should be listened to. I probably won't change my mind but usually I learn something. I don't think I would learn much if I only listen to people I agree with. Someday maybe America will even listen to dangerous and crazy men like Lawrence Summers! What do you think, liberals?

Columbia University is under fire for inviting Iranian president Ahmadinejad to speak. Many people and organizations are protesting the appearance of the leader of a country Bush has called part of the axis of evil. Ahmadinejad is accused of building nuclear weapons, aiding terrorists, sending weapons of Iraq and denying the reality of the Holocaust. Despite the protest, President Lee Bollinger of Columbia is keeping the invitation.

At the University of California former Harvard President Lawrence Summers was supposed to speak at a Reagents' meeting. Summers lost his job because of his comments that there maybe biological difference that explain the lack of women in physical sciences. As a result of some protests, particularly from the UC Davis campus, that invitation was rescinded.

In my view both should be allowed to speak. I don't think that students or faculty learn much if they just listen to people with the same views as them. Let Ahmadinejad stand up there and take questions about his views. I doubt that he will act like a neo-nazi and start shouting death to America and Israel. And if he does it will only make him look like an idiot to the whole world. By not allowing him to speak you just make a ideological martyr of him. By listening to your enemy you may learn something that will be helpful later. We should not be afraid of showing the freedoms we have in this country. Hurray to Bollinger for taking his stand.

A big boo to the UC Regents. They caved in to political pressure. The whole Summers incidence at Harvard shows that there is only academic freedom for the politically correct. Summers offered a theory which has NEVER been proven right or wrong. But the liberal nazis would not engage in rational discussion. This is like the ancient times where people thought that the sun revolved around the earth. Even though it was never proven, anyone who disagrees with that was attacked. Summers may well be wrong but he can't even bring that up for discussion? How many times in history have someone bring up a theory that was wrong? He was not going to the UC to discuss this topic anyway. The UC Regents are bunch of wimps to cave in.

It is interesting that the liberals would be more likely to back Columbia than conservatives. As a result Columbia can use academic freedom to allow Ahmadinejad to speak. But since liberals run the UC any politically incorrect views are scorned. In this case a person who had a politically incorrect view is not even allowed to speak on another topic! So to the liberals the former President of Harvard is a more controversal and dangerous speaker than someone who had called for the destruction of Israel and may very well have helped terrorists against the U.S. You have to wonder what are they teaching on our campuses today. Or what is it that they are smoking!

Watched parts of the Emmys the other night. I was wondering why Ray Romano and Sally Field got censored. Still don't know what Romano said but Sally Field apparently made a short speech against the war and included the words "goddamn war". It doesn't seem that outrageous compared to past political speeches at award shows. It does not seem to warren censorship in a supposedly free country. Now most of the time people who make these types of speeches really don't help their causes. I mean it usually is a big ramble that would not convince anyone that is not on your side to change his mind. Field, for example, sounded confuse and said that if women ran the countries there would be no wars. That is nonsense. Didn't Golda Meir fought the Arabs? I am sure Margaret Thacher would not hesitate to fight a war. Sometimes wars are necessary. We just should not fight those that are not necessary.

Also read in Time magazine that Kathy Griffin was censored when she accepted a creative-arts Emmy, telecasted on E!. Of course nobody watched that. I didn't even know there was such a channel! She said "a lot of people come up here and thank Jesus for this award but no one had less to do with this award than Jesus". The Catholic League condemned the remarks and got it edited out of the broadcast. It is absurd that people thank God when they win an award or score a touchdown. The true God would careless about who won an Emmy or the Super Bowl. Now I am sure Kathy Griffin would not have gone to Tehran and told the Iranian basketball team, which had recently won the Asian championship that "Allah really has nothing to do with this unless He told China not to send Yao Ming and the rest of the "A" team to the tournament". If she had said that in Tehran she would probably be beheaded. We didn't go that far here but by censoring her, we are moving a little closer to Iran.

The truth is that these people who make political statements at awards make themselves look silly. But at the same time, people who censor them look silly also and even help spread their messages. Everybody wondered what Sally Field had said and looked for it in the papers the next day. If they had heard it on t.v. they would have not paid any attention at all. Kathy Griffin's comments would not have been heard by anyone since nobody watches E! anyway. But by getting censored, her message is in Time and other media. It is like protesting a book or movie, it just helps the sales.

A new tape of bin Laden came out yesterday. For a man who doesn't like the U.S. he appears to have gone Hollywood. What is with the dark beard? I am no expert but I don't think once you have almost totally grey hair that you can miracously turn back to dark hair. He must have seen the Walt Frazier and Keith Hernandez commercials. I wonder what he thinks of corporations that sell hair dyes.

One thing that is interesting to me about the speech is that he mentioned that Americans should read the book by Michael Scheuer, the former head of the CIA's bin Laden unit. I have not read the book myself but I have heard that Scheuer denounces the U.S. leaders being untruthful in the war on terrorism. It is not hard to figure out what is probably said in the book. The U.S. leaders, not just Bush but most of the Congress as well, consistently framed the war as terrorists against democracy, freedom, and our way of living. This may arouse nationalism but does not help us to fight terrorism in the long run. If people like bin Laden were to ask for jihad against democracy and freedom, do you think that they would get many people to sign up? Who is going to blow himself up because other people's women are wearing bikinis? Evil people are able to recruit others to do their dirty work only if our policies are truly or perceived to be evil.

So how does Bush respond to the video? He says that proves Iraq is part of the war against al qaeda! Nevermind that al Qaeda was not in Iraq before the war! It is always just rhetoric and no real understanding of the world. Bin Laden is not sincere when he says the policies of the U.S. is main the reason behind the attacks. He is just using rhetoric. But so is our president not being truthful when he links Iraq with bin Laden. Bush does not understand that while there are evil people who are against us, he makes it easier for these people to fill their ranks by the poor policies that he has initiated.

The stock market is in a slump with no end in sight. The Federal Reserve is trying to improve the situation by decreasing the interest rate. It appears to work at least a little as there was a rally in the market on Friday. I doubt the rebound will continue. I think there will be more downward spiral into next year at least. Which brings me to something I never really understood. Why is it that the chairman of the Feds is so revered? Greesnspan attained rock star status in the economic world with his so-called deft handling of the economy for many years. I understand that anyone who becomes chairman of the Feds is a really smart guy. But what do they do anyway? They can only increase the interest rate when there appears to be inflation. If there is a depression looming they can decrease the interest rate. So basically they choose one of 3 alternatives: increase, decrease or do nothing. It seems like anyone who is good at multiple choice questions can do this job. I mean the SAT questions have 5 choices and lots of people get perfect scores. This economic business doesn't seem to be rocket science.

I tell you what is also not rocket science. Lending money to people to buy houses. It does not take a genius to figure out that you don't give risky loans to people with poor credit and without adequate income. Yet large institutions who can hire lots of accountants and actuaries were doing all these subprime loans. These idiotic deals are the main reason the stock market is going downhill right now. Some of these institutions which have made billions in the last few years are now in danger of going bankrupt. Angelo Mozilo is the president of Countrywide Financial, the largest mortgage lender. Mozilo was paid $48.1 million last year! He and others will argue that they deserve what they make because under a capitalist system a person who is most responsible for the profit should be best compensated. It is not surprising that Mozilo arrogantly said that other people in his industry were not as smart as he was because they were giving out risky loans. Yet now Countrywide is in the same situation as others, ie, in deep financial trouble from giving out too many risky loans. But Mozilo has not come out and take responsibilty. He has refuse to be interviewed. He did manage to cash out his stock options before the price went down. If he deserved to be paid that enormous sum when the company was prospering, shouldn't he has to give some of the money back for leading the company toward possible bankruptcy? It is likely that it will be the low level employees who will suffer the most by losing their jobs.

There will be those in the financial and business world who clamor for the government to bail out the mortgage lenders. This is something the government in China would do for their banks, not something our government should do here. Anyone who truly believes in the capitalist system knows that bailouts will only encourage businesses and individuals to make risky decisions. I guess we have not learned from the savings and loan debacle not long ago. Bailouts will make our economy less efficient in the long run. Basically it will be welfare for greedy rich people at taxpayers' expense.

The date 8-8-08 was chosen as the date the Olympics open because of the number 8 is supposed to be good luck in Chinese. So on 8-8-07 the news media all across the nation have articles about China. I have read articles in the LA Times, Time Magazine, and Sports Illustrated. It is like when a book came out about Billy Graham and all of a sudden every newspaper and network talked about Graham and his relationships with presidents. As I wrote in one of the blogs about the trip from China, you have to take the information you get from the media, whether Chinese or Western, with a grain of salt.

One of the common complaints from western journalists is that while China promised to open things up for the press during the Olympics, they still run into obstacles in trying to get interviews from athletes and go to rural areas. This is not surprising. Even coaches in this country have tried to control their athletes. Try interviewing Bob Knight's players without his permission. While Xiang Liu is not allowed to grant interview in China, he is allowed to travel abroad for meets and as SI pointed out he does give interviews in the U.S. Only in the U.S. he is not of any importance to the media while in China he would a symbol of China controlling their elite athletes. As far as traveling to rural area to report the vast difference in conditions between the rich cities and poor villages, these are trite stories that are well-known to anyone who have taken an interest in China. It would be like covering the LA Olympics and try to compare Beverly Hills with towns in Alabama.

There was a picture of a policeman questioning a journalist in LA Times. The article says that the police often intimidated the journalists. Now the picture showed a skinny cop with no weapons talking to a westerner. It didn't look very intimidating. There was a protest about freedom of the press held by westerners in Bejing and the police broke it up. But there was no injury or violence by the police. Contrast that with the LAPD's action on an immigrant march a few months ago where journalists as well as children were injured by the police. Yes, journalists should have the freedom of the press but they should also be fair in their reporting.

There was the obligatory mention of the human rights issues in Tibet and the Northwestern region of China which is populated by Muslims minorities. If I am the president of China I would grant independence to all these areas. The country would be smaller and population less. But so what? These areas are a drain to the country. It costs more to rule them than what they return. While China do abuse the human rights of these areas especially in terms of freedom of religion, it does provide an improvement of the economies of these regions. When there was a one child policy for the majority, the ethnic minorities were exempted from the policy. There was also affirmative action for things like college admission. (The Republicans would be shocked at this.) Holding these regions is just an ego thing and it is bad international public relations. So I would get rid of them. Of course if I am the president of the U.S. I would do the same and get rid of Puerto Rico and American Samoa for economic reasons. Journalists always write about the deculturalization of Tibet by China. The truth is Tibet is extremely poor. If China was to leave, Tibet will have to bring in business to survive. It will be westerners who will come in to exploit the area. McDonalds and other western icons will dominate the place. The deculturalization will go on anyways. Even now monks are skipping prayers to watch World Cup Soccer on t.v. So the purity of these regions has been long gone.

So forget about all the call for the boycott of the Olympics. As you know I am no fan of mainland China but it is not South Africa before apartheid was abolished. It is maybe similar to the U.S. in the fifties where the paranoia about Communism was similar to China's paranoia about Western democracy today. Remember McCarthy calling everyone a communist and Hoover spying on Martin Luther King? It will be many years before China will be free. In the meanwhile if the western press were to bring in democratic activists to complain about China, they should also mention about the history of colonialism by the western nations. This would be what a true free press would do. So my feeling is still the same: China is not as good as the state run media portrays it to be and is not as bad as the western press portrays it to be.

It is hard for me to say it but I actually feel bad for Michael Vick. It is not that I think torturing animals is ok, but I have a lot of problems with people who were protesting against him. He has not been convicted yet but people were already demanding the Falcons get rid of him. Sure if he is found guilty he should be sent to jail. But athletes have committed crimes against PEOPLE and not get that type of protests. Domestic violence and even murders have been committed by athletes and yet nobody protests at their hearings or at their team headquarters. Some of these people bring dogs to the protests. They put clothers on the dogs with signs on them. I never understand people who clothed dogs, esp. in the summer. That seems to be cruelty to me!

Animal rights activists have bombed or burned laboratories doing research with animals. Never mind that these research may someday cure diseases, people cound have been killed during these crimes. A judge recently agreed with animal right groups and put an injunction against the navy from practicing with sonar technology in the ocean. I don't know enough about the science of this to say if the sonar is as a disaster for whales as it is alleged in the lawsuit. But I did not see many people from the U.S. coming to the defense of the Puerto Ricans a few years ago when the navy wanted to use live ammunitions on their islands. I am very leery of people who thinks that animals are more important than people. It is sad that more people worry about what Michael Vick did than what is happening in Sudan.

After several blogs on China and HK, it is time to go back to U.S, politics. Saw some of the Democratic debate on CNN/Youtube with ordinary people presenting questions. It was actually pretty good and I think it got the candidates open up a little more. The one thing that interested me was the battle between Obama and Clinton. When asked if during the first year of presidency would the candidate meet unconditionally with the leaders of rogue nations such as North Korea and Iran, Obama answered that he would while Clinton said she would not. Later Clinton said that Obama showed his lack of experience in his answer. Obama fired back by saying that by refusing to meet with these leaders one would be continuing the failed policy of the Bush administration.

I am not sold that Obama has enough experience to be president but I agree with him here. A good president should not be afraid of meeting a rogue leader face to face. By meeting with your enemy you gain an understanding of that person and will be able to deal with him better. There is an old Chinese saying that if you know your enemy well then you will win every battle. George Bush has been using name calling as a way of diplomacy which is about the same as people like Kim and Chavez have been doing. Of course Bush has very little understanding of other leaders. Remember him saying he looked into the eyes of Putin and saw he was a good guy? Maybe with misjudgments like that he has to avoid meeting leaders other than those of ally nations.

I don't buy the argument that by meeting with these leaders you are lending them legitimacy. They are already leaders of their nations whether we choose to recognize them or not. By refusing to meet with them and calling them names it just makes it easier to arouse nationalism within their countries. None of these people are popular in their own country. But by having the U.S. as an enemy it makes it easier for them to get support. I mean if the greatest military power on earth is calling your country part of the axis of evil, wouldn't that arouse your nationalism? It would have been much better if you give your message to your enemy directly and see if he blinks. You will have a better idea what to do afterwards.

It is obvious that I like HK more than mainland China. I am biased because I was born in HK and spent the first eleven years of life there. I will always root for the HK people because the only thing that has been certain for them in recent history is uncertainty. From British rule to now Chinese rule, Hk people have had very little say about their future. They can only work hard and hope for the best. It is amazing that after all these years they are still the "Pearl of Asia".

Ten years ago HK was already a world class city. For the time being China has pretty much left it alone to run its economic machine. Since 1997 Hk has built a new airport. It is almost an absurdly big airport for a city of 7 million. It has shuttle trains to get from one part to another and still there is a lot of walking. It was built on another island away from the congestion of the HK and Kowloon. There is a train from the airport to HK along with a highway connected by a bridge. The view from the train or the highway is spectacular. Along the way we also pass the port of HK which is considered the most efficient in the world with computer automation everywhere. It certainly looked cleaner and more organized than the LA/Long Beach port which has resisted the latest innovations due to labor unions' fear of losing jobs.

The subway and bus system in HK are excellent. All the public transportations are clean and safe. English only speakers can get around the city with public transportation easily. Of course the hotel reception staffs are way better in English than those of China. The only problem in the hotels is that the rooms are very small. The prices of everything are similar to those of the U.S. so it is way more expensive than in China. The income average of HK people had surpassed the British in the 1980's and is close to those of Americans. Except for occaisional disabled people begging on the streets, there are very few homeless people in HK.

Since China took over Mandarin has become an official language along with Cantonese and English. On the subway train the announcements for each stop and connections are given in all 3 languages. When politicians speak they often have to speak three different ways. Many of the maids are now from the mainland and the busboys and sometimes waiters in hotels are also from the mainland and thus do not speak Cantonese. This was kind of annoying to me as I feel that Cantonese people built this city and now you cant't always be understood if you speak Cantonese. I can better understand the feelings of the angry white male who can't get somebody to understand them in their own country!

Just as there are backlash against illegal immigrants in the U.S., there are many HK people who are against people sneaking in from the mainland. Ironically the HK people import many workers from other countries particularly maids from the Phillipines. Yet they are trying the best to keep mainlanders from entering illegally. This is because the vast numbers that can possibly flood across the border. In HK people have to carry an identity card to show that they are residents or are there legally. We saw policemen stopped a woman on the street to see her card. She was legal even though she was from the mainland. My wife asked the cop how he knew whom to stop. He said he can spot people not from HK base on how they act. What about Chinese Americans who don't have their passport with them? He said most cops speak English well enough plus it is obvious to them who is a westerner even if he looks Chinese!

HK people work very hard. Twelve hour days, six days a week are not unusal. The education system is still hard. All my wife's friends' kids are having a hard time and are getting tutorial help. It speaks volume of the value of education when you see that in newspapers there is a section on education everyday that is as big as the sports section. And the sports section includes a lot of international sports. Of course they also have a horse racing section that is BIGGER than the regular sport section! So I guess gambling trumps education in HK.

Speaking of education. Like in the U.S. there are more women going to college than men in HK. I guess women are working harder than men everywhere. Boys are wasting their time playing video games just like here.

Overall HK continues on a path that was similar to ten years ago. I am sure the democratic activists and the press are being monitored closely by the Chinese government. So far China has keep its hands off. We went to HK University and we saw a large sculpture that was dedicated to the people who died for the cause of freedom at Tiannamen Square in 1989. If this sculpture ever comes down then we will know that the end of HK as we know it will have come.

Now that you have had a good laugh at my expense, it is back to analysis of world importance! Not really, but hopefully this will answer some of your questions about China.

It is true that China is making a great effort to improve its service sector so it would be more impressive next year at the Olympics. But most of the effort is aimed at Bejing where the Games will be held. As I said, Bejing has improved greatly with people much more friendly and the transportation system expanding rapidly. Ten years ago there were 4 subway lines, today there are 9 and by next year, 13. The level of English has improved a lot in the city but surprisingly at our hotel we found a bellhop who was more knowledgeable than people at the reception desk. Overall I think Bejing will be ready next year. It may not be as westerner friendly as Sidney was but I think it will be better than Athens and will have less snafu than Atlanta had.

The same cannot be said for other cities which are not holding the Olympics. Shanghai is supposed to be the past and future financial center of China, replacing HK. But I find the servce level below that of Bejing and nowhere as good as HK. The level of English is also behind Bejing. Even at the Bund where westerners congregate you don't sense any excitement. There are still people selling fake merchandise in the open in Shanghai. There were street vendors laying their goods right on the ground. This was hardly seen in Bejing and Canton. With the history of foreigners dominating in Shanghai's past, you would expect the government to be sure it looks more impressive now. But this does not seem to be the case. In another city Hangzhou the reception desk practically speak no English. My wife tried to ask where the pool was and they had no idea in English or Mandarin. Well, her Mandarin may not be great, although she got by elsewhere. But the woman actually thought she is telling her that there is something wrong with the water in the room!

Now Canton, being so close to HK, is probably the most prosperous of all the Chinese cities. Yet as I mentioned the reception desk fouled up our check out, causing us to be late and desperate for any cab. With all the business Canton gets from HK, many from non-Chinese based in HK, you would think that they would be better educated in English and services. The large number of non-Cantonese speakers is unsettling. Also the view from HK people, such as my wife's friends, that Canton has a lot of crime, particularly against foreigneers, is alarming. This may not be an accurate perception, but it would still be damaging to China. I did not get robbed as my wife feared, but the fact that a visitor think that it is a distinct possibility would not be good for the city. The incompetence of the cab drivers certainly would not leave a good impression to visitors.

Also while foreigners are able to move about anywhere in China now, they require a visa everytime you enter and reenter the country. There is a fee for each entrance of course. But more aggrevating is to have to apply at all. Going to HK, for example, requires no visa, just your passport. It is little things like that that still makes China not as visitor friendly as HK.

I never did try out the public toilets in the streets. Fortunately my illness affected me the worst in the morning while I was in China. So if I did not eat the rest of the day I was able to make it back to the hotel. I was more sick the first day in HK and I stayed in the hotel all day. I got sick probably from using a lot of hot sauce at a restaurant in Shanghai where we boiled our own food in a pot of hot water. The hot sauce was not refrigerated which we didn't think of at the time. My wife and older son also got sick, though not as much as me. The other three didn't use the sause so they were fine. If the timeline doesn't make sense, it is because we went from Shanghai to HK for one day as part of the tour and then we had to go back to Canton to get a picture of my wife's ancestor in the old house they used to live in. This is where the whole fiasco occurred. By the time we were back to HK I was almost back to normal. So I don't think I was more of a couch potato than while I am in the U.S. Although don't ask my wife that.

Next time I will talk about HK.

As promised a story that demonstrates some of the problems that still plague China. I have to admit I bear some responsibility to get us in trouble in the first place.

We were leaving Quangzhou (Canton) by train to HK. It started with a problem at the hotel where we were delayed because of the incompetence of the staff. As a result we took the first two taxis that came by. You see we were warned by friends that there are taxis drivers that were incompetent and some vans that were unlicensed driven by crimnals who may rob you. This is in one of the major cities of China! We were told that the green taxis were the best and had the most competent and honest drivers. But since we were delayed I decided to take a red taxi because it was first one. I figure that I speak Cantonese and this is day time and the train station is not too far away, I should be all right. I went in with my 2 girls and my wife and 2 sons would take the next taxi. My wife told the driver to go the the "east" railroad station. Now if I was at some place where they spoke Mandarin I would have checked the tickets and make sure I got it right. But I was over confident and I thought she said "main" station. Main and east sounded alike in Cantonese and I figured this being a train that crosses the border that it would make sense that it would originate from the main station rather than a sub station.

I noticed that the driver didn't seem to know Cantonese well. It turns out that there are a lot people from rural and northern areas moving into southern cities to find jobs. Whereas before almost everyone spoke Cantonese in Guangdong province, it isn't the case anymore. I was not worried still because when we got to the station a big sign said main station in Chinese. I asked the guy if this is where the train to HK is at and he nodded. Obviously no clue to what I said. The place is a zoo. In retrospect I know why the train to HK is at east station. This is so the foreigners will be more comfortable and avoid the crowd! I only saw trains to other cities in China but no HK line at this station. Finally I stopped a staff member and asked her. Of course she does not speak Cantonese! But I get the message that this is the wrong place and I then checked the ticket and realized my error. I started running to the taxi stand. But people were lining up to take taxis. I was stopped by a policeman for trying to cut in line. Fortunately he spoke Cantonese and I was able to explain that the previous cab driver had messed me up and I was running out of time. He sympathasized with me and let me go to the front of the line!

The second cab is a green one! The driver also spoke Cantonese! He told me that we were 3 miles away and that we can make it. Of course he drove crazily through traffic (not unusual in China). But of course the traffice was horrible and it was much farther than 3 miles! He dropped us off at an underground entrance with no signs. I asked him where is the station and he said go down the stairs of the entrance and we would be at the train station. I had my doubts but I had no choice but to run down the stairs. Well, at the bottom of the stairs was a subway station, not a railroad station! I asked the guard there how do get to the railroad station and he said pay the token and then walk to the end of the corridor, turn left and walk to the end of the next corridor, go up the escalators and you would be there. So I don't have to take the subway? No, he replied. So I still have to pay? Yes, he replied. Can I just pay you some American money and you let us jump over the turnstile? No, he replied. You must buy the tokens at the machine here. So we spent another minute or two buying 3 tokens and started our way down the corridor.

I must mention at this point that I have had diarrhea for 3 days and had not eaten for 3 days. I had very little energy to begin with. So after we went thru the turnstile and saw the length of the corridor, I knew I was in trouble. But adrenalin was flowing and I started out sprinting much faster than my 2 daughters. About 100 yards or half way through the corridor my adrenalin ran out. My legs became wet noodles, and my lungs were burning. In slow motion I saw my daughters pulling past me, probably laughing. As we turned left I realized that the next corridor was just as long with just as many people. My daughters waited for me at the escalators. People moved over to let us run up but I was too exhausted. I was breathing so hard that they must thought I may need cpr soon. When we got to the top we found the gate with 5 minutes before departure time! Alas, they stopped us. We had to pass the gate with 15 minutes before departure time. I was livid and I demanded to know what should we do now. The guard said go back downstairs and talk to the ticket agents!

Of course the ticket agent downstair told us that the tickets are not refundable and that we would have to buy new tickets if we want to catch the next train. Of course they do not take American dollars nor credit cards. Where can we exchange money? Upstairs, of course. Of course I cannot make it upstairs so I sent my daughters upstairs. I lied down on the floor and then it hit me! My wife has our passports. If she had gotton on the train which it seems to be the case as she and my sons are not here, then we are in trouble. I can't even get on the train without the passport. This is why they closed the gate 15 minutes before departure because you have to show your passport before getting on the train. If my wife had gone to HK she can't come back to get us today because it requires a visa to return to China. I am really in trouble here.

Suddenly a familar voice called out my name. I thought I had passed out and was hallucinating my wife's voice. But it was her! She had realized that she had our passports! When she got to the terminal and didn't see us there, she went up to the gate and was told that nobody can get on the train without a passport. So she knew we had not make it. Of course she is worried that the cab driver had taken us hostage or rob us and left us at some remote place. She decided to send the boys ahead to HK and stayed behind to wait for us outside the terminal figuring that hopefully we would show up at the front door in a cab. Of course we had not come from the front door but from some subway station at least half mile away. She came in a couple of times but with all the people with yellow skin and black hair she thought she was at Berkeley and went back outside. This time she was able to spot me because all my blood had gone to keep my lungs and heart working so my skin was as pale as can be. The equivalent of about 140 American dollars later, the 4 of us were on the way to HK.

As you can see just writing about this experience have exhausted me. So I will wait till next time to analyze this whole thing.

Some more observations from China and HK. Ten years ago Chinese t.v. in the hotel had CNN and BBC and maybe couple of Chinese stations. CNN and BBC were available only in hotels. While these stations are probably not widely available outside of hotels, the number of Chinese stations have grown to over thiry. In Shanghai, some HK stations and ESPN Asia were also available. The Chinese stations now depend on advertising for their survival and there is almost no obvious propaganda from the government. (more on that later) As a result the programs in Chinese are much better than before. The downsided is that you get bad commercials just like here. Kids are dragging their parents to KFC or McDonald and with the one child policy and the emphasis on sons, there are a lot of fat boys walking around now.

Even though there are no overt propaganda on t.v. now, I learn from this trip that you have to take what you see in the media with a grain of salt. This is the 10th year of the hand over of HK to China. It is interesting how that is being portrayed in the media. On CNN and BBC Chinese democratic activists would be brought on the air complaining about the lack of universal suffrage in HK and that China has total control of HK. On the Chinese channels inevitably when it comes to HK they would bring in a westerner working in HK who would say how great it has been in the last 10 years and that Hk will prosper as part of China. Of course neither side is completely honest. People in HK did not have complete freedom under British rule, something the BBC should know. It is just that the political decisions that used to be made in London is now made in Bejing. And HK has not survived the Asian economic depression, the bird flu and SARS during the last 10 years and still prosper because of the help of China. The continued success of HK is mainly due to resilency and skills of the HK people, whether they be Chinese or Westerners.

As a matter of fact China still has a lot to learn from HK. Despite the transition to capitalism in the large cities, many people in China do not have the skill to compete in a capitalistic world. For example despite being more friendly as I mentioned, many service worker do not know how to provide good service. A shop at the airport had about 10 employees but when my wife asked a question nobody could answer it. In an airport shop in the U.S. or HK there would be 1 employee and he/she would be able to answer the question. In restaurants there would be 10 waitresses standing around but nobody fill the teapot unless being asked. Despite trying to get ready for the Olympics next year, Bejing is not world class yet. Neither is Shanghai. On my next blog I will tell of something that happened to me to illustrate why China still has a long ways to go.

Wrote a post yesterday but somehow got erased! Can't figure out these computers. Just returned from China. I was surprised that I was not stopped by any customs agents. I thought that they would be stopping all physicians since the UK terrorists attack was blamed on physicians. Also my son Michael was stopped a couple of times because he had cut his hair and didn't look like his passport picture. My passport picture is the worst mug shot in history so I was offended that the agents didn't even take a second look at me. This means that I might actually be ugly! There are many things I want to write about the trip. I will start with the positive things I saw in China. Over the next few days I will write about the negatives and the situation in HK and how this relate to the world we live in.

By the time I got into Bejing airport I noticed that besides structural improvements there are many changes. Ten years ago there were PLA soldiers all over the place. The custom agents were soldiers. Now all the staff are civilians or ordinary policemen. There are many more shops and a lot more advertising. The propaganda posters were all but gone. This was true on the streets as well where communist slogans were gone and replaced by Walmart or KFC signs. Despite the pollution the air seem cleaner as less coal was being used. While there are still lots of bicycles, the numbers are much lower. There are more and higher quality cars owned apparently by middle class people. There is no question that economically China has made great strides in the last 10 years. Overall the people are friendlier, dressed better and smiled more. In 97 when I visited, I thought Bejing was about where HK was in 67. Now I don't think Bejing is 30 years behind anymore although HK is still way ahead.

The first morning we got into Bejing we were on our own to explore the city. So we walked around the area near the hotel. People were pouring into factories, offices and schools at 7 a.m. It was unbelievably crowded. Somehow we wandered into a park. This green oasis in the middle of madness. We found old people doing tai chi and kicking this thing I think is called something like hackysac? All of a sudden someone turned on a boom box and Chinese music with western instrumental filled the air. Bunch of old people started ballroom dancing! These people are my in-laws generation. I have heard them talked about learning ballroom dancing when they visited Russia when they were young. I guess the communists eventually stopped this practice as being a decadent western act. Now these old folks are able to practice this art once again, in the middle of this communist capital. How cool is that?

Sometimes I wonder if in order to be working for law and justice in government you have to be a bad guy yourself or be totally incompetent. It started couple of weeks ago when LA County Sheriff Lee Baca mysteriosly sent Paris Hilton home. That got LA city attorney Rocky Delgadillo, a friend of Magic Johnson, all upset. He complained bitterly about Baca's action. However, the media then found that Delgadillo's wife had drove with a suspended license. She was found to have no insurance which led to the finding that Delgadillo also had no insurance. Then it was found that his wife had crashed his government car. The government was billed for the repair. The media also found that Delgadillo's staff had to do personal errands for him and babysit for his family. Oh, he was also recently fined for improper campaign finances. Whatever happened to "those who lives in glass houses should not throw stones"?

The police chiefs in LA are always in trouble. The performance of the LA district attorney's office in the O.J. trial was notoriously poor. Here in Ventura County a few years ago the D.A. was found to commit fraud. So it is unlikely that "Law and Order" will be using any of our local hero's stories soon. Of course at the Federal level things are not any better. The best thing you can say about John Ashcroft is that he is no Alberto Gonzalez.

This will be my last blog until I come back from vacation. Writing over the internet under my blog name will probably get me screened and arrested while I am visiting China. Of course having complained about the law enforcement dept. here, they probably won't let me come back!

An article in the LA times yesterday got me angry. It was about a school district in Chula Vista, CA that served "alternate" lunches to kids whose parents were behind in their lunch payments. The kids were given cheese sandwiches instead of the usual burgers or pizzas that is on the main menu. They are also allowed to use the salad bar. This cut the yearly debt from $300,000 to $67,000. Of course the dead beat parents are complaining because it hurt their children's self-esteem. But of course if the parents had not stiff the school, the kids would not be stigmatized. Another case of people not taking their responsibilities but blaming others.

Of course I don't even think it is the role of the school to feed the kids. It is your kids, you should feed them! The poor kids get free breakfast and lunches at school. The other kids pay $1.50 which means the lunches are heavily subsidized. The schools are failing and yet society wants the schools to take on responsibilities that used to be those of the parents. Sex education used to be taught by parents but now the school teaches it. There is a call for medical clinics at the schools. They already have school nurses now. Pretty soon you won't have to keep the kid from school and take him to the doctor if he is sick. The doctor will be at school. How much longer do you think before they pass out condoms at school?

One of the first blogs I wrote was about Katrina. I have not written about it or New Orleans since then because almost all of the stories I have heard since then has been bad news. Rebuilding has been slow and lots of people will never go back. There was the story of the trailers provided by FEMA that caused allergy or asthma reaction in young children. Numerous stories of people cheating the government to get money for free and numerous stories of people really needing help not getting it. Finally today I saw a program on Dateline NBC that was a good story.

This was about the Vietnamese community which had to relocate to Houston and elsewhere after Katrina. Unlike many other communities the Vietnamese have rebuilt in New Orleans. There are several reasons why they are successful. First of all they did not depend on the government. They did not wait for handouts which may never come as many have found out. In fact the local government made things worse for them by trying to not allow rebuilding of the neighborhood. Ultimately the passion of the community won out. Many of these people came to the U.S. as refugees. Having survived typhoons in a war-torn Vietnam and then the high seas after they left their hoemland, Katrina did not seem to be an unbeatable enemy. Finally they were tied together by the Catholic church. They had a great priest as their leader and the organization of the church to help them.

I am not a big fan of organized religion but in this case the church and the priest deserve a lot of credit. It also show that we can't depend on the government. Unfortunately many people have to come to expect the government to bail them out even in much less dire situation than Katrina. Finally this shows that immigrants give strength to our country because many have survived disasters. They have learned how to rebuilt their lives before.

Missed the Democratic debate last week. I understand I didn't miss much. No new good ideas. None of the second tier candidates made any progress. The biggest coverage of the three top candidates of was of them professing their faith for Jesus. As I said before, I don't think God is going to bless us just because our leaders end every speech with "may God bless America". I find that people who goes around saying how great God is in their lives are usually moralistically deficient. Hilary Clinton is an example of that. Does anyone really believe that the Clintons are religious people? Yet she is saying how faith kept her marriage together. The truth is nobody can possibly win the presidency without pretending that he or she is religious, preferrably a protestant chrisitan. So instead of coming with ideas of their own, candidates all pretend they get strength from God. I don't have any respect for that since I always believe that God helps those who help themselves.

I did catch most of the Republican debate. I am just as disappointed with the Republicans. Actually I like Ron Paul. Or is Paul Ron? At least he knows that preemptive strikes and trying to create democracy by military force are bad ideas. I understand McCain's position and he has no choice now but continue his advocation for more aggresssion in Iraq. Giuliani was my favorite among the Republicans before but I don't see how I can vote for him after hearing him talk about Iraq. He still insists that invading Iraq was a good idea. Mitt Romney tried his best to avoid the question as to whether he would have invaded Iraq. Finally he said that if Hussein had let inspectors in before the war then the war would not have started. This shows how much he kept track of the war since Hussein did let inspectors in before the U.S. invaded. This was almost as much a blunder as when Ford said that Poland was not under Soviet control during his debate with Carter.

So the quality of candidates is still poor. Since all the primaries are being moved up this means that only candidates with lots of money backing can campaign in numerous primaries at once. This makes it unlikely that an unknown candidate will get momentum by a good showing in New Hampshire or Iowa. So no fresh faces to keep things interesting!

A few days ago there was an article in the LA times about the city of Taishan, China. Taishan is the city of my ancestry. My great grandparents were all from there. It is the ancestry home of over half a million Chinese Americans. There are 1 million people in Taishan today but over 1.3 million people of Taishan ancestry all over the world. The story of this city and its people provides a lesson not only about immigration but also about prejudice (not just the racial kind) and about human nature in regard to work ethic.

Taishan was an extremely poor area even by Chinese standard in the early 20th century. Well before WWII the men from the area were leaving oversea to find work. The land was poor and there was no industry. Since it was close to South China Sea many people left for places like the Phillipines, Malaysia and Indonesia. The more ambitious ones went to Canada and the U.S. Of course most of them got in illegally. This means once they are in they can't leave easily because they may not be able to come back. So usually many years went by before the men could see their family again. My grandfather left for Canada, came back a dozen years later for about a year and then returned to Canada forever. My grandmother was pregnant with my father when my grandfather left the second time. It was over 30 years later that my father saw his father for the first time. My other grandfather never made it back home, having been stranded in SE Asia. Meanwhile back in Taishan the women were in charge. It became almost a matriarch society as most of the men were gone.

By the 1980's most of the people who had left Taishan had done well oversea. In the Americas they had gone from waiters and cooks to businessmen. Their children, if they were able to join them, had become professional people. In SE Asia they became even richer as many ran corporations or small businesses. While America is the land of opportunity for immigrants, in some ways it was easier to be successful in places where the natives were not as advanced as Americans. The drawback is that while the Chinese may face prejudice in America because of their skin color, they face even worse prejudice in other lands because they became richer than the natives. Many Chinese had to change their names to hide their ethnicity. When they became rich they had to hire armed guards. They were basically to SE Asians what the Jews were to the Europeans in the 40's.

As the Chinese did well overseas they sent large amount of money back home. Since Taishan had more people oversea than other Chinese cities, it benefited the most. Schools and hospitals were build with oversea money. The hillbillies of China had became the "Beverly Hills Hillbillies". But this would not last. As the overseas Taishanese became old and died, less and less money were coming back. The children and grandchildren of these "wah kius" had no connection with the old villages. The young people who benefitted from the new schools built by overseas money moved out to cities like Canton, Hong kong and Shanghai. This left the old and less educated in the old villages. Having dependent on overseas money all these years the people left behind are unable to lift themselves out of poverty. With the change to capitalist system throughout China there is no handouts from the government either.

What are some lessons I learned from this history of the Taishanese people? First of all, my view of illegal immigration. When you are desperate you will not hesitate to break immigration laws. If China was connected to the U.S. the most law abiding Chinese would have ran over here without regard to immigration laws. If the Chinese would risk their lives in the ocean to come here illegally, do you think that any fence would keep out the Mexicans? Where there is a demand there will be a supply.

Another lesson about prejudice. This is the prejudice of Chinese against Chinese. The Taishanese were considered inferior by other Chinese. They spoke a dialect that many Chinese considered to sound less intelligence than other dialects. This is similar to our belief that the southern accent sound less intelligence than those from other areas of the U.S. Due to their high poverty level, the Taishanese were also considered to be hillbillies of China. They were looked down upon because the men are gone from the villages. Just like the southerners here, the Taishanese were considered to be less intelligent. But look what happens when their children had the opportunity to have an education in America. So it is a matter of opportunity not genetics. So what we should do is make sure that all of our children have an opportunity to succeed.

As I mentioned before, Taishan was considered backward because most of the men had left. But the women were able to keep the society going without the men. They tended to the fields and animals while raising the children by themselves. So the theory of the weaker sex has to be thrown out the window.

Having the opportunity itself does not equal success. Some in Taishan took the advantage of the better school provided by the overseas money and left to bigger cities. But some just took the handouts. They spent their time playing mahjong and drinking. This is like the welfare system and the Indian reservations in this country. It just makes people lazier. Human nature is such that if there is a easy way out we would take it. Also if we are given handouts then pretty soon we would believe that we are always entitled to it. The Taishanese who left the country had no other choice, so they would do whatever it takes to survive and provide for their families. So to lift people out of poverty we cannot just throw money at them but we must think about ways to increase the opportunities. Then it is up to the individual to succeed on his own.

Now that I have angered the postal workers I will go on and anger the police. I understand that it is difficult job being a policeman. Sometimes a cop has to make a split second decision to shoot or not to shoot. I certainly would not want to be in that situation. I will always give the cop the benefit of the doubt. But sometimes I wonder if they are actually protecting us or making things more dangerous. The Rodney King incident a decade or so ago led to a riot. On May 1st a relatively calm immigrant demonstration turned violent in LA when a few thugs threw bottles at the police. The police somehow pushed the thugs into a park and started firing rubber bullets into a crowd of mostly peaceful families. Several people were injured. For some reason the police also started attacking some journalists on the scene. While some thugs started it, the situation was not dangerous until the police reacted. In other words the police actually made things worse.

Now I am not saying that the average person would not have done the same as the cops in these cases. But I am saying that the cops are suppose to do a lot better since they are trained for these situations and they are paid to do this. Sometimes they act as if they had no training at all. Like the time they fired about 20 shots into a car with a black woman sitting in it. Granted she was on drugs and had a gun next to her and was startled when she awoke and grabbed the gun. But shot after shot even though she was diabled already? Then there was an incident where a black (sounds familiar?) man stole a car and was cornered by the police. They surrounded him and started firing. Now I said they surrounded him so if they miss the car they can actually hit each other. They fired over one hundred shots! Some ended up in houses way down the street. You tell me anyone with any training would have done this?

Now you may say these are isolated incidences in a large metropolitan area. But those are some of the incidences that happened to be captured on camara. What about the times when nobody is there to film the situation? I bet the cops get away with a lot of use of illegal force. Blacks and Latinos are always complaining the illegal use of force by cops. I usually side with the cops because most of the ones complaining have criminal records. But working in the old Detroit Genraly Hospital I also saw alleged criminals come in with injuries by cops that were probably sustained after they were already subdued. I had a neighbor in Michigan who retired from the Detroit police dept. after serving in the elite STRESS unit. He said he quit when he realized that every time he saw a young black man he instinctively reach for his gun. Unfortunately not many cops come to that realization. Of course this makes things more dangerous because minority groups tend to not trust the police and more crimes are then not solvable.

It is not just the violence by the police that gets me. There is also the financial aspect as with all government employees. There are way too many desk jobs. Whenever there is a call for more money for cops they would say that we would have to transfer some office personels to the streets if no additional money are provided. Well, they belonged on the streets anyway. I suppose the only drawback is that some of these guys are way out of shape from sitting at a desk all this time! A few years ago a woman cop in the police dept of the city I work at filed a gender discrimination suit against the dept. The reason I think this is outrageous is that her husband was third in command at the dept! So either she is making all this up or that the people in charge there are stupid enough to discriminate against the wife of one of the top people in the dept. Of course the case was settled so the public cannot find out exactly which of the two scenarios it was. See how the government is not afraid to spend your money for no reason?

Another postage increase starting today! I think we just had an increase in the beginning of 2006 from 37 to 39 cents. So this makes an 11% increase in less than a year and a half. It is a mandate that the postal service be self-supporting. Of course it is easy to be self-supporting if when you are losing money you can just increase the price without worrying that the consumer will go some place else. Isn't this the reason why we have laws against monopolies? But with government service there is no law against monopolies. Sure the increase in fuel prices must be devasting to the postal service. But this would apply to UPS and Fed-ex as well. The way I understand it is that the cost of labor is much higher with the postal service than UPS and Fed-ex. It seems to me that the government is the only sector that cannot negotiate effectively with the unions. Why? Because it is our money that they are using to pay the workers not their own money. There is an old saying in Chinese that when you work for the government you have an iron rice bowl. It is perfectly true in America today.

I understand that big business is cold. But if you can be easily replaced then you don't have leverage in the private workplace. With the government, however, once you are in you are in good shape. The average postal worker makes over $62,000 which is much higer than a nurse. The number of first class mail has decreased with the increase in e-mail. Generally when there is less demand, the prices goes down. But that is not the case here. Labor costs continues to go up in the postal service. This is typical of government services. The teachers, police, fireman etc unions have done a lot better in negotiations than the unions in the private sectors. Some prison guards in California are making close to $100,000 per year. This is outrageous.

Now that I have angered all government workers who read this blog, I would like to point out that I would not mind too much if they actually do their jobs well. In the case of postal workers, there were couple that my wife has come across at a post office near my office that she found extremely helpful. So certainly some government workers deserve what they are paid. Unfortunately, with the contracts that our so called public servants have given to the unions, the pay in government service is almost never based on merit. Unless we can find a system where if the government service can lose its monopoly due to poor performance, we will pay higher and higher taxes with worse and worse services.

I saw George Tenet on t.v. couple times recently, plugging his book. Journalists like to interview him because he is criticizing the Bush administration. Basically he said that while the intelligence for the war was not very accurate, the Bush administration had decided to go to war regardless of the intelligence. I would agree with that assessment as I have always felt that Wolfowitz, Cheney and Rumsfeld had convinced Bush to go to war right after 9/11. The Bush administration did make a scapegoat out of Tenet. Whatever happened to "the buck stops here"? Nevertheless, from watching the interviews, I feel that I have very little respect for Tenet.

While he acknowledged that the intelligence was flawed, he said that he warned the administration not to go to the public with them. Of course, he claimed that he had not read the state of the union address ahead of time where Bush said that Hussein was building nuclear weapons. When pressed by the reporter about his estimate for WMDs, he said that since he said it was an estimate that they were not wrong. Well, that is nonsense. In medicine when we put a drop of urine under the microscope and can see one single bacterium, then we can estimate that there are more than 100,000 bacteria per ml of urine, indicating a significant infection. If we don't see any, we can't estimate anything. Since there was no WMDs found at all, how can they come up with any estimation?

Tenet sat behind Colin Powell while Powell embarrassed himself at the UN with false intelligence. All Tenet would say is that he has talked to Powell about that incident but would not say that he apologized or what exactly did he say to Powell. He also flatly denies that the U.S. has tortured any prisoners at Guatanomo Bay or elsewhere. Common, when Russia and China denied torturing people, did anyone believed that? I don't have problem with torturing known terrorists. But I don't think all the the people incarcerated at Guatanamo all dangerous terrorists. So if Tenet had said that there were a few al qaeda operatives that we had to get information out of by any means necessary, it would be believable. Zero torture? I don't think so.

Tenet accepted the Medal of Freedom from Bush. This is obviously a bribe for him to go away quietly. To make Tenet a scapegoat and then tell the nation what a great job Tenet did was dispicable. If Tenet is a real man he would have tell Bush where he can shove his medal. But Tenet gleefully accepted the bribe, er, medal. Now couple of years later he is trying to make a few bucks and clear his name by blasting away at the Bush administration in his book. I can only be thankful that he is no longer running the CIA.

A few people have asked me to comment on the Virginia Tech shooting. I don't think I have much of interest to say about this tragedy. In the future I would write something about growing up as an Asian American male. This would seem to be easy since I am an Asian American male, but to me it is not so easy. It would be difficult for me to be objective and my experience may not reflect other Asian males. So I am going to wait for the right opportunity, with the right type of lead in. To me the VT tragedy is about one mad man and not reflective of an ethnic group's experience. Anyways, there are a few points I want to make:

My wife was all worried when the killer was identified as Asian. She said that she hope that he is not Chinese. I can understand her feelings. The paper next day interviewed Korean leaders in LA who apologized for the killing by a Korean. I can understand that also. But I think we should set these feelings aside. There is no need to apologize. White people didn't have to apologize for Tim McVeigh and Jeffrey Dahlmer. Just because some people think that I should know all the Chinese doctors in town, it doesn't mean I should. Nobody is responsible for this killer's action except for him, so nobody else should apologize.

Now that doesn't mean that there are not some racists out there who would take advantage of this. Remember the time an American spy plane went down in China? Some Chinese restaurants were threatened or vandalized. After 9/11 the yoga studio my wife goes to was graffitied with the words "go back to where you came from". This happened even though the studio was owned by a white female and there are no Arab members. Fortunately there were not too many of these incidences. Majority of Americans are fair-minded. We should not let a few crazies intimidate us. There is no reason feel shame of being Asian over this.

I am a gun control advocate. I don't see the reason to have any guns except rifles for hunting. All automatic weapons should be banned. Forget about the so-called constitutional rights to bear arms. There has to be a line drawn because if not then someone can claim his right to own an atomic bomb. Some people say that to protect one against criminals, one needs to be armed. Some even suggest that if someone had a gun in VT then the killer may have been stopped. Well, I don't think the average person is carrying automatic weapons and if he has just a hand gun, then he would be no match against the bad guys. I would bet the number of times an armed innocent person save the day is way smaller than the number of accidents caused by guns. People, not guns, are ultimately responsible for killing people. But I have yet to see a person kill thirty people at a time with a knife or a baseball bat.

All this nonsense about privacy of mental illness has to change. Psychology is not an exact science. But a person with a history of psychological illness should not be allowed to purchase guns. People who have seizure disorders are not allowed to drive and a doctor has to notify the state. This is obviously a right law because a person may have a seizure and kill others with a car. So why should people with mental illness be allowed to operate a gun and be able to kill others? People with mental illness can also refuse treatment unless they are imminently dangerous to himself or others. Since their judgments are impaired, why do we have to wait to the danger point or maybe beyond that to force treatment?

I think these issues are the more important lesson to be learned from this case. It is not a case of ethnic or racial problems. It is a case of mental illness and our violent world in which guns play a major role.

It has been awhile since I have had a chance to write. A lot has happened that I want to comment on. So will start with the old news. Don Imus got what he deserved. It was not the first time he says something of poor taste. I don't have much respect for someone to say outrageous things to get ratings. I say the same about Howard Stern. Since he brings in advertising dollars he can thumb his nose at his critics. This is the capitalist system. But it is also the capitalist system that dumped him. CBS was not acting on moral grounds when it fired him. CBS waited to see what the sponsors would do. When they pulled out, it got rid of Imus. So I don't feel bad for him. I think what he said was worse than what Michael Richard said. Richard said it in the heat of anger to someone giving him a hard time. The Rutgers women were not bothering Imus and he had no reason to insult them. It was a vicious verbal attack on some innocent victims.

Having said good riddane to Imus, I am bothered by the actions of Sharpton and Jackson. Why do we even care what these people say? Jackson called New York "Hymie town" a few years ago and he is still in the lime light today. The Rutgers women don't need these guys defending them. If Imus is a total bigot, getting rid of him still would not help black people at all. There are stiil thousands of bigots out there. Why is it that Sharpton and Jackson don't try to go after the hip hop people who are saying things worse than Imus? Why are they not being called out for using these words? The people with so-called street cred are telling the black kids to never snitch, in other words never cooperate with the police. As a result assaults and murders are almost never solve in black neighborhoods despite witnesses being present in many cases. These types of things are more hurtful to the black community as a whole than what Imus said.

On the previous blog there were 2 questions directed back to me. One was what I thought about Guliani. Well, he is my choice among the Republicans who have announced so far. Which is not saying much. He is already backing down on some of his liberal views to please the conservatives. While he did do a decent job of cleaning up New York and provided leadership during 9/11, he did support the war. Since I think Obama is too inexperience, I would have to say that Guliani is also too inexperience, especially in term of foreign policy. As I said before, I have no favorite in either party right now and will see how things play out.

The other question was what I thought about the new "holistic" admission policy of UCLA. Well I don't really have to comment. The facts speak for themselves. With this admission process, blacks, Hispanics and Native Americans increased their number of admission this year. White admission, amazingly enough, stayed the same. The only group that saw its admission decreased was Asians. First of all to believe that the readers of the application cannot tell the race of the applicant most of the time is nonsense. To believe that in taking into accout hardships, Asians actually did worse than whites is unbelievable. There are a lot more Asians who are from immigrant families with non-English speaking parents than whites. So to think that whites did not lose spots while Asians did---I don't need to comment further. I will place a bet on this. In four years the number of Asian graduates in engineering, computer science, chemistry and math from this class will not be less than previous classes. I don't think the "holistic" admits will take any of those places from Asians.

It is still 10 months before the first primaries and the campaign is already well underway. I have no favorite at this time and probably won't have for a long time. One person I don't think I can vote for is John McCain. He was my favorite in 2000 and I thought he was a victim of dirty politics from the supporters of Bush then. I still consider him an American hero for what he went through during Vietnam and all the work he did for bipartisanship. But I think he is not thinking clearly anymore. Maybe it is his age (70), although he still seems very vigorous. It is not just his kissing up to the conservatives, I understand his need to get support for the nomination. It is not just his idea of sending massive number of troops to Iraq, I have written in the past that it may be a sound political strategy, if not a good military one. It is his recent trip to Iraq that has made me feel that he may have gone over the edge.

He went to Baghdad to try to show that the surge is working and that the city is safer. After touring through Baghdad, he claimed that he felt safe to walk the street there. Of course he was wearing a bullet-proof jacket and was escorted by soldiers. There were snipers on roofs and helicopters overhead to protect him. He rode in an armored hummer. Those are not the advantages offered to the average Iraqi. McCain's proclamation that the city is safe now is similar to all those claims made by Cheney and Rumsfeld. If McCain credibility is similar to those two, how can he be consider a viable candidate?

As you know I have been against the war from the beginning and have advocated getting out as soon as possible. However, I feel angry about the bill the Democrats just passed through the House. The bill would continue to fund the war as Bush requested but added artificial deadlines that supposedly obligate the troops be pulled out by certain days depending if any progresses are made in Iraq. I understand that if you don't fund the war, you will be accused of not supporting the troops. But by funding the war more soldiers will die and it would not make a difference in the war on terrorism. If Bush does not veto and follows the timetable, the Republicans can say that the failure was due to the constraint the Democrats placed on the generals. In fact that is what they are saying about this bill right now.

The other thing I am angry about this bill is that in order to get it passed, Pelosi allowed attachments to the bill that are not related to the war at all. Most of these are porks that would have no merit of being passed on their own. Among them were spinach, shrimp and peanut subsidies. The Democrats had promised reform when they took over Congress. They had promised to make it transparent about who would give their votes for pork. They have broke these promises by putting these spending attachments to this bill and not revealing which Congressmen were behind them. It is unconscienable that in this crisis of war the politicians put their interests ahead of those of the nation. It just goes to show you, you can't trust either party.

The Supreme Court is hearing a case this week about a high school student who was suspended for 15 days for holding up a sign that said "Bong hits 4 Jesus" at a parade. This was supposedly an important case because it may have implication of a student's free speech rights versus the authority of a school. I don't see that at all. The kid had put up a sign at a parade, not on school grounds so I don't see why the principal had the right to get involved at all. If he had put up the sign in the school, then certainly the principal had a right to hand out punishment if the kid did not remove the sign right away. Since it was outside the school the principal should have called the parent and let them handle it.

Interestingly the kid is now in his twenties and is teaching English in China. He admits that he was a kind of troublmaker as a kid but he felt that his free speech rights were violated. I wonder what he thinks would happen if he was to hold up a sign at a Chinese parade that says "Bong hits 4 Mao"? I hope he appreciates the freedom we have here and will take some reponsibility about drugs and insulting other people's religion. On the other hand, the principal should understand that to keep this freedom, she should not get bent out of shape by a stupid sign written by a kid. There was no need to make a federal case out of this incident.