Mid-Week Post

Somewhere in the middle.... is you.


But seriously....


China, already in the thick with Sudan, sends an envoy to mediate between Sudan and South Sudan:

China will send its envoy for Africa to Sudan and South Sudan to urge talks as it works with the United States to bring an end to border fighting that has raised fears of a full-scale war, Chinese government officials said on Wednesday.

South Sudan has accused Sudan of mounting bombing raids on the newly independent country's oil-producing border region after South Sudan said it would withdraw from the disputed Heglig oilfield it seized this month.

Chinese President Hu Jintao, whose country has significant oil and business interests in both African nations, told South Sudan's President Salva Kiir on Tuesday that the two Sudans should return to talks.

"Our special envoy to Africa will soon visit the two countries to continue urging talks," Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Weimin told a regular news briefing.

"Actually, he has already gone at the beginning of this year. This is the second time he will go to Sudan and South Sudan to promote talks," Liu said, referring to China's newly appointed envoy, Zhong Jianhua.

"China is deeply concerned," he said, reiterating calls for calm and restraint.

 Related: Google is forced from China after plot:

When Google left mainland China, it was pushed out. The search engine giant was a casualty of the struggle over succession in the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), according to exclusive information provided by a high-ranking government official in Beijing. This information is corroborated by a January 2010 Beijing U.S. embassy cable, marked “secret,” released by Wikileaks.

The campaign against Google was launched in March, 2009 at the Honglou Hotel in Chongqing. The annual National People’s Congress meetings were taking place at that time.

Bo Xilai, then the Party chief in the province-level city of Chongqing in central-western China, had arranged a meeting with Li Yanhong, the chairman of the Chinese search engine Baidu, through Baidu’s regional manager in Chongqing, Jiang Zhi.

Bo brought up helping Baidu fight off its main competitor, Google, and gain a monopoly in the Chinese-language search engine market. Jiang Zhi recalled that Li bowed to Bo right on the spot.

Bo was willing to promise that Google would be thrust out of China, but a quid quo pro was involved. Bo needed Baidu to cooperate with Chongqing officials and lift the censorship on articles criticizing Party head Hu Jintao, Premier Wen Jiabao, and presumptive next Party head Xi Jinping. The articles would be published on websites outside China favoring former Party head Jiang Zemin.

The articles targeting Xi were especially important, Bo said. Li agreed.

Ontario is in the hole even if the Liberals don't wish to believe it:

Standard and Poors has placed Ontario on a negative outlook, although it held the province's credit rating steady.

"We need to embrace this," Finance Minister Dwight Duncan said, arguing the downgraded outlook from stable to negative was not as important as the credit rating itself, which remains AA-.

Progressive Conservative finance critic Peter Shurman said Duncan can spin the news any way he likes but it's still a warning the province faces a tough economic challenge.

"The bottom line here is that we have been warning about this consistently," Shurman said.

"The only surprise is that it came so fast. The budget will not do what the government says it is going to do."

It's the second time Ontario's economy has been placed on a watch by a credit rating agency. Moody's made a similar move in December.

Arrogance coupled with ignorance, hubris, anti-Catholicism and jumping on an old band wagon:

First Lady Michelle Obama boasted at a campaign event in Omaha, Neb. on Tuesday that “we made history” when the president’s health care proposal was enacted and the administration issued a regulation mandating that insurance companies provide women with free contraceptives.

“Two years ago, we made history together by finally passing health reform,” said Mrs. Obama. “And because we passed this law, insurance companies will now have to cover basic preventive care — things like prenatal care, mammograms, contraception — at no extra cost.”

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) finalized the “preventive services” regulation in January and it will take effect for most employers on Aug. 1. The regulation mandates that nearly all health insurance plans in the United States must provide women with sterilizations and all FDA-approved contraceptives (including those that can induce abortions) without any fees or co-pay.

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops and many Catholic leaders in the United States have voiced strong opposition to the mandate because they say it would force Catholics — whose church teaches that sterilization, contraception and abortion are wrong — to act against their consciences and the teachings of their faith. In comments submitted to the Department of Health and Human Services, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops called the regulation an “unprecedented attack” on religious liberty and asked the administration to rescind it in its entirety.

Related: Obama's popularity falls among Catholics.



MP Stephen Woodworth wants to inject reason into the debate and this is just one of the reactions to it:

Motion 312 will be DEFEATED.  

OOOOH, I'm so worried now. Except not. Consider that this is general tenor of ANY discussion with someone who insists that their chosen handle automatically makes them bellicose and therefore fearsome.


Have the discussion or don't but don't stamp around like some petulant chub-tastic adolescent who considers it beneath oneself to exert five minutes of intellectual effort in any debate one jumps right into without invitation.


Just had to get that off my chest.



And now, a frog that thinks it's a guy.