What's for Breakfast

In the video, Mr. Silvio Berlusconi was seen started a good morning with what he picked from his nose with a cup of coffee. link

Photographer Arrested for Flag Pole Shot

Via Boingboing, a New York resident amateur photographer Ben Hider took a picture (shown above) of the flag pole of the court house near a train station. The photographer was detained and interrogated by the police. Later, he was released and received an apology from a judge. However, the police offered no apology as they claim there's no guideline on dealing with such issues.

The City Manager of Tuttle Oklahoma

Jerry A. Taylor is the city manager of the city Tuttle, Oklahoma. Armed with an bachelor degree in EE from UT Arlington, a bachelor of Art degree from National-Louis University, and most recently an MBA degree from Averett University, Mr Taylor is an Executive Board Member of City Managers Association of Oklahoma and a member of International City Managers Association. Mr. Taylor also accumulated 22 years of computer system engineering and operation. However, nothing stopped him from making himself a fool when he repeatedly threatened staff of CentOS for an totally unrelated non-issue, something wrong with his web hosting. Not only he showed that he didn't understand a bit of the thing people call it computer, but also he showed what a poor reader and generally speaking lower than boundary IQ.

Even though Tuttle, OK is a small city, people there deserve a better city manager for that salary line. Well, the political information from epodunk.com says Tuttle supported President Bush in the past two elections, no wonder.;-)

Within hours, the news was caught on by the UK Register and other international media. Also read a few funny comments from the CentOS story page, and the Digg:

tti_7
Posted: 2006/3/25 23:14 Updated: 2006/3/25 23:14

Re: It's L-i-n-u-x, that is an Operating System
Wow... a taste of everything... Baskin Robins Flavors

(1) Pre-emptive Doctrine - Shoot First!, ask questions later
(2) Schoolyard Bully
(3) Michael Brown - Forever redefining the Brownie... Brown-nose...
(4) The FBI - in color...
(5) Chicken Little - The (barn) Roof is falling
(6) Hair Club for Men (or The Man)
(7) Raytheon - Un(Patriotic) Missiles - shooting friendlies as well as enemies
.... there are more...many more...

And how does this look?

An old song

只有情永在              Only Love Survives

张学友 邝美云           Singers: Jacky Cheung Cally Kwong

女:世间事 不知怎分对错  Kwong: Issues in this world, hard to tell right from wrong
男:懒得问 恩怨怎分开    Cheung: Don't bother, who can seperate love and hate
女:当一切若浮云         Kwong: When everything turns into clouds and fogs
男:只有情永在           Cheung: Only love survives
合:心中记一份爱         Choir: Save a piece of love in your heart

女:再不问               Kwong: Won't ask agin, whether love is the answer
问一声应否去爱

男:爱海内               Cheung: Love everything, that's the answer
一切也应该

女:也不怕消失去         Kwong: No longer afraid, afriad of losing
男:不会难替代           Cheung: Nothing is ireplacable

合:风声里都找到爱       Choir: Love can be found even in the sound of wind

女:未怕分开 纵使分开    Kwong: NO longer afraid of seperation, even if so
亦都知美梦仍会在                We knew good dreams will be there

男:何必感慨 谁会意外    Cheung: No need to sigh, who will be surprised
此心不变迁 何曾改                The heart won't change, as it never has

女:再不用 口中天天说爱  Kwong: There's no need, to say the word love everyday
男:懒分辨 心内情意若何  Cheung: Don't bother to tell, what's your feeling insdie

女:有朝会暂别离         Kwong: Someday we will be apart
男:不会成障碍           Cheung: That's no obstacle

合:清风里 都找到爱      Choir: In the wind, love to be found
啊 千山里 都找到爱              In mountains, love to be found

Both singers are buddhists. Cally is the first runner-up of 1982 Miss Hong Kong Pageant.

Remembering Yuan Baojing

Chinese netizens have been by and large characterized as 'rich bashing' people, which is obviously evident in a number of high profile cases such as the Harbin BMW and many others. In the gang boss Liu Yong case, the High Court of Liaoning Province sentenced Liu Yong to suspended death, which is usually converted to a life time in jail after two years. The Chinese netizens mobilized to get the Supreme Court involved to change the sentence to a death sentence. However, we just observed a rare opposite exception, while the netizens cried foul when a billionaire was executed for a contract murder case by the a court in Liaoning Province.

Yuan Baojing 袁宝璟, a Chinese billionare, together with his brother and a cousin were executed for an alleged contract murder case on March 17, 2006. His another cousin was sentenced to death with two years suspension.

The prosecutor's story was that the murder victim, Wang Xing blackmailed Yuan on an earlier case. Then Yuan arranged his two brothers to kill Wang. However, the story never holds, as inconsistent police report on the crime scene and various versions alleged plot, and that the police never set the connection to the murder weapon.

The murder case has question marks written all over it. The sentence itself is nothing short of a SCANDAL. No joke, but it is unprecedented even in the history of communism red China to execute three persons for one murder case, not to mention that the Supreme Court just recently issued a directive asking more causiousness in considering death sentences.

Many Chinese Netizens believe Yuan and his brothers were killed to bury crimes committed by top CCP disciplinary official Li Feng 李峰 of the Liaoning Province. Li Feng once 'borrowed' HKD $120 million to register a company in Hong Kong, the money was never returned. Li was known to be the big boss controlling all drug traffic and counterfeiting money business in Liaoning. Liaoning is notorious for its corrupt legal system. Last year, the Supreme Court scolded Liaoning by overturned Liu Yong case with an on-the-book-but-never-used legal maneuver. Many Chinese people are surprised and deeply dismayed that the Supreme Court did not intervene this time.

It was said that Yuan's wife Zhuoma, a professor of the Central University for Nationalities, donated more than USD $36 billion (most of which are stock of an oversea oil field) to the central government to bring attention for a fair trail.

Rumor has it that Li Feng is close to a relative of Jiang Zemin. Rumor also has it that the Minister of Commerce Bo Xilai is deeply involved. Any discussion or reference to the case were prompted removed on all Chinese online forums.

Yuan Baojing had been little known for his fortune because of his low profile life style when he was alive. Distinct from most rich Chinese businessmen who spent their fortune on luxuries, Yuan gave money to worthy causes. Since 1996, 900 college students cross the country had receive a prestigious Jianhao scholarship, seen by many as the top scholarship in China. The scholarship was donated by Yuan, who chose not to use his own name. He also established at least two elementary schools in Tibet. Because of Yuan's deliberate intention of not advocating for his charity giving, these kind of information has only been leaked slowly through people close to him after he was arrested two years ago.

For the first time, the tip and bottom layer of the Chinese fortune pyrimid found common language: the fear from corrupt officials. Who killed their sons? Who robbed their money? If a billionaire can't save his own life with his ways, means and treasure, what can a ordinary people count on?

『天涯杂谈』东方某国，一个省级官员竟然垄断了当地的毒品市场

作者：mcseaver 提交日期：2006-3-18 17:37:00
　　不仅如此，据说那个官员还做假钞生意阿。这可是算是在颠覆那个国家经济秩序阿，可是谁让它和那个国家前任NO。1 的亲戚有着千丝万缕的联系，竟然还安坐太师椅。
　　可怜给他洗钱的那个马仔阿，千不该万不该得罪老板阿，有钱有什么用，首富有什么用，最后还不是落了个满门抄斩的地步，你到底下怎么去见你的列祖列宗阿。亏你还是赚大钱的，你把那财产全捐出去本来不就没事了么，偏要多嘴搞什么举报，你都那么一把年纪了，不知道这里是由谁说的算的，你不死，谁死。
　　不过那个小老板也危险了，这个国家隶属于另一股势力的媒体可不会放过这个机会的。估计那家伙也和我们国家的王宝森要一样了。

『天涯杂谈』从亿万富翁之妻的言行你看到了什么？？？！！！

作者：adc1180 提交日期：2006-3-19 20:41:00
　　　　在这里我们不谈袁宝璟出身贫寒发奋自强；不谈袁宝璟靠自己种黑小麦的干净的第一桶金；不谈袁宝璟首创的不是以其个人命名的建昊奖学金；不谈袁宝璟官司的“复杂”；甚至也不谈袁宝璟他太太所介绍的模范丈夫的事例；更不谈袁宝璟遗赠的数额......我们只满怀敬意的谈一点---她的太太在接受媒体的访问答录：
　　　　一个我国著名藏族舞蹈表演艺术家、中央民族大学教授为她所爱的人停止了跳舞，为了求生的欲望而日夜呼号，视金钱如粪土，临危患于不顾，最为令人为之心碎的是她竟然置刚满一岁多的幼子于不顾说：“他（袁宝璟）要是死了我也不活了！”试问在当今社会里不要说是万贯家财的富豪，就是一般的普通穷老百姓能有这样的有几人？？？我就凭这一点，我也深信袁宝璟绝对是个屈死的英灵！！！
　　　　（为凑500字文再加短文：）
　　　　 袁宝璟案中“被害人”是个劣迹斑斑之徒，凭什么他的死会受到重视，从而表态要“不破此案决不收兵”？是要替他声张正义还是后有伏笔？
　　　　从起诉书来看警方事先根本就没有实施逮捕的法定理由（因为公安要求其堂兄听袁宝璟受刑的惨叫声以胁迫其招认袁宝璟，说明袁宝璟案在北京的被捕不是由于其堂兄的供词，而本案的认定完全是靠“供词”堆砌的），而袁宝璟案当事人连续被抓，即从前晚上辽阳他的堂兄到次日下午北京袁宝璟本人，前后不过半日有多，中间连续四人。其审讯效率，批捕效率，从辽阳至北京的出捕效率，和其后不是在拘留所而是到警犬训练场（没有“干涉”方便用刑）的审讯，这一系列连续动作如果说对一个普通人而言也是异勿寻常，而对一个各方面都有着不寻常的背景的人而言，这种“简单”和“效率”只能说明是有一双黑手在做这个案子！
　　　　袁宝璟以前也是法校学院派出身，我们大家亦可谓师出同门，生于这样的司法环境这是可悲可叹啊！

NYT: China Hails a Good Nazi and Makes Japan Take Notice

The house of John Rabe, who saved many Chinese lives, is being restored as a museum (Ryan Pyle for The New York Times).

Letter From China
China Hails a Good Nazi and Makes Japan Take Notice
By HOWARD W. FRENCH
Published: March 15, 2006

NANJING, China — From the outside it does not look like much: the shell of a two-story brick building with scaffolding running up its sides and, on a drizzly winter day, a pair of construction workers kicking around in a courtyard littered with building materials.

But 69 years ago the courtyard was filled with hundreds of Chinese seeking refuge from Japanese troops who were rampaging through the city, then China's capital. The invaders subjected Nanjing to a six-week reign of terror, killing large numbers of Chinese soldiers who had thrown down their weapons and murdering and raping thousands of civilians.

The property was the home of John Rabe, a Nazi Party member and employee of Siemens. In addition to sheltering people in his own compound, Mr. Rabe led a score of other foreigners in the city to form an international safety zone that shielded more than 200,000 Chinese from the Japanese.

Despite his heroism, Rabe was for decades all but forgotten here. Even the location of his house, today all but swallowed up by the sprawling campus of Nanjing University, was unknown.

But now, amid a political and intellectual cold war with Japan that revolves to a great extent around the history of China's conquest by its neighbor, this country is seizing on the memory of a man often called "the Good Nazi," and even China's Oskar Schindler.

Since the publication of Mr. Rabe's diary in 1997, his story has become a central theme in narratives of the Nanjing Massacre, much as the massacre story itself has become an important pillar in China's emerging new nationalism. In addition to the Rabe museum there is a new, minutely detailed 28-volume history of the massacre, and academics are rethinking the way the episode is taught in schools.

Why this sudden interest in an event that took place nearly 70 years ago? Historians cite two reasons: to refute Japanese denials and to encourage patriotism among Chinese youth.

"The Japanese right is becoming stronger and stronger, and they have denied causing the war in Asia," said Zhang Xianwen, the editor of the recently published history and director of the Center for the History of Republican China at Nanjing University. "We have decided to fight back and force Japan to admit its responsibility."

Yet seven decades after the event there is still serious academic dispute, even over something so fundamental as the death toll. Estimates range from a few tens of thousands to more than 300,000, the official Chinese number that is literally set in concrete above the entranceway to the expansive Nanjing Massacre memorial here.

China is by no means alone in this. In Japan, denial of the killings — once restricted to the far-right fringe — has entered the mainstream as the country's politics have shifted rightward. Today, in the face of the best evidence, many Japanese textbooks minimize the event, playing down suggestions of Japanese atrocities.

Experts say the fact that there were mass killings is beyond any reasonable dispute. "It was not until we toured the city that we learned the extent of the destruction," Mr. Rabe wrote on Dec. 13, 1937, just a day after Japan took control of the city. "The bodies of the civilians that I examined had bullet holes in their backs. These people had presumably been fleeing and were shot from behind."

His account is backed up by the few remaining survivors from his courtyard, like Mu Xifu and Li Shizhen, who fled there for shelter and married each other years later. "The Japanese were killing people and raping people," said Mr. Mu, who is 83. "You could see dead bodies in the river and all over the road."

But official records tend to be scarce or unreliable. During the war Japan rigorously counted its own dead but paid little attention to Chinese casualties. The defeated Japanese military also took care to burn its records in the city.

China's accounting of the incident has been consistently marred by politics.

During the war Nanjing was the capital of the Chinese Nationalist government of Chiang Kai-shek, which mounted a brief investigation after the Japanese defeat in 1945. From the time of the Communist takeover in 1949 until the early 1980's, when disputes over Japanese textbooks first arose, Chinese experts say there was no serious study of the massacre.

More curious still, there is no record to show that Mao, who died in 1976, ever spoke publicly about it. Save for a brief mention in a 1960 middle school textbook, the Nanjing Massacre was not featured in Chinese textbooks until the early 1980's. As recently as the early 1990's, historians and others who wanted to organize conferences about the event were barred from doing so.

The decades of silence were owing in part to the government's unwillingness to recognize the resistance that China's Nationalist armies put up against the Japanese. Although recently the Nationalists' role has been acknowledged more, official histories of the war have always credited Mao's Communist armies with defeating Japan.

There was also a deep sense of humiliation surrounding the fall of the city, in which scarcely trained Chinese conscripts stripped off their uniforms and fled the invading Japanese. "It is a natural Chinese character to be ashamed to speak of being raped, about being massacred while hardly resisting," said Shao Tzuping, a founder of the Alliance in Memory of the Nanjing Massacre, a private association.

In recent decades, partly in response to Japan, Beijing has itself looked toward nationalism as a spur to unity and a way to quell social troubles, especially in light of Marxism's fading relevance. "It was in the last 20 years, with the Japanese denials, that we found it essential to intensify our propaganda, to make sure that our people remember this better," said Zhang Lianhong, a historian at Nanjing University.

Such efforts mirror those of Japan's new rightists, who say their aim is to bring an end to what they call a masochistic style of teaching history and make young people feel proud to be Japanese.

"Both the Japanese and the Chinese have clung to a sense of victimhood: the Chinese for what happened during the war, the Japanese for what happened after," said David Askew, a professor of law at Ritsumeikan University in Japan. "They are not so much interested in Nanjing as their country's place in the world."

HYSIS Hoax, Update 2

One of the major role in the HYSIS Hoax 汉芯, or HYSIS Scam, Yan Xiaoqun 严晓浪 was further questioned on his ethics as the 863 project manager. This time it is related to an old high profile Chinese commercial spy case.

Zhong Ming and Ye Fei are both Chinese Americans. They were arrested by FBI in the San Francisco Airport before boarding to China in Nov 23, 2001. They were charged for commercial espionage. The buyer is a Hangzhou based company named Supervision Inc. At the time, Supervision was actively applying for 863 grant, which is managed by Yan himself. Supervision denied any relation to Zhong and Ye. However, it was uncovered that both Zhong and Ye were on the five person board of directors, which is chaired by Yan Xiaolang. Ye Fei and Zhong Ming were indicted for conspiracy to take trade secrets from four Silicon Valley companies to China on Dec 4, 2002.

In an interview with reporters, Yan Xiaolang said the 863 project had achieved great progress in the past five years, and that should not be negated by the HYSIS Scam.

A blog by a reporter Zuo Zhijian 左志坚 covering the HYSIS Hoax. The blog by his teammate Yang Linhua 杨琳桦.

HYSIS Hoax, HYSIS Hoax, Update

IQ in Different Fields

The number are converted from graduate students' general GRE scores. From Steve Hsu's blog:

The results are:

1. 130.0 Physics
   
2. 129.0 Mathematics
   
3. 128.5 Computer Science
   
4. 128.0 Economics
   
5. 127.5 Chemical engineering
   
6. 127.0 Material science
   
7. 126.0 Electrical engineering
   
8. 125.5 Mechanical engineering
   
9. 125.0 Philosophy
   
10. 124.0 Chemistry
    
11. 123.0 Earth sciences
    
12. 122.0 Industrial engineering
    
13. 122.0 Civil engineering
    
14. 121.5 Biology
    
15. 120.1 English/literature
    
16. 120.0 Religion/theology
    
17. 119.8 Political science
    
18. 119.7 History
    
19. 118.0 Art history
    
20. 117.7 Anthropology/archeology
    
21. 116.5 Architecture
    
22. 116.0 Business
    
23. 115.0 Sociology
    
24. 114.0 Psychology
    
25. 114.0 Medicine
    
26. 112.0 Communication
    
27. 109.0 Education
    
28. 106.0 Public administration

If you trust these numbers, one of the conclusions is that the economists are the brightest among the social scientists (rank 4) who are only followed by philosophers (rank 9). The philosophers are still brighter than political scientists (rank 17) who are smarter than the sociologists (rank 23). This list may confirm virtually all of your preconceptions about all these fields, at least it was my case. The only exception was medicine that I expected to appear in the upper half.

A Snail's Home

蜗牛的家                        A Snail's Home
 
作詞：鄭智化     作曲：鄭智化     Tune/Lyric: Zheng Zhihua


密密麻麻的高樓大廈 找不到我的家   Lost among the skyscrapers, where is my home
在人來人往的擁擠街道 浪跡天涯     Lost on the crowding street, flowing anywhere

我身上揹著重重的殼 努力往上爬     Climbing up, up, with my thick shell on my back
卻永永遠遠跟不上 飛漲 的房價      I shall never catch up the rising house price

給我一個小小的家 蝸牛的家         Let me own a tiny little home, a snail's home
能擋風遮雨的地方 不必太大         Just enough to hide from the weather, not too large

給我一個小小的家 蝸牛的家         Let me own a tiny little home, s snail's home
肯安撫疲憊的空間 不必害怕         A place to rest, where I can feel safe

給我一個小小的家 只是小小的家     Let me own a tiny little home, a tiny little home
一個屬於自己溫暖的 蝸牛的家       A cozy home of my own, a snail's home

Open Letter to Brother Tao

Xu Xiang is a Chinese journalist. He is credited for the exposure of a local government scandal on $5 million misuse of money allocated to poor people settlement after a irrigating project.

He published an open letter on his personal website to Brother Tao in Jan 11, 2006. In the letter, Mr Xu potraited a dark reality of today's Chinese military, and asked president Hu Jintao to responde swiftly.

The Seagull browsed Mr Xu's website, and determined that Mr. Xu was an examplary responsible Chinese journalist. The Seagull wishes Mr. Xu good luck!

History: People Eating Northern Minorities

304 A.D. to 439 A.D. It's one of the darkest time period in the history on the land of China. After the fell off of a weak Han empire Jin 晋, many minorities on the northern boundaries came down. This period is called Five Minority Messing China (无胡乱华). The five minorities are 匈奴民族、鲜卑民族、羯民族、氐民族、羌民族.

Governor of You Wang Jun 王浚 invited Murong Jiangbei 慕容鲜卑 to fight another warlord. Before Murong returned to his home in the north, he captured thousands of Han girls in additional to numerous treasure. These girls were consumed as food, and when the troop met Wang Jun at Yi River 易水, only eight thousands were left alive. Being a Han himself, Wang asked Murong to release the girls. Murong couldn't eat them all, but he also didn't want to set them free. He ordered to drown them in the Yi River.

Qiang 羯族 who set up the Zhao 后赵 Kingdom had Chinese women as their regular food. They never bothered for supplies in military actions, but always ate Han women they captured. They even gave them a name 'two feet sheep', which were used in the day for sexual satisfaction, and in the evening for the dinner. The crown prince Shi Sui 石邃 was a believer of Buddhism. He enjoyed most was to had sex with beautiful nuns, and then cook their meat with lamb and beef. When a Han general Ran Wen 冉闵 defeated Zhao, he liberated 200 thousands 'two-feet-sheep'. He let them go home. However, most of them did not have a home to go. About 70,000 decided that they wanted to stay with his troops in the capital city Ye 邺城. Later, Ran was defeated and Ye was surrounded by Xianbei troops, some of them were eaten by hungry city defenders, some again were taken as two-feet-sheep after the city were broken by Xianbei.

中國黑暗史, anonymous;
中國古代吃人肉之歷史, anonymous

Chinese Net Cops in Action

Chinese Net Cops responded promptly to an online animal abuse allegation, and successfully brought the suspects to justice. No, they are not part of the notorious Great FireWall, but some mobilized netizens who are enraged by the pictures recently posted online despicting a so called crush fetish on animals.

Crush fetish is originated in the western and Japan, but it found some Chinese followers recently. A netizen downloaded a piece of video clip accidently, and was disgusted by the contents. He posted some images captured from the video, and many fellow netizens were mobolized to identify the persons shown in the video, also the photographers and distributors.

The highheal lady and the photographer are from Luo County, Heilongjiang, and the website owner is from Hangzhou, Zhejiang. Both the lady, a nurse, and the photographer, a local TV station employee were suspended from work while the investigation is still in process.

Hood College selected a female King

Students of Hood College, a private liberal arts college in Frederick, Maryland voted a woman student to be the homecoming King. 21 years old lesbian Jennifer Jones beat three male nominees when elected by a vote of 64 out of 169 in February, 2006. According to UPI, Jennifer didn't even know she was nomited this time until she saw her name on the ballot. She did attempt for the prince year, but was turned down by a student review committee, even with enough supporting signatures.

Detailed reports: The News Journal, Frederick News-Post, The Washington Post