Tag Archives: Xi Jinping

True to the old word

The ‘old’ saying is “Where are idiots grouped”, the answer is “Usually between Canada and Mexico”, I don’t completely agree as politicians are for the most to some degree a global problem. But you get the gist of the matter. It gets to be funnier as we look at the numbers on Fentanyl smuggling where 86.4% of the convictions are US citizens. Take that and the anger from Canadian people (regarding the 51st state) and we have ourselves a clambake. And that is getting more traction now. The setting has gone viral as many places (I am reluctant to hide behind the operative word ‘all’) have removed America booze from the shopping racks (example: LCBO). For others (Australia) it could be seen as good news as Bundaberg Rum might grace the stalls of these shops, UK already had their gin setting, but that could grow a lot more now that brands like American Gin are removed (sorry Mr. Reynolds) as well, and the removal of several Vodka brands will be good news for Sweden. The branding marks will currently see a shift in consumer ‘appreciation’ as over $20,000,000,000 is removed from America’s branding. I reckon that soon others will see places like Coca Cola will soon also have an impact. Then there is tourism, that ship still under investigation might also see impacts. I think that the numbers for the tourist operators (like Disney, Warner Brothers and Universal) might see a bad summer coming. I don’t think that they have a large dip as they were seemingly over capacitated, but there will be an impact. As such the estimated impact from Canada on Fentanyl is getting a weird impact. According to some, the In the first 10 months of 2024, the Canadian border service reported seizing 10.8lb (4.9kg) of fentanyl entering from the US, while US Border Patrol intercepted 32.1lb (14.6kg) of fentanyl coming from Canada. And if the NPR is to be believed that joke has a nasty sting as in 2024, only about 43 pounds of fentanyl was seized at America’s northern border. That compares with roughly 21,100 pounds seized at the southern border. So the difference of this implies that the 43 pounds of substance caught on the Canadian side amounts to a mere 0.002 of the actual problem and that is now costing America an additional $20B plus change and commission. So how does that go over with Wall Street? So in a short moment, Alcohol, Tourism and retail is impacted in America. If we can believe Doug Ford (Premier of Ontario) has given the headline ‘Ontario premier Doug Ford cancels $100-million Starlink contract’, it becomes a comedy should Huawei fill that gap. So how is that Trump ego going at present? As Canadian tourists generated $20.5 billion in spending and supported 140,000 American jobs last year. They could see an optional 40% drop at present, I personally believe that this could be as much as 60% in an area where spend was 20% down from pre-Covid settings. And others are taking notice Especially the UK, Australia and New Zealand. They might not amount to much, but they do have an impact. I for one had dreamt (I have silly dreams) of seeing Universal Orlando once, but at present I will chose Abu Dhabi over USA. Warner Brothers would still see my money, but where in America my contribution would be close to 100%, In Abu Dhabi they merely fetch 30% of my money and the rest is all for Miral Experiences L.L.C. As such I become an asset feed to Julien Kauffmann. And consider I am merely one person, now consider that 40% of the commonwealth sees this the same way? How much damage did President Trump do to his own economy? If he was the King of Australia I would advice the board of Governors in Australia to muzzle him. This typically refers to the Reserve Bank Board, which oversees the monetary policy of the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) and is made up of the Governor (currently Michele Bullock), Deputy Governor, and other appointed members. So, what did Wall Street duo to reign in this level of idiocy? (Just to coin a phrase). 

So, as we realize that over the course of Rome’s long history, taxation was frequently a source of outrage and grief. Indeed there is a basic lesson to be learned from Roman history, namely that people did not like paying taxes they found unjust. And this setting comes from 357AD. As such it is over 1700 years old. Even Julius Caesar, according to the historian Ammianus Marcellinus “declared that he would rather lose his life than allow it to be done. For he knew that the incurable wounds of such arrangements, or rather derangements had often driven provinces to extreme poverty.” So President Trump (and his advisors) had examples coming from history and now the stone is set and Beijing announced retaliatory tariffs of 10-15%, starting 10 February, on various US imports, including coal, crude oil and large cars. (Source: BBC) and that has larger repercussions. Huawei is sensing blood in the water and at present they are ‘arming’ their devices with Linux (I reckon for Europe and other places). People might not ‘go’ for HarmonyOS at present but they now have a foot in the door and with a linux setting they could get into the Commonwealth to a larger degree (Canada included) as America now has to prove that there is an actual danger (which they never did). And only yesterday ‘Huawei Unveils Latest Suite of Intelligent Campus Solutions to Accelerate Intelligent Campus 2.0 Development’ that is the business opening to more. By providing high-quality 10 Gbps network experiences, it accelerates the digital transformation of enterprises across various sectors. No American solution got this close before (only on leaflets as far as I could tell). So whilst Huawei was stated to look out for what was coming, they opened the door to a juicy steak for all the greed hungry entrepreneurs sailing the global waters and they will get their grain. With ‘Intelligent Stadium Solution: Redefining Sports Venues’ they stand to win the hearts over in Saudi Arabia and the UAE, including people in Glasgow (2026), 2027 Cricket World Cup (South Africa, Zimbabwe, and Namibia),  French Alps (2030), 2031 Cricket World Cup (India and Bangladesh) and Brisbane (2032). So when you add that up, how much of the world stage will Huawei capture? And China will be there to laugh out loud, especially as America NEVER showed any evidence and that has been voiced by Germany more than once. 

So how stupid was starting a trade war founded on tariffs and based on a ludicrous setting whilst Canada was a mere 0.002 of the actual problem? Oh, for desert we get the quote we were fed less than 10 minutes ago (source: USA Today) ‘Canadian province leader threatens to cut off energy to 3 US states, imposes 25% surcharge’ and I suggest that the MAGA fans in Michigan, Minnesota, and New York find a good hiding spot, because when that energy block comes through a lot of people will curse the day President Trump was reelected for some time. And then there is the energy coming at +25%, so how much energy does New York need?

Have a great day and happy trails to Bundaberg Rum as they now have an open door to an optional 40 million additional consumers.

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The writing is on the floor

Yes, it is the case here, never mind what the walls say. I have made mention of this again and again. The US had a piss poor approach to their innovation lack. First they tried to make Huawei their bitch and accuse Huawei of all sorts of things, whilst setting a backstabbing approach to remove Huawei from revenue streams. They did this in the worst possible way and they did it without any corroborating evidence. Then we get the setting that the media is painting China as the big evil. Yet America is not held to any standards. This is an issue for me and for most people relying on evidence. As such the article ‘Xi Jinping meets Henry Kissinger as US seeks to defrost China ties’ (at https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-66106076) comes over as hollow. In this the BBC has its own share of issues here too. As such when we see ‘US needs Kissinger’s diplomatic wisdom’ I would state “How about some simple wisdom?” Today Al Jazeera gives us ‘Australia blocks acquisition of lithium mine by China-linked firm’. I am not commenting on the events because I know too little, yet it is again some event involving China. Now, there might be all kinds of circumstances that could show it to be a valid block, but the fact that this started in January implies that a block this late has other attached reasons too. The issue is that the media is adhering to the US needs to paint China negatively in many ways and there is only s much you can get away with. At present Huawei is rocking the telecom industry all over Asia, the Middle East and soon enough Africa and Europe too. That will increase and accelerate with the release of 5.5G years ahead of Nokia and others, as such China, Asia and the Middle East are about to get a huge advantage. I reckon that the United Arab Emirates are about to become a larger technology hub in the Middle East and this one will stretch wherever the STC (Saudi Telecommunication Company) reaches. I reckon that before the end of 2025 it will connect Asia, the Middle East, parts of Africa and southern Europe making it pretty much the largest telecom company around. That was what I tried to warn you all for, it opens up all kinds of doors and with the release of 5.5G, my IP now has a shining new setting. One that the US and EU cannot match. They do not have the IP, they have shown consistent cluelessness and even Google and Amazon could fall short here. So what do you think all that will cost these players in revenue? So when I see ‘US seeks to defrost China ties’ I merely laugh. This was a joke and a mistake that was years in the making, now that the events are coming to a close (as the Conversation gives us) with ‘China is playing the long game in the Pacific. Here’s why its efforts are beginning to pay off’ (at https://theconversation.com/china-is-playing-the-long-game-in-the-pacific-heres-why-its-efforts-are-beginning-to-pay-off-209960) where we are given “Other appointments suggest China is appointing higher-calibre diplomats to the region. These include Li Ming, the current ambassador to the Solomon Islands, and Xue Bing, the former ambassador to Papua New Guinea who now holds the challenging post of special envoy to the Horn of Africa. With experience in the region and good language skills, these diplomats have been more able to engage with Pacific communities than their predecessors, who largely focused on sending good news back to Beijing. More serious representatives suggest more serious intent.” A setting I never saw (because I was looking elsewhere) and when you add this all up it becomes a much larger issue (especially for America). There are unconfirmed rumours that Saudi Arabia will join BRICS in August. There is every chance that the UAE will either join at the same time or shortly after. Now with China and Saudi Arabia (STC) having a united telecom front with 5.5G years ahead of all the other players, the setting for global telecom will shine well before the end of 2023. I made mention that I had found something in the last two days and here it is. It is not merely what they are doing. Players like Amazon and Google have the option to create service centres in the UAE (Dubai or Abu Dhabi) most likely and ride that tidal wave, or whomever gets there first will have the option to take market share away from these two players. Huawei is ready to start there, but they cannot do it alone, the waves will be too high. Google is already there (I checked), but unless they get the infrastructure ready others will pass them by left and right and there is the option for billions. Whomever is there first will be able to set the score, not adhere to it and that setting will go from Shanghai in the east to Croatia in the west all whilst these networks will include China, Bangla Dash, Indonesia, India, Pakistan, UAE, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, from there it all goes into Europe via TAWAL. A setting no telecom company has had to THAT degree and what do we get from Washington? ‘US seeks to defrost China ties’ I think it is a bit late or that and it is about to get worse, especially if the 5.5G is launched in Q4. Those ready to upgrade will show the rest what a massive lag in streaming technology looks like. It is like watching Wall Street people deal in stocks whilst having a system that is 3-4 milliseconds slower than the other system and it takes less than 50 trades to see a decent profit be reduced to a massive loss. I haven’t even taken the lack of labour force in the US at present, which makes their $42 billion overhaul plan an Edsel to say the least. All this was visible several days ago, but go right ahead, consider that China will defrost, they have been playing the long game and now that will turn into a near total victory. The setting I never clearly looked at was the pacific region, I saw the plans for Indonesia, but not the other parts and these are all about to come into focus. As I see it, by late 2024 Germany will chose solutions for their services and Huawei will have them, others do not. The moment that happens (I made mention of that before) France will adhere to the need of economic stability and that is where the EU either overturns the US directive, or be made (close to) obsolete. And all that happens whilst Tencent Technologies is about to launch a few products as well. My IP is in a different direction and I was (sort of) testing that premise beyond the Dubai Mall. I equally looked at the settings for the Mall of the Emirates, Nakheel Mall, tourist settings as well as the Real Estate setting which was a $20 billion market in the UAE (I did not initially know that), so I looked at my Canadian ‘solution’ to the UAE, and now we are vying for the big bucks (I am allowed to dream, am I not). Whatever YOU think, these elements are out in the open and some of them were out in the open since the first Covid lockdown (2020), so players like Amazon, Apple and Google had 3 years to wake up, as far as I can tell they never did.

So the writing was on the floor (the walls too) and these players were all watching the sky to see how their revenue streams were set up and doing. The media was full of it and with the shortage of people and pretty much dumping thousands of people, they had to look at the Middle East and see if these people would be willing to move to a new shore and that is where others will soon have a larger advantage. That I how I personally see it. 

You make your own conclusions, but take the time to go through all the sources, too many media is playing a catering game and they are not serving food. The day before the weekend is underway, enjoy it.

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By what evidence?

I had to stop and read an article on Business Insider (at https://www.businessinsider.com/saudi-crown-princes-china-deals-hint-city-darker-neom-mbs-2023-3) the headline ends with the ominous ‘His deals with China reveal a darker vision.’ I wonder where they get that from. You see the text “But analysts believe that Chinese tech could be used to place residents under total surveillance.” You see, the text sounds nice, but what evidence is there? Are these the same analysts that claimed that there were Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq? Are these the same analysts that dropped the ball again and again in the era 2017-2022? So when we are given “The crown prince has been strengthening his ties with China’s leader, Xi Jinping, who has agreed to provide powerful surveillance technology.” I wonder what evidence there is. China courted Saudi Arabia for a long time as there was billions in defence structures to be build and to be sold. Solutions that the US and UK sneered at, like the yapping chihuahua they deserted Saudi Arabia and now that America is almost done for, they are poisoning the well any way they can. We see the name Jili Bulelani and we see the word Harvard, but we see no real evidence. So when we are given “China has already provided surveillance technology for the creation of so-called “safe cities”, run on user data, in Egypt and Serbia, report by the Washington Institute think tank found.” The simple question becomes, what evidence do you have to show? It is nice that we see think tanks, but their revenue revolves around worst case scenarios and I see no evidence, none at all. Then we are given “Last December, MBS welcomed Xi to Saudi Arabia for a lavish summit, where the leaders announced cooperation across a broad range of issues, including surveillance tech.” That is actually correct, but the Chinese goals were loftier, they had the option to push America out of the defence business and the defence business involves surveillance and reconnaissance s well, so it is merely half a point and not in the right direction. Then we are given ““We’re not yet seeing quite the same degree of sort of physical surveillance [in Saudi Arabia] as we’ve been seeing in China, for example, but China is working with the Saudis and other Gulf countries to start to implement that,” Annelle Sheline, a researcher with the Quincy Institute in Washington, DC, told Insider.” In this what exactly is ‘not yet seeing quite the same degree’ that implies some degree, so where is THAT evidence? We see all these institutes vomiting statements like a cat eating citrus leaves and it goes nowhere. Then we get “Another potential concern is cloud technology, specifically the companies that store huge amounts of computer data. Chinese telecoms giant Huawei has already signed contracts with Saudi Arabia, including in NEOM, and James said there were huge questions about how much privacy protection the firm would provide users in the city.” Yes, Huawei was invited to roll out a complete 5G circus, especially after the US was stupid enough to make boasts, all whilst the Huawei was over 700% faster and stronger. I will include that chart below. It is a few year old, but that was the setting in 2020.

As such Huawei has proven themselves and at present the US and EU have never shown EVIDENCE that Huawei was spying on its consumers with their phones. Stronger, they don’t need to, the Pentagon will happily put TS information online to appease their own ego’s and that is nothing compared the the documents some leak to the press. China could merely slam an American ego and the information would come pouring out (no honeytrap required). 

As such we have an issue, it becomes worse when the Business Insider gives us “While casting himself as a reformer, Crown Prince Mohammed has dealt brutally with critics and opponents of the Saudi government, including the 2018 murder and dismemberment of Saudi dissident Jamal Khashoggi.” It is worse because there is no evidence that the Crown Prince was involved, more important there is no body as such no actual evidence of what happened to that columnist no one gives an eff… about. As one source gave someone I knew, he had a secret mistress age 19 and they are spending their lives on Bora Bora. That too is unconfirmed and therefor not reliable, just like that essay that the UN essay writer Eggy Calamari gave us. I punched several holes in that on February 27th 2021 in the article ‘That was easy!’ (At https://lawlordtobe.com/2021/02/27/that-was-easy/) as such the article in the Business Insider gets to get hurt as well, there were a few issues and perhaps their readers enjoy part of an incorrect story, but the short and sweet is that the US administration was willing to soil its ally Saudi Arabia, a powerful nation with lots of oil and trillions in real estate investments and now that China is eager to get that large slice of revenue, the US is looking at what is left, but there isn’t much left, there is just the 30 trillion in debt and little or no revenue and now that the Ukraine-Russian clambake is starting to bite, that revenue was imperative, but China is there now. Is it possible that the story is true? Well one part definitely is not, the rest requires EVIDENCE, evidence that we aren’t given and that remains an issue. I am a firm believer of evidence, so as I reject one side, I also reject the other side (Bora Bora) because the evidence is not there. 

As such Business Insider needs to reevaluate what they print and by what standards, and as I have stated before, the standards of the media is slipping by a lot and that is merely the last 3 years. I reckon that as the US grows desperate for more and more revenue that standard slips most likely even more, but that is a personal view I hold.

Have a great day, that day after the weekend. Happy Monday!

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The first coin drops

I have stated it a few times in the past. The US is basically bankrupt, it can merely feign activities and merely resort to financial pressures, as such the Canadian CBC gives us ‘After Biden and Xi speak, U.S. warns China could face sanctions if it aids Russian invasion’ (at https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/biden-xi-call-china-russia-invasion-ukraine-1.6390235), yes, yes, yes. We all heard it sanctions. It is what the opposing parties see and expect. You see a paper tiger only looks menacing to those who cannot see that it is merely only a paper one. So when we get “President Joe Biden warned Chinese leader Xi Jinping on Friday there would be “consequences” if Beijing gave material support to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine”, I wonder what President Biden expects to happen? I think that President Xi Jinping understands really well that the longer the Ukraine situation takes, the weaker the US looks, the less he gets involved the better China stands. If I were to move this into an old saying, for China it is better to watch the two junkyard dogs slug it out (US and Russia) and walk away with the bone when they are too tired to move. And there is a lot to be gotten. There are increasing indications that the US is done in the Middle East and when China gets their military contracts, when more Chinese firms get options towards building Neom, the US will have lost. In the Ukrainian setting, President Xi Jinping merely has to wait. The US royally screwed up too many options and they are now at the end of the options tether. In addition, with China winning options in Saudi Arabia, they will get a foot in the Egyptian door as well. A station that the EU feared for a while. Whilst they are shouting options and opportunities opposing the silk road. As the US goes, so does the EU, too deep in debt and no real options remain. For a quarter of a century they refused to overhaul the tax laws (both US and EU) and now the stage becomes too uncomfortable for both as you are about to find out. 

This takes us to the second article that the BBC gives us ‘War in Ukraine: America is learning the art of humility’ (at https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-60799659), well actually they haven’t. They shouted ‘Money talks, bullshit walks’ and now that stage is in play. The US basically shows that it cannot afford too much anymore. So now we get treated to “The US’s leverage over China is limited, and readouts from both sides suggest the call didn’t achieve much. But it was part of an orchestrated diplomatic strategy that contrasts with much of the first year of Joe Biden’s presidency.” There is a problem here. You see ‘Inaction through inability’ is different from ‘orchestrated inaction’, when a nation is unable to fund what is needed they will desperately look towards “This was genuine alliance building”, I personally believe it to be incorrect. You see, we were given all the actions of a nation who (sort of) bullies others into complacency, but the credit card is no longer working, the US method cannot be afforded and some administrations (read: CIA and NSA) have played the wrong Trump card and now credibility is in the basement. They pissed off France, Saudi Arabia, Germany and the UK (to some extent). So when we see “US diplomacy helped win German support” we merely get a partial story, we merely get half the teacup and not that much tea. The US will not be opposing any German needs in several places, they are now that much in a state of ‘inaction through inability’. Feel free to oppose this view and that is your right, but consider what the US has actually achieved since their departure from Afghanistan. That list is short. Very, very short. 

And you do not need to consider me the problem, the problem is out in the open. It is not really President Xi Jinping, it is the fact that he realises more than ever that he gets the shielded threats from a paper tiger and that makes him giggle (I expect that he is giggling). He knows he is about to win a global war without ever firing a bullet, China is showing orchestrated inaction (as I personally see it) and when the silk road comes to the doors and windows of Europe, they know they have won. The largest win will be a direct connection to Neom, which gives them a massive boost into Saudi Arabia and most of Africa as well. That is the point the EU and the US have lost and at present neither have any option to counter the engineering path China is on. So when President Xi Jinping stated “War is not in anyones interest” He was right, it slows down his Silk Road and that takes precedence for China, so their inactions are orchestrated and as the US (EU too) show inactions towards an active field in the Ukraine there are a few reasons, a full fletched war in Europe being one of them, but their inability to afford a war is another. If only that USS Zumwalt worked, it would be a great pressure point, but wait, it was a failure on many levels and now it is useless. The United States is losing options and Russia knows this, they are also learning (the hard way) that the Ukraine is more of a threat than the US has been in close to half a decade, so cheers all around.

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The seventh guest

Yes, it is a game, but this is not about gaming, it is the game we detest, but it is being played and we sit in the middle, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia sits in the middle and the Trump administration is uniting behind “the shooting down of a US drone could have been carried out by a “loose and stupid” Iranian officer without authorisation from Tehran“. So good morning it is Friday, no throw back Thursday for us, just the start of meaningless banter from the political isles.

To get to the 7th guest, you have to understand the content. It was a brilliant puzzle game released by Virgin in the 90’s. The story was over the top but cool, it was a journey to stay alive until the next morning. The house was filled with puzzles that needed to be solved to continue. It was a little more like an interactive movie (in those days). The first puzzle was to carve a cake in equal pieces, there were 6 guests to each person and the cake was 6 by 5 squares. Simple you think, but the clue was ‘2 skulls and 2 stones, the rest is just icing‘, and now cutting the cake was not as easy as initially seemed.

Now we get to the icing of Yesterday (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2019/06/20/the-ice-and-the-icing/) where I quoted in response: “It is seen when the most stupid of all actions is given with: “If Iran did breach the uranium limits, the deal, known as the joint comprehensive plan of action, gives both sides time to go into a disputes mechanism before it is declared void“, is it really that bad, after the ‘breach’ Europe still wants to talk?” It seems that boar mongering President Trump is now trying diplomacy, to not let things escalate too much. The biggest bully on the block is eager to not get into a fight, when did logic ever prevail?

So when we see: “We didn’t have a man or woman in the drone. It would have made a big, big difference,” Trump said. Asked how the US would respond, he said: “You’ll find out.”“, as well as ““I find it hard to believe it was intentional if you want to know the truth. I think it could have been somebody who was loose and stupid that did it

This is how Iran has ‘sanctified’ the weapon deployments to Hezbollah, is Mr. Bad Hair Cut really going to play the card that enables Iran? Apparently these $120,000,000 drones are well insured, or is he taking the loss out of his own pay check?

I can only wonder how the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia feels after the disappointing support that both the United Kingdom and United States are giving them at present. So as we see that the allies of Saudi Arabia are backing down when the drums of war are sounding with the increased cadence of (what they call) vigor by Iran, Saudi Arabia needs to reconsider who their real allies are. I am certain that Russia and China will use this opportunity that opened up, I just do not know how at present. In addition now that we know that President Trump is not about sticking to his guns, I wonder how long his own party will suffer the blunders he makes day after day, it will optionally be the first impeachment that gets full support from BOTH the Democrats and his own Republicans.

How to continue?

That is the larger question and I feel certain that this is on the mind of the ruler in Riyadh as well. Saudi Arabia must do what is best for Saudi Arabia, Israel needs to do what is best for Israel and so does Europe and the US, yet in this there is no real skin in the game for Europe and the US. Iran will strike at Israel and Saudi Arabia when it can and keeps the other two at bay with fear and both are now facilitating towards Iran through the fear of removing all diplomatic options.

CNBC gives us that a mere 5 hours ago with: ‘EU top diplomat says Europe will try to make sure ‘escalation is avoided’ between US, Iran‘, there is a time and place when avoiding escalation is the best of all options, I personally feel that it is way too late for that, again, the proxy war utilising the terrorist organisation Hezbollah is evidence of that. And the escalations are still going on, the strike a mere 12 hours ago as we are told (by Al Jazeera) that ‘Attack by rebel group on facility in southern province of Jizan the latest in string of attacks on Saudi targets‘ gives rise that Iran is actually still playing both an offensive game optionally with their offensive group Hezbollah and a defensive play where officers get a bonus and a promotion if they hit an American drone. Yet when we see: “The Houthis have stepped up missile and drone attacks in Saudi Arabia in recent weeks amid rising tensions throughout the Middle East fuelled by a bitter standoff between Iran and the United States” no one is asking how these drones are paid for, because Yemen is out of money and has no technological stage to make them. I wonder how to see the statement: “US, Iran and Saudi Arabia have all said they do not want a war to break out in the region“, in my view Iran is telling any story that the others are willing to swallow, America is broke and Saudi Arabia has no real allies to rely on, the weapon case in the UK and the US president doing a 180 degree direction on previous statements, It puts Saudi Arabia in a poor place, that is unless Germany and China get out of the dug-out and properly give support to Saudi Arabia.

I don’t get it, what purpose is served to cater to the needs of a child called Iran to this degree? I stare at the maps and I look at the places being hit, and to be honest, for the life of me, I do not understand how Saudi Arabia is able to keep calm at present, the moment highway 30 is hit in multiple places, the direct threat to Riyadh will be visible and all options will be taken off the table and I fear that this is sooner than we think, giving Iran more time to use the misdirection to finalise their Uranium requirements. At that point WW3 is almost the only step left to us, there is no way that Saudi Arabia and Israel will accept such a threat.

Yet there is an upside, with 5-9 million dead Iranians, the carbon footprint goes down a little, a small victory for the environment, you see, give me a lemon, some water and I will sell you a melon juice smoothie.

If that is what is required to play the game, I am in!

I will end this part with a personal message to Chinese President Xi Jinping (and to Chen Wenqing: ‘No, I am not trying to corrupt him with western ideology‘).

Dear Sir,

I would like to discuss the purchase of 20-30 Chengdu J-20 fighters. In light of both a first order discount, as well as a student discount (we are all students on the path of life), I believe that should the talks be successful, that 20-30 planes at a unit cost of $27.35 million (with rebates, discounts and commission applied), in addition the 2 years of full service with no regards to hours flown, mileage traveled or missiles fired. This is based on 2016 flyaway cost. The benefit is that these fighters will be directly engaging Iranian forces and as such you will have access to a massive amount of data enabling you to start on the 6th generation fighter, optionally making you the first country to have one. We would also be interested in the testing of the Xian H-20 prototype that is now nearing completion. If the specs are as they are claiming to be, it will help us in removing morale from Tehran and from the IRGC as a whole. In this the unofficial word is that the sky is the limit as regarding to the price of this place (my 2.17% commission still applies). My client is ready to upgrade several army based parts (both light and heavy guns), however I hope that this part can be tabled until Iran decides to attack directly, at which point Saudi Arabian boots on Iranian ground becomes a direct first.

Kindest regards,

Lawrence van Rijn

I look forward to a mutually fruitful support towards presenting the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia a proper defense option that will result towards strength and stability in the Middle East region, under the guiding lights of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

That was not hard was it?

So in one strike the BAE loses 2 years of commerce, but the British anti-weapon league is happy, the UK loses well over $4 billion in business opportunity in the long term but you can get the green party to sell grass to a place called whatevernation, can’t you? The US loses its arms options overnight and enables China to economically grow 9%-12%, and as other options fall away for Europe and the US to a much larger degree, Russia will be ever ready to pick up a few scraps in the process.

It was a really simple equation and by choosing the facilitating side of a route that goes nowhere, other options came out to play. Let’s be honest, in light of what has happened, does the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia have any cause to trust the US or Europe in any of this at present?

In the end the 7th guest was about another person in the house (hint) that only showed 6, it makes the game decently apt to the situation the Middle East faces at present. The question is that when that puzzle is solved, will some of the political voices in Iran, Europe, America, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon and Yemen stay in denial?

 

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That crazy thought

Crazy thoughts, we all have them at times, we all think them, we all wonder the ‘What if’ question whether it is valid or not. So when the news hit, among them the line ‘The $6 trillion wipeout in Asian stocks is getting deeper‘ (source: Sydney Morning Herald). I was not contemplating the quote: “Just like that, the region’s equity benchmark erased weekly gains and is now heading for a sixth slide in seven weeks, only worsening the wipeout that already erased $US4.3 trillion ($5.95 trillion) of market value this year“. So there I was looking at that quote, as well as the quote “One thing that might be worth keeping an eye on is data around China’s consumption — car sales fell for a fifth month and and Ctrip.com International joined the likes of Baidu and Alibaba Group Holding in being unable to avoid the economic slowdown. Also throwing cold water on the recovery is the US dollar, which resumed its appreciation as the Federal Reserve signaled it’s still ready to increase rates in December. The strong greenback has been a key concern for investors in the region, as its weakened local currencies and triggered massive outflows from emerging-market assets“. You see, I believe that none of this matters, the excuses like ‘consumer prices steadied amid sluggish demand‘. I went into the ‘What if this was always meant to happen?‘ mode. It is my personal belief that we have been sitting still whilst analysts have been inflating prognoses of economy, whilst they were all humming; it is a bright and sunny day, whilst it was not. We get excited when USA Today gave us ‘Economy adds robust 250,000 jobs in October in last employment report before election‘ on November 2nd. Yet this is news that was merely overdue and way too late. The world has been at a stand still for the longest of times. Millions of US citizens are still overcoming a decade of hardship, many of them lost the bulk of their retirement funds and it will take half a decade of really good news to turn this around. Too many have felt the pain and it is the same all over Asia. We might see news last month with ‘India adds 7,300 new millionaires’ thinking that hard times are over, yet this merely shows the stage where 7,300 clever Indians are getting other Indians doing their bidding, the millions behind those 7,300 people are not in a much better place, they have not been for the longest of times. Those 7,300 will be the foundation of a dozen or perhaps two dozen billionaire over time, yet like in any pyramid scheme, the profits go upwards, the foundation of that pyramid will not see a dime of that and we forget about that unbalanced setting. So as we are all in a stage of happy happy joy joy, the market is relentless in too much upbeat procrastinated prognoses and the market will seek equilibrium. No matter what excuse we see, what term we give to oil, what term we give to car users. The foundation is that every sold car is linked to a person buying it and from the current stage less than 25,000 were able to afford a new car, because the normal monthly expenses remain the same or go up, they never go down. So when we see ‘car sales fell for a fifth month‘, it makes perfect sense, you can up production all you like, yet when the people cannot afford to buy one, making more really makes no sense. That stage is clearly seen in Asia and Europe, in addition, the people in the US don’t have that much extra to spend, even with the new job, their living expenses had been through the roof for 2-3 years and they build either a buffer or go hungry and become homeless.

It all gets to have a hilarious side when you consider the Wall Street Journal (at https://www.wsj.com/articles/peter-navarro-blasts-china-and-wall-street-globalists-1541787254). We see “President Trump’s senior trade adviser, Peter Navarro, excoriated China and attacked Goldman Sachs and Wall Street as Beijing’s “unpaid foreign agents” who are weakening the U.S. leader before his meeting this month with China’s president“. It seems to me that Peter Navarro does not comprehend Goldman Sachs or Wall Street, so as an Australian I feel it is my duty (my entertaining duty mind you) to explain that part in a plain manner. ‘Mr Navarro, these two players Wall Street and Goldman Sachs do not give a fuck about you or your president, they never did! They only care about their bottom line, the annual growth, the profits they do make and their bonuses. It is that plain, and simple enough the board of directors in these two places care exponentially more about their bonus, nothing else matters!‘ I do hope that Peter Navarro comprehends that part, because it has never been different. The American people were sold down the drain in an instant in 2004 and 2008 and those people will do that again and again. It is not rocket science; it is transparent and extremely predictable. So when I see “As a summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping looms at the Group of 20 meeting in Buenos Aires, the economic council is coordinating what kind of trade deal the U.S. might accept from China. It is focusing on intellectual property, agricultural tariffs, forced technology transfer and requirements that U.S. firms form joint ventures to operate in China“, I see no mystery, I see no questions. It is merely the execution of the operational merit that profit brings to these 20 players that is on the table and the US is weaker than it has been ever before. A lot of the IP is not in American hands, the ones that matter are in the hands of IBM, Google and Intel and the US administrations have been able to piss all three off in more than one way, so good luck there. In addition, if the US exercises some ownership need, we will see both IBM and Google moving their IP all over the place making matters for the US worse.

Oh and this was all before we see the current US president in a stage where we see: “France on Saturday attempted to defuse a row sparked by President Emmanuel Macron’s comments about a European army which angered US President Donald Trump“, we can consider that passing of the few allies left is not really a good thing, is it? Especially in light where Marine Le Pen is currently more popular than Emmanuel Macron is the upcoming EU elections. The advantage is only one percent, yet we also see: “Far-right parties, including those supporting a French exit from the EU, secured a combined 30 percent of support“, that is way more than most EU nations are currently willing to be comfortable with. The fact that President Macron has agreed with Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte to a union of En Marche, Dutch Liberals and Democrats is optionally one that could backfire in France to some degree and if Le Pen gets to the 40% mark a stage of Wall Street panic would be the consequence making the markets slip even further getting the overall losses to surpass eight trillion before the year ends. This stage becomes an even larger US nightmare as Matteo Salvini enters the stage, and he is siding largely with Marine Le Pen in all this, most likely purely for his own interests as would be expected in Lego Politics, but the impact is still there. This all impacts to a much larger degree as Italy has stated less than a day ago that they will not adjust the Italian budget which now puts the ECB and the EU in a much darker light, this budget could optionally impact the stage in a few European ways and the other nations will be reminded of the Greek tragedy when it overstated what they did not have, whilst we now see Italy not acknowledging the things they do not have, with a similar impact to several EU nations, the consequences could propel out of control and that too will impact greed driven Wall Street. This means that President Trump is going into a G20 meeting with three sets of balls and chains on their ankles, whilst China gets to point out these six balls and chains and remind him that this is partially all his doing (whether that is true or not).

So in the end, he sits in a meeting with little to use, nothing to go by and all merely because the previous 4 administrations all left control of the wealth reigns with Wall Street themselves, how was that ever going to work?

So that crazy thought is now going into the direction: ‘What if we remove the reigns of wall Street?‘ Would that be the craziest idea? In the end it is not going to happen, yet a first step is not the weirdest idea. It is time to take a very close look at those Wall Street analysts and their exectations, even if they ever correctly solve their rounding problem, the people still end up being confronted with a (what I personally would speculatively call) a 1.13% offset from any norm and that made all the differences for well over 12% of the companies ‘underperforming’ in the eyes of Wall Street. When we consider going back in time to 1874 when French economist Léon Walras decided to give ‘Elements of Pure Economics‘, he failed (as these settings did not exist) to give two elements a much larger consideration. The first is ‘behaviour of supply and demand‘, whilst not realising that governments have a required supply and demand and the corporations have a forecasted supply for the expected demand of an international community, which is weighted and rounded upwards sinking the notion of science towards anticipated presentations. So there we see three sets of numbers, all weighted and only after the fact shown as ‘due to unexpected factors‘ graded downwards after the fact giving us a few headaches all at the same time.

So as we see ‘adjusted’, ‘evolved’ and ‘expert driven’ algorithms towards forecasting the fact that there was something wrong with the formula’s in the first p[lace is not set into the stage of punitive prosecution ever. Meaning that these wipe-outs will happen again and again and the next time it hits a group of people that will revolt violently for being presented the invoice that others should have paid for, a stage that is unseen as many are in denial and often merely wiping the consideration away as non-relevant and unimportant. And the idea is not unique, my thoughts, my very own thoughts were proven correctly in 2013 by former Wall Street analyst Yves Smith in her book ‘ECONned‘ and she is not the only one, yet in the 5 years that followed, after all the evidence shown in several ways, the US Administration decided not to act, decided not to take control of the situation, even largely diffusing the danger was beyond them and now we see the stage where we see ‘weakening the U.S. leader before his meeting this month‘, in my personal view Peter Navarro needs to wake up and smell the coffee. He comes from an environment that did nothing for too long.

How crazy was that thought?

 

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The FX slogan in action

I always loved the FX slogan, it is true, and it is at the centre of entertainment. Yet is it at the centre of viable analytics? Is a result merely presented as an anecdote more acceptable? We seem to lack the ability to take a step back and look at it in a clinical setting, because it is not always about the mere setting.

A scientist will show you how expensive progress exactly is.
A diplomat makes you look forward to the invoice attached to it.

This is a setting that we seem to laugh at. Now take this in a very different direction: ‘A person who is 30% white is still 70% guilty‘. You are not laughing now are you? Take this to the next level with KTVU naming the crew of a plane crash (at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gpP2S6c74Ts), still having fun? The people connected to Asiana Flight 214 are not, I am certain of that. So when we see this, where do we go? Well we need to take a short pit stop when we address something that I have seen in my surrounding. The practice is not wrong, it can be loaded and it can blow up in your face if you do it wrong.

To get this we need to look at 2009, when Google’s Chief Economist Dr. Hal R. Varian told the audience: “The ability to take data—to be able to understand it, to process it, to extract value from it, to visualize it, to communicate it—that’s going to be a hugely important skill in the next decades“, this is true, it has been true for decades. So as data becomes is found everywhere it becomes the setting of an almost opposition. To get data from almost common sense (where everyone seemingly gets it, to a stage that the presentation of numbers, with a story, almost any story that fits we get to see that companies are desperately searching for talent with data skills and they make it worse by trying to find people who can tell a story. Yet where is the story the value? Is that because it is more believable, or because it fits the moment? Yet that danger is now growing as well. You see each quarter the story needs to be amended and builds upon the previous story and investors have a much better memory than some realise. This is where Forbes gets us with “Interestingly, much of the current hiring emphasis has centered on the data preparation and analysis skills—not the “last mile” skills that help convert insights into actions. Many of the heavily-recruited individuals with advanced degrees in economics, mathematics, or statistics struggle with communicating their insights to others effectively—essentially, telling the story of their numbers.” I am not sure that this is a correct path. Instead of focussing on the communication skill, we are given data presentations by Mother Goose and Mr Grimm and in all that, will we get the story that is told correctly? I have prepared dashboards and data reports for decades. I have seen how some jumps were made on the assumption of one result, whilst the data was not supporting it, or it was, yet only after targeted weighting? In that we get the story that is a partial truth, yet it is in that same instant a partial lie too and that part will no longer get the proper scrutiny that is required.

So now we get to the good stuff. Now we get to the Guardian that treated us to: ‘China planted chips in Apple and Amazon servers, report claims‘ (at https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/oct/04/china-planted-chips-on-apple-and-amazon-servers-report-claims). Is it possible? Yes it is, yet the numbers and the speculative sides in all this is a larger problem, or better stated it is a large issue in a much larger universe and we are merely shown the keyhole view with the audio of two moaning people. Yet whether they are having sex or are pushing the bed around cannot be stated as we merely see a wall and part of a piece of furniture and we go by the sounds we hear. So when we consider that the corn borer can make the identical sound of a bat, so much so that the female corn borer moths cannot distinguish between the sound of a real bat and the sound of a male moth imitating a bat. Which quite literally gets her screwed, it’s merely how he gets lucky.

This now relates to the article, where we see: “A Chinese military unit has been inserting tiny microchips into computer servers used by companies including Apple and Amazon that give China unprecedented backdoor access to computers and data, according to a new Bloomberg report“, yet when we are also told “The attack was reportedly discovered in 2015 by the US intelligence services, as well as by Apple and Amazon as the companies purchased servers made by Super Micro Computer“, yet companies stay in the dark on this? So first it is Russia, now it is China? Consider the next quote “Amazon, Apple and Super Micro have all denied Bloomberg’s report. Amazon said: “It’s untrue that AWS knew about a supply chain compromise, an issue with malicious chips, or hardware modifications when acquiring Elemental.

Furthermore, we see both “As we shared with Bloomberg BusinessWeek multiple times over the last couple months, at no time, past or present, have we ever found any issues relating to modified hardware or malicious chips in SuperMicro motherboards in any Elemental or Amazon systems“, as well as “Apple said: “On this we can be very clear: Apple has never found malicious chips, ‘hardware manipulations’ or vulnerabilities purposely planted in any server.“. Is this an issue about what exactly?

This we see in the consideration of: “There have been increased concerns about foreign intelligence agencies infiltrating US and other companies via so-called “supply chain attacks”“. This is not unique. The American nagging and the nagging by its bitches (aka Australian Intelligence) is becoming a much larger setting as to the stage on where economic prosperity goes to. This is as I personally see it, the setting of a stage on where outsourcing goes to. This seems to be much more realistic and much more believable. You see, if there was truth in the Bloomberg part, if there was the real setting of “Apple had reportedly bought around 7,000 Super Micro servers when its security teams discovered the chips“, in that setting 7,000 server boards would have been shown to the world, it would have changed everything, places like Stanford, Harvard, Cambridge, Oxford and UTS (which has Apple co-founder Steve “Woz” Wozniak as a professor). They would be showing you the high and low of it all, yet that did not happen did it? So when we are seeing “Technology shares in Hong Kong fell sharply on Friday led by Lenovo, which lost 23% in morning trade. The Hong Kong-listed shares of Chinese telecommunications equipment maker ZTE Corp lost more than 14%“, which is interesting as ZTE was a thorn in the 5G side of the US and a few other players (like Telstra for example) for a much longer time, so is that a mere coincidence? What story telling sides are we not exposed to?

However, this is not the end. It is important to look at Bloomberg, because Bloomberg is not really the ‘storyteller’ of the century. We get introduced (at https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2018-10-04/the-big-hack-how-china-used-a-tiny-chip-to-infiltrate-america-s-top-companies) to the quotes “In late spring of 2015, Elemental’s staff boxed up several servers and sent them to Ontario, Canada, for the third-party security company to test, the person says“, as well as “Nested on the servers’ motherboards, the testers found a tiny microchip, not much bigger than a grain of rice, that wasn’t part of the boards’ original design“, which also gets us: “During the ensuing top-secret probe, which remains open more than three years later, investigators determined that the chips allowed the attackers to create a stealth doorway into any network that included the altered machines“. This is a much more frightening setting, yet why was this kept in the dark for so long? Not because of any matter that can be attributed to common sense. You see, I find “Still, to actually accomplish a seeding attack would mean developing a deep understanding of a product’s design, manipulating components at the factory, and ensuring that the doctored devices made it through the global logistics chain to the desired location—a feat akin to throwing a stick in the Yangtze River upstream from Shanghai and ensuring that it washes ashore in Seattle” an acceptable tactic, yet it opens the door on multiple places, places that are implied but not shown into the limelight. The first and perhaps the most visible one is: ‘timeline to design a chip‘. If that is so small, how can we be certain that the CIA did not do this to every Apple and IBM device ahead of fabrication? So when we get to “But that’s just what U.S. investigators found: The chips had been inserted during the manufacturing process, two officials say, by operatives from a unit of the People’s Liberation Army“, why them? Why not the Ministry of State Security? When we look in those directions, I personally find Chen Wenqing has a much more deceptive look then Xi Jinping. For either, funding would never have been the issue. And in the end Bloomberg gives us: “Three senior insiders at Apple say that in the summer of 2015, it, too, found malicious chips on Supermicro motherboards. Apple severed ties with Supermicro the following year, for what it described as unrelated reasons“. So yes, Bloomberg is raising questions, questions on where we need to consider ourselves in regards to China, an issue not properly raised by the Guardian this time around. Yet in both cases we end up with questions. We know that 5G will be a multi trillion industry and the US is desperate to melt the cogs of Chinese industry here, they have a backlog that is too large, there is at present no chance that the US, or Europe could catch up with China. The Chinese focus had been on 5G for too long, production is nowhere near it needs to be to go up against China. Yet this story, this event 3 years old and never in the limelight until now, that is impacting Lenovo and ZTE, so one of the 5G drivers is now as they call it: ‘In the shits‘, a 14% loss is nothing to get sneered at. And this optionally links back to the accusations against China in 5G, yet they are all still stories. The evidence was never handed into the limelight, and it also squarely lands the entire matter into the pond of former President Barack Obama, who still wanted to get trade deals going at that stage, so the Democratic party is going to get pushed into this mud pool sooner rather than later, because corporations at a global scale will feel betrayed in this mess. It gets fuelled more when we go back to September 2015, after this mess started and the people (via Reuters) get treated to: “President Barack Obama announced on Friday that he had reached a “common understanding” with Chinese President Xi Jinping on curbing economic cyber espionage, but threatened to impose U.S. sanctions on Chinese hackers who persist with cybercrimes.” So, did it happen? Was the story on the servers a ruse? Seems interesting that when placed in the proper timeline, against other news, we see a different setting do we not?

That is the stage we see when we add an element, any linked element to the story, it changes the preface of it and it changes the conclusions of it all. Any story with incomplete data is not a story, it degrades into a fairy tale, and both Mother Goose and Jacob Grimm both had their end of the spectrum when we watched their stories unfold. So where do the Guardian and Bloomberg stand? They go with sources that gave them news, yet when those sources cooperate in getting a particular story told, where do we get to stand, being told a story?

The server boards are evidence, yet where are they? If it is in 7000 server boards, there should be plenty to go around and show the world what was going on, but that did not happen, did it? So even as we were made aware a mere 5 hours ago of: “Huawei is trying to convince the U.S. government that Trump’s trade wars with China might slow down 5G adoption on American soil“, we now see that this is exactly what the US needed, time to catch up, or at least get a bigger slice of the 5G pie chart. You see a nation that is to be regarded as bankrupt cannot rely on importing goods; it needs US based goods to use a circle of non-cycled currency to keep its government running. And the 5G wave will go on for some time, the more time they get, the longer they can negate their official moment of being bankrupt. I am not the only one with that view, the same view is given (with a better economic handling) by Economist Laurence Kotlikoff who gives us: “While the United States’ official debt is $20 trillion, the fiscal gap is really 10 times larger — $200 trillion. That comes from adding in off-the-book liabilities, including debt that’s in the Federal Reserve’s hands, Kotlikoff said“, who also gives us: ““The evidence is in front of our eyes that we’re bankrupt,” Kotlikoff said. “It’s not bankrupt in the future. It’s bankrupt right now.”” A stage that I had mentioned three years ago, it might have been 4 years ago. I mentioned the settings and the consequences and I only needed an abacus to get there, but according to all the newspapers, I was wrong. Now we see more storytelling games and more pushes by large corporations to keep the current machine switches on, because once it is switched off, it ends for them, they will have no options and the markets will collapse soon thereafter wiping ours (and partially their) retirements away. That is the realism of our day and age and it is a story that I am telling, just like the others. I merely believe that I have seen more data, more complete data and I see the interactions on a wider scale. From that assumption my story is (seemingly) better, truer and more believable, is that the case, is it that for you?

You see, that is the danger with stories, it all hangs on the evidence that we are given and for the longest of times, the supporting evidence has been lacking, or basically completely absent on their side of the discussion. When we watch the Grimm in the TV Series Nick Burkhardt we accept it, because it is entertainment, and when the Grimm kills the Hundjägers, we know it is fabrication, entertaining fabrication mind you. Yet when we see the mention of Lenovo and ZTE, when we realise that 128,000 people are now in a state with an endangered job, families in danger of social security, as well as the impact on a larger scale, are we happy with the tale when it is the story and the non-shown evidence that is the matter. The fact that more parties are in denial is also an issue, but that could be for a whole host of reasons. It is the lack of evidence that is open for scrutiny that becomes the larger issue and that is an issue, it is an issue in every story, so whilst I embrace the FX slogan: ‘the story is everything‘ it is the lack of supported reality that makes it an issue in business intelligence and actual intelligence analyses. A setting that was 3 years in the open and we only get it partially served now, now that the need of America is becoming more and more dire.

The math does not add up and that has a much larger setting in all this than most are willing to admit to at present.

 

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