Gov. Blinky Ishihara wants to buy the Senkaku Rocks

[cstaylor]

I always find it funny when people deem assassination of a foreign dignitary supposed next in line for the throne of a major empire to be merely pocket change...

[1] Next in line to a dying empire. Could have been the perfect chance to cut it up and divide among the remaining family members if it wasn't just a pretext for war.
[2] Austria-Hungary could have done nothing on its own. It was the silly treaties and the elites that controlled the nations involved that led to war. Where cooler political heads should have prevailed, military leaders on both sides were so sure that they could overwhelm the other, why not settle it militarily?

I'd suggest reading this.

And your strawman argument is terrible.

[Yokohammer]

I'd suggest reading this.

Ooh ... The Guns of August.
Only JPY 761 from amazon.co.jp, and ordered!
Man, you are full of great book recommendations. Keep em coming.

Speaking of which, and slightly OT, have you read "Why Nations Fail" by Daron Acemoglu and James A. Robinson? It's on my pile, but I haven't managed to crack it yet.

[Coligny]

arf, give strawman a break, it wuz just derision...

[cstaylor]

Speaking of which, and slightly OT, have you read "Why Nations Fail" by Daron Acemoglu and James A. Robinson? It's on my pile, but I haven't managed to crack it yet.

No, I haven't read it, but I'll add it to my list. Right now I'm rereading "Team of Rivals" along with "The Fiery Trial".

[Coligny]

Meanwhile in Toyohashi...

51JK8HTZNFL._SL500_AA300_.jpg

[Yokohammer]

No, I haven't read it, but I'll add it to my list. Right now I'm rereading "Team of Rivals" along with "The Fiery Trial".

A Lincoln festival! Getting pretty specialized there.

Meanwhile in Toyohashi...

Good to see that you're keeping up with the most inspired French philosophy.

Shouldn't you be reading Michel de Montaigne or something like that? (Even I have his "Complete Works," Everyman's Library English edition, but I've only managed to wade through a very small portion of it.)

[Screwed-down Hairdo]

Meanwhile in Toyohashi...

51JK8HTZNFL._SL500_AA300_.jpg

You call Noddy Oui-oui? Tell me you're just taking the er...piss. Does he beat up the darkies in French, too? It's unfair the British hate Benny Hill but still love End Blyton. I loved Enid Blyton's Freudian stories with Dick and Fanny scaling the Faraway Tree's roots, the Saucepan Man banging away at Silky and Dame Washalot gushing over the children while everyone had a wonderfully gay time as Moonface beamed over them. Of course, Enid had some problems with her baddies always being wicked Golliwogs. Yet, she never failed to get a dick into every story.

[cstaylor]

A Lincoln festival! Getting pretty specialized there.

Lincoln handled squabbling subordinates effectively; it makes for inspired reading when you have employees.

[matsuki]

Meanwhile in Toyohashi...

51JK8HTZNFL._SL500_AA300_.jpg

You call Noddy Oui-oui?

Better than boob

[Screwed-down Hairdo]

A Lincoln festival! Getting pretty specialized there.

Lincoln handled squabbling subordinates effectively; it makes for inspired reading when you have employees.

Yes...he made them go out and shoot their brothers or other relatives. (Albeit, he did have the moral high ground.)

[Screwed-down Hairdo]

Apologies...double post

[Screwed-down Hairdo]

Meanwhile in Toyohashi...

51JK8HTZNFL._SL500_AA300_.jpg

You call Noddy Oui-oui?

Better than boob

True...if that's what boys in this cuntry think "boob" is, little wonder the population's declining...(Mind you, at least there's some substance in this boob compared to many of the other examples of boob I have seen among many of the native nymphs, so perhaps it's understandable.)

[cstaylor]

Yes...he made them go out and shoot their brothers or other relatives. (Albeit, he did have the moral high ground.)

Well, if he had had diggers to do the dying for them, he surely would have used them instead.

[Screwed-down Hairdo]

Yes...he made them go out and shoot their brothers or other relatives. (Albeit, he did have the moral high ground.)

Well, if he had had diggers to do the dying for them, he surely would have used them instead.

Wouldn't be the first to have used them for cannon fodder...

[Coligny]

The stupid keeps rising, Jackie Chan, now voicing on the matter:

“Vladivostok should also be returned to China, and the Northern Territories to Japan.”

Oh yes !!!

Please DO get Putin involved in this shit and tell us how it works for you...

[cstaylor]

The stupid keeps rising, Jackie Chan, now voicing on the matter:

“Vladivostok should also be returned to China, and the Northern Territories to Japan.”

Oh yes !!!

Please DO get Putin involved in this shit and tell us how it works for you...

Maybe it'll come down to hand-to-hand combat between Chan and Putin. Both are accomplished fighters.

[Screwed-down Hairdo]

Reminds me of Frankie Goes to Hollywood (the part where they got the world leaders fighting, not the bum sex song...)

[cstaylor]

Shamelessly copied from JapanProbe

Japan’s purchase of three of the Diaoyu (Senkaku) Islands has pushed anti-Japanese rhetoric in China to a fever pitch. Yesterday on Weibo, the Beijing Evening News posted a link to an article comparing weaponry for a potential with Japan, claiming that China should use the atomic bomb. Chatter mounted around this post before all mention of “advocating war” was deleted. (It is unclear whether Beijing Evening News or Sina deleted the material.)

Yes, I know it's not an official position, and the posts were deleted, but it is on their mind.

[Coligny]

Yeah yeah...

Margaret Thatcher forced François Mitterrand to give her the codes to disable Argentina's deadly French-made missiles during the Falklands war by threatening to launch a nuclear warhead against Buenos Aires, according to a book.

For these kind of conflicts, nukes are the best way to lose a war by winning it...

(plus... If you'd knew the number of times I threaten my cat to kill him everyday you'd put me in a padded cell prehemptively... Despite the fact that detterence is to be accomplished in the threat, not the execution...)

[Screwed-down Hairdo]

Yeah yeah...

Margaret Thatcher forced François Mitterrand to give her the codes to disable Argentina's deadly French-made missiles during the Falklands war by threatening to give him head in Buenos Aires, according to a book.

You misread it, you duffer.
She was talking about something much scarier than nukes...

[Yokohammer]

Nicholas Kristof (New York Times) chimes in, and the Consulate General of Japan in New York responds in the comments.

http://kristof.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/09/19/the-inconvenient-truth-behind-the-diaoyusenkaku-islands/

[Coligny]

Yeah yeah...

Margaret Thatcher forced François Mitterrand to give her the codes to disable Argentina's deadly French-made missiles during the Falklands war by threatening to give him head in Buenos Aires, according to a book.

You misread it, you duffer.
She was talking about something much scarier than nukes...

Thanks for the nightmares...

[yanpa]

I always though Mitterrand was hot for BBW German guys

mitterrand-kohl-hands.jpg

[yanpa]

Nicholas Kristof (New York Times) chimes in, and the Consulate General of Japan in New York responds in the comments.

http://kristof.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/09/19/the-inconvenient-truth-behind-the-diaoyusenkaku-islands/

Point of pedantry, the body of the article is by Han-Yi Shaw, "a Research Fellow at the Research Center for International Legal Studies, National Chengchi University, in Taipei, Taiwan."

[Coligny]

I always though Mitterrand was hot for BBW German guys

mitterrand-kohl-hands.jpg

He needed that to forget the two wives...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fran%C3%A7 ... d#Mazarine

[Yokohammer]

Nicholas Kristof (New York Times) chimes in, and the Consulate General of Japan in New York responds in the comments.

http://kristof.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/09/19/the-inconvenient-truth-behind-the-diaoyusenkaku-islands/

Point of pedantry, the body of the article is by Han-Yi Shaw, "a Research Fellow at the Research Center for International Legal Studies, National Chengchi University, in Taipei, Taiwan."

Uh ... yeah. I thought that'd be clear to anyone who read the piece.
If we're going to pick nits for the sake of people who aren't going to read it, it's Kristof's blog and the intro is by Kristof. Kristof is supporting Shaw's position by posting his article.

[Russell]

Nicholas Kristof (New York Times) chimes in, and the Consulate General of Japan in New York responds in the comments.

http://kristof.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/09/19/the-inconvenient-truth-behind-the-diaoyusenkaku-islands/

Point of pedantry, the body of the article is by Han-Yi Shaw, "a Research Fellow at the Research Center for International Legal Studies, National Chengchi University, in Taipei, Taiwan."

This article can be summed up as follows:

I’m Chinese and thus sympathetic to China’s position.

The arguments he used to claim the Senkakus as Chinese are based on events more than a century back. However, the islands have since been under Japanese administration (with an interlude by the US), and under International Law that is what counts. Fact is that a lot of international borders on this earth have been established through conflict, and if all countries would start making similar claims as China, it would become a hell of a mess. I do not even want to think of Europe. International Law is precisely the mechanism designed to prevent this.

Hell, if China's claim to the Senkakus is valid, than its claim to Vladivostok is just as valid. I quote from Wikipedia:

In Chinese, the city was known since the Qing Dynasty as Hǎishēnwǎi (海參崴, meaning "sea cucumber cliffs").

The territory on which modern Vladivostok is located had been part of many states, such as the Mohe, Bohai Kingdom, Goguryeo, Jīn Dynasty, Yuan Dynasty, and various other Korean and Chinese dynasties, before Russia acquired the entire Maritime Province and the island of Sakhalin by the Treaty of Beijing (1860). Qing China, which had just lost the Opium War with Britain, was unable to defend the region. The Pacific coast near Vladivostok was settled mainly by the Chinese and Manchus during the Qing Dynasty period.

So, Jackie Chan's claim (pointed out in Coligny's post) is not a surprise, really.

The problem in all this is China's very aggressive stance in territorial conflicts. It is summed up very well in this post by a Singaporean as so-called "tiong logics" (whatever that might mean):

tiong logics (these are literally applied by them and not colored by me). these are seen so often that the pattern is very clear one. to them, shifting goal post is considered flexibility and jin smart, and they are proud of that.

1. used to give tributes to china or once recognise china as a powerful state = once part of china = was part of china = is part of china = should be part of china = integral and inseparable part of China.

2. what was not part of china, but is now occupied by china = must be part of china.

3. what was part of china, but now not part of china = must be part of china

4. had chinese name = part of china

5. on chinese map = part of china

6. incorporated chinese culture = part of china

7. invaded china = part of china

8. once invaded by china = part of china

9. had a large chinese immigrant population = part of china OR should be loyal to motherland

10. for point 1-8, if it fulfil one of the point but none of the others, it is still part of china. for point 9, to be fair, it is not consistently applied by tiong.

11. all above are irrefutable facts and the truth, supported by international laws

12. people who disagree with above rules equal to
a) han jian
b) ang moh/korean/japanese who wanted china weak and fragmented
c) ungrateful singaporeans who didn't know (believe) history (china version) and all should be put down mercilessly, plus now someone even use WWII translator to describe that, despite of the WWII translator being pro-PRC

13. people who support the above and sounded like a tiong, but is actually singaporean, actually felt offended if u just ask if they are tiong. this make me confused cos they think sinkies are the same as tiong, yet they are different from tiong.

[yanpa]

Nicholas Kristof (New York Times) chimes in, and the Consulate General of Japan in New York responds in the comments.

http://kristof.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/09/19/the-inconvenient-truth-behind-the-diaoyusenkaku-islands/

Point of pedantry, the body of the article is by Han-Yi Shaw, "a Research Fellow at the Research Center for International Legal Studies, National Chengchi University, in Taipei, Taiwan."

Uh ... yeah. I thought that'd be clear to anyone who read the piece.
If we're going to pick nits for the sake of people who aren't going to read it, it's Kristof's blog and the intro is by Kristof. Kristof is supporting Shaw's position by posting his article.

Hmm, but it wasn't immediately clear when I read the article in the expectation of it being from author A, when most of it was from Author B. Mind you at the moment I have the attention span of an oh look butterfly what was I talking about?

[cstaylor]

If China's claim is approved by the international court, Spain and Mexico should apply as well.

[yanpa]

Here's a deal: China can have the Senkaku islets if they give Tibet back