ARTICLE 1
Dialects dampened among young Chinese – Updated: 2012-03-22 21:39 (chinadaily.com.cn)
An Internet survey among more than one thousand people shows that fewer Chinese speak dialects, China Youth Daily reported Thursday.
The joint investigation, conducted by major portal sina.com and china.com.cn among 1,045 Internet users, showed that 39 percent of people said they often use dialects, whereas 10 percent of them never use or could not speak dialects at all.
Qian Nairong, a professor at the College of Liberal Arts at Shanghai University, said the Shanghai dialect may not last long as many young people born after 1985 cannot speak the language.
“Many people use dialects to contrast with mandarin, which is required and popularized in primary and middle schools in some urban areas,” Qian said.
As many as 64 percent of the interviewees said they avoid speaking dialects due to their “rustic pronunciation”, according to the survey.
Some experts are calling for the preservation of dialects along with the spread of mandarin.
Dialects have a large amount of vocabulary and vivid descriptions of life, said Qian.
“Many local operas may also die out as they are developed from dialects,” Ding Chongming, a professor with the College of Chinese Language and Culture of Beijing Normal University said.
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Dialects should be protected and retained as a form of coded communication for locals that do not travel much that can be used to protect local interests with. Multiple dialect studies required for promotions to higher levels of office. I.e. a PM of a country should have knowledge of all dialects. A governor should have knowledge of all local dialects around his own province. At the same time, the national language should ONLY be used for general conversations, with the ‘already dead’ dialects to be used as coded languages for perhaps espionage duties or giving of military orders or such. The neurotech issue could render NLP sabotage via KNOWN languages and in this, Mandarin has already been ‘breached’ for all purposes of keeping issues secret.
At the same time, avoid or instruct producers and directors to avoid use of dialects in or poorly scripted movies or idiotic dramas as this is probably a foreign method to cause young people to turn their backs for a supposedly more ‘formal’ language like ‘English’. Again the insular classes as in the past should NEVER learn external languages and hire LOCAL translators for travel purposes if needed. Finally do not abuse non-users of own dialects or outsiders foreign or Chinese, even within China, as that dialect will have another opponent as well as the local community being considered rude. Lower tier areas of course are inhabited by coarser people and in general a map of areas considered socially unsuitable for foreigners and even locals could be developed and updated by Courtesy Auditors who could travel about and rate the locals in any given area. A culture of politeness borne of a desire to not be marked as a tourism or even local tourism unsuitable area could drive a society to be better.
ARTICLE 2
2 dead, 2 missing in yacht accident in E China Updated: 2012-04-04 21:05 (Xinhua)
SHANGHAI – Two people were killed and another two missing when their yacht hit the cable of a cargo ship in East China’s Jiangsu province on Wednesday, local maritime officials said.
Eight people, including six students of Shanghai Jiaotong University, a tour guide and a boat driver, were aboard when the accident happened at around 1 pm in Taihu lake in the city of Suzhou, the municipal maritime officials said.
One college student and the tour guide died after treatment failed in hospital. Four others were treated in hospital. Two students were missing,they said.
Search for the missing students in under way.
Wednesday is the Qingming Festival, or Tomb-sweeping Day, and the last day of the three-day national holiday.
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Try a line of Oil Rig form platform homes (at 10km intervals perhaps?) for any who want to live an pelagic simulating lifestyle (without oil drill equipment) at the limits of China’s EEZ.
Maybe at every 100km interval, a customs point with helipads, airstrips, hotels or series or individual homes perhaps, military outpost base and warehouse-port facility, could also be placed. This way the limits of China’s territory will be very clearly marked. China can afford to do this. Since China has 20,000k worth of coast, this would mean 2000 projects or private luxury homes, much like or fashioned in the manner (excepting that there will be ocean around the tower instead) of :
http://www.igougo.com/review-r1272276-Broadway_Tower.html
A private maritime tower should be quite pleasant a get away to own and could be marketted to China’s billionaires to fund. A Oceanic Great Wall if you will.
Try the below link :
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=29595494968&v=app_2373072738
ARTICLE 3
What does China’s Wen mean when he says break bank monopoly? – April 04, 2012
BEIJING, April 4 — When Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao talks about busting a bank monopoly, he may be thinking of modest financial reforms, not a dismantling of the Big Four state-owned banks.
His comments on Tuesday were blunt: the big banks reap profits “far too easily” and operate like a monopoly that needs to be broken in order to speed the flow of money to loan-hungry smaller businesses.
Reuters contacted five of China’s largest banks to see how Wen’s remarks were received. There was little concern that a major policy shift was imminent, especially when the Communist Party is only months away from a once-a-decade power handover, which includes replacing Wen.
“Wen has one year left (in his term),” said a Chinese state banker who asked not to be identified because of the sensitivity of the topic. “This is a task for the next generation of leaders. It cannot be accomplished within one year.”
The Big Four banks, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China , Bank of China, Agricultural Bank of China and China Construction Bank, account for about 40 per cent of China’s total loans.
They have come under criticism for earning fat profits while small businesses scramble for financing.
Last year, the top four banks earned net profits totalling $99 billion, more than double at their U.S. equivalent – Citibank, J.P. Morgan Chase, Bank of America Merrill Lynch and Wells Fargo.
The large banks tend to direct most of their lending toward fellow state-owned enterprises, but China increasingly relies on smaller private firms for job creation and economic growth.
The big banks wield formidable political power. Top executives are appointed by the Communist Party’s Organisation Department and hold a rank equivalent to a cabinet vice-minister.
That means any aggressive form of monopoly busting, akin to the U.S. government’s dismantling of the “Ma Bell” telephone company in the 1980s, would require widespread political support and that does not appear to be in place.
Judging from Wen’s past remarks on financial reform, his answer to unblocking lending likely involves more modest measures such as encouraging the development of local banks and deepening credit markets to give borrowers choices other than traditional bank loans.
That could open up the flow of lending to smaller businesses without posing a serious threat to the Big Four.
Wen has long been known as a reform-minded leader and has been outspoken on the need to modernise China’s financial system to help sustain economic growth. His views are not always shared by the rest of the leadership in Beijing, and it was unclear whether Tuesday’s comments reflected a broader consensus.
Neither Xinhua, the state-owned news organisation, nor the People’s Daily, the main Communist Party newspaper, reported Wen’s latest remarks, which could be an indication that they do not reflect the rest of the leadership’s thinking.
This wasn’t the first time Wen has spoken of loosening the big banks’ grip on lending. On Jan. 30, he said the government needed to “break monopolies” that block private capital from coming into the financial sector.
He also promoted a pilot programme in Wenzhou, a city that has been a hotbed of entrepreneurism but also risky lending schemes, to encourage private investment in local banks and set up loan companies as a way to expand borrowing options.
Wen may feel emboldened to push his reform agenda harder after last month’s ouster of rising star Bo Xilai who had made no secret of his ambitions to enter the inner circle of the ruling Communist Party.
His downfall followed oblique criticism by Wen which has raised questions over whether the more traditional, state dominated economic model that Bo promoted would be able to survive him.
“Market economists have been talking about reforms for many years and Premier Wen will push ahead for it this year,” said Jian Chang, a China economist with Barclays Capital in Hong Kong. “The progress will be steady and gradual, and starts with trials… It cannot happen overnight.” — Reuter
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Thats truly using the mandate if anything and China with such wide powers could easily make what the lazier among Marxists incorrectly implemented via violence into something intended by Marx – a control against uncontrolled Capitalism, perhaps via Socialist Caps onf maximum wealth sequesterable.
Annual declaration of assets by all government functionaries and (something which some politicians with something to hide cannot do or worse still promise to declare and do not abide by in states that are corrupt enough that they do not dare to require such declarations) and the criteria by which a bureaucrat could be dismissed on. If a bureaucrat is rich, he takes up posts which could support an average person (removing an opportunity for work), and instead of drawing a salary when he already does not need to work but insists on staying because he wants power! . . . nationhood is not about power, and a statesman does not need to be formally hired by the state in order to participate (though oligarchs tend to suppress any and all citizens who are not on state payroll or state hierarchy).
ARTICLE 4
Chinese officials inhale bribes? – from guanwei.com.cn – Published: 05 April, 2012, 18:19
In China, entrepreneurs say it is impossible to run your business without bribery. And the new trend – provoking an angry buzz in the local internet community – is to pay dishonest officials with record-priced cigarettes.
In the Chinese city of Xian, a carton of luxury Good Cat cigarettes goes for no less than $889. Shop assistants say that despite the exorbitant price, the cigarettes sell quite well, mainly as gifts. This has led to speculation that Good Cats are used to bribe officials.
“Because of corruption, you cannot do business. In effect, you can do nothing if you don’t send gifts to those in power,” Xinhua news agency’s editorial said.
News of the extravagant smokes has blown across the Chinese internet on Thursday. Some outraged users wrote that they could easily live for a whole month for the price of a single cigarette. Others claim that the producers of such expensive cigarettes only rely on the growth of corruption in Chinese society.
Meanwhile, the manufacturer of Good Cat, the Shaanxi Tobacco Company, claims that these shockingly-priced Good Cat cigarettes circulating the market are just rare samples, because the product has not yet hit the shelves.
It is not the first time cigarettes have been at the heart of a corruption scandal in China. The former director of the Nanjing Property Bureau, Zhou Jiugeng, was fired in 2008 for “purchasing high-priced cigarettes using public funds.”
In China giving and sharing cigarettes is a customary practice. In a country where over half the adult male population smokes, cigarettes are used as gifts for various special occasions from weddings and business meetings to funerals.
This creates a growing market for luxury cigarette brands. Panda cigarettes, which used to be loved by the Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping, can reach as much as $107 per pack, against $2 for a more generic brand.
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The cronies selling cigarettes will channel back profits from these imports. Corruption via proxy. Briber, cigar seller and officials have arrangements. During Chinese New Year or some other time where money can flow without being detected, the official will get the REAL bribe which is charged against the exhorbitant inflations purposely imposed by the vendors. Any secret police personnel could be assigned to ALL officials at all times in 3 shifts at a minimal salary, with an equitable and reasonable award for catching the official. Live cams could also be installed on these secret police monitored by a superior so that bribery/subversion attempts can be caught.
Corruption and lack of understanding of REAL values in wasting money on things like cigars much like 100K luxury handbags or 150K champagnes while 99% of the population starves, is partly why the Manchu led Qing Manchu minority led Dynasty led China to the 1911 colonization situation.
ARTICLE 5
9-month foetus forcibly aborted by authorities – by -Tencent Weibo – Thursday, 05 April 2012 17:44
The news and picture came from a web posting in Baidu’s discussion forum: Family planning authorities in Moshan town, administered by Linyi city, Shandong province, forced a 9-month pregnant woman into abortion. According to the post, the baby “even gave a cry when it came out.” The family, on hearing the cry, went over to see the baby, before it stopped crying or breathing. Doctors pronounced its death.
The image shows the 9 month fetus lying dead in a bucket. Because the parents of the baby already have a child, the local government hunted them down and forced abortion, citing the One Child Policy, which is imposed on all urban Han Chinese families. The mother was restrained as doctors injected her with a drug to kill the unborn baby. But after the baby was dragged out of its mother’s body, it was still alive and began to cry, before doctors left it in a bucket and drowned it.
The post soon attracted public attention. An unidentified netizen condemned the local birth control office vehemently in his comment on the post:
Translation:
I am from Linyi city. I know how dark the family planning authorities here are. Each village has a target set by the higher-ups that must be met. Besides, each village is also entitled to a fixed number of abortions as an extra. However, not all villages have eligible people, or this number of pregnant women. So officials responsible for women’s affairs of each village take the trouble to rummage about for pregnant women to induce abortion. As long as her hukou (family register) is in the jurisdiction, as long as she agrees to terminate pregnancy, the village will reimburse all her surgical costs and even mete out a monetary reward of 8,000 to 10,000 yuan (US1,270 to 1,580). If the set target cannot be met, the village will be faced with penalty. But how can there possibly be so many incidences? Most people these days do not want that many children. How can there be so many extra births? In this case, they pounce on mothers-to-be like vampires who see blood. Reckless of how old the fetus is, they force abortion. There are just too many things like that in Linyi. I even witnessed one myself. In the hospital, a pregnant woman was dragged by several ruggedly muscular men into the operation room and did not relax their vigilance until she was injected with the drug. They said, “Another one accomplished.” But that pregnant woman was near term! And her family did not even know she was kidnapped here. I later learned that she was captured when she was at a fair.
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China, please investigate and re-educate the lower tier cities and rural areas especially. This is a chilling sort of news easily dismissed as rumour or covered up as a form of anti-China propaganda. There are many families happy to adopt children around the world, please streamline the social protections and social services in China if this is true. Young lives destroyed in this manner will only harm China’s reputation.
malaysiandemocracy 