As IF Times

link Britain rethinks China strategy after Copenhagen and Shaikh failure – Times Online

The lead paragraph of this piece summarizes nicely the naivete in which the West views China:

“…After the Copenhagen debacle this month and the execution of the first citizen of a European country by China since 1951, Britain is now reassessing how to handle China diplomatically.

In both cases the Foreign and Commonwealth Office appears to have considerably overestimated its leverage with the emerging superpower, convinced until it was too late that China was so desperate to avoid public criticism that it would yield to private pressure. A wholesale change of direction is ruled out but senior government figures admit to feeling shaken by the twin failures…”

As if. Let’s just take a breezy survey of who’s at the poker table. It can be argued that the wealth, power and influence of England as an empire has diminished significantly since the days when the Empire covered most of the globe. The halcyon days when Dukes and Earls commanded large plantations and expansive lands in far flung venues lives on only in dusty old adventure novels. The days when the threat of a squad of British soldiers dropping by to keep the natives in line are quaint bits of history.

Clearly on the other ascending horizon, China is now the dominant player in any game that they choose to play. Clearly in manufacturing since no western nation can compete at the cost advantages that China enjoys. Clearly in the financial space since they are rapidly becoming the largest holders of Western nations’ ballooning sovereign debt. Clearly militarily as China has built up their navy as well as other weapons armaments. Clearly in resources as they now compete for valuable commodities such as oil, minerals and precious metals. Perhaps most compelling is the sheer size of China’s population with a burgeoning youth eager for education and and the associated future benefits in fields of technology, engineering and science. It’s quite possible that soon, the graduating class of a given PhD level of math or engineering can equal the population of a small U.S. city.

Contrast that to the western societies where law degrees are seen as paths to success, leaving most engineering and science seats to the foreigners.

With the explosion of China’s influence onto the world stage again, it’s logical to expect that China will do what they see as expedient for China. Certainly in the realm of domestic issues and laws. While certainly harsh and swift by western standards, the Chinese have little trouble acting on policies decisively. Contrast this to the western leaders, especially recently who appear to be weak and vacillating over every major policy issue.

Politically, it’s going to take more than fear of few diplomatic tsk tsks to influence the Chinese. It’s very hard to bluff when the guy across the table has all the chips and all you have are a couple of reds and some drink stains.

link: Population control called key to deal:

This just in from the earnest folk in Copenhagen grasping for solutions to ‘climate change’. The most intriguing part is this statement:

“Meanwhile, she said studies have also shown that family planning programs are more efficient in helping cut emissions, citing research by Thomas Wire of London School of Economics that states: ‘Each $7 spent on basic family planning would reduce CO2 emissions by more than one ton’ whereas it would cost $13 for reduced deforestation, $24 to use wind technology, $51 for solar power, $93 for introducing hybrid cars and $131 electric vehicles.”

A couple of issues jump out here. First of all, the dollar value associated with the respective solutions to warming are not just suspect, they are out loud laughable. I can’t even imagine the convoluted model created to spit out such numbers; and yet, soon supporters (warmers) will be quoting these stats like they are inviolable truths, or as Al Gore says, “like gravity, it just is”.

Secondly, if you consider what this implies, rather than spend all these billions and billions on cap and trade, electric cars, blah blah blah, why don’t we just restrict humans from reproducing!! What an elegant solution! To be clear then, this implies that the best and most cost efficient way to reduce climate change is to get rid of man. The smaller the world’s population of mankind, the better for the polar bears, the lizards and the yellow bellied sapsuckers.

It’s bad enough that rabid charlatans are proposing massive shifts of wealth from developed nations to fund spurious and laughable schemes like carbon credits, but this ‘research’ opens up an entirely new and sinister avenue for the control of people; their very right to procreate. Logically, a U.N. committee would be struck to administer who can or cannot have children. Here comes the next front in this charade.