If you haven't seen it , this doc may interest you.

"Ukraine on Fire"

Across its eastern border is Russia and to its west-Europe. For centuries, it has been at the center of a tug-of-war between powers seeking to control its rich lands and access to the Black Sea. 2014's Maidan Massacre triggered a bloody uprising that ousted president Viktor Yanukovych and painted Russia as the perpetrator by Western media. But was it? "Ukraine on Fire" by Igor Lopatonok provides a historical perspective for the deep divisions in the region which lead to the 2004 Orange Revolution, 2014 uprisings, and the violent overthrow of democratically elected Yanukovych. Covered by Western media as a people's revolution, it was in fact a coup d'état scripted and staged by nationalist groups and the U.S. State Department. Investigative journalist Robert Parry reveals how U.S.-funded political NGOs and media companies have emerged since the 80s replacing the CIA in promoting America's geopolitical agenda abroad.

Can watch here if interested https://youtu.be/fCWBRg6_VsM

And as predicted, video of Gno hanging out with the patriot prayers as they were pre-planning the violence surfaced. Odd, you might think a journalist would report that, but he didn't....because he's no journalist, and now he's not even employed, but your ilk gave him well over a hundred thousand dollars on his go fund me, so his plan to bilk some idiots with a fake story worked like a charm.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/andy-ngo-who-became-a-right-wing-star-leaves-quillette-after-incriminating-video-appears

https://youtu.be/awN9J88j4mA

Lemme guess, Gno getting caught lying again and fired is the fake news, and you won't ever admit you were duped by your own team..... again.

Andy Ngo is a liar. Multiple times on different platforms he's spread outright lies. When he got fired for telling lies, he turned around and wrote an article titled, "Fired for Reporting the Truth".

As far as I can tell, he's never been entirely honest about anything he's presented in the media.

He is not a journalist. Journalists may be biased about the stories they choose to tell and the slant they put on those stories, but there must be some attempt at honesty, or it's just rabble rousing, and inciting to violence. He incites others to do violence upon Muslims regularly through his lies, so wouldn't it be poetic justice if he received some of his own back?

In any case, the guy's so dishonest it wouldn't surprise me at all if the attack was staged in an attempt to raise his profile in conservative circles. And if that turns out to be the case, are you going to apologize for spreading these lies, @bobknight33 ?

Somehow I doubt it. You have about as much honesty as Ngo does.

Brain dead policies are the bread and butter of large organizations. Every major corporation, every major bureaucracy, every major NGO has plenty of them. It's what people do, when they gather in groups, make stupid unthinking rules.

Welcome to the human race.

I think that you will find enriched uranium is not plutonium. Also, depleted uranium can't be used to make nuclear weapons explode, so I don't know exactly why you bring it up. To be clear, all nuclear nations main weapons plutonium has been made in a very specific way, a way that is inconstant with power generation. It is exactly because power generation reactor are so costly that they are relatively poor weapons materials creators, the method in which uranium needs to be removed from the neutron flux requires you to shut it down often. It is better to get a small, non-power generation reactor and crank out the plutonium. This is what India did with a small test heavy water reactor (CIRUS reactor). You need a reactor you can quickly turn on and off (and uranium extracted), then chemically reprocess the uranium, let it cool down, then put it back into the reactor. This laborious method is why power generation reactors are poor candidates for weapons material generation and why the current generation of weapons have not been made this way.

IAEA safeguards are important to make sure enrichment centers aren't diverting enriched uranium, sure. Plutonium should also have some safeguards as well, so don't take my words for a lack of concern or action on a world stage, I just believe for most, their concerns are blown way out of proportion to the actual risk.

But to reiterate, the relatively complex process to make weapons ready plutonium is why powered reactors aren't used in for weapons material for any of the worlds nuclear weapons nations, nor have any of the non-nuclear nations which have nuclear power and participate in NPT and IAEA systems been implicated in such actions. If Amory Lovins is the one forming your opinion on this, I would suggest a different source. It is like asking the CATO institute their opinion on climate change. I would consult the IAEA or some respectable international organization known for objective science rather than an anti-nuclear advocate. I, actually, fell for the same supposed expert (Amory Lovins) and was fairly anti-nuclear myself as a result. While there surely is some overlap between weapons technology and reactors, they are separate enough that safeguards can be highly effective. The existence of many nuclear powered states without nuclear weapons gives credence to their abilities. Only those countries who decide not to participate in NPT and IAEA systems have been the players known to developing weapons, most notably North Korea.

IAEA Safeguards: Stemming the Spread of Nuclear Weapons

http://www.iaea.org/Publications/Factsheets/English/S1_Safeguards.pdf

I think he is pessimistic is because energy use is also in growth, usually from coal. When you similarly look at CO2 emissions over the past decade, they aren't going down...every year is a new record. Even in IEA's 450 Scenario, "oil, coal and natural gas — remain the dominant energy sources in 2035"...this is a problem.

I can't find a notable environmental group that endorsees nuclear at all. Like the public, most environmental NGOs don't really make a distinction in reactor types. Nuclear is nuclear is nuclear. From friends of the earth to greenpeace, they are all pretty proudly anti-nuclear, with only local chapters of FoE even remotely interested in revisiting their views.

At any rate, I hope you aren't finding me to be combative or argumentative, I am not the best communicator of controversial issues. But I think climate issues are forcing us into a pretty thick walled box which will be hard to breakout of even in the most optimistic technological factors, which is why even if every single concern people have about nuclear is completely justified, waste, weapons, ect, we would most likely still need to build lots and lots of nuclear to even hope to address climate issues...they are that challenging.

When responsible people screw up, they make things right. Else, they really should not do anything in the first place. The UN and NGOs really have done more harm than good to Haiti and many have used the facade of doing good to enrich themselves: *related=http://videosift.com/video/How-did-the-Red-Cross-Spend-in-Haiti

Regimes supported

Juan Vicente Gomez, Venezuela, 1908-1935.
Jorge Ubico, Guatemala, 1931-1944.
Fulgencio Batista, Republic of Cuba 1952-1959.
Syngman Rhee, Republic of Korea (South Korea), 1948-1960.
Rafael Trujillo, Dominican Republic, 1930-1961.[citation needed]
Ngo Dinh Diem, Republic of Vietnam (South Vietnam), 1955-1963.
Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, Iran, 1953-1979.
Anastasio Somoza Garcia, Nicaragua, 1967-1979.
Military Junta in Guatemala, 1954-1982.
Military Junta in Bolivia, 1964-1982.[citation needed]
Military Junta in Argentina, 1976-1983.
Brazilian military government, 1964-1985.
François Duvalier and Jean-Claude Duvalier, Republic of Haiti, 1957-1971; 1971-1986.[citation needed]
Alfredo Stroessner, Paraguay, 1954-1989.[citation needed]
Ferdinand Marcos, Philippines, 1965-1986.[8][9]
General Manuel Noriega, Republic of Panama, 1983-1989.
General Augusto Pinochet, Chile, 1973-1990.
Saddam Hussein, Republic of Iraq, 1982-1990.
General (military), Suharto Republic of Indonesia, 1975-1995.
Mobutu Sese Seko, Zaire/Congo, 1965-1997.
Hosni Mubarak, Egypt, 1981-2011.
Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa, Kingdom of Bahrain, 2012.
Saudi royal family, 2012.
Islam Karimov, Uzbekistan, 1991-2012.[10]
Meles Zenawi, Ethiopia, 1995-2012.[11]
Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo, Equatorial Guinea, 2006-2012.[12]

In response to Ghark's intelligent breakdown, of course it is infeasible and impractical to expect a complete evacuation of Americans from the continent and I'm sure you do not condone such action.

I believe in your last option, that Western society as a whole is more developed morally and philosophically today than hundreds of years ago. Structures to prevent such decimation such as the United Nations and hundreds of NGOs that exist today would act against such extermination today. Granted, the UN is not perfect, but it is better than what previously existed and it certainly would've changed the course of US history if globalization and world pressure existed as it does today.

To address another point you made, I'm sure the Native Americans would've done the same to us had they not been Native Americans and had been another group of settlers landing in America with advanced weaponry and systems of government. Of course, they wouldn't be Native Americans anymore would they? They would have a completely different way of life because they would've developed in a different environment.

Historically, Native American tribes did war with each other, but they hardly ever wiped each other out. Almost all Native American wars were small spats, some of which were over ritualistic and others were over things such as honor and rights.

Sorry for rambling, but it's a complicated issue and you've brought up some complicated questions.

I'm still searching the Japanese news sites for the truth about what went down at this meeting, but according to some people on the Japanese YouTube version of this video, this may have been a setup. The reason for all the cameras and shouting was supposedly because the majority of the audience in attendance that day were members of "Green Action" and "Greenpeace" who weren't even residents of the affected area. They basically came to further their own anti-nuclear agenda and brought the urine with them knowing that it wasn't these guys jobs to test it. Again, I'm not sure of the truth of all that. If I find out more I'll post again.

EDIT: Did a bit more research and found children from the Fukushima area have had their urine tested back in June, but only trace amounts of Cesium were found--not at any levels that would affect health (0.41~1.13 becquerels per liter of urine).

EDIT2: Yeah, it was a total setup. The whole meeting was organized by an NGO called Friends of Earth Japan (FoE), who have a strong anti-nuclear agenda (the page I linked to is their public announcement of the meeting, including handouts that detailed their strategy for the meeting). They called out to other groups like No Nukes More Hearts who share similar goals. On the No Nukes More Hearts web page that I linked to they encourage all members of the group, whether they are residents or not, to attend the meeting. Other groups that seem to be involved were the Fukushima Protect Children from Radiation Association, Fukushima Fukuro Club (similar to Greenpeace) and Greenpeace Japan, further stacking the audience.

These groups apparently invited government representatives for "negotiations" about the rights of people living in the stricken areas. Realizing the groups were there to grandstand and not actually discuss anything, the government officials eventually withdrew from the meeting--after nearly 2.5 hours of patiently trying to answer questions! The NGO groups quickly edited down and translated the original video of the meeting to further their own purposes, deleting the two hours of the video in which the government members listen to speeches given by various group leaders and try to answer questions from the audience.

You can see the original unedited video of the meeting here. It looks like the attending government officials were only given copies of the questions they would be asked moments before the meeting started (although in fairness if they had gone to the websites I linked to above they would have known what they were walking in to). Before the meeting even begins, the Fukushima Protect Children from Radiation Association drops a petition demanding all children be evacuated from Fukushima. Throughout the meeting, as the government officials try to patiently answer questions from the audience they are routinely interrupted by others who stand up and give speeches (there's a lot of talk about "protecting the children" which always gets a lot of applause).

So yeah, these guys got ambushed. It was basically a successful troll for these NGO groups.

EDIT 3: In the link to the original (uncut) meeting video, you can go to 1:02:00 to see where this clip starts. Notice this clip has been heavily edited and the government officials actually stuck around for ANOTHER HOUR to answer questions before being accosted by the urine-wielding brigade.

More and More NGO's are starting to only give funding to women in a village. They know how to spend it much better.

>> ^Bidouleroux:
>> ^blankfist:
I think at the end of the day, we can all agree the current system needs to be reworked, because it's broken. I believe the answer isn't in socializing health care, but rather removing corporations from it.

lol. You don't seem to understand the words you're using... removing corporations = socializing. Corporations are private entities. Everything else is public, because the antonym of private is public. That's why in a non-biased country like Canada, we call "socialized medicine" simply "public health care". The former is a scaremongering term based on McCarthyism and the fear of anything communist and the latter is a neutral, descriptive term. We have public health care in Canada, not socialized medicine. Our health care is directly managed by our provincial governments, but it could be managed by an NGO, a co-op (OMG SOCIALIZATION!!!!11) or whatnot, as long as it's not a corporation. A government-controlled corporation would not do either, because their goal would still be profit.


But the corporations.. they're all corporationy.

>> ^blankfist:
I think at the end of the day, we can all agree the current system needs to be reworked, because it's broken. I believe the answer isn't in socializing health care, but rather removing corporations from it.


lol. You don't seem to understand the words you're using... removing corporations = socializing. Corporations are private entities. Everything else is public, because the antonym of private is public. That's why in a non-biased country like Canada, we call "socialized medicine" simply "public health care". The former is a scaremongering term based on McCarthyism and the fear of anything communist and the latter is a neutral, descriptive term. We have public health care in Canada, not socialized medicine. Our health care is directly managed by our provincial governments, but it could be managed by an NGO, a co-op (OMG SOCIALIZATION!!!!11) or whatnot, as long as it's not a corporation. A government-controlled corporation would not do either, because their goal would still be profit.

>> ^spoco2:
Really, that was a very poor presentation which told me pretty much nothing, explained nothing, delivered it in a poorly constructed way.

I think the problem is that it was limited to 3 minutes. As you can see, he has to run through some of those slides without enough time to even read what's on them.

The upshot of what he's saying is that the squatter cities are a big economic engine. And while those of us used to living in far better conditions view them as centers of crushing poverty and disease, the simple fact is, virtually everyone living in them are in fact better off than they were living in a remote rural village.

They are creating their own economy, their own infrastructure, their own education systems, etc., with essentially no help from governments or NGOs. And the fact that more than 15% of the world's population live in them (soon to be > 40%) means we should be paying a lot of attention to them.


>> ^MaxWilder:
I could be wrong, but my common sense is screaming "bullshit!"

I'm guessing that's because your common sense is derived from living in the highly developed West. I'm not saying that it's invalid, just that it's a completely different perspective than that of the people living in squatter cities.

In reply to this comment by jonny:
It's certainly true that the U.S. economy has been shifting away from making stuff over the last 50 years, but it's still the case that most cities and towns in the U.S. are completely dependent on their local manufacturing base.

Oh yes that is true, that is a factor I forgot about, small scale suppliers providing for larger multinational firms. But I wonder how many of these jobs have started to be outsourced and will eventually be outsourced to places like China?

Do you think that eventually a manufacturing base in the US is sustainable in the long run?

But that doesn't change the fact that hundreds of thousands (millions?) of people in the U.S. are employed in the agricultural business. Again, I was just using it as an example of producing stuff. Perhaps this points out a fundamental flaw of using GDP as a measure of a country's economic strength.

I agree that yes you have a significant population in the agricultural business, I just simply disagree with subsidization of this industry by the government. I mean post 9/11 they wanted to enforce a renamed act called something like Food Security Act that would increase subsidization of the agricultural industry in certain key states. Since most of the voters are part of those, there is large political pressure to sustain them.

Really? I was under the impression it was more the other way around, i.e., the third world nations were begging the west to stop their subsidies and "level the growing field".

Yes third world nations beg but its the first world nations that have the larger political and legal expertise in WTO negotiations, its a form of bureaucracy, so you have nations that have litte understanding of the paths or argument points that need to be made. Not to mention that the first world is always more keen about its own objectives then the development of the third world to which they are more keen to send a few million dollars in USAID. Sorry I have this big thing against western nations, aid and Africa where I lived. But its a whole another topic.

That I just have to disagree with. It is only because of political realities and labor costs, not farming practices or technology (i.e., true efficiencies). There is no way that it is more efficient to grow corn in Zambia than it is in Iowa.

But do the cost benefit analysis, third world nations that are wholly dependent on agricultural industry, have larger real estate and much lower costs of production then America. Efficiencies in the US come from economies of scale and mechanization, something that is simply lacking in other nations. But you look into FDA rules, the lax rules towards food quality, the large penetration of manufactured foods, the chicken farms that stack chickens in cages one after the other. There is a seeming problem in this. Notice how its only the first world that so far has had problems with regards to food contamination problems.

The subsidization I talked about creates further ramifications further down the line, a certain supply level is reached but the subsidization increased keep going on, you have over supply, with over supply you start dumping this production into the global market. The reason that even in Kuwait we get US apples, bananas and other exotic fruit. It's hilarious.

Ultimately, that's how a company should be run, but how many companies do you know of that have that kind of long term vision. (This is really worthy of another conversation on the ethics and ultimate sustainability of commerce. Too much to handle here.)

Oh of course, you can never expect altruistic behavior from companies, but their profit motive is an easy to read incentive. But you have the IMF which already dictates nation policy to nations to allow for better free market behavior, and yes there is exploitative behavior, but there is enormous room for growth and market formation. The reason I pretty much am planning to come back to Kuwait eventually after University, its an untapped market.

I believe that with IMF, ILO and other NGOs giving good solid economic policy advice we could have FDI into developing nations without exploitative behavior taking place that is still cost efficient to foreign companies. We haven't had much of that mostly due to that fact that these NGOs sometimes expect market knowledge and legislation to magically pop out of thin air instead of being advised.

There is already trade exploitation when you can get EU and US products in the developing world, we got Kellogg and OMO and so on. The problem I see in the developing world is that its this no possible development outlook by both citizens and firms, while the reality is that there is not motivation for FDI in these nations. Africa is always seen as this war torn cess pit of corruption, but thats media for you.

It's a complicated issue, but I still believe that there is avenues for large growth, because the more nations that become developed the more benefit is there for world wide trade as a whole. When I was in Zambia it was a perverted picture, alot of companies and NGOs entered and provided highly technological solutions to very basic problems, shock growth I would say instead of embryonic growth. You don't give powered water pumps to a nation that has no electrical power grid. You don't lie down phone lines and so on. The development profile has to be totally different for example mobile market exploded in Africa because deploying mobile towers and phones is cheaper then laying land lines. I worked with a NGO called Engineers without borders that provided basic technological solutions to problems, real bronze age stuff that could be easily built and more importantly kept up by local populace. This transmission of information is very important. But am a idealist here as well. I want to see the developing world progress, especially Africa which has seen GDP decreases since colonization ended.

I have twice personally "bailed out" close friends. I doubt it was complete ignorance, but there was certainly a lack of understanding of just how much it would cost to run up large amounts of debt.

I agree. But there is alot of access to seemingly low credit and very little knowledge being passed on about controlling run away debt. Consumerism is pushed at the American public at far higher rates then anything else, sophisticated marketing and advertising is far more alluring then sensible financial behavior. It's this consumer pressure that I disagree with, the constant psychological pressure that buying something will make you feel good, the buying for the sake of buying not because its a good product that you need. But am an idealist like that.

Of course you're right that true and fair globalization (as opposed to exploitation) is the best solution. How much luck have you had convincing your neighbors? I haven't had much.

Almost none. Its a hard topic to explain because it requires a very wide macroeconomic viewpoint instead of a localized view. I mean would say 90% of the people I knew in University on one hand wanted development in the third world but were against the implications that developing the third world would mean a short term loss of certain industries locally. But its going to happen eventually. We can't all be growing bananas.

>> ^bcglorf:
Finally, I must insist that Israeli aid to the region must not be ignored either. If Israel really wants the region cleansed, why are they still the largest individual provider of humanitarian aid to the region? You know what the biggest complaints where when the borders where closed? Access to Israeli hospitals that where previously available to Palestinians living on the border. And for unemployment caused by closing the border, it was because a great many living in Gaza were working in Israel.


Err? Israel imposed a blockade on Gaza since 2007.

U.N. humanitarian chief John Holmes said that while Israel had been letting some relief supplies into Gaza, with 60 truckloads entering on Monday, that was "wholly inadequate", as about 100 truckloads a day of flour or grain alone were needed. Stocks of fuel were "more or less zero", meaning Gaza's power plant might have to shut down at any time, while medical supplies were "just about enough to cope", Holmes said.
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/LV538165.htm

A boat delivering 3.5 tonnes of Cypriot medical aid to the Gaza Strip has been rammed by Israeli naval vessels in international waters, activists say.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7805075.stm

"The Commissioner-General of the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), Karen AbuZayd, on Monday warned that new restrictions Israel planned to impose on the West Bank could force the agency to curtail its humanitarian aid to the Palestinian territory."
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/925748.html

Billions of aid dollars pledged to the Palestinians to bolster peace talks with Israel are having a muted economic impact because of Israeli restrictions on travel and trade, the World Bank said on Sunday.
http://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSL2616242520080427

The United Nations is accusing Israel of imposing arbitrary taxes on humanitarian relief supplies - including food and medicine - being ferried to Palestinians in occupied territories. The levies charged by Israel were "unreasonable and unique", Peter Hansen, commissioner-general of the U.N. Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) for Palestine Refugees, told a meeting of donors Wednesday.
http://www.globalpolicy.org/ngos/aid/2002/0925israel.htm

On average, the U.S gave more than $6.8 million* to Israel each day and
gave $0.3 million** to the Palestinians each day during Fiscal Year 2007.
http://www.ifamericansknew.org/stats/usaid.html