China Ponders Putin’s Georgian & Crimean Precedents

Is Vladimir Putin just about the world's greatest fool?

There is, however, one country with an imperial past and a renewed craving for empire that has territorial ambitions which make of it a threat to Russia, and that country is China…The majority of those who live there [Siberia] today are not Russian. Many of them are Chinese who have journeyed north in search of well-paid work; and China, which is just across the border from Siberia, is an economic juggernaut increasingly desperate for resources of the very sort that are found in abundance in Siberia.

Vladimir Putin should think hard about the precedent he is setting in the Crimea. The day may come when China does to Russia in Siberia what he is trying to do right now to the Ukraine in the Crimea. Putin's government piously states that its only concern is to protect the majority Russian population in the Crimea from the Tatars and the Ukrainians there. China, in time, will say the like about the Chinese in Siberia. And when that day comes, he will have alienated everyone of any significance who might otherwise have rallied to Russia's defense. [Emphasis added]

More on Putin's folly.

Iowahawk on the Ukraine

And replacing them with golden toilets:

Lenin statue in Ukraine replaced by golden toilet on top of his pedestal.

Image from Boston.com

UPDATE: A similar monument to foreign domination was toppled in Taiwan just the other day…

Toppled Sun Yat-sen statue in Tainan, Taiwan.

Taipei Times: Toppled Sun Yat-sen statue in Tainan park.

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On Dnieper Banks, Did Yanukovych, A Stately Pleasure Dome Decree

The palace constructed by Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych.

Dude's salary up till 2009 was $24,000 a year. Helps to know a guy, who knows a guy, who knows a guy…

Oh, how interesting is this?

Another peculiarity of the president is his fear of being poisoned. Because of this, he has had greenhouses built in his compound, designed to mimic twenty climatic zones. The idea is that anything Yanukovych wants to eat can be brought to his table directly from his own farm.

Guilty conscience, perhaps? 

UPDATE: Pictures of the mansion Yanukovych built with his looted millions. More here. And here.

More great ones here.

After former dictator Viktor Yanukovych fled the country, Ukrainians politely stay on the sidewalk as they inspect his looted mansion.

Hooligans, the Russians call them, hooligans! As the Ukrainians, err, keep on the pathway and avoid walking on the grass…

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The Chinese Aren’t Threatening Europe

…they're just fantasizing:

China has made a major diplomatic faux pas by illustrating its Moon Rover exhibit with a stock image of a nuclear mushroom cloud over Europe.

China Threatens Europe With Nuclear Destruction. A mock moon-rover is displayed at a trade show, with a stock poster featuring a nuclear strike on Europe behind it.

(Sinofascist dreams of nuclear holocaust. Image from TheWeek.com)

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Communist China Demands Britain Return Artifacts

From News.com.au:

One of the most popular questions [posed to British Prime Minister David Cameron on the Chinese Twitter copycat-site] was posted by a prominent Chinese think-tank, the China Center for International Economic Exchanges, which is headed by former vice-premier Zeng Peiyan and includes many top government officials and leading economists among its members.

"When will Britain return the illegally plundered artefacts?" the organisation asked, referring to 23,000 items in the British Museum which it says were looted by the British army.

Interesting question. While the Foreigner is not necessarily opposed to returning plundered artifacts, he does wonder when China will volunteer to return all the tribute it illegally plundered from foreign countries during its Imperial period.

To take but a single example:

Slaves from tributary countries were sent to Tang China by various groups: the Cambodians sent albinos, the Uyghurs sent Turkic Karluks, the Japanese sent Ainu, and Turkish and Tibetan girls were also sent to China.

Anyone care to monetize the value of all those slaves in 2013 dollars?

China’s Peaceful Rise? Beijing Slavers For War

Chinese unilaterally declare Japanese air-zone as their own.

If he were an honest man, Joe Hung of Taiwan's China Post would now write a column apologizing for being hoodwinked by claims of "China's Peaceful Rise".

IF he were an honest man…

UPDATE: Ha. Missed this quote from Yang Yujun of China's Ministry of War:

China "has always respected the freedom of over-flight in accordance with international law".

Sure. With exactly the same respect it affords the territory of its neighbors.

 

Hey, Big Spender: China Buys Typhoon Victims Half-A-Can Of Coke

Self-proclaimed financial "superpower" China donates a whopping $100,000 to disaster relief in the Philippines.

That works out to about 14¢ per Filipino left homeless (given that there are about 700,000 left homeless after Typhoon Haiyan).

Or in other words: just about enough to buy each of them half-a-can of Coke.

Postscript:

A day-laborer, Bill Gates, and Xi Jinping walk into a bar. Each gets a beer, but each finds his mug has a fly in it.

The workman pours off the fly and drinks the rest. Bill Gates sets his glass aside and buys another.

Meanwhile, Xi Jinping grabs the insect by its wings - violently shaking it while screaming:

"Spit it out! Spit it out!"

[Cheapskate jokes. I love 'em!]

UPDATE (Nov 13, 2013): CNN now reporting that 2 million people in the Philippines require food.

Evidently, the Chinese are either too stupid or heartless to realize that half-a-can of Coke isn't going to make much difference…