- Saweeeeet! The world has been waiting anxiously for another good espionage scandal to come along and at long last, it has happened. Big ups to senior Taiwanese Major General Lo Hsien-che for his arrest and arraignment on charges of spying for China. Lo, who earlier served as the country's military attaché in Thailand from 2002-2005 before heading the military command's communications and information office, has the distinct honor of being the highest ranking Taiwanese military official to be charged with espionage. Prosecutors in Taipei announced the arraignment on Friday and are seeking a life sentence for Lo. It’s a keu distinction between Taiwan and China, where no charges would have been filed and Lo would have been in a shallow grave with a bullet hole in the back of his head by now. The general has been in detention since February after authorities carried out a search on his residence and reportedly recovered incriminating documents. Taipei's Defense Ministry alleged that Lo was recruited by China during his tenure in Thailand and was paid $150,000 for passing on sensitive information on military matters. Furthermore, Taiwanese officials claim Lo’s actions greatly harmed Taiwan's national security and struck a debilitating blow to the military's reputation and morale. Predictably, Taiwanese officials have remained tightlipped about the nature of information passed on by Lo. Speculation has centered on details of something known as Posheng Project, a proposed integrated command involving communications links between Taiwanese military and the United States. To find such a high-ranking Taiwanese official arrested and charged with espionage, one would have to time travel back to the 1960s, when a vice-Defence Minister was accused of spying when the Taiwanese government conducted a crackdown on Communist moles. The scandal comes at a time when Taiwanese President Ma Ying-jeou has been pushing a policy of engaging China instead of the hard-line approach adopted by his predecessor Chen Shui-bian. The two nations are at something of a standoff because China still considers Taiwan a renegade state even though the island has governed itself for over half a century. Taiwan’s strong ties to the U.S. are an obvious source of consternation for China, but if the situation can produce more quality espionage tales, then the world can nevertheless benefit from it…………
- With the possible exception of Detroit, a.k.a. Hockey Town U.S.A., would any American city be truly upset if it’s local NHL franchise up and moved to Canada? Better yet, would any American city notice if the guys on ice skates who smack around a cylindrical rubber disc on a giant slab of ice weren’t there next season and were plying their frozen trade north of the border? The good people of Atlanta may soon find out because their (not exactly) beloved Thrashers may soon be moving to Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. The decision has not officially been made, but if and when it happens Winnipeg would have an NHL team for the first time since the franchise then known as the Jets moved to Phoenix after the 1996 season and were renamed the Coyotes. Not that Atlantans haven’t supported the Thrashers, but they simply haven’t supported them well enough to convince the team’s ownership that a long-term run in the ATL is financially wise for them. A group called True North is negotiating to bring the Thrashers to Winnipeg and sources close to the group insist no deal has been completed to sell and relocate the Thrashers, despite published reports to the contrary. "It's simply not true, it's not a done deal," said a source at True North. As for Atlanta……the Thrashers were 28th of 30 teams in the league this past season with an average attendance of 13,469, so expecting any sort of “Save Our Thrashers” rally complete with signs, banners and tearful fans would probably be a mistake. The franchise has existed only since 1997, so it does not have a long and storied history in the unofficial capital city of the Dirty South. But should anyone in Atlanta truly care about the very likely possibility of losing their soccer on ice team, now would be the optimal time to launch that grassroots campaign………….
- Does anyone else get the distinct impression that Tyler, The Creator of fast-rising hip-pop (hip-hop + pop) group Odd Future just starts sh*t with other artists in order to generate buzz for his group’s own substandard music? Among others, he had feuded with Bruno Mars and B.O.B. and now he’s unleashing some genuinely classless smack directed at the sexual preferences of Sara Keirsten Quin from the Canadian pop duo Tegan and Sara. Quin, who is a lesbian, posted a blog entry on the group’s website Teganandsara.com taking issue with the offensive nature of the Odd Future leader's rhymes. She wrote: "While an artist who can barely get a sentence fragment out without using homophobic slurs is celebrated on the cover of every magazine, blog and newspaper, I'm disheartened that any self-respecting human being could stand in support with a message so vile. Quin continued: “As journalists and colleagues defend, excuse and congratulate 'Tyler, The Creator', I find it impossible not to comment. In any other industry would I be expected to tolerate, overlook and find deeper meaning in this kid's sickening rhetoric? Why should I care about this music or its 'brilliance' when the message is so repulsive and irresponsible? Is Tyler exempt because people are afraid of a backlash? The inevitable claim that detractors are being racist, or the brush-off that not 'getting it' would indicate that you’re 'old' (or a faggot?) Because, the more I think about it, the more I think people don't actually want to go up against this particular bully because he's popular." For his part, Tyler has not stepped up to defend the lyrics themselves, which certainly appear to have a homophobic slant. Rather than step up and explain why the lyrics aren’t as bad or offensive as they are being portrayed to be, he instead reacted by lobbing another verbal grenade at Tegan and Sara, writing on his Twitter page: "If Tegan and Sara Need Some Hard Dick, Hit Me Up!" You stay classy Tyler, you stay classy………..
- Well lookee here, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention can no longer be called a stoic, bland government agency with no sense of humor, not after the it posted a blog entry Monday with a straight-faced list of recommendations on how to survive a massive invasion of the flesh-eating undead. That’s right, the organization tasked with preventing pandemics and pushing flu shots is now preparing the nation - the living among us anyhow - for a zombie apocalypse. "In such a scenario zombies would take over entire countries, roaming city streets eating anything living that got in their way," the post said. "So what do you need to do before zombies ... or hurricanes or pandemics for example, actually happen?" Is the post a complete joke, as every ounce of rationality, sanity and logic would suggest? Dave Daigle, a CDC spokesman and self-described member of the Zombie Task Force, explained how the zombie list came to be. During a brainstorming session on how to interest Americans in the agency's annual campaign on hurricane preparedness, someone suggested linking zombies to the campaign because as everyone knows, people are terrified of zombies. They’re also terrified of the black holes of time wasting that are brainstorming sessions, but that’s another discussion for another day. "I worry we try the same thing every year and I didn't know how many people we were actually engaging," Daigle said. "Let's face it -- preparedness and public health are not sexy topics." Whoever suggested the zombie link did so because following the earthquake in Japan, the CDC saw a big traffic spike on its Twitter account after someone tweeted the agency asking if radiation emissions could set off a zombie attack. "That phrase popped into my head: zombie preparedness," he said. Daigle ran the idea by the CDC's director of preparedness, Dr. Ali S. Khan, who inexplicably approved the project. The truly crazy part of the idea? It’s working. A normal CDC blog post gets maybe 1,000 hits in a week, but by Wednesday, two days after the post went up, the zombie post had accrued 30,000 hits. Then the server crashed. The CDC has since boosted its available server space and hopes the zombie ties to hurricane prevention might just inspire people to make even basic preparations for a real emergency. "This includes things like water, food, and other supplies to get you through the first couple of days before you can locate a zombie-free camp (or in the event of a natural disaster, it will buy you some time until you are able to make your way to an evacuation shelter or utility lines are restored)," the post stated. On the heels of their zombie success, Daigle and his CDC colleagues are already debating next year’s hurricane preparedness campaign, with alien invasion or vampire attacks as the early leaders in the clubhouse……….
- God bless conspiracy theorists. They’re irrational, incomprehensibly angry and typically looking to fight anyone who doesn’t agree with them and for those reasons, they are typically hilarious in the most unintentional of ways. AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka is one such man and he validated his credentials Friday by accusing House Speaker John Boehner of blackmailing America for withholding his vote to raise the debt ceiling unless there are drastic spending cuts. “Now we see Speaker Boehner and his colleagues engaged in a new round of blackmail with a ransom note that reads: 'Cut Medicare, dismantle the government, destroy hundreds of thousands of jobs to fund more tax cuts for the rich, or we will cause the United States to default on its debts'," Trumka said in a speech at the National Press Club. As one could surmise from Trumka’s (and his bloated face and walrus-style moustache’s) comments, he is among those who wants Congress to raise the debt ceiling and give the United States more ability to borrow more without tying such a move to the budget. Lining up on the side of Democrats and against Republicans is nothing new for a member or official of a labor union. Boehner's spokesman, Michael Steel, quickly responded to Trumka's comments by saying that Americans are the ones demanding spending cuts along with raising the debt ceiling. "The American people simply won't tolerate another blank check for more Washington spending," Steel said. "Raising the debt limit without spending cuts and reforms would be more irresponsible than not raising it." The debt ceiling blast was not Trumka’s only cogent point during his speech; he also railed against the imperiled state of the labor movement, calling it workers' "great struggle." He made the tremendous leap of likening the recent fight of state legislators and governors against workers' rights in Wisconsin, Indiana and Ohio to battles over public employees rights to organize during the 1960s civil rights movement. Sure, because the protection of high-paying union jobs and bargaining rights is the same as an entire race of people fighting for the right to be treated like actual human beings intead of sub-human pieces of meat. Well said, Trumka. During his rant, Trumka also lambasted Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker's attack on public employees' collective bargaining and organizing rights. "Working people remember that these rights were not easily won," Trumka said. "The pivotal 1968 Memphis sanitation workers' strike began with two men crushed to death in a garbage truck, and ended with Martin Luther King giving his life for the cause of public workers' right to organize together." To punctuate his point and underscore how serious he is, Trumka threatened to divert resources from causes and candidates, including Democrats, who don't support workers. He talked about the need for a more independent labor movement. "If leaders aren't blocking the wrecking ball and advancing working families' interests, working people will not support them," he fumed. "This is where our focus will be -- now, in 2012 and beyond." At the end of his diatribe, Trumka expressed support for President Obama and praised him for working for workers. Ultimately, the only relevant point to come out of his remarks was the idea of a blackmailing plot being carried out by Boehner, whose perpetually orange-ish self will undoubtedly find support from at least one union: The National Tanning Salon Operators………..
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