Norinco M4
- Thread starter The Cocker
- Start date
Well that's f*cking garbage.
What's their rationale? Not that it makes any difference at this point.
Ummm....Their are communists? They do whatever they want to.
Well that's f*cking garbage.
What's their rationale? Not that it makes any difference at this point.
This is why:
Beijing begins massive Olympic shutdown
By STEPHEN WADE – Jul 19, 2008
BEIJING (AP) — Beijing's Olympic shutdown begins Sunday, a drastic plan to lift the Chinese capital's gray shroud of pollution just three weeks ahead of the games.
Half of Beijing's 3.3 million vehicles will be pulled off the roads and many polluting factories will be shuttered. Chemical plants, power stations and foundries left open have to cut emissions by 30 percent — and dust-spewing construction in the capital will be halted.
In a highly stage-managed Olympics aimed at showing off the rising power of the 21st century, no challenge is greater than producing crystalline air for 10,500 of the world's greatest athletes.
"Pea-soup air at the opening ceremony would be their worst nightmare," said Victor Cha, director of Asian Studies at Georgetown University.
Striking venues and $40 billion spent to improve infrastructure cannot mask Beijing's dirty air. A World Bank study found China is home to 16 of the 20 worst cities for air quality. Three-quarters of the water flowing through urban areas is unsuitable for drinking or fishing.
International Olympic Committee president Jacques Rogge has repeatedly warned that outdoor endurance events lasting more than an hour will be postponed if the air quality is poor.
Under the two-month plan, vehicles will be allowed on the roads every other day depending on even-odd registration numbers. In addition, 300,000 heavy polluting vehicles — aging industrial trucks, many of which operate only at night — were banned beginning July 1.
Five days after Sunday's traffic ban goes into effect, special Olympic traffic lanes will begin operating until Sept. 25, a plan that has been used in previous games. Beijing is setting aside 165 miles of roadway on which certified Olympic vehicles will be allowed to move from hotels, Olympic venues and Athletes Village.
To further ease congestion, employers are being asked to stagger work schedules. Public institutions will open an hour later than normal and two new subway lines scheduled to open Sunday should also bring relief.
The plan to clean the gray air seems to match the high-security tone of the games, which will be policed by 100,000 officials.
Razor-wire barriers and soldiers standing at attention guard the outskirts of the Olympic Green area and the Chinese have even installed ground-to-air missiles near one Olympic venue to protect it from possible attacks.
Security, tight visa rules and inflated hotel prices seem to be keeping foreigners away. Many nightspots near Olympic venue are being closed by security officials, who say the games are under threat from Muslim extremists in China's western Xinjiang region.
Beijing organizers are also in a protracted showdown with TV broadcasters, who are seeking free movement and reporting during the games. China's communist government seems to fear being embarrassed during the games by pro-Tibet activists, local dissidents or critics of China's human rights policies.
The gigantic experiment to curb pollution could still go wrong.
Veerabhadran Ramanathan, an atmospheric scientist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California San Diego, said unpredictable winds could blow pollution into Beijing despite factory shutdowns in the city and five surrounding provinces.
Ramanathan is leading a multinational research project in tracking Beijing's pollution before, during and after the Olympics.
"Reducing the local emissions is going to reduce the local pollution, but is that sufficient to help the athletes breath cleaner air? This is going to depend on the winds," he said.
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5jBkbRSP7sOLCdXivr6asGiD_4Q2QD920PS0G0
Daehanminkuk
Regular
- Location
- Seodaemun-gu, Seoul, ROK
Really? ....
It is the Chinese saving face to try and get their way... too little too late.If China, Brazil, and India had emissions standards like the rest of the industrialized world, there wouldn't be an issue. I'm all for a cleaner planet, but anyone who believes Al Gore's movie has sh*t for brains.
TDC
Really? ....
with their 1 child law and no car days they they have ( cars with license plates ending in even or odd numbers on a given day are not allowed on the road - in certain cities ) i dont know if it is too little too late, they do more than alot of countries
Actually, not really, and Kyoto is part of the problem. Under the Kyoto agreement, nations with businesses that put a lot of CO2 into the air can acquire offsets by fixing some other CO2 emitter elsewhere.
This lead China to build almost 40 brand new coal power plants with absolutely NO pollution controls. This way, they can sell to western businesses the right s to paying to give them rudimentary pollution controls, earning those businesses the offsets. The Chinese pay less for a power plant, earn money on the sale of the opportunity, and get the upgrades for free. They are totally gaming the system.
I want to remain in the middle on this issue and make my own conclusions, but I am finding that harder and harder to do every day. There is so much corruption on the left and on the right, the real science is being swept away in a cloud of misinformation.
The irony is that global warming had pretty much reached scientific consensus about a decade before Gore made the big push in recent years to raise awareness. In doing so, Gore turned it from a scientific issue into a political issue and ruined things for everyone.
Back in the day the scientists were not challenged on their findings, except by other scientists. Peer review was good enough. But now that Gore has turned this into a political issue, all the political dirty tricks are being introduced and this is getting in the way of the real science.
Global warming supporters will take an isolated case of a polar bear drowning and market it as an epidemic. There will be no scientific merit or large sample sizes to back this up. All they need is a sound byte from an environment Canada employee shrugging his shoulders and saying "I guess the bear drowned due to a lack of ice?" This is a slap in the face of the hard work researchers are doing every single day.
Opponents will invent their own pseudoscience completely devoid of merit or peer review (rampant on the godawful Chorus talk radio network in canada). "Just ask this scientician!" They will bring on a guy who wrote a book on global cooling and calls himself a doctor (but is really a chiropractor) and then they will complain about the utility bills in Al Gore's mansion ($30,000 a year... not very green.)
Worse, they will dig up dirt on a scientist who published a damning article in 1985 and show that he had a scandal with a prostitute. In the political world, you attack someones character and all their findings become invalid. Science shouldn't work like this; the man behind the paperwork means nothing. Peer review of his findings is all that matters. Sadly scientists are more frequently coming under personal attack in order to discredit their findings for or against global warming.
Mediawhores like Suzuki and Gore battle it out daily with their right wing counterparts who believe the whole thing is "a secret Jew conspiracy to control future energy sectors and shift wealth away from big oil".
I miss the good old days where it was just about scientists and tree huggers, and an uplifting moral lesson from the "Captain Planet" cartoon.
The irony is that global warming had pretty much reached scientific consensus about a decade before Gore made the big push in recent years to raise awareness. In doing so, Gore turned it from a scientific issue into a political issue and ruined things for everyone.
Back in the day the scientists were not challenged on their findings, except by other scientists. Peer review was good enough. But now that Gore has turned this into a political issue, all the political dirty tricks are being introduced and this is getting in the way of the real science.
Global warming supporters will take an isolated case of a polar bear drowning and market it as an epidemic. There will be no scientific merit or large sample sizes to back this up. All they need is a sound byte from an environment Canada employee shrugging his shoulders and saying "I guess the bear drowned due to a lack of ice?" This is a slap in the face of the hard work researchers are doing every single day.
Opponents will invent their own pseudoscience completely devoid of merit or peer review (rampant on the godawful Chorus talk radio network in canada). "Just ask this scientician!" They will bring on a guy who wrote a book on global cooling and calls himself a doctor (but is really a chiropractor) and then they will complain about the utility bills in Al Gore's mansion ($30,000 a year... not very green.)
Worse, they will dig up dirt on a scientist who published a damning article in 1985 and show that he had a scandal with a prostitute. In the political world, you attack someones character and all their findings become invalid. Science shouldn't work like this; the man behind the paperwork means nothing. Peer review of his findings is all that matters. Sadly scientists are more frequently coming under personal attack in order to discredit their findings for or against global warming.
Mediawhores like Suzuki and Gore battle it out daily with their right wing counterparts who believe the whole thing is "a secret Jew conspiracy to control future energy sectors and shift wealth away from big oil".
I miss the good old days where it was just about scientists and tree huggers, and an uplifting moral lesson from the "Captain Planet" cartoon.
