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While you were sleeping…

China ousts Japan, owning the most U.S. debt:

China passed Japan to become the U.S. government’s largest foreign creditor in September, the Treasury Department announced yesterday, reflecting the dramatic expansion of Beijing’s economic influence over the American economy.

China’s new status — it now owns nearly $1 out of every $10 in U.S. public debt — means Washington will be increasingly forced to rely on Beijing as it seeks to raise money to cover the cost of a $700 billion bailout. China, in fact, may be the government’s largest creditor, period.

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The growing dependence on Chinese cash is granting Beijing extraordinary sway over the U.S. economy.

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“This is an unhealthy relationship,” said Brad W. Setser, geoeconomics fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. “The U.S. relies too heavily on subsidized financing from a non-democratic government. And China is still a poor country that has in turn invested too much of its national savings in the United States. There remains an underlying financial vulnerability if China were to scale back its purchases. It could deliver a shock to the United States.”

And also… something else you may have missed:

China extends interests to Latin America

Two areas of great interest to China are Central and South America, and Chinese investments in that part of the world are rapidly expanding. Just this week, Chinese president Hu Jintao met with the Costa Rican president Oscar Arias to discuss new business ties.

China’s rapid advances into the African continent have already been well documented, so it comes as no surprise that they continue to push westward to expand their reach and influence. We (the USA) may be the world’s military power (I suppose we should be since we spend more than most countries, if not all others, on defense), but our economic power on the global stage is weakened, given the above news. There’s a saying that goes something like this: “He who controls the money, rules the world.”

The “Super Power” days of the US of A are numbered. In fact, the fat lady may have already begun singing…

And that may not be such a bad thing.

You’ve probably seen the first Zeitgeist project which was unleashed online in 2007. If not, I strongly encourage you to watch it, which you can do HERE.

Below is part 2, titled Zeitgeist: Addendum, which was just released about a month ago, in October. This installment is certainly topical as you’ll see within the first 10 minutes. If you can’t see anything below, go HERE.

Losing sucks, doesn’t it? Most of the time anyway. Some are content with learning something from the experience; however, there are those who just simply refuse to accept defeat.

Listen up GOP, and every other party whose candidate didn’t win enough electoral votes to be named the 44th president of these United States: Your party’s candidate DID NOT WIN! Accept it, deal with it and move the hell on! There’s nothing you can do to change the results in your favor. No amount of whining, nor attempts to sully Obama’s reputation and accomplishments will reverse course - unless you simply want to fan the flames of hate and divisiveness already consuming this country, which would be pathetic on your part, and even worse than being sore losers!

Get over it!

I’m getting tired of reading about all your various antics.

I’m looking right at you Mr Alan Keyes. I would expect this kind of nonsense from some of the nuttier, paler, right-wingers; not from you, sir!

From the AIP’s website:

Presidential candidate Alan Keyes, vice-presidential candidate Wiley S. Drake, and the Chairman of the American Independent Party, Markham Robinson, have filed suit in California Superior Court in Sacramento seeking to bar Secretary of State Debra Bowen from certifying to Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger the names of Electors, and from transmitting to each presidential Elector a Certificate of Election, until documentary proof is produced and verified showing that Senator Obama is a “natural born” citizen of the United States, and does not hold citizenship of Indonesia, Kenya or Great Britain.

In addition, they have asked that the court issue a peremptory writ barring Senator Obama’s California Electors from signing the Certificate of Vote until such documentary proof is produced and verified.

In response to questions about why the suit was being filed, Ambassador Alan Keyes commented, “I and others are concerned that this issue be properly investigated and decided before Senator Obama takes office. Otherwise there will be a serious doubt as to the legitimacy of his tenure. This doubt would also affect the respect people have for the Constitution as the supreme law of the land. I hope the issue can be quickly clarified so that the new President can take office under no shadow of doubt. This will be good for him and for the nation.”

Bleh…!

SOURCE

Ya know… I’m still not so sure how I feel about these. I’m taking the motivation behind each gesture into consideration, but, something still bothers me about them… I feel like the candidates are being exploited in some way.

See for yourselves:

- First, in Angola, as an attempt to call attention to the damage caused by the existence of landmines left over from the country’s long-standing civil war, various organizations collectively introduced what they call the Miss Landmine beauty pageant, claiming to be encouraging female and disabled pride and empowerment, questioning established concepts of physical perfection, and celebrating true beauty.

Here’s one contestant (CLICK HERE for more):

- And secondly, in economically downtrodden Zimbabwe, we’ve got the Miss Autonomy 2008 HIV/AIDS Stigma free pageant, essentially a beauty pageant for the HIV Infected, which aims to “reduce stigma attached to HIV/AIDS and show people living with the pandemic that even if they are positive they can also do things like the rest of the people in society.” The virus has infected about a third of Zimbabwe’s population and the pageant is said to be “a fun way to educate people about the need to erase stigma surrounding HIV/AIDS.”

You can read more about it here: ALL AFRICA

I suppose I can see how there could be some psychological benefit for each contestant in each scenario. But I’m having difficulty getting past what feels like the exploitation of these women by the various organizations whose core intentions are actually quite commendable. Maybe if the same intentions were explored outside the already exploitative idea of a beauty pageant, I would feel less ambivalent… then again, maybe it’s just me.

Yes, I’m back… Monday nights at 8PM, starting tonight!

If you missed tonight’s episode, you can download it via iTunes. Just open up iTunes on your computer, go to the iTunes store, search for “Obenson Report” in the search box, and subscribe, or just download the latest episode.

Of just click the player below to listen here, now.

Episode 36
TRT: 59 minutes
Topics discussed: It’s good to be back; A recap of the “Black & Sexy” screening on from last week Wednesday; Oscar-Bait movies - what are you looking forward to seeing; Oliver Stone’s “W.” doesn’t register; An examination of the rising costs of movie ticket prices over the past 20 years; Enough with the historical black dramas (The Secret Life Of Bees and others); Spike Lee’s Miracle At St Anna flops commercially and critically.

The player follows below. If you don’t see anything, you may need to upgrade to the most recent version of the Flash player. Or just download it via iTunes.

It was a good day indeed…

My name in lights:

My name in more lights:

The lines were long from the front:

The lines were long from the back:

Part of the dream team (minus me):

The crowd files in, while some seat in anticipation:

Ralph Scott of BET (tall male, right) and Aaron Ingram getting cozy with other guests at the after-party:

Yours truly, trying to look important, managing the crowd at the door:

Yup, it was a good day… that’s what I call collective power!

http://www.theblackandsexymovie.com/

I haven’t seen it yet, and wasn’t planning on seeing it. The last one, Casino Royale, failed to woo me; I think the James Bond series should have been relieved of duty once Sean Connery and Roger Moore were done with it. The revamped version with Daniel Craig just doesn’t quite feel the same. Espionage thrillers with renegade, suave, solo anti-heroes are not as cool as they once were, since there are so many of them these days.

Anyway, after reading the below reviews, I just might check this one out after all. Film as subversive art is nothing new. In fact, as I recently became aware, there’s something paradoxical about the fact that, often, the same corporate entities vilified for their “evil deeds” in countless mainstream movies, are the financiers, producers and distributors of these very same films! It gives a whole new meaning to “selling out;” a company is willing to sell a negative image of itself and the reasons for its existence, as long as what it’s selling returns a profit. Fascinating isn’t it?!?

Hat/tip to HuffPo for these:

Liberals and conservatives alike seemed to have picked up on a distinctly anti-imperialist strain in the new Bond film “Quantum of Solace.” A warning that there are minor spoilers below.

- Via the liberal Juan Cole:

The reviews of director Marc Forster’s “Quantum of Solace” have complained about the film’s hectic pace (reminiscent of Doug Liman’s and Paul Greengrass’s Bourne thrillers), about the humorlessness of Daniel Craig’s Bond, and even about the squalid surroundings, so unlike Monaco and Prague, in which the film is set (with many scenes in Haiti and Bolivia). They have missed the most remarkable departure of all. Forster presents us with a new phenomenon in the James Bond films, a Bond at odds with the United States, who risks his career to save Evo Morales’s leftist regime in Bolivia from being overthrown by a General Medrano, who is helped by the CIA and a private mercenary organization called Quantum. In short, this Bond is more Michael Moore than Roger Moore.

The plot of the film was developed by producer Michael G. Wilson during the filming of “Casino Royale.” New York-born Wilson is from a show-business family (his father, Lewis Wilson, was the first actor to play Batman on screen, and his step-father, Albert Broccoli, was long the producer of the Bond films). But Wilson did a law degree at Stanford in the 1960s and worked for a while at a firm specializing in international law. Outrage at offenses against international law are as much at the heart of this film as the more personal vendettas of Bond and Camille (Olga Kurylenko).

- And over at the conservative National Post, this aspect was cited with annoyance:

Too much Naomi Klein in the plot line. When I was a kid, James Bond fought the Soviet Union and prevented terrorists from blowing up nukes. In Quantum of Solace, the villain … wants to privatize Bolivia’s water supply. When the camera starts taking in poor Bolivian villagers moaning helplessly as the villain shuts off their water pipes with one of his dams, I felt like I was reading one of Klein’s columns in The Nation.

Wow, contextualizing a James Bond movie using Naomi Klein ideology… what is this world coming to :o) And I thought it was just about hot chicks in various stages of undress, Martinis, cool fight scenes and action sequences!!

SOURCE

A good way to start the work week… courtesy of Bill Maher.

Words can’t describe just how incredibly horrible this is… What goes on in the mind of a human being as they commit these kinds of atrocious inhumane acts? I certainly don’t have an answer… and what really eats away at me is that there are likely countless others who are suffering a similar kind of physical and psychological abuse at this very moment that I type this, or as you read this; those suffering essentially in silence, because we have yet to discover who and where they are. The thought of that alone should infuriate all of us!

VIENNA (AFP) — Josef Fritzl, 73, has been charged with murdering one of the children he fathered with his daughter during the 24 years he held her captive in a cellar, as new details of her plight have emerged.

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Fritzl held his daughter Elisabeth captive for 24 years in a cellar of his apartment building, raping her on a regular basis and fathering seven children with her.

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Details of the living conditions in the tiny basement cell emerged for the first time Thursday in the charge sheet, which said Fritzl chained his then 18-year-old daughter for the first nine months of her captivity in 1984.

Drugged by her father, Elisabeth Fritzl, now 42, was repeatedly beaten and kicked, as well as raped, sometimes several times a day.

Josef Fritzl apparently also forced her to act out pornographic films he showed her in her cell. The rapes continued throughout her captivity.

The prosecutors noted that Elisabeth had “resigned herself to her situation as she saw no way out.”

They added that Fritzl had treated Elisabeth “as his property.”

Although Fritzl later furnished the cell with beds, a small kitchen area and a shower, the tiny space was secured by a vault door, often saw rats and had no natural light, hot water or heating. He regularly shut off power as punishment.

Fritzl confessed to raping and sequestering his daughter for over two decades, days after the case was brought to light, although he denied killing one of the babies.

In a report published in mid-October, a psychiatric expert who examined Fritzl concluded that the 73-year-old was entirely responsible for his actions.

His lawyer had said earlier that Fritzl may plead diminished responsibility.

Fritzl’s trial is not expected to begin before late January 2009, the court president in Sankt Poelten told the Austrian daily Kurier.

Elisabeth Fritzl and her six children, aged 5 to 19, have been living since their reunion in May in a flat on the grounds of a psychiatric clinic near Amstetten, a town some 100 kilometres west of Vienna that gained worldwide notoriety overnight after news broke of the monstrous incest case.

Fritzl’s wife Rosemarie, 69, who always denied having any knowledge of her husband’s actions, has moved to another nearby town.

Doctors have said the family’s condition has been improving steadily, even though the victims would likely be psychologically scarred for life.

I don’t believe his wife when she says that she had no knowledge of her husbands actions! How could she not??? This was her daughter as well, living in their building! How the hell could she not have known?!?! It’s one thing if she admitted to knowing, but was fearful of her life if the husband threatened her (although the report didn’t say that he did); it’s another to deny that she knew nothing about 24 years of horrendous abuse of her own child! It’s ridiculous… as the saying goes, evil prevails when good men/women do nothing. Sad, sad, sad…

You can read the entire report HERE. Hat tip Citizen Sugar.

The “Honorable” Pastor James David Manning is a nut… I couldn’t help but think of Jim Jones and the Peoples Temple mass suicide after watching the below 2 videos. I think a crafty attorney from any child protective organization could probably make an argument for child abuse in the first clip. To think that he actually has a congregation of followers is frightening!