PREGUNTAVER

The US economy is said to be hardly moving. In fact,Jeanine Aversa, an economics writer for the Associated Press describes at as having skidded to near halt. Here are a few other points of view.

In my past posts, I have taken shots at President Thaksin Shinawatra (Thailand) and Prime Minister Shinzo Abe (Japan) for trying to jump start their sagging popularity ratings by creating foreign enemies. In my books , people like them do not deserve praise and should be discarded in the dustbins of history. Now, the great Hillary, in her quest to live up to the name popularized by the great Sir Edmund, is hitting on outsourcing, thereby joining the paranoids of her country. She tried to stay away from this group but with her diminishing chances to nag the democrats nomination, she finally joined the fray, hoping to bag some brownie points. She doesn’t get my vote.

I receive a lot of thank you notes from various people. All those letters are well appreciated, most especially when it arrives early morning and lands on top of my inbox. But for the more serious thanks, they can buy me a beer through the PayPal donations site that I intend to install or, they can send me a Chemise Lacoste! :-) Kidding!

A blog becomes doubly attractive when it comes with beautiful photos. For some people, using photos being given away for free by some free photo sites work but the more serious bloggers and commercial websites buy photo rights. Purchased photos need not be expensive. Shutterfly coupons may be sourced online and the end result are professionally taken and enhanced photos that can make a big difference.

The weapon The missile strike that brought down a crippled satellite confirms what the Russians have feared. The Americans have an operational Star Wars system. The strike probably sent Russian President Putin the same message that Reagan gave Gorbachev- We can do it! I just remembered... When the US released what was supposed to be the largest non nuclear bomb in Afghanistan and Iraq, the Russians released a bigger version a few years later. Let's see how the Russians will respond to this one. There's one thing that we are sure of. this is the start of a new age in warfare. Now that the Americans have admitted such capabilities, expect them to keep on using it. Here is a diagram of how it was done as well as a Syndicated news regarding the event. The attack diagram Some considerations

A few years ago, I read an article that talks about animals wanting to mate with younger counterparts. In the world of Human Sapiens, order had to be installed for everybody's protection so rules were made such as the protection of minors and subordinates against predatory authority figures such as older people, teachers, employers, etc. During the past few years, we saw an upsurge in teachers all over the world being indicted for having sex with their students. The latest is South Carolina middle school teacher Allena Ward who had sex with 5 teenage boys. Watch the video.

Reminiscent of a Reagan era Star Wars initiative, the Bush intends to shoot down a malfunctioning spy satellite as it re-enters the earth's atmosphere. And it won't be long before they do it, the satellite is expected to hit the planet a couple of weeks from now... Read more

With lots of foreign currencies continuously gaining in value against the dollar. Stores owners in New York have started to speculate against the US currency by accepting Euros, Canadian dollars, UK pounds and a few other denominations. At the rate the dollar is being devalued, I would say that the move is very wise. Store owners make more money by setting their own exchange rates and by selling their hordes foreign currency when its value has substantially grown, they make more money. And with the Philippine peso gaining 20% against the US dollar within a year, I will not be surprised if stores where there are Asians will start putting up "Philippine Pesos Accepted here signs"

It’s been a month and a half since the Christmas holidays and my appetite for good food has not waned. On the contrary, it probably has increased. The unusually heavy challenges that came into my work table seemed to have challenged me to stop thinking of weight loss and fantasize about weight gain. OK, that was an overstatement. But the fact remains, I am starting to look like my dad!

One of the things that people should have is individual health insurance policies from reputable companies. There is no telling what can happen to us as after we wake up in the morning and unless we have no parents, siblings or close relative that we want to benefit, we all should have one. And that is my unsolicited practical advice for the day. Cheers!

Just a couple of weeks ago, I wrote about mesothelioma being a form of cancer that is one of the dangers associated with people exposed to asbestos. It is quite dangerous since it only starts to manifest itself to people 20~50 years after exposure. Since the widespread use of asbestos fell in the early eighties, people with this type of cancer can be expected to grow in numbers until 2020. I don’t know what the medical industry is doing but with a decline in the expected number of affected people approximately 12 years from now, I suspect that the efforts to find a cure may not be as much as the trouble they are get themselves into for other types of medicines.

This reminds me of Japan's Abe and Thailand's Thaksin. Whenever their domestic performances go down, they try to look for foreign enemie that their country can unite against. In Japan, as Abe's popularity dipped, he went nationalistic with his controversial war denial and historical revisionist stance (lots of related posts in this blog). In Thailand, when Thaksin was being hit by billion dollar corruption charges, he tried to rally his people against the Philippines by fueling allegations of cheating in the South East Asian games. And just recently, Taiwanese president Chen Shui-bian went to the the conflict area Spratly Islands to assert his country's claims against several others like China, Taiwan, Vietnam, Malaysia, the Philippines and Brunei. This was said to have been done after his Democratic Progressive Party suffered a humiliating loss in the legislative elections three weeks ago. The pattern seems to be so evident. So what's next? Chen's downfall?

Whatever happens to the US economy will most likely have a corresponding effect to the rest of the world. This is largely due to the size of its economy that has partnerships even with its enemies, like Venezuela for instance, which supplies lots of oil to the US. Should the US economy go down, it's suppliers and clients can also expect a corresponding effect on the behavior of its exports and import performance. It is therefore an interest to most people, who the next US President will be. For now, Hillary Clinton and Barrack Obama seems to be even on the Democrat's side. Senator John McCain of Arizona, f ormer Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney and former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee seems to be in a tight race on the Republican's side . On other parts of the world, leaders seem to be quick in condemning the violence in Darfur but a bit slow when it comes to actually doing something about it. At this point, there are only 9,000 poorly trained UN soldiers on the gro