China's expanding Pacific footprint: It is up to the leaders of China's new economic dependencies to wake up to the reality of the bargains they have struck. There is usually a hidden price to be paid, in the form of Chinese asset stripping - fish stocks and irreplace­able tropical timber are the main targets - and political sclerosis that favours corruption and dictatorship. Governments are understandably eager to receive Chinese money and political support but they should understand that nothing comes for free with a foreign policy devoid of ethics. Biff- not devoid of ethics, but simply different quids exchanged for different quos. All relationships are in a constant state of negotiation in real time. Ergo, the article would be more useful if it provided rules of thumb per engagement rather than trivializing events via injecting a children's morality play of do-gooders and baddies into the works.

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Climate of Fear: Ambiguous scientific statements about climate are hyped by those with a vested interest in alarm, thus raising the political stakes for policy makers who provide funds for more science research to feed more alarm to increase the political stakes. After all, who puts money into science--whether for AIDS, or space, or climate--where there is nothing really alarming? Biff- Here's Mencken on another topic, but the rule of thumb applies equally as well: April 3, 1927 - I hope no one will be upset and alarmed by the fact that various bishops, college presidents, Rotary lecturers and other such professional damned fools are breaking into print with high-falutin discussions of the alleged wave of student suicides. Such men, it must be manifest, seldom deal with realities. Their whole lives are devoted to inventing bugaboos, and then laying them. Like the news editors, they will tire of this bogus wave after a while, and go yelling after some other phantasm. Meanwhile, the world will go staggering on. Their notions are never to be taken seriously. Their one visible function on earth is to stand as living proofs that education is by no means synonymous with intelligence.

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The s-word : ...To confuse the issue, a non-disabled colleague had overheard and told me that she found that term offensive and thanked me not to use it in front of her. I was offended that she was offended because I didn't feel it was her place to be offended... after all, it's not her word and she wouldn't have been taunted with it. ...Interestingly though, Scope were criticised by many younger disabled people last October after they came out against a new US brand of wheelchair, The Spazz, which started selling in Britain. Biff- People who play the "I'm offended" card are just as logic-challenged as those who play the race-card or any other card. Sloganeering and ex-cathedra claims of moral piety ain't no substitute for debate. Which is of course the attraction to the insincere and mentally feeble.

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CHINA’S “MALACCA DILEMMA”: The PRC has also watched with concern India’s enhanced presence in the area, especially the modernization of military facilities on the Andaman and Nicobar Islands located near the northern entrance to the Malacca Strait. Some Chinese newspaper commentaries have bordered on the paranoid. For instance, when the United States restored the International Military Education and Training (IMET) program to Indonesia last year, one Chinese newspaper accused U.S.-Indonesia military cooperation as “targeting China” and aimed “at controlling China’s avenue of approach to the Pacific” (Takungpao, March 7, 2005). Biff- Paranoia which comes from the warm and fuzzy conceit that one is the primadonna center of attention. It often comes as a shock when locals discover that US international news ain't focused on China.

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THE STRATEGIC VULNERABILITY OF CHINA’S RELIANCE ON COAL: The need to transport coal, consisting of 40 percent of all freight in China, creates bottlenecks that prevent exports (Asian Development Bank, 2002). Lacking a means to move their products to external or even coastal markets, the inland provincial economies can produce only for themselves. Even goods that in a period of declining profit margins in China could be produced more efficiently and profitably in these inland provinces cannot be moved beyond local markets. The net result is that the bottlenecks created by coal exacerbate unemployment problems and restrict economic potential. Transporting coal, in part, was a significant reason for the failure of the “Open Up the West” campaign designed to improve the economic performance of these inland provinces. Barring substantial reform, the “New Socialist Countryside” campaign is unlikely to prove more fruitful.

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Print me a heart and a set of arteries: To print 3D structures, Forgacs and his colleagues alternate layers of supporting gel, dubbed "biopaper", with the bioink droplets. To build tubes that could serve as blood vessels, for instance, they lay down successive rings containing muscle and endothelial cells, which line our arteries and veins. "We can print any desired structure, in principle," Forgacs told the meeting.

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BEIJING’S “NEW THINKING” ON ENERGY SECURITY: In the past year, top Chinese policymakers have emphasized the fact that China, as a developing economy, is paying a huge price for mounting oil prices, a point not always recognized in the West. In 2004 alone, Beijing had to spend an extra US$7 billion of its foreign exchange due to climbing oil prices, with payment totaling over US$43 billion, making crude oil and product oil the country’s largest single import item. As reported by Sinopecnews, this had a negative impact on consumption, investment, export and import, and China’s GDP suffered a 0.8 percent downturn.