Boxing

boxing rankings for WBC WBA IBF WBO and FIGHTNEWS.COM respectively

Looks like you CAN bet on the white guy.
But the most interesting thing is how the rankings are so all over the place and not directly related to record as far as i can tell. It seems insane to have someone like Wladimir Klitschko not even in your top 11 list.
Oh well we always knew it was corrupt - I guess the fightnews one is the one that is most accurate. Maybe everyone should just start reporting their ranking - how about it?

Oleg Maskaev
Samuel Peter
1 . Vladimir Virchis
2 . Oliver McCall
3 . Hasim Rahman
4 . Juan Carlos Gomez
5 . Nicolay Valuev
6 . Alexander Dimitrenko
7 . Chris Arreola
8 . Donnell Holmes
9 . Jameel McCline
10 . David Tua
11 . Calvin Brock
12 . Michael Moorer
13 . Oleg Platov
14 . JD Chapman
15 . DaVarryl Williamson

Ruslan Chagaev
1.Nicolay Valuev
2. Serguei Liakhovich
3 . John Ruiz
4. Davaryll Williamson
5.Taras Bidenko
6. Michael Moorer
7.Wladimir Virchis
8.Mike Mollo
9. Juan Carlos Gomez
10. Alexander Dimitrenko
11. Alexander Povetkin
12.Hasim Rahman
13.Jean Francois Bergeron
14. JD Chapman
15. Kali Meehan

Wladimir Klitschko
1 Not Rated
2 Not Rated
3 Calvin Brock
4 Chris Byrd
5 Nicolay Valouev
6 Vladimir Virchis
7 Hasim Rahman
8 Lamon Brewster
9 Ray Austin
10 Eddie Chambers
11 Alexander Povetkin
12 Alexander Dimitrenko
13 Shannon Briggs
14 Sergei Lyakhovich
15 Oleg Platov

Sultan Ibragimov
1 Tony Thompson
2 Alexander Dimitrenko
3 Serguei Lyakhovich
4 Vladimir Virchis
5 Calvin Brock
6 Matt Skelton
7 Kali Meehan
8 Evander Holyfield
9 Eddie Chambers
10 Shannon Briggs
11 Vitaly Klitschko
12 Luan Krasniqi
13 Fres Oquendo
14 Shane Cameron
15 Hasim Rahman

1. Wladimir Klitschko
2. Ruslan Chagaev
3. Sultan Ibragimov
4. Oleg Maskaev
5. Samuel Peter
6. Nikolai Valuev
7. Tony Thompson
8. Shannon Briggs
9. Sergei Liakhovich
10. Calvin Brock
11. Alexander Dimitrenko
12. Vladimir Virchis
13. Hasim Rahman
14. Alexander Povetkin
15. Oliver McCall
16. Juan Carlos Gomez

Terror suspects

Trevor Loudon has done some great work putting together information on the terrorist suspects.
Interesting reading I expect there will be more.

For what it's worth I think that there is clearly some breaches of the law going on and the police should ensure the law is enforced as it is written and with enough force to discourage illegal behaviour - which almost certainly means quite a few of them should be in jail.

I also think that terrorism laws tend to be very loosely worded and so are a bit dangerous. But it would seem there is a pretty high standard of proof that will be required to get past the attorney general and so if they get convicted they almost certainly deserve it.

Bio fuels

UN expert says biofuels are a crime against humanity.
well ok he said htat converting food stocks into biofuels are a crime against humanity because they push up the cost of food out of the reach of poor people. But there is no need for the caveat.

1) Almost any food can be used to create energy - that is why we eat them ourselves, worse yet any land that is good for food is also good for biofuels.

2) Worse still as I explained some years ago - there is not enough farmable land on earth to provide all of our energy needs into the future via biofuel.

3) food has a demand profile that means that even a very rich person only wants to eat a certain amount of food. energy has a very different profile.

4) there is currently a little more food on earth than is required to prevent widespread starvation as long as the market operates fairly well. But not a hell of a lot more and this is achieved via a bit of over farming and over fishing. I sat through a PHD thesis presentation explaining that.

the bottom line is that food prices will continue to rocket upwards as long as we encourage biofuels. poor people within the first world and in the third world will be priced out of the market for all sorts of food in part because there will fundimentally not enough of it to go around. that would drive all sorts of behaviour - such as wars over farmland.

This could easily become a disaster to make global warming look like a walk in the park.

Sexual abuse in NZ

Janet Fanslow did a study on voilence and using this definition
Sexual violence was defined as having experienced one or more of the following acts: being physically forced to have sexual intercourse when the woman did not want to; having sexual intercourse because she was afraid of what her partner might do, or being forced to do something sexual that she found degrading or humiliating. The SRQ is a validated instrument used to screen for emotional distress.
came up with this result
Sexual violence by non-partners was reported by 9% and 12% of women in Auckland and Waikato respectively (in lifetime)
not sure where the rest came from but aparently that has become
about one in four women are victims of child sexual abuse before the age of 15.
or in more detail
The study suggests that 23% of women in urban areas and 28% in rural areas have experienced some form of sexual abuse before the age of 15.
oither reseach noted
Her research noted that about a fifth of Kiwi boys and a quarter of our girls will suffer regular physical punishment from one or both of their parents before they reach the age of 15. possibly the same quarter? What is strange there however is that less boys get physically punished than girls? that really makes no sense to anyone who has actualy met a young boy or a young girl.
this doesnt seem to make mcuh sense either
http://www.who.int/gender/violence/who_multicountry_study/fact_sheets/New%20Zealand2.pdf
14% in Auckland and 22% in north Waikato reported that they had experienced sexual violence by an intimate partner at some time in their life. 9% of women in Auckland and 12% in northWaikato had experienced sexual violence by a non-partner since the age of 15 years. Strangers were most commonly identified as perpetrators.
interestingly
32% of physically and/or sexually abused women in Auckland and 29% in North Waikato had turned to formal services (health, police, religious, or local leaders, etc.)

Actually maybe I Will try an paint this in a light that might make it seem more plausible.
Thinking about it over a life time it is quite credible that lets say 1 in 3 men would take some assault like action against their partner (I'm thinking the marginal events are on the milder end of the scale - pushing, maybe some sort of slap).
And possibly an even grater proportion would request / force their wife to do something she did not want to do and found a bit humiliating sexually - I am envisaging of oral sex in particular - maybe some period of pestering, if it is the beginning of a relationship the marginal version might have an implied threat of leaving her or kicking her out of his house.
However it is hard to get past the 1/4 of under 15 year old girls - maybe that would include a degree of under 15 kids abusing other under 15 kids - sure the average is about 30 but throw some 50 yr old uncles in there and that pulls the average up pretty quick. But Janet probably isn't that insidious - so probably it was largely 30 something guys in which case maybe her suggestion that guys get away with it many times is the answer - it could be a small set of guys abusing their entire extended family. Otherwise I have to think that when I went to school maybe half the guys in the class were rapists and a half of them were child molesterers - most of which willing to do it to their own family.
Hard to believe.

Argentina wins

Argentina again confirms it was no fluke beating the sub par French. Clearly the south africa england tonga samoa pool was by far the toughest containing 4 of the best teams.

based on form this tournument I rank the teams as below

South Africa 1
England 2
Argentina 3
Australia 4
France 5
New Zealand 6
Tonga 7
Fiji 8
Ireland 9
Scotland 10
Wales 11
Samoa 12
Italy 13
Japan 14
USA 15
Canada 16
Georgia 17
Romania 18
Namibia 19
Portugal 20

Aust beats france because they lost by less to england, and lost less ganes in the tournument
NZ scrapes in ahead of Tonga - although its a tough call since NZ had such poor opposition and tonga had such good opposition. and scotland and italy drop down since they lost to everyone half decent they played.

That makes South Africa's pool the pool of death with 1 2 7 12 and 15
Argentinas the next pool of death with 3 5 9 17 and 19
Australias next with 4 8 11 14 16
and NZ's the easy pool with just 6 10 13 18 20

if you sum them Sth africas pool's total is about half of NZ's total.

Then the ideal fair pools would have been

South Africa Fiji Ireland Canada Georgia
England Tonga Scotland USA Romania
Argentina New Zealand Wales Japan Namibia
Australia France Samoa Italy Portugal

All blacks sex romp

Scandal!!
some All black had a sex romp (who would have guessed they do that). the story seems to almost give away who it is, but I wont highlight that in this post.
but this is absolutely classic
"I'm very proud of how they conduct themselves as people," Henry said on Wednesday as he and members of the worst-ever All Blacks World Cup team...
Ohhh I can feel the sarcasm from here.

Swing Low Sweet Chariot

England has done it again - they beat France 14-9
I am happy about that because
A) I picked it
B) England plays like I would play and what I think is the ultimate in rugby

Here are my key theories
A) It is a totally different game that thrashes minnows by 90 points and one that beats a really good team. The former uses the wingers all the time the later is much tougher with an emphasis on resolute defense.
B) If your forward pack is totally dominant it doesn’t matter how good their wingers are.
C) if you can stop the other guy scoring any points and can kick a field goal - it doesn't matter if that is the only point you score.
D) If you beat percentage rugby with flashy antics you were a HELL of a lot better than the other team anyway.

Also I believe that habit is a fundamental part of psychology. What this means is that if you play 5 games against minnows just before a crunch game - you will probably screw up and try minnow tactics on a strong team. the down side to that is one stupid low percentage pass and your 7 points behind, that’s 7 points you probably can't make back. So you should ALWAYS play minnows as if they are super teams. Concentrate on ROCK SOLID defense, if a minnow scores a try against you ITS A DISASTER.

So it frustrates me when you hear commentators complaining that an all black team did not put 60 points on another team or are somehow ok wiht portugal scoring a try. I will take an 8-0 win anyday of the week and you shouldn't need any buffer bigger than that because your defense should be up for it.

here comes my VERY harsh call.

It isn't that the All blacks or the Australians played terribly badly - England (and to a lesser extent france) has stepped it up to a level that NZ actually never reaches even at there best. NZ just doesn’t even have that sort of top gear because England’s strategy is perfect rugby. You prevent any tries - make all your tackles and kick for position and kick field goals. Percentage rugby is talked about like it is a dirty word, no wonder we cannot win a world cup.

It is like trying to win a badminton tournament with a tennis racket - you can be REALLY good, you might even win games - you might even beat the other guy - but if the other guy is on form you just wont have the same top gear as him. Sure he wont be on form outside the world cup - but come finals time...

I note that technically the ranking for the knockout stage

England
South Africa / Argentina
France
Australia / New Zealand
Fiji / Scotland

with the team first of each pair probably having a 'points' advantage and of course the SA/Arg winner going to join England at the top.

Both Australia and England and south africa would have beaten us - Australia by a larger points margin (because they are flashier), but beat all the same. We could have done wiht having argentina as our first match, like france did - so that some sense could have been bashed into our team.

Of course I pick England to win the finals if they can hold it together. having said that I think that South africa, of all the sothern teams is the best team to beat them. I picked them as the pre finals favourites. The reason for that was in addition to being good - they had a statistically much easier run to the finals, only needing to beat argentina and fiji.

IQ results by field of study …

To me numbers appear to be skewed to the high end
	IQ
Physics & astronomy	133
Mathematical Sciences	130
Philosophy	129
Materials Engineering	129
Other Engineering	128
Economics	128
Chemical Engineering	128
Mechanical Engineering	126
Engineering	126
Electrical Eng	126
Physical Sciences	125
Banking & finance	125
Other Humanities & Art	124
Computer & Infor Sci	124
Civil Engineering	124
Chemistry	124
Industrial Engineering	123
Religion & Theory	121
Earth, Atmos & Mar. Sci	121
Biological Sciences	121
Political Science	120
Humanities & arts	120
English language & lit	120
Arts-History, theory, crit	120
History	119
Foreign languages & lit	119
Anthropology & Archeology	119
Architecture	118
Natural Sciences -Other	117
Library & Archival Sciences	117
Secondary	116
Social Sciences	115
Agriculture	115
Sociology	114
Other business	114
Life Sciences	114
Business	114
Arts-Performance & studio	114
Psychology	113
Higher	112
Health & medical sciences	111
Curriculum & Instruction	111
Communications	111
Business admin & mgmt.	111
Other social Science	110
Education	110
Accounting	110
Public Administration	109
Other Education	109
Evaluation & Research	109
Elementary	108
Administration	107
Special	106
Home Economics	106
Student Counseling	105
Early Childhood	104
Social Work	103

Rugby

I dont know about all this "we love the all blacks no matter what, thing that hte media seems to be going for. Sure I also dont support spitting on them (its not like I am better at rugby than them) but if I had jsut gone overseas, had been by far the favourite to win my sporting specialty and had been defeated in the quarter finals by a team that was beaten in their pool by a 'minnow' I wouldn't want to be greted at theairport by a crowd. Its like what they say in men are from mars and women are from venus - when you screw up you dont want understanding or anything you just want a cave to go hide in.

Now they have to go around hundreds of interviews with hollow sounding comments about how they are good because they tried their best or whatever. that would be like nails on a chalkboard to me. I think we should just leave them alone for a bit.

Still I guess tv3 spent millions on the coverage (and therefore have taken a hiding on the deal) and they are damn well going to get somthign out of it. I also Imagine that the little models are probably not selling very well - the company on the other hand has to PRETEND they are sellign well because if they dont then they destroy the collectable value of them and therefore undermine any sales they might still have.

World Cup Jokes

1)
Did you hear NZ Post has just recalled their latest batch of stamps?
They had photos of all blacks on them & people couldn’t figure out which side to spit on.

2)
Graham Henry has a busy day and tells the team just to practice passing round some plastic cones for training.
After 80 mins he says them trudging back looking depressed.
“How did the session go lads” he asks
Richie McCaw replies “The cones won 18-12″
"I’ll get my coat."

3)
Did you hear about the NZ politician who was found dead in an All Black jersey? The police had to dress him up in women's underwear in order to save his family from the embarrassment.

4)
Q: What do you call an Australian at the RWC final?
A: Ref.

5) Wayne Barnes walks into a sperm donor bank.
“I’d like to donate some sperm” he says to the receptionist.
“Certainly Sir” replies the receptionist, “have you donated before?”.
“Yes” replies Wayne “you should have my details on your computer”.
“Oh yes, I’ve found your details” says the receptionist “but I see you’re going to need help. Shall I call your wife for you?”
“Why do I need help?” asks Wayne . The receptionist replies
“Well, it says on your record that you’re a useless wanker….”

6) Q: What have the All Blacks got in common with a three pin plug?
A: Both are useless in Wales…

7) On a tour of New Zealand, the Pope took a couple of days off his itinerary to visit the north coast on an impromptu sightseeing trip.
His 4X4 Popemobile was driving along the golden sands when there was an enormous commotion heard just off the headland. They rushed to see what it was and upon approaching the scene the Pope noticed just outside the surf, Wayne Barnes struggling frantically to free himself from the jaws of a twenty-foot shark.
At that moment a speedboat containing Graham Henry, Richie McCaw and Anton Oliver roared into view from around the point. Spontaneously, Richie McCaw took aim and fired a harpoon into the shark’s ribs, immobilising it instantly.
The other two reached out and pulled Wayne Barnes from the water and then, using long clubs, beat the shark to death.
They bundled the bleeding, semi-conscious Wayne into the speedboat along with the dead shark and then prepared for a hasty retreat, when they heard frantic shouting from the shore. It was of course the Pope, and he summoned them to the beach.
Upon them reaching the shore the Pope went into raptures about the rescue and said, “I give you my blessing for your brave actions. I had heard that there were some hooligan elements and vindictive people upset by the result of the match but, now I have seen with my own eyes this is not true. I can see that you are truly enlightened examples of cultural harmony and could serve as a model which other peoples could follow.”
He blessed them all and drove off in a cloud of dust.
As he departed, Graham Henry asked the others, “Who was that?”
“That,” Anton Oliver answered, “was his Holiness the Pope. He is in direct contact with God and has access to all God’s wisdom.”
“Well,” Richie McCaw replied, “he knows fuck all about shark hunting. How’s that bait holding up?”.

8) John Kirwan has been appointed the new All Blacks coach because at least he knows how to deal with depression.

Anyway go England - time to destroy those frogs.

England vs SA in the final.
NZ was always overrated at 1.7 odds even discounting the 'choke factor'.

'Pumpkin' Xue returns to China with grandmother

China daily reports 'Pumpkin' Xue returns to China with grandmother .

they note that Judge Boshier ordered that half-sister Grace Xue has contact with Xue Qianxun by email, telephone, exchange of photos and visits when Ms Xue is in China or Xue is in New Zealand.
Which I find a little funny since it is a Chinese newspaper talking about NZ law applying inside of China. Anyway,

Mrs Liu was grateful to the police and the New Zealand Government. She was suprised everything went so smoothly and she could return home after just 12 days.

The government had paid the $6,000 cost of Anan's funeral and about $10,000 in legal fees for Liu to gain custody of Xue Qianxun.

Mrs Liu said the police had taken them to visit a vineyard and a butterfly show.

She had no plans to seek financial help from the Little Pumpkin Trust, set up by Grace Xue.

The Sunday Star-Times reported that Grace Xue was expected to make a statement tomorrow on behalf of Mrs Liu and herself, outlining plans for the care of Xue Qianxun and her possible return to New Zealand or Australia for part of her education.

NZ herald congradulates judge

the NZ herald argues that the decision by the court to avoid the child protection laws of the family court and reveal the name and decision related to Qian Xun Xue (ie to let her go with her grandmother in china) served 'pumkin' andhte public well.

Im not sure if it really mattered to pumpkin but I suppose the country is saved from the futile attempt to keep such a thing secret.

Resident evil

The south China Morning post focuses on how abuse can easily be enabled by the desperate search of many people for perminant residency.

meanwhile Nai Yin Xue is to be on america's most wanted this saturday - unless it gets 'bumped'

Toilet Humor

Good old Ben Wilson admits to injuring his hand while trying to reach into a toilet roll dispenser
I’ve injured myself with a toilet roll dispenser before. When you’ve taken a dump, you usually want to wipe your arse. When the stupid packet of mostly ineffectual waxpaper that’s supposed to come down fails to do so, you are sorely tempted, however dangerous it may seem with the benefit of hindsight, to avoid wandering around the crowded bathroom with your pants around your knees and a shit-stained arse, by probing further up the dispenser with your hand. For some it is only then that they discover that toilet roll dispensers are carefully designed to prevent people stealing whole boxes of toilet paper by all sorts of cunning jaws and locking mechanisms. My hand was cut and bruised

Nih has also scratched himself the dispensers being replaced are the big round ones with the teeth at the bottom. I’ve actually scratched myself on them, and they can be quite sharp.

Is it surprising that at Waitemata DHB “Following an injury to a staff member earlier this year it has been recommended that an improved type of toilet roll dispenser be introduced."

I fortunately have not had such an injury - but I note that the thought of ben wandering aroudn the hospital with his pants down actually makes me want to vote for the party that has manditory upgrades of toilet paper rolls. Im sue to Adolf's great distain.

Qian Xun going to China

the family court has given custody to the grandmother Nai Xin remains as the other guardian since he is jsut a 'suspect' of murder at present.

Dr Phil

Dr Phil has offered to help britney Spears - how very generous of him. I'm sure it will be such a huge sacrifice for the generous doctor. Oh wait a minute Dr Phil just picks a side then sits on his couch using his position of power to call you an idiot. I am inclined to think Jerry Springer is actually BETTER than Dr Phil.
britney - don't go to Dr Phil.

What is wrong with the media

I found this story on the blogs which directs to a fox story .
The basics of the story is
School security guards in Palmdale, CA have been caught on camera assaulting a 16-year-old girl and breaking her arm after she spilled some cake during lunch and left some crumbs on the floor after cleaning it up.

Now I think the security guard appears to have crossed the line- and the school probably deserves what it gets - but that isn't the issue I want to raise here, the issue is that the media has failed to investigate the story despite it being implausible - or, more likely, has intentionally ignored relevant information and failed to report it. And knowingly allowed a misleading article to be published.

1) The video did not capture the breaking of the arm in this regard the story is obviously factually incorrect.

2) According to the articles the guy who broke the girl's wrist 'tackled' (well you can see exactly what he did) the guy with the camera. That would mean he was the Hispanic guy not the guy who looks like he could be a member of white power. Well who was it?

3) I know the guard is the bad guy but if he broke black girl's wrists for no reason there would be no black girls with wrists in that school. Clearly he did it for some reason even if that was a stupid reason. It is said that that reason is that she slapped a female security guard, that seems very plausible since it appears to be the source of the 'challenging a school official to a fight' charge and the 'battery' charge against her. But that might get in the way of a good story I guess.

4) Dropped apparently a euphemism for "threw", (I.e. a food fight ).

It would seam Fox is intentionally misleading but all the other media agencies and blogs left their brains at the door. Presumably the people involved don’t want to run around making media statements for legal reasons (and because they wouldn't end up looking good anyway) but come on - the media should tell the whole story not just the cookie cut one.

the worst thing is this happens to almost every story and not always in obvious ways.

Anan's lover

It appears NZ police have found Anan's lover (not Jun Cao apparently) who used to live in Auckland.

Suspicious

I'm a little suspicious of the man who uses the term "华夏巨侠" and "Lao Xue" (using the honorific?) also who tends to have an issue with anan and her affiars and sometimes uses a nickname indicating he is from the same province as Nai Yin Xue.

Still, only a bit suspicious...

If you are wondering what I am talking about - I think that Xue could hardly help himself from going online and reading if not posting on chinese (not english) webboards.

everyone-else, your cover is safe.

timeline of Xue case

hat tip YQR

Timeline of events:

mid 1990s - Nai Yin arrived in New Zealand from Fushun, in China's Liaoning province

"He invited people to come and test how skilful he was," restaurant owner and former acquaintance Raymond Tang recalls. "I believe a Pacific Islander came up and because of his mass, (Xue) was beaten easily

1998: Nai yin writes a book "The Pearl of Wu-style Tai Chi: the life of Xue Nai Yin" in the style of a Chinese folk tale where he cals himself a gift from God. and he was named Naixi, meaning "the stamp of royalty". He also makes a blog Nai Yin Xue's blog which is in english .

2000: Xue and his first wife divorce. She returns to China, but their daughter Grace stays with him in New Zealand.

2000: Xue meets and stays with 许秋艳 (Qiu Yan Xu) in Los angeles on a 6 month trip.

2001: A book about his style and Someone in 2001 asks about naiYin some write positively others not so Someone accused Xue of being a fake

2002: Grace runs away from her father / has money dispute (he wouldn't support her).

July 2002: Annie Liu, a 22-year-old international language student, arrives in New Zealand from China. Liu was desperate to stay in New Zealand but failed the English language test. She meets Xue later that year.

July 2003: Ms Liu and Xue marry at a central Auckland registry office. Grandmother disapproves

January 2004: The couple's only child Qian Xun Xue is born.

2005: Xue becomes a New Zealand citizen. His wife becomes a resident. The couple experience marital difficulties and move several times.

Lui writes a blog to keep in contact with her mother here is the origional and here is a copy of her blog

2006: On September 20, the couple reportedly fought over money. Xue threw a mobile phone at Liu, who was holding Qian Xun, then aged two. The phone bounced off Liu and hit Qian Xun in the head, leaving a small cut and swelling. While the child was in her mother's arms, Xue allegedly held a 30-centimetre knife to his wife's stomach and said, "I treat you good and you don't treat me very well. I love you but you don't love me. I am going to kill you! Xue then punched his wife two or three times, striking her above her right eye and on her nose.
Later Lui had been hunting for her passport and instead found a gun. "Xue happened to see this. He beat Annie and threatened her with a knife."
Liu begged Xue for her life and gave him money to placate him before fleeing. At one point she stayed in the Shakti refuge for Asian women in Auckland.
Xue is convicted.

During the separation Liu had a relationship with a married man whom she deeply loved, according to her blog, but whose "love nest" she had to flee the week before his wife returned to him.

March 2007 : Xue meets MP Pansy Wong at a sea scouts event "Mr Xue was obviously very proud of the daughter because the first thing he did was to say, 'Pansy Wong, come and meet my daughter. Don't you think she's gorgeous?"

Early 2007: Xue makes film with help of students in which he cries and begs for his daughter Grace to come home. Xue also claimed to the documentary maker that he was revered by 40,000 adherents, most of them in America.

Xue, whose English was poor, through a translator ordered them not to speak to Anan Liu: "Basically, it was, 'This is my documentary. Don't talk to my wife. Talk to me at all times.'

Xue was in financial trouble despite owning his $5,000 Chinese-language newspaper (almost all small newspapers in NZ loose money).

Ms Liu joined three dating websites. I understand she used the nick name 彼岸花 on one.

Xue told 'John', in a holding cell, he was "going go kill his wife and was then going to leave with his daughter." reported on 1ZB

recently: Xue came down to Wellington to retrieve Liu. Upon returning with her daughter from Wellington last month, Liu had two demands for her husband: the first was that he rent office space so that he was not always at their Mount Roskill home, and the second was a car. She believed having her own car would give her independence and freedom.

Tuesday, Sept 11: One of the last confirmed sightings of Ms Liu takes place outside a childcare centre in the Auckland suburb of Balmoral at 4.35pm. At 9.20pm, Xue collects his passport and a ceremonial sword from police, which had been confiscated but were returned because his wife had refused to testify against him in an assault matter.

Xue appears to have killed Liu with a yellow teck tie (strangulation).

Thursday, Sept 13: Xue and his three-year-old daughter Qian fly into Melbourne, Australia, from Auckland in the evening.

Saturday, Sept 15: Xue is captured on security footage abandoning his daughter Qian Xun and walking off pulling a suitcase, before boarding a flight to Los Angeles.

Sunday, Sept 16: Victoria Police launch public appeal to discover the identity of the girl, who they call Pumpkin.

Xue checks into a hotel in Los Angeles Walter, the attendant at the one-and-a-half star Pagoda says, "I see the newspaper picture, I know the bad guy come in. I know now why he lie; he don't want anybody to know him."

Xue came out again about 5pm, and went out for a meal, this time having changed his clothes, and wearing a "green cap like a US Marine's". I imagine that Xue did not mis hte symbolism (to wear a green hat means that your wife is having sex with another person - a chinese person would be unlikely to not know that)

Tuesday, Sept 18: New Zealand police conduct forensic tests on the family home and Ms Liu's car, which was found at Auckland International Airport.

Qian Xun's flight from Auckland to Melbourne is now being treated as an abduction.

Wednesday, Sept 19:

The "missing" older daughter, Grace, contacts police in New Zealand to say she is alive and well. Police find the remains of an Asian woman - believed to be Ms Liu - in the boot of Xue's car, which has been parked outside the Mt Roskill home for several days.

comments appear on the web critical of Liu "She married a man but she was fooling around with other guys. She said she was divorced without kids. She was talking bullshit, lying to everyone on the internet and trying to cheat the next man. Shame on her!" Family says "for respect of the dead, and to restrain themselves".
October 1 : Grace Xue, Qian Xun and Xiao Ping Liu (the grandmother who is a senior manager at Hunan Yunda Real Estate Development Co. Ltd who do the sheraton building in that province) meet, first informal then with CYFS

sept 25 : the grandmother writes an open letter

Oct 1 NZ police discover anan's lover (not Jun Cao apparently)

Oct 3 Memorial occurs organised by grandmother and friends and paid for by NZ government (great PR job there congradulations to their strategists).

Oct 4 the family court has given custody to the grandmother Nai Xin remains as the other guardian since he is jsut a 'suspect' of murder at present. Grace indicates she is comfortable with the decision.
The government had paid the $10,000 in legal fees for Liu to gain custody of Xue Qianxun.

Oct 6 Nai Yin Xue is to be on America's Most Wanted unless it gets 'bumped'

Oct 7 Qian Xun grandmother and anan's ashes return to china.
According to Grace xue's spokesperson (Edmonds), grandmother Lui indicated that Qian Xun may return to NZ for the education and english speaking advantages however she will not ask the pumpkin fund for money.

National foreign affiars

National released its foreign affairs. To put it simply the policy is to do exactly what labor would do - except leaving the door open to change a few unspecified things.

Politically: a winner - National does well by having no political point of difference because that leaves less weak points where they could be attacked.

In practice: Not so great
1) There is no point to having an anti nuclear policy.
Carbon is probably more dangerous than nuclear - shall we ban carbon fuled ships?
I have a solution just tell everyone there is an anti nuclear policy - but it will never be checked and even if it is discovered the penalty is $1 and it needs to be proven beyond a shadow of a doubt (i.e. samples of uranium).

2) Maintaining defense spending
NZ needs to get smarter about what they will do with their military budget. National has hinted that they might look at it - but they will not do it correctly. The bottom line is we need to define the core role of our military - and it is nonsense for that to be anything other than "defending NZ". Then train the army to do that and only that. Don’t build a NZ military designed to fight some huge army or something when we know full well it will either never get used or be totally useless.
So what does that mean in practice? Well no frigates, in fact we hardly need boats at all - if we have a peacekeeping mission we can buy a plane ticket to there and save a billion dollars on the difference. Each NZ can pocket the extra few hundred dollars. Heavily armored vehicles? Almost no need etc.
But training skills at guerilla warfare - yes indeed - and it is cheap.


3) foreign aid
To focus on the pacific.
That is a good idea - you get more money back from donations to the pacific than to Africa so you can afford to donate more, simple really.

Elections

revision to my predicitons - labour will indeed beat the conservatives in the UK - shouldn't have backed the conservatives anyway there is a masive natural advantage to labour. But I still feel its far enough out to make that change.
so its Labour to win in coalition here / labour to win in the UK / labour to win in aust and democrats in the US -- now its a clean sweep for the left..

Pansy Wong

I dont think Pansy Wong (a local conservative Member of Parliment is very good at reading people

Mrs Wong met the family, including Qian, in March at a Sea Scouts event and said Mr Xue was very proud of his daughter.

"Mr Xue was obviously very proud of the daughter because the first thing he did was to say, 'Pansy Wong, come and meet my daughter. Don't you think she's gorgeous?"'

She said she was taken totally by surprise by the case and was concerned about the mother, who she said seemed a private person.

Pansy goes on to say how surprised she was. It is rather like the comments made on the video that Nai Yin made. the student who did hte interview talked about him normally, while his supervisor talked about how his tears seemed fake and his wife insinuated that he did not care for Qian Xun much.

To me he looks fake, a bit selfish. I think I read peopel pretty well.
I would think reading people would be an important skill for a politician...

meeting over Qian Xun

Grace Xue, Qian Xun and Xiao Ping Liu met yesterday, aparently their son played a bit with Qian Xun - I expect rather like how a 3 and a 1 year old plays - he 3 year old probably had a bit of a poke and the 1 year old tried to eat everything (such as Qian Xun's drawing).

She said a formal decision would be made at a court hearing on Thursday.

it would seem that she is keeping open the options which probably has some benefits for the trust as well as indicating that she is still interested in adopting, since the grandmothers position would almost certainly have ben that she wanted the meeting to openly declare her as the prefered location. I expect the meeting of two strong willed women who both want to take care of the child may not have been entirely amicable under the surface (I envisage a feminine sort of conflict). I expect the meeting particularly the informal one wihtout CYFS would have been quite interesting to be a fly on the wall.

Myanmar

news on myanmar
“Tell them to send foreign troops, UN troops,” said a young monk at the Mwe Kya Kan pagoda. “Please, fly them to our country to save our lives.”

An American in Rangoon told me yesterday about an opinion poll carried out on Burmese attitudes to US foreign policy.

“Like most people, they thought that it sucks,” he told me. “But not for the usual reason. Burmese wanted to know why George Bush hasn’t invaded their country yet.”

Revolution

I think the time of people power is almost over. If I am right then the modern left will soon face some tough decisions.
People like
maia will need to decide do they want to have active interference from overseas in the affairs of countries like Myanmar, north Korea, Zimbabwe, Iran etc or do they want the current regime to continue indefinitely.

Look at attempts at revolution in Zimbabwe which have failed despite the almost total incompetence of the government (take plummeting life expectancy as an example). It just has not mattered how much the vast majority of the population must hate Mugabe (surely only an idiot supports a guy who will make you live a decade or two shorter on average).

You don’t even hear of attempts at revolution in North Korea even during times of starvation. There are no gay activists marching in Iran and I don’t see it coming any time soon.

Even in Myanmar I expect the result of any attempt to fight the government will only result in a few extra people being killed. No political change except maybe stricter laws. The only way there would be change is if someone like the Chinese made it happen.

I am not proposing that we automatically go around invading these Countries - just that there are tough choices out there and if we are sacrificing the people of Zimbabwe or Myanmar because it is just too hard then we should be honest with ourselves.

So… ‘doves’, let’s say I am right – then what should we do?

Oh well... maybe there is time for one more revolution...