The John Batchelor Show

Wednesday 19 August 2015

Air Date: 
August 19, 2015

Photo, left: 
JOHN BATCHELOR SHOW
Hour One
Wednesday  19 August 2015 / Hour 1, Block A: Charles Burton, professor at Brock University, in re:  Chinese agents illegally entered the US – Chinese state police passing themselves off as members of trade delegations –  have been intimidating Chinese-Americans and bullying them to return to China, threatening their families at home.  Operation Foxhunt and Operation Skynet. WSJ: "All Chinese officials are corrupt" – Xi Jinping's "anticorruption" campaign is actually two political factions fighting each other. The result of the illegal entry of Chinese agents has led to the US demanding that all Chinese police leave the US.  Something has changed since April, such that the US no longer cooperates with China; threre seems to have been some sort of rupture. Apparently no further contact between American and Chinese police departments, as that collaboration feeds into Chinese politics. The two nations have different legal codes, and due process doesn't exist in China, so there's no ______ treaty.  CCTI is well known for torture; after a victim is broken he's turned over to officials for questioning.  Canada and Australia, along with .  smaller nations. have been collaborating with China; 930 suspects have been returned to China, one supposes that all of them have been tortured.  The upcoming mtg between Mssrs Xi and Obama; China expect the US to respect China's wishes, wolens nolens, When Mr Obama refuses, Mr Xi will become unhappy
Wednesday  19 August 2015 / Hour 1, Block B:  Abheek Bhattacharya, WSJ HK, in re: the Western maxim of investing only when there's blood on the Street doesn't hold in China.  Niche mfrs such as certain kinds of power tools and the like are still OK to buy; but buying onto HK now might be a value trap.  . . .  Projections made by analysts, as no one trusts a company's projections.  . . . If it's paying dividends, that suggests that the numbers on the balance sheet aren't entirely made up.  Look for a dividend, and a privately-owned co (nothing state-owned).
No way to ignore the big economic convulsions across in China. Last week, for instance, China weakened its currency. . . .  a piece identifying a Chinese power-tools exporter who could hugely benefit from a weaker yuan. In the same vein, when Chinese stock markets were crashing in early July, article on a few good companies that were suddenly bargains.
Wednesday  19 August 2015 / Hour 1, Block C: James Holmes, prof of strategy at the Naval War College, in re:
The sea is a vast ocean space; finding a sub is a needle in a haystack – trying to hear a sound for anti-submarine warfare. Very difficult. For decades, the US has had Ohio-class subs (with Cruise missiles) that seemed invulnerable, but now the balance is changing, Center for New Strategic and Budgetary Assessments in DC: "Since subs became nuclear, the advantage has always been with the one trying to hide.  That changes with Big Data; we're always thinking of the offense-defense balance.  The underwater analogue to other realms.  When a US sub returns to port, data are analyzed. If it turns out that a US sub has been tracked by an adversarial country, the commander has basically lost his job.  . . .  China used to be lagging in submarine warfare; although it's possible that they've leapfrogged over several generation of technology, that's pretty unlikely.  Go beyond acoustic sub warfare, use lasers to make the water transparent and find subs more easily.   We're losing the main asset we've counted on; if China can project power underwater and keep US subs at bay, that'll be a major change. Further, underwater transparency makes our carrier groups more powerful because our carrier groups are more powerful to start with.   Clausewitz: War as two wrestlers' constantly jockeying for greater power.  Shift from US greater power to China taking over could occur swiftly. Battle will be fought underneath the water – which was the US advantage from WWII, but not so much now.
Wednesday  19 August 2015 / Hour 1, Block D:  Hotel Mars, episode n.  Dr Robert  Pappalardo, NASA JPL Europa Mission director, in re:      http://www.nasa.gov/jpl/nasas-europa-mission-team-joins-forces-for-the-f... What makes Europa special is the prospect of a subsurface ocean beneath its icy shell – we might find microbial life.  We have a lot of support from Congress, the scientific community and the public.  Conditions for organic life: a source of energy leading to water in gas, solid, and liquid forms.   Rock . .  .  Right chemical compound to react in order to power life? The oxygen cycle:  can O2 be a fuel for life?  Also, the right elements to bld organic molecules?   We can actually sniff the atmosphere by a low overfly: can get at the composition, measure particles of dust and their make-up, and remotely sense the surface – it's the combination of modalities that helps. If we really want to see if there is life there, then need to check just below the first few centimeters, subsurface, to search for signs of life.  NASA selected a payload of nine instruments: camera can see half-meter per pixel; ultraviolet to search for plumes; infrared; thermal instrument to find hotspots; ice-penetrating radar; scooping up dust for a dust analyzer; a mass-spectrometer to look at organic compounds; a magnetometer and a plasma instrument.  Now looking at a Jupiter orbiter that makes 45 flybys of Europa.  Could be more. Launch date uncertain: depends somewhat on funding profile, but in the next decade. How long it takes to get there depends on the launch vehicle – conventional, seven years; but NASA is working on the Space Launch Vehicle, which could take three years or less.
Hour Two
Wednesday  19 August 2015 / Hour 2, Block A:  Dean Cheng, Senior Research Fellow, Asian Studies Center at the Heritage Foundation, in re: North Korea threatens US and South Korea; now has more capability to do damage than formerly. When threats don't garner a prompt negative reaction, it then portrays itself as having "tweaked the lion in its own den." All of them cower before the will of Kim Jong-eun.  Maybe 85 senior officials have been executed there; establishing the impressiveness of Eun, who has nothing to his credit but creating fear and a war atmosphere.  China is trouble=d economically, socially, politically, but can affords the bare life-support of sustenance to DPRK - in fact, Beijing can't afford North Korean instability and Koreans' flooding across the border.  While there are civilian contract 'twixt China and North Korea, the latter remains a buffer vs the Americans in southern Korea, and also the Europeans – to wit, Russians – in the north.  US has signed a deal with Iran and another with Cuba.  Credible that there cd be conversations now between Washington and DPRK. . . . Iranian have been since October 2012 at a DPRK base just south of China.  Note that there's an armistice, but the Korean war has never yet ended.  Clinton hoped to open a consulate if not an embassy . . .  Allowing Iran to inspect its own suspect nuclear center at Parchin, why not let North Korea inspect its own nukes?  https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2015/08/17/north-korea-has-threatened-a-u-s-attack-for-years-why-arent-you-scared/
Wednesday  19 August 2015 / Hour 2, Block B: Julia Famularo, research affiliate at Project 2049 Institute, on this: http://time.com/3999852/china-shuts-websites-tianjin-censorship/ Explosions in Tianjin, a devastated landscape: bloggers posted pix, immed removed by state censors, who then had to post their own; awhile civilians constantly sneaked in for more photos and post them . Sate: Don't do your own investigative journalism, use only CCTV or Xinhua.  While the ferry disaster was underwater and remote, this is in a major metro area.  Even state reporters pushing the envelope by hounding govt officials, who were clueless on how to answer a real question.   State playing whack-a-mole by closing 50 websites.  Nearly 309 industrial explosions in the six months, alone; housing near the warehouses; arsenic in Tianjin and the nearby Bohai Sea and shareholders of the culpable company are govt officials.  Young contract firefighters sent to fight the chemical fires with zero information, were encouraged to use water, which is extremely dangerous.   Previous promises of transparency were lies. See official hand-wringing and officials' bowing before firefighters – but no change of the lethal Party culture.  Tightened Internet controls. Xi Jingping with Document Number 9: foster patriotism, not unduly criticizing govt. "You can't devalue yourself to prosperity" – can incr export, but capital flight issues out of China now, and other problems. A complex trade-off.
Wednesday  19 August 2015 / Hour 2, Block C: Tom Mitchell, FT Beijing correspondent, in re: article on China's economy.  Vietnam devalued the dong; protectionist warfare in the neighborhood not to likely, but PBOC inadvertently surprised global mkts by revising its RMB rate – moved it down 2%, a lot – allowed people to image 2% a day, which would be shocking. However, the PBOC held the fall at around 3% for the past week. It moved to 3% quickly and held. Want to convince the IMF that the RMB rate is determined by mkts so it can join the IMF international reserve basket, SDRs.  . . . Debt-to-GDP ratio is a big problem. Debt is growing twice as fast as the economy.  Strategy of endless govt intervention in RMB?  No exit strategy.  And it always intervenes.    http://www.wsj.com/articles/a-global-recession-may-be-brewing-in-china-1439764500?mod=djemBestOfTheWeb
Wednesday  19 August 2015 / Hour 2, Block D:  Michael Ledeen, FDD, in re: Parchin, mil site in Iran that was to be part of the inspections regime by IAEA and others, where an atomic energy residue was thought to be;; and much earth-moving after Vienna; an arrangement between the (UN) IAEA: Iran will be its own inspector at Parchin, The White House was said to know nothing of this.  Iran consistently says, "Sure come inspect," then immed says. "Never in a military site." This has gone on for years.  Right out of The Onion.  When this Administration says "We have all the info" – that's false.  Sen Chas Schumer was a principal in negotiating with the Green Movement, the opposition to the ayatollah; yet the White House and its allies berated Sen Schumer for being a "hardliner.'  What?  Michael: In 2009. Sen Schumer was picked to be the messenger between US and Green Movement.  But Farnaz Fassihi, at WSJ is being accused by the ayatollahs of being "the Wall Street friend" whom Schumer used to reach the Greens. Huge attack, just make things up, lie. Khamenei still hasn't approved the deal while Iranian hardliners want him to reject it
Hour Three
Wednesday  19 August 2015 / Hour 3, Block A:  Monica Crowley, Washington Times, in re: www.oregonlive.com/today/index.ssf/2015/08/democratic_insiders_worry_abo... (1 of 4)
Wednesday  19 August 2015 / Hour 3, Block B: Monica Crowley, Washington Times, in re: www.oregonlive.com/today/index.ssf/2015/08/democratic_insiders_worry_abo... (2 of 4)
Wednesday  19 August 2015 / Hour 3, Block C: Monica Crowley, Washington Times, in re: www.oregonlive.com/today/index.ssf/2015/08/democratic_insiders_worry_abo... / CNN/ORC Poll: Donald Trump now competitive in general election  For the first time in CNN/ORC polling, Donald Trump's gains among the Republican Party . . . (3 of 4)
Wednesday  19 August 2015 / Hour 3, Block D: Monica Crowley, Washington Times, in re: www.oregonlive.com/today/index.ssf/2015/08/democratic_insiders_worry_abo... (4 of 4)
Hour Four
Wednesday  19 August 2015 / Hour 4, Block A:  Anna Nemtsova, Daily Beast, in re: American Troops in Ukraine Rattle Putin
The Kremlin is worried about not just what the Americans are teaching the Ukrainians, but what they may be learning from them and the Donbas battlefield.

Wednesday  19 August 2015 / Hour 4, Block B: Anna Nemtsova, Daily Beast, in re: Russia Slides Back to the Middle Ages
 Under President Vladimir Putin, Russia has been sliding back toward the Middle Ages.

Wednesday  19 August 2015 / Hour 4, Block C: John Avlon, Daily Beast, and Taegan Goddard,  Political Wire, in re: http://politicalwire.com/2015/08/18/hillary-clinton-is-still-nearly-inev... http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/08/18/all-the-electable-repub...
Wednesday  19 August 2015 / Hour 4, Block D: John Avlon, Daily Beast, and Taegan Goddard,  Political Wire, in re: http://politicalwire.com/2015/08/18/so-much-for-the-gop-dream-team/    http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/08/18/trump-s-oreo-boycott.html   http://politicalwire.com/2015/08/18/bush-is-the-easiest-for-clinton-to-b...