Taiwan and China

The political status of Taiwan is controversial. Not only is it controversial whether Taiwan should remain as part of the Republic of China, become part of the People's Republic of China, or become an independent Republic of Taiwan, different groups have different concepts of what the current situation is.

The political solution that is acceptable to most of the current groups is the status quo, which is to leave Taiwan's status the way that it is.

The current position of the People's Republic of China is that Taiwan is part of China and the PRC is the sole legitimate government of China. In addition to the problem the People's Republic of China is unwilling to negotiate under any other formulation than a one China policy.

Within Taiwan, support for Taiwan independence and Chinese reunification exists as part of a political spectrum with most people apparently in the middle.

The current controversy is over the term one China, which the PRC insists is necessary to begin negotiations.

-> When given a choice between the three options of independence, status quo, or unification, typical results of recent polls show 20% in favor of independence, 15% in favor of unification, and about 50% in favor of status quo.

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Arab-Israeli Conflict

The conflict, which started as a political and nationalist conflict over competing territorial ambitions following the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, has shifted over the years from the large scale regional Arab–Israeli conflict to a more local Israeli-Palestinian conflict, though the Arab World and Israel generally remain at odds with each other over specific territory.

The thing here, in my opinion the most important factor that is causing this conflict is mainly religious. Why?, Because in that little piece of land are the establishments and the beginnings of the 3 most important religions in the world, that is Catholicism, Judaism and Islam-ism. The conflict is that each one wants to keep the territory because the thing here is that their beginnings and establishments started in the same region : Catholics, because Jesus was crucified in Jerusalem, for the Jews, the Salomon Temple and for the Muslims, the ascendancy of Mahoma was too in Jerusalem.

The one solution i see to this problem is that the territory will have to be divided; each religious group gets its own main land.

Arab League	Israel
Have been at war with Israel	Gaza Strip and West Bank
Date Early 20th century-present Location Middle East Result Ongoing
Belligerents
Arab nations	Israel

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The Arctic will be ice-free in summer within 20 years

"Ships will be able to sail in open water to the North Pole in the summer of 2020, according to a study that found a rapid acceleration in the loss of sea ice."

The Arctic will be ice-free in summer within 20 years, the study found, while the Earth will lose the white cap that can be seen in photographs taken from space.

“The North Pole will be exposed in ten years. You would be able to sail a Japanese car carrier across the North Pole and out into the Atlantic,” Professor Wadhams said.

This has several consequences, such as:
1. Without ice to reflect sunlight, the Arctic Ocean would warm more quickly, resulting in the release of greenhouse gases
2. The warming of the Arctic surface waters would accelerate the melting of the Greenland ice sheet, speeding up the sea level rise.

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Religion vs Freedom : the right of egyptian woman to wear veils in universities.

CAIRO, Egypt (CNN) -- There's more to wearing the "niqab" -- the austere, all-covering veil favored by ultra-religious Muslim women -- than meets the eye.

A recent declaration by the leading Egyptian religious authorities that women will not be allowed to wear the niqab (veil) in university areas frequented only by women has sparked demonstrations by female students in Cairo determined to wear the all-encompassing veil wherever they go.

Egypt's Al-Azhar University, recently convened an all-male committee to rule on what women can wear at Egypt's public universities.
Universities started to propose the using of the veil as an option, not obligatory, but the Muslim religion clearly states the using of the niqab (veil) as obligatory always.

Do you think Muslim women should wear the niqab?

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Blast from the Past

Today at our class, we were talking about the EU Institutions, specifically the European Council, and the teacher told us about some news about the election of president of the European Council, and the best candidate for it was Tony Blair, ex prime minister of the United Kingdom.
I found this interesting picture in the London Times that really shows what we saw in class, im going to explain this cartoon:
The United Kingdom (Tony Blair) has been viewed as a pro-americanist nation rather than a pro-european member, a clear example of this has been the support of the UK to the war in Iraq and Afghanistan, sending thousands of troops along with the US army.
This cartoon tells us how the UK, in particular Tony Blair will the lead the European Union into an armed conflict even though the bast mayority of the european members are against war.

• The hat represents the one Napoleon used in war
• The horse represents the 4 horses of Apocalypsis, said by the Bible, meaning destruction or an end.

What this cartoon is telling us too is that thanks to the firm Ireland confirmed of the Lisbon Treaty, now all member states will probably choose Blair as the president of the EU.
What an irony, because Blair being pro-americanist, how can he rule the EU being all members of the EU agains the US and war?

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Keep studying!!

Here are the top ten paying jobs in the United States :

1. Anesthesiologist :$292,000
2. Physician/Obstetrician/Gynecologist : $222,000
3. Psychiatrist : $177,000
4. Nurse Anesthetist: $157,000
5. Sales Director : $140,000
6. Actuary : $129,000
7. Finance Director : $121,000
8. Software Architect : $117,000
9. Attorney/Lawyer : $115,000
10. Insurance Broker : $114,000

SO, WHAT ARE YOU STUDYING AND WHERE ARE YOU WORKING IN THE FUTURE?
THINK ABOUT IT ...

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Obama's power : declining or helping?

President Obama faces a daunting fall to-do list against the backdrop of an American public losing enthusiasm on a variety of issues.

Obama's agenda ranges from dealing with Iran's nuclear ambitions to traveling to Copenhagen to pitch Chicago for the 2016 Olympics :

• "Health care reform has been his No. 1 priority issue here"
• On the global scene, in addition to Iran, Obama also must deal with winding down the war in Iraq and deciding what's next for the U.S. in Afghanistan.
• Also worth noting, Obama's goal of closing down the prison at Guantanamo Bay is proving to be difficult; and slow enough that his original deadline of January 2010 is no longer a deadline.
• And then of course, there is the unknown -- the unpredictable things that require immediate attention in any presidency.

It's a lot -- but during the campaign, then-candidate Obama seemed to know what he was getting into, telling voters, "presidents are going to have to deal with more than one thing at a time."

¿DO YOU THINK PRESIDENT OBAMA WILL DO EVERYTHING AS HE SAID AND WHAT HE PROMISED TO ITS CITIZENS?

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Made in China

I found this interesting picture about the world "made by china". I think it will eventually happen, because of all the great power China has been getting and all the technology and the trading with a great part of the world. If you see what you have in your home, notice that around 60% of the products are made in China. Thanks to globalization, China is getting more powerful, making it in the future i think the most powerful country in the world, and not in a long time!!!

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year 2100 : México challenges the US

I've been reading a book, and i got to a chapter that really interested me: 2100: the year Mexico challenges the US.
As we all know, North America has been the center of gravity of the international system, specifically the US, because it's power is so overwhelming that no one is in a position to challenge it. The great global war in the twenty-first century will make clear that no European country will emerge to challenge the United States. In addition, whoever controls the Atlantic and Pacific oceans control the global trade, and whoever controls space, will control the world ocean's. The United States controls and will control most of space, making it in control of everything.
Reality however, is more complex: the United States will have a very strong weakness in the future, that it will not have confronted for two hundred years. Well Mexico comes in here. The question of Mexico's relative power to the US will be raised again. Mexico, after two hundred years, will be in a position to challenge the territorial integrity of the United States, and therefore, the balance of North America.
A Mexican challenge will emerge around 2020's, but it will be solved by immigration laws, aggressively encouraging immigration to the US in order to solve America's labor shortages. There will be a massive influx of immigrants, specially from Mexico. But the Mexicans have a positive side : geographically there in the same continent and years after shared territory, and that, coupled with the growing strength of Mexico as a nation, will shift the North America balance of power.
There will be such Mexican population in the US, nowadays around 8 million Mexicans live in the US, imagine 40-50 years later, there will be such population that there will have to be something, like a treaty to occupy part o the US because Americans will migrate and Mexicans will occupy most of the southern US territory.
Surging immigration into the US and the aftereffects of the war will kick off an economic crisis around 2060's. The availability of capital and land will no longer be the same.

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Digital Information vs. Libraries

I uploaded this video, that's seems very interesting to me, because i think it´s what is happening right now with all the technology, and what will happen in the future. This is thanks to all the advances in technology. I see one bad opinion only, because of all the technology and the accessibility to information in internet, libraries are going to disappear. This is not a good one because no more authors are gonna be interested in writing books or it will be just as much as technology that books will eventually almost dissapear. And i think books are very good resource of information because it's different from internet, in internet you get exactly what you want, and with a book there's more into it.

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CNN News : Economic Summit Comes Down

As the leaders of the world's industrial powers gather this week in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, their economies are starting to emerge from the shadow of the worst financial downturn since the Great Depression.

A year ago, global markets were in free fall as governments moved to prop them up, sometimes nationalizing financial institutions and automakers. At this year's Group of 20 summit, the leaders will begin looking at an exit strategy for the programs that were considered necessary, because this strategy seemed not to work.

"The Pittsburgh summit is an important opportunity to continue the hard work that we have done in confronting the global economic crisis and renewing prosperity for our people,"

"Together, we will review the progress we have made, assess what more needs to be done, and discuss what we can do together to lay the groundwork for balanced and sustainable economic growth", President Obama said in a statement ahead of the start of the two-day G-20 summit, which begins Thursday.

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History of the European Union

The European Union was born with the desire to end the frequent and bloody conflicts between neighbors that had culminated in the Second World War. In the 50s, the first step started in an economic and political union of European countries to achieve lasting peace, so that they won't fight anymore.

Its six founders are Belgium, France, Italy, Luxembourg and the Netherlands.

In the 60's comes the 'youth culture', fueled by bands like the Beatles that attract crowds of teenagers wherever they go, helping to stimulate a cultural revolution and widening the generation gap. It is a good time for the economy favored, among other things, because the EU countries didn't have to pay anymore on commercial transactions between them.

On January 1, 1973 Denmark, Ireland and the UK become part of the European Union, bringing the number of Member States rises to nine.

In 1981, Greece becomes the tenth member of the EU, and five years later, Spain and Portugal joined. In 1986, The Single European Act was signed;, treaty to eliminate borders and free movement of goods across EU borders, and gives rise, therefore, the 'single market'. In the same year, both Germany's opened their borders and unified.

In 1995, Austria, Finland and Sweden enter to the European Union.

Around the year 2000, ten new countries join the EU and the EURO started to circulate as the new monetary in the EU.

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The Hidden Face of Globalisation

Here's a video that impressed me about the negative side of globalisation, and the worst of all, is that it`s true. And everything they do, they work at, it's for us, to export to other countries. What an irony, because we get everything, and those people are literally killing themselves for us to have clothes, food, and the get paid just like 8 cents a day, working 12 hours a day or more, everything for export. In my opinion, they should get more payments and rewards for their hard work that they are doing instead of us.

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NATO

NATO stands for North Atlantic Treaty Organization. This is a military affair between the countries, where if an external attack is going to happen, they are going to defend collectively. This organization was created in April 4, 1949 as a result of threats by the Soviet Union and his allies against the USA with west Europe (Germany,Spain,England,France, etc). The outbreak of the Korean War in 1950 was crucial for NATO as it raised the apparent threat level forcing the alliance to develop concrete military plans.

As countries started to join this alliance, the Soviet Union proposed to unify to this alliance in 1954, to preserve peca ein Europe and with the USA. The NATO countries, fearing that the Soviet Union's motive was to weaken the alliance, ultimately rejected this proposal.

This led to the creaton of the Warsal Pact, created in 1955 by the Soviet Union and his allies (Poland,Bulgaria,Romania,ALbania and East Germany) in respond to this event.

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Obama cares about the economic crisis?, think for yourself

I found this picture while i was doing some homework, and i think its curious, because we can see that the president Obama doesn`t really care about this accident, as about neither the US economics crisis like some people say. We can see this result in Obama working for it, are we really looking at a change?. I dont know, i leave it to you, im no one to judge the president, because first of all i dont live there and two is my perception about what i see in the news.

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THINGS TO KNOW FOR EXAM :)

IMPORTANT TO KNOW FOR THE EXAM!!

* WORLD WAR 1 : 1914 - 1918
* WORLD WAR 2: 1939 - 1945

* MAIN CAUSES OF WW1: NATIONALISM, ECONOMIC COMPETITION, ASSESINATION OF FERDINAND.

* NATIONALISM IS TO LOVE, RESPECT AND BE PROURD OF YOUR COUNTRY; EXTREME PATRIOTISM.

* NATO: NORTH ATLANTIC TREATY ORGANIZATION.

* POLICY OF CONTAINMENT: WANTED TO STOP THE SPREAD OF COMMUNISM. (NATO´S IDEA)

* ARGENTINA, GERMANY AND CHILE HAVE WOMAN LEADERS

* MOST IMPORTANT ORGANIZATIONS: NATIONS STATE AND INTERNATIONAL INSTITUTION

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