SGP a strong ally of USA - Leader not considered World Class
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Are the Singapore Political Leaders recognised as World Class on the Global Political Stage as Singaporeans have always been led to believe by all the self-aggrandizing information from the local broadcast and print medias ?
Even the first African-American President - with links to S.E.Asia - do not seem to put this strongest US Ally in the region to be on par with those nine national leaders whom he called personally to thank them for their congratulatory messages.
The silence is loud.
Obama in phone talks with nine world leaders
Posted: 07 November 2008 0846 hrsCHICAGO - President-elect Barack Obama spoke by telephone Thursday with the leaders of nine US allies to express thanks for their messages of congratulation, an aide said.
Obama returned calls to the leaders of Australia, Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Israel, Japan, Mexico and South Korea, according to Stephanie Cutter, spokeswoman for the Democrat's transition office.
America's next leader was "thanking them for having called to express congratulations on his election earlier this week," she said in a statement without elaborating.
Obama has been inundated with foreign plaudits after triumphing over Republican John McCain to be elected the nation's first African-American president Tuesday, with even US foes such as Iran and Cuba offering praise.
After the election, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown hailed Obama's "energizing" politics.
"This is a moment that will live in history as long as history books are written," Brown added.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy, another of the leaders called by Obama, wrote to the president-elect to say his "brilliant victory rewards a tireless commitment to serve the American people."
Outgoing Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said he was certain US-Israeli ties would strengthen under Obama's presidency, after Republicans had said the Democrat would endanger the Jewish state's security.
According to Cutter, Obama spoke also with Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso, Mexican President Felipe Calderon and South Korean President Lee Myung-bak. - AFP/vmhttp://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/afp_world/view/388226/1/.html
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He does not want to be accused of "palling around" with public money grabbing, dissidents persecuting, foreigners first despots.
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Aiya, maybe for Singapore govt, he treat them more special, he will come and personally to thank singapore instead of using phone call which is not so sincere mah.
So wait hor
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obama, pls become a citizen of singapore.
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Originally posted by jay_rocks:
obama, pls become a citizen of singapore.
he dun want, he said he only want to be a PR, no need to pay so much tax and burdens by high cost of living as a citizen -
Originally posted by Atobe:
Are the Singapore Political Leaders recognised as World Class on the Global Political Stage as Singaporeans have always been led to believe by all the self-aggrandizing information from the local broadcast and print medias ?
Even the first African-American President - with links to S.E.Asia - do not seem to put this strongest US Ally in the region to be on par with those nine national leaders whom he called personally to thank them for their congratulatory messages.
The silence is loud.
cos LKY objected to his presidency wad. -
REPUBLIC of Singapore.
Obama ... is D
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What world class are u talking about, those countries govts cannot even match our govt class, not even Obama, they are the lower class, so how dare he call us.
Our Ministers are earning more than him, we got world class salary paid govt here, world class career govt path of SM, MM and then SMM, world class perks for Ministers and world class obedient citizens, even Bush will soon be gone liao, but our former Ministers still around.
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Yes, what a shame the bloody lee hsien loong and gang pay themselves super high obscene world class salary but in reality they are not even near world class. These arrogant idiots are a shame to the people of Singapore who feed them.
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Originally posted by Fantagf:
Yes, what a shame the bloody lee hsien loong and gang pay themselves super high obscene world class salary but in reality they are not even near world class. These arrogant idiots are a shame to the people of Singapore who feed them.
"people of Singapore who feed them"?
I feel robbed, for a lack of choice in that matter...
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Originally posted by Atobe:
Are the Singapore Political Leaders recognised as World Class on the Global Political Stage as Singaporeans have always been led to believe by all the self-aggrandizing information from the local broadcast and print medias ?
Even the first African-American President - with links to S.E.Asia - do not seem to put this strongest US Ally in the region to be on par with those nine national leaders whom he called personally to thank them for their congratulatory messages.
The silence is loud.
i'm surprised that cna reported it.
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I can imagine Obama's eyes widen when he hears how much sg ministers are getting paid.
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Obama didn't call Spain, Italy, Greece, Brazil, Argentina, India, Indonesia, Phillippinese, Saudi Arabia, Portugal, Fiji, Tonga, Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia, Nigeria, Senegal, South Africa, China, Denmark, Switzerland, Norway, Finland, Tunisia, Algeria, Mongolia, Russia, the list can go on and on.
What the big deal?
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Originally posted by mancha:
Obama didn't call Spain, Italy, Greece, Brazil, Argentina, India, Indonesia, Phillippinese, Saudi Arabia, Portugal, Fiji, Tonga, Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia, Nigeria, Senegal, South Africa, China, Denmark, Switzerland, Norway, Finland, Tunisia, Algeria, Mongolia, Russia, the list can go on and on.
What the big deal?
The big deal is Singapore govt claims to be world class and the minsters the highest paid in the world and Obama don't give two fucks about it!
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With so many M here, Obama is probably confused as to which one calls the shot here. So it is likely that he will call those countries with the traditional president and prime minister first, until his aides can advise him on the right protocol in dealing with an oddball ally with such a sui generis structure in leadership.
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His line is incoming call free la..Outgoing calls exceed limit already
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Obama must be thinking, MM Lee you good, say I lousy.
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...The choice of Obama is unlikely to be popular with the conservative Mr. Lee Kuan Yew, who was quoted to have said in February that he favoured McCain, and that Obama was a flash in the pan...
http://209.85.175.104/search?q=cache:qbKcn9nTHLIJ
Will Obama forgive and forget or will he be vindictive towards Lee Kuan Yew?
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"The Bell curve is a fact of life. The blacks on average score 85 per cent on IQ and it is accurate, nothing to do with culture. The whites score on average 100. Asians score more ... the Bell curve authors put it at least 10 points higher.
These are realities that, if you do not accept, will lead to frustration because you will be spending money on wrong assumptions and the results cannot follow."
- Lee Kuan Yew, The Man & His Ideas, 1997
I think Lee Kuan Yew better update his theories or else make a fool of himself before Obama.
Like to believe in rubbish theories, this Lee Kuan Yew. Very odd.
The Bell Curve Flattened
Debunking The Bell Curve
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Originally posted by simikai:
With so many M here, Obama is probably confused as to which one calls the shot here. So it is likely that he will call those countries with the traditional president and prime minister first, until his aides can advise him on the right protocol in dealing with an oddball ally with such a sui generis structure in leadership.
Indeed. Overseas IDD is expensive nowadays you know...
If he calls S.R.Nathan, then MM might get jealous, if he calls MM Lee, then SM Goh might get jealous, if he calls SM Goh, PM lee would complain to his father, If he calls PM Lee, then MM lee, SM Goh and S.R.Nathan would all get angry...
If he calls all of them... well, his phone bill will go bust. -
Originally posted by Atobe:
Are the Singapore Political Leaders recognised as World Class on the Global Political Stage as Singaporeans have always been led to believe by all the self-aggrandizing information from the local broadcast and print medias ?
Even the first African-American President - with links to S.E.Asia - do not seem to put this strongest US Ally in the region to be on par with those nine national leaders whom he called personally to thank them for their congratulatory messages.
The silence is loud.
Do u mean only those leaders who Obama called are considered world class?
How many nations in the world?
SG leader dunt need American to endorse that SG is important.
Oz PM Rudd is very eager to attend whatever meeting with USA President.
He would cry if he had not been invited to attend G20 meeting on 15 Nov.
What would achieve during the few days meeting with so many
transalations?
@@@@@@@@2
What is the point to ask the poor first world countries to the meeting?
Do they have $$ to inject to the world system?
USA depends on printing IOU to survive,Oz little federal reserve....
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Originally posted by lionnoisy:
Do u mean only those leaders who Obama called are considered world class?
How many nations in the world?
SG leader dunt need American to endorse that SG is important.
Oz PM Rudd is very eager to attend whatever meeting with USA President.
He would cry if he had not been invited to attend G20 meeting on 15 Nov.
What would achieve during the few days meeting with so many
transalations?
@@@@@@@@2
What is the point to ask the poor first world countries to the meeting?
Do they have $$ to inject to the world system?
USA depends on printing IOU to survive,Oz little federal reserve....
Do you know how to read the 'Billing' in this Thread, or are your thought process and vision controlled by your knee jerks ?
Singapore is as strong an ally to the USA as the leaders of the nine countries whom Obama called - Australia, Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Israel, Japan, Mexico and South Korea - more so when the Singapore Leadership had given unstinting support to most US policies as much as Australia, Britain, and Israel despite our size.
Canada, France, Germany, and Mexico had broken ranks with the USA on more political and military issues then Singapore has supported; while Japan and South Korea were even more selective.
Despite the unstinting support from SG as an ally - did any US Administration showed the same level of appreciation to SG ?
Only you will pull the wool over your own eyes to believe that "SG leader dunt need American to endorse that SG is important".
What possibly could be the reason for LKY to desparately build a deep sea naval base in Changi that can accomodate a US Navy aircraft carrier - and annoy every South-east Asian countries, when all had wanted the US Military out of the ASEAN region ?
Was it not a fact that LKY was promoting SG to be an important lynch-pin in the US Global reach ?
Surely, your Oz bitterness had blind-sided your views towards PM Rudd - and forgot that his first agenda as PM - was to withdraw Oz troops from Iraq, while SG's Old Man felt that it was important to fly Singapore's flag in a token appearance in Iraq - with an aerial tanker and a naval LST.
Yet for all the negative claims you made, Australia is a member country of the G-8 while for all the self-aggrandizing claims you made about SG's wealth - we are not even a member of the G-8 or even part of the G-20 Countries - which included the richest Asian country - China, and the poorest - Indonesia.
From the calls made by Obama to the 9 leaders - are you suggesting that the other nine countries are poorer, while Singapore is far richer than them ?
From your typical stance taken in this SgForum, you will probably turn a blind eye to the fact that it is the Singapore Government that is rich, while Singaporeans are the poorer lot.
Conversely, the US Government may have incurred a shocking huge national debt that have gained notoriety, many like you have largely ignored the other fact that the Private Wealth in the USA far surpass the Singapore National Reserves or the size of the US National Debt.
The reason for the USA still standing strong - despite the present chaotic economic and financial melt-down - is due largely to its inner strength - compared to the Asian financial crisis of 1997, when many Asian economies were shaken to its core that resulted in total financial collapse in Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, and South Korea.
Despite the present US financial melt-down, the US Dollar remains solid vis-a-vis other currencies, and is still used as a Reserve Currency by many countries.
The solid Gold Bars locked up in Fort Knox remains untouched.
The stupidity and greed of the World Financial Community in swallowing all that the ingenious US Financial System had created - reveal the smartness of not utilising their own internal resources, but to incur the losses onto others.
The US Lehman Brothers had the biggest investment fund subscribers from Asian investors, and the biggest losers of the collapse of Lehman Brothers were Asians not US Citizens.
In your anxiety to blow the horn so loudly on behalf of the SG Government, can you even begin to understand the politics that have been played by the US Private Financial Institutions on the World Community - when the US financial system was de-regulated by the Bush Administration ?
Can we trust your abilitly to differentiate between the debt incurred by the US Private Financial Institutions with the US Government Bonds issued by the US Government ?
From your skewed views of Oz, it will be benefit you more if you start re-reading and try to look into the deeper meanings behind The Wizard of Oz.
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What possibly could be the reason for LKY to desparately build a deep sea naval base in Changi that can accomodate a US Navy aircraft carrier - and annoy every South-east Asian countries, when all had wanted the US Military out of the ASEAN region ?
Was it not a fact that LKY was promoting SG to be an important lynch-pin in the US Global reach ?
If Lee Kuan Yew has such a policy of promoting USA military power, I will totally and completely be opposed to that policy.
I am against USA foreign military bases.
Lee Kuan Yew, please don't act like a dog.
Please, I beg you.
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The USA remains as the richest country in the World with Private Wealth far exceeding that of the US Government.
In a publication from International Financial Services London : International Private Wealth Management 2007, it stated that the US has US$11.3 Trillion belonging to 4,585,000 persons in the 'millionaire group' and 371,000 in the 'billionaires group'.
It also reported that only 2% of its assets is invested overseas, compared to 30% of the Middle-eastern and African wealth that are invested off-shore - which speaks of the continued confidence of the wealthy US individuals in the US economy.
How much of our Singapore Wealth - largely held by the SG Government - is invested overseas ?
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it stated that the US has US$11.3 Trillion belonging to 4,585,000 persons in the 'millionaire group' and 371,000 in the 'billionaires group'.
USA political affairs is largely under the influence of this great powerful corporate and financial group.
If Obama truely seeks change in USA, he will have to deal with this group.
...Any reform of Wall Street practices came from pressure from the hinterlands, especially from the farming West, and was long delayed by the close alliance of Wall Street with the two major political parties, which grew up in 1880-1900.
In this alliance, by 1900, the influence of Morgan in the Republican Party was dominant, his chief rivalry coming from the influence of a monopoly capitalist, Rockefeller of Ohio.
By 1900 Wall Street had largely abandoned the Democratic Party, a shift indicated by the passage of the Whitney family from the Democrats to the Republican inner circles, shortly after they established a family alliance with Morgan.
In the same period, the Rockefeller family reversed the ordinary direction of development by shifting from the monopoly fields of petroleum to New York banking circles by way of the Chase National Bank.
Soon family as well as financial alliances grew up among the Morgans, Whitneys, and Rockefellers, chiefly through Payne and Aldrich family connections.
For almost fifty years, from 1880 to 1930, financial capitalism approximated a feudal structure in which two great powers, centered in New York, dominated a number of lesser powers, both in New York and in provincial cities.
No description of this structure as it existed in the 1920's can be given in a brief compass, since it infiltrated all aspects of American life and especially all branches of economic life.
At the center were a group of less than a dozen investment banks, which were, at the height of their powers, still unincorporated private partnerships. These included J. P. Morgan; the Rockefeller family; Kuhn, Loeb and Company; Dillon, Read and Company; Brown Brothers and Harriman; and others.
Each of these was linked in organizational or personal relationships with various banks, insurance companies, railroads, utilities, and industrial firms.
The result was to form a number of webs of economic power of which the more important centered in New York, while other provincial groups allied with these were to be found in Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Chicago, and Boston.
J. P. Morgan worked in close relationship to a group of banks and insurance companies, including the First National Bank of New York, the Guaranty Trust Company, the Bankers Trust, the New York Trust Company, and the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company.
The whole nexus dominated a network of business firms which included at least one-sixth of the two hundred largest nonfinancial corporations in American business.
Among these were twelve utility companies, five or more railroad systems, thirteen industrial firms, and at least five of the fifty largest banks in the country.
The combined assets of these firms were more than $30 billion.
They included American Telephone and Telegraph Company, International Telephone and Telegraph, Consolidated Gas of New York, the groups of electrical utilities known as Electric Bond and Share and as the United Corporation Group (which included Commonwealth and Southern, Public Service of New Jersey, and Columbia Gas and Electric), the New York Central railway system, the Van Sweringen railway system (Allegheny) of nine lines (including Chesapeake and Ohio; Erie; Missouri Pacific; the Nickel Plate; and Pere Marquette); the Santa Fe; the Northern system of five great lines (Great Northern; Northern Pacific; Burlington; and others); the Southern Railway; General Electric Company; United States Steel; Phelps Dodge; Montgomery Ward; National Biscuit; Kennecott Copper; American Radiator and Standard Sanitary; Continental Oil; Reading Coal and Iron; Baldwin Locomotive; and others.
The Rockefeller group, which was really a monopoly capitalist organization investing only its own profits, functioned as a financial capitalist unit in close cooperation with Morgan.
Allied with the country's largest bank, the Chase National, it was involved as an industrial power in the various Standard Oil firms and the Atlantic Refining Company, but it controlled over half the assets of the oil industry, plus the $2 1/3 billion assets in Chase National Bank.
Kuhn, Loeb was chiefly interested in railroads, where it dominated the Pennsylvania, the Union Pacific, the Southern Pacific, the Milwaukee, the Chicago Northwestern, the Katy (Missouri-Kansas-Texas Railroad Company), and the Delaware and Hudson. It also dominated the Bank of Manhattan and the Western Union Telegraph Company for a total of almost $11 billion in assets.
The Mellon group centered in Pittsburgh dominated Gulf Oil, Koppers, Alcoa, Westinghouse Electric, Union Trust Company, the Mellon National Bank, Jones and Laughlin Steel, American Rolling Mill, Crucible Steel, and other firms for total assets of about $3.3 billion.
It has been calculated that the 200 largest nonfinancial corporations in the United States, plus the fifty largest banks, in the mid-1930's, owned 34 percent of the assets of all industrial corporations, 48 percent of the assets of all commercial banks, 75 percent of the assets of all public utilities, and 95 percent of the assets of all railroads.
The total assets of all four classes were almost $100 billion, divided almost equally among the four classes. The four economic power blocs which we have mentioned (Morgan; Rockefeller; Kuhn, Loeb and Company; and Mellon) plus du Pont, and three local groups allied with these in Boston, Cleveland, and Chicago, together dominated the following percentages of the 250 corporations considered here: of industrial firms 58 percent of their total assets, of railroads 82 percent, and utilities 58 percent.
The aggregate value of the assets controlled by the eight power groups was about $61,205 million of the total assets of $198,351 million in these 250 largest corporations at the end of 1935.
The economic power represented by these figures is almost beyond imagination to grasp, and was increased by the active role which these financial titans took in politics. Morgan and Rockefeller together frequently dominated the national Republican Party, while Morgan occasionally had extensive influence in the national Democratic Party (three of the Morgan partners were usually Democrats).
These two were also powerful on the state level, especially Morgan in New York and Rockefeller in Ohio. Mellon was a power in Pennsylvania and du Pont was obviously a political power in Delaware...