Lobsang Sangay - burning passion, dying cause

Eloquent, well educated and good looking Dr Lobsang Sangay, appears to be the front guy and figurehead, surrounded by an inner circle of Dalai Lama's extended first family kitchen cabinet. If he has "power" it is endowed by His Holiness who has a strong influence over exiled Tibetans emigres.  It is an improvement from the theological serfdom left behind when the current Dalai Lama escaped from his palace after a failed coup staged with CIA help, but nonetheless, far from being a democratic representative government.

Those who understood Lobsang Sangay should be credited with a prize. Religion and philosophy comes across as ambiguous for one to find the right interpretation and path for situational and individual circumstances. In other words, there is no such thing as one size fits all. However, when it enters the realm of equivocal and suggestive mode, it is not as innocent as it seems.  

Religious and political leaders implicitly but publicly endorsing extremist activities is quite disturbing. There is no justification for suicide and destruction even if the parties involved believe that it is a good cause and they would be better off dead. Though less damaging than suicide bombing, the intentions and manifestation are highly questionable. Immolation victims need medical help more so than encouragement. The result is inevitably increase in loss of human lives. To a small minority, economic wealth and freedom of religious practice may not help to alleviate pain and dissatisfaction. Their only hope of religion does not seem to help either. 


There are contradictions in what Sangay and his company adovcate. The notion of persecution and Tibetan culture according to overseas Tibetan definition is broad and flexible. Indeed, exiled Tibetans are culturally more Indianised and Westernised than traditional. Lobsang Sangay is encouraging belated lame policies to multiply Tibetan population outside China. He is probably aware by now that ethnic Tibetans in Chinese territory have due to preferential population policy and affirmative action. Just as urgent is to reverse the losing of Tibetan culture among overseas Tibetans. 

Religious beliefs can be bent especially when time is running out for Lobsang Sangay's followers. Desperation can drive leaders to think of drastic policies that necessitate sacrifices on the part of junior followers. Respect for human lives and human rights does not apply universally and justly to all species. Lobsang Sangay cannot be relied upon to protect the Tibetan people. It is unfortunate that when power supersedes religion, practitioners are still stuck in the mundane level of existence and prevented from moving on to a higher level. 

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/25/lobsang-sangay-immolation-tibetan-buddhist-monks_n_1231954.html

http://www.dorjeshugden.com/forum/index.php?topic=1766.10;wap2

http://www.in.com/news/current-affairs/tibetans-encouraged-to-have-more-children-lobsang-sangay-interview-50182488-in-1.html

Rise and Fall of "Sun King" Shi Zhengrong

Shi made his fortune by harnessing solar energy with his strong technical and business skills has met his downfall.  A victim and scapegoat for the company's falling profits, his past achievements could not save his position as chairman of the company he founded.

You wonder how some financial and other corporate executives who were largely responsible for fleecing customers and losing billions within a short few years could continue to keep their pay and positions intact.

Let's see if  Shi would make a comeback in his company or in another new venture.

Dubbed the "Sun King", Shi Zhengrong converted a PhD in electrical engineering in solar technology at Sydney's University of NSW into a fortune worth $3 billion when he debuted on BRW's rich list in 2006.
 

By last year, though, Shi had dropped off the rich lists altogether, missing the BRW's $210 million cut-off as his holdings wilted to $170 million.

 Shi, born on Yangzhong Island in the Yangtze River in 1963 to farming parents, was lured back to China by a $6 million grant from authorities in Wuxi, located in one of its most prosperous regions.

As UNSW's solar guru Martin Green recalled in the 2007 Time 'hero' article, Shi's return from Australia was in marked contrast to his tough upbringing

http://www.theage.com.au/business/carbon-economy/rise-and-fall-of-the-sun-king-20130307-2fmor.html

Yitzhak Shamir dies - hawkish legacy revival in Israel

Terror and clandestine activities were justified for the creation of Israel in the aftermath of holocaust. Yitzhak Shamir was an unyielding hardliner. The environment now is no less difficult than those days. The present leadership deals with threat perception of growing hostility and retaliate many times over in ways that are no different from the founders. However, divisions have emerged in the country from controversial policies.  Will the first generation be disappointed with the ironic similarities of their nation's current experience and problems? 

Yitzhak Shamir, who emerged from the militant wing of a Jewish militia and served as Israel’s prime minister longer than anyone but David Ben-Gurion, promoting a muscular Zionism and expansive settlement in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip, died Saturday at a nursing home in Tel Aviv. He was 96.

A native of Poland whose family was wiped out in the Holocaust, Mr. Shamir was part of a group of right-wing Israeli politicians led by Menachem Begin who rose to power in the 1970s as the more left-wing Labor Party declined, viewed as corrupt and disdainful of the public.
Stubborn and laconic, Mr. Shamir was by his own assessment a most unlikely political leader whose very personality seemed the perfect representation of his government’s policy of patient, determined, unyielding opposition to territorial concessions. 

Many of his friends and colleagues ascribed his character to his years in the underground in the 1940s, when he sent Jewish fighters out to kill British officers whom he saw as occupiers. He was a wanted man then; to the British rulers of the Palestine mandate he was a terrorist, an assassin. He appeared in public only at night, disguised as a Hasidic rabbi. But Mr. Shamir said he considered those “the best years of my life.”

His wife, Shulamit, once said that in the underground she and her husband had learned not to talk about their work for fear of being overheard. It was a habit he apparently never lost.Rather than bend to them, Mr. Shamir often simply outlasted his political opponents, who were usually much more willing to say what was on their minds, and sometimes to get in trouble for it. To Mr. Shamir, victory came not from compromise, but from strength, patience and cunning.
Prime Minister Begin appointed Mr. Shamir as foreign minister in 1980. When Mr. Begin suddenly retired in 1983, Mr. Shamir became a compromise candidate to replace him, alternating in the post with Shimon Peres for one four-year term. Mr. Shamir won his own term in 1988. He entered the political opposition when Yitzhak Rabin of the Labor Party was elected prime minister in 1992. Mr. Shamir retired from politics a few years later, at 81.

A Hard-Line ApproachAs prime minister, Mr. Shamir promoted continued Jewish settlement in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, which Israel conquered in 1967; the Jewish population in the occupied territories increased by nearly 30 percent while he was in office. He also encouraged theimmigration of tens of thousands of Soviet Jews to Israel, an influx that changed the country’s demographic character.

One of the most notable events during his tenure was the Palestinian uprising against Israeli control that began in December 1987, the so-called intifada. He and his defense minister, Mr. Rabin, deployed thousands of Israeli troops throughout the occupied territories to quash the rebellion. They failed; the years of violence and death on both sides brought criticism and condemnation from around the world. 

The fighting also deepened divisions between Israel’s two political camps: leftists who believed in making concessions to bring peace, and members of the right who believed, as Mr. Shamir once put it, that “Israel’s days without Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria and the Gaza Strip are gone and will not return.” 

The intifada dragged on year after year as the death toll climbed from dozens to hundreds. Israel’s isolation increased, until finally the rebellion was overshadowed in 1991 by the first Persian Gulf war. 

During that war, at the request of the United States, Prime Minister Shamir held Israel back from attacking Iraq, even as Iraqi Scud missiles fell on Tel Aviv. For that he won new favor in Washington and promises of financial aid from the United States to help with the settlement of new Israeli citizens from the Soviet Union. 

Then in the fall of 1991, under pressure from the first President George Bush and Secretary of State James A. Baker III, Mr. Shamir agreed to represent Israel at the Middle East peace conference in Madrid, Israel’s first summit meeting with the Arab states. There, he was as unyielding as ever, denouncing Syria at one point as having “the dubious honor of being one of the most oppressive, tyrannical regimes in the world.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/01/world/middleeast/yitzhak-shamir-former-prime-minister-of-israel-dies-at-96.html?pagewanted=all

Prof Shi Yuzhi stirs up controversial drug use for creativity - intoxicants of the past, the way forward?

Prof Shi Yuzhi's musing nearly got him into hot soup. His employer's pledge to investigate was enough to prod Prof Shi to remove the controversial blog entry. The tertiary institution NUS (and similar government bodies for that matter) has been eager to present its responsive and democratic side to the country and the world. The pressure points really came from netizens who are quick to knee jerk, play the moralist, and powerful voice in the feedback channel. If it does not threaten the status quo, NUS would not have bothered to comment. It is the internet that has brought about strong criticisms and expectation to do something to correct the "wrong".

Shi's suggestion would have been deemed harmless in liberal societies that assumes individuals knows and takes responsibility for their decisions. Worry about negative effects later. Psychedlic drugs or LSD are associated with the hypie culture in the 1960s and the attendant social issues.

For more regimental environments, even free wheeling internet discussions frown upon wild, unconventional and out-of-line ideas that are unlikely to be translated into policies.

Prof Shi is not a healthcare professional or chemical researcher. His comments are at best social advocacy, from the viewpoint of a Chinese Studies academic and concerned citizen. He may not be fully aware of the implications of wide use of psychedlic drugs, the positives and no-man's land. Some "psychedelic drugs" are naturally occurring. However, this does not mean they are less detrimental to those who are allergic or unsuited to these chemicals. Moreover, the range of LSDs have not been fully understood and has thus far been carefully tailored for individual use out of necessity. Should we push the boundaries, and play doctors, and risk your own health? Surely, a little will not do much harm?

What triggered Shi to whip up a controversy?

Preoccupied with moneymaking, many Chinese are engaged in mindless work and hardly think outside the box. The education system geared to produce the best engineers and financial analysts is not conducive to creativity.

On the contrary, Tang and Sung dynasties saw the proliferation of countless creative works, more than any time in Chinese, or dare some say, world history.  In those days, rice wine was the stimulant. When Li Bai composed poems and lamented at the imperfect world in intellectual discussions with fellow scholars usually in a drunken stupor. However, overdose of alcohol also killed the famous poet when he fell into the river to grasp the moon's reflection, believing the image was the real thing.

However, Shi was referring to the late Apple CEO Steve Jobs who admitted using LSD. Shi was not too interested in artistic branch of creativity. Nevertheless, abuse and misuse of drugs will produce similar outcomes. Except over-the-counter drugs, many controlled medicines, definitely in the case of LSD, must be prescribed by medical doctors with a purpose to treat the patient. A luxury, optional, drug, such as hormones that could enhance one's height, botox or the likes to meddle with the biological clock, or even choosing the sex and IQ of your baby with greater certainty in the future.

Shi's idea or opinion is unlikely to be accepted widely. He probably knows that. A blog is too brief and exaggerative to truly reflect the holistic thinking of the writer and may misrepresent his good intentions. However, for a man of reputation, respect and status, the public are less forgiving when he wondered aloud. Shi's starting point is not malicious since he hopes to produce more geniuses in China. However, this scenario if actualised, will be really scary to many developed countries.  As it is now, China's competitors are lagging behind in manufacturing, research, inventions and creative piracy.

Hence, it is really doubtful if Shi will have many supporters on both sides of the fence in the world stage.

Prof Henry Lai : Cell Phone Use Increases Risk of Brain Cancer Over Time

Radiation from cell phones can possibly cause cancer, according to the World Health Organization. The agency now lists mobile phone use in the same "carcinogenic hazard" category as lead, engine exhaust and chloroform.

"When you look at cancer development -- particularly brain cancer -- it takes a long time to develop. I think it is a good idea to give the public some sort of warning that long-term exposure to radiation from your cell phone could possibly cause cancer," said Dr. Henry Lai, research professor in bioengineering at University of Washington who has studied radiation for more than 30 years.

Results from the largest international study on cell phones and cancer was released in 2010. It showed participants in the study who used a cell phone for 10 years or more had doubled the rate of brain glioma, a type of tumor. To date, there have been no long-term studies on the effects of cell phone usage among children.

http://edition.cnn.com/2011/HEALTH/05/31/who.cell.phones/index.html

http://depts.washington.edu/bioe/people/core/lai.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NZl2MSHDKls

FB Mark Zuckerberg Married Longtime Girlfriend Priscilla Chan - formula for relationship

Nine year marathon and finally tying the knot with Facebook status update that surprised not only the world but close friends of the couple.

Lessons for enduring and happy relationship : be down to earth and forget about fairy tale stories with airy fairy endings. They do not exist in the real world. A sustainable union requires hard work and mutual support. Cherish what you have and strive for a better future.  

Behind every successful man is a woman. In Mark Zuckerberg's case, his sweetheart Priscilla Chan is a brainy medical doctor who has contributed to his success.

Now that Mark has both career and love going for him, hope he will continue to enjoy happiness and success by treasuring the most important things in life. 

Singapore's Lam Keong Yeoh : Modest Model Living - Future depends on spiritual not material wealth

Robin Hood Policies : Living by Example - Zen Buddhism, the way to the Future for resource poor Singapore? 

Singapore's social policies are not future-ready

THE LONG INTERVIEW: YEOH LAM KEONG
Are we ready for the future?

Singapore's social policies are not future-ready, says former GIC economist. He talks to Susan Long about his new cause in life

By Susan Long, The Straits Times, 18 May 2012

WHEN Mr Yeoh Lam Keong quit his job as chief economist of the Government of Singapore Investment Corporation last June, his colleagues presented him with a T-shirt which read: 'Buddha says: Stop wanting stupid shit.'

It's a message that suits the 54-year-old to a T.

He lives in a Housing Board flat, takes public transport, and eschews holiday resorts with air- conditioning. 'I don't consider it spartan, it's cosier and aesthetically more pleasing,' he says.

He has not moved from the Marine Terrace flat he bought in 1987 because he wants his children to grow up in an HDB setting. 'So they have a choice. They don't have to live in private housing, they can go and live in a three-room flat in Sengkang if they need to and be totally comfortable,' he says.

To his mind, he is not under-consuming. 'Others are over-consuming. Most of us have enough resources to live comfortably, yet we kill ourselves to drive a Lotus, instead of an ordinary car.

'We end up killing the environment and stressing each other out. Perhaps, as Lord Robert Skidelski, professor emeritus of political economy at Warwick University said, mass consumption capitalism has outlived its usefulness.'

Social awakening

MR YEOH grew up in a bungalow along Bukit Timah Road. He was the eldest of four children born to an orthopaedic surgeon and doctor-turned-housewife. His three siblings include Ms Yeoh Chee Yan, permanent secretary for Education.

His social awakening happened five years ago, when he was roped in to help analyse Ministry of Community Development, Youth and Sports data on poverty. As he examined the grim figures, he realised serious structural problems were creating a growing underbelly of poverty in Singapore.

Before long, he found a face to the problem.

While watching football with his son in a coffeeshop one evening, he chatted with a neighbour from a nearby rental block, and found out that the latter, after working as a cleaner for 10 years, earned $700 a month.

Mr Yeoh ventured in Mandarin: 'That's really tight, I don't suppose you have kids?' The guy's response: 'You mad, ah?'

His son, then 11, soon became aware of the substance of the conversation - that there were people too poor to have children. Later that night, he asked his father: 'Pa, do you think the Prime Minister knows about people like him?'

Mr Yeoh said: 'I hope so.' His son prodded: 'I think someone should tell him.'

Before long, father and son had added to their coterie of coffeeshop companions an odd-job labourer, who had been unemployed for 10 years because of a history of mental illness. The man had not eaten properly, surviving on a giant vat of green bean soup for days.

Mr Yeoh offered to go with him to see their Member of Parliament. But the man refused, fearing social workers 'will bother my brothers and sisters'.

'It became clear to me that the so-called social safety net was both undignified and insufficient. It was undignified where sufficient, or plain insufficient.

'He didn't want to be ashamed before family, or for government officials to bug his family to look after him, which he himself would not do,' says Mr Yeoh, citing a 2009 Lien Foundation survey which showed that being a burden to family and friends was the top death-related fear of Singaporeans, followed by medical costs.

Early influences

HE CREDITS his Anglo-Chinese School mate and Deputy Prime Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam for first stimulating his social conscience.

He was all set on becoming a naturalist - and studying marine biology - but was persuaded by Mr Tharman that economics was more 'socially useful' . They both applied to the London School of Economics and were accepted.

In London, Mr Tharman encouraged his interest in the underprivileged, social issues and student activism. Mr Yeoh returned to Singapore in 1983, and worked at the Skills Development Fund in the Economic Development Board for two years, then left to become a senior economist at the Monetary Authority of Singapore.

He was soon seconded to help start up the Economics and Strategy Department at GIC and ended up staying a total of 26 years because the work was so riveting.

GIC, he says, taught him all about 'real-world economics, politics, markets, people, policymakers, under the most extreme stress'. Six major financial crises unfolded during the time he was there. 'It was a huge education in economic policy analysis, what could go right and wrong.'

The department he headed at GIC became infamous for its high-quality analysis, independence and daring to challenge convention, say Mr Yeoh's colleagues.

GIC's chief economist Leslie Teo says: 'Lam Keong was never afraid to speak his mind even if his views were not popular or politically correct; he was not afraid to explore new and unconventional ideas. He always stood apart from the prevailing culture of the industry - big money, flashy, top of the world - by his concern for the average person and his simple tastes.'

He worked under Mr Lim Siong Guan, group president of GIC, whom he says drummed into him the importance of being ready to meet the future.

'He taught me that being future-ready is being strategically on top of the most important relevant long-term trends even before they became conventional wisdom,' he says.

'Because catching up is the worst position to be in, you are chased and dragged and not the master of your own destiny. You become like Nokia, or Blackberry, as opposed to Apple.'

One of his top worries for Singapore today is whether its social policies are future-ready.

He worries that the old social compact is eroding, because the delivery of public services in social security, housing, health care, education and infrastructure is fraying at the edges, and excessive immigration has crowded out quality in such services.

'It's not ready for the world that faces us now; a world where median wages are stagnating, inequality is rising sharply, our population ageing, our maturing economy is growing much more slowly. And it's not going to be ready for the decades ahead, or maybe even the next five years,' he vexes.

Time for social reform

HE FEELS that now is the time for the Government to embark on large-scale social reform because it can.

Singapore is in a 'uniquely privileged' position to make these changes, he says. 'We have extremely low taxes, such that we can afford to raise them somewhat and still remain very tax- competitive, and we are unnecessarily conservative in our budgetary accounting, even by International Monetary Fund standards.'

He notes that the Government's spending, as a share of GDP, of around 17 per cent is among the lowest in the developed world, compared to 35-40 per cent in most OECD countries and 25-30 per cent in other advanced Asian economies.

'Our current levels of spending are low even by our own historical standards of up to 25 per cent of GDP seen in the mid-1980s and early 1990s. These are levels of a public spending we can afford to return to while maintaining competitiveness and long-term fiscal sustainability,' he says.

He applauds the Government's pledge announced by Health Minister Gan Kim Yong to double health-care expenditure from $4 billion to $8 billion in 2017, which will raise it from 1.5 per cent to 2.2 per cent of GDP. However, he points out, Taiwan was already spending 3.5 to 4 per cent of GDP on health care in 2001.

Notwithstanding the superiority of quality and efficiency of Singapore's health care, he asks: 'Is it enough for Singapore, which is steadily ageing, to spend half of Taiwan's 2001 budget in 2017?'

He adds that Mr Gan, to his credit, has assured that no Singaporean will be denied medical care if he or she needs it. 'But rather than say it, why not design policy for someone to afford it, rather than have him deplete his own savings and his family's Medisave accounts first?

'The most important reform needed, which is still missing, is that we still do not have universal financial access to medical care for all citizens, which is politically unacceptable in most democratic developed countries.'

Citing figures, Mr Yeoh notes that a relatively large proportion of health-care expenditure in Singapore is still funded out of pocket, with 55 per cent of spending financed by patients, with the rest borne by the state or insurance.

In comparison, patients in other developed Asian economies like Hong Kong, Taiwan, South Korea and Japan pay about 15 to 30 per cent out of pocket. The World Health Organisation's recommendation is 33 per cent and below.

He says the key driver of Singapore's success, going forward, will hinge on how substantively the government can overhaul social policies and win back voters.

The Government still enjoys strong credibility and trust, he says, though he fears that too is eroding, 'especially if they keep to their current course and the public continues to feel the level of provision of these basic needs is inadequate'.

'It will take a decade to build up a credible alternative government capability as the opposition, while making impressive strides, is starting from such a low base.'

He worries that if the government continues with piecemeal tweaks but does not restructure sufficiently to meet the future, 'it will be like a big company not doing enough to keep market share, like Nokia or Blackberry, which refused to go touch screen till it was too late'. Both are now eating the dust of Apple.

'A key business of government is strategy, says US statesman Zbigniew Brzezinski. Right now, we are forgoing strategy for tweaks. The trouble with tweaks is that you are not spending strategically and not making headway in things that matter, you are just reacting to pressure from the ground,' he says.

One example: The many rounds of cooling measures that have failed to arrest runaway housing prices.

Although most Singaporeans can afford $150,000 to buy a Build-To-Order flat in Sengkang, on a lower floor and facing a car park now, they worry that future HDB flats will be priced out of their children's reach, he says.

'They know that prices will converge towards resale and private residential prices which, at five to six times median annual household income, are extremely unaffordable. On current trends, how likely is it that HDB can keep prices at $150,000 if they price off market price plus costs?'

He thinks that HDB needs to abandon its 'market fundamentalist' pricing formula and revert to its original mission of meeting 'social needs'. For starters, he suggests pricing entry-level three- room flats at around two times household income in all locations - only for citizens - which he says would be 'in the spirit of HDB's original inspiration and success'.

But will these sweeping changes he suggests - radically increasing health and housing subsidies - depart too much from the ethos of cautious continuity and fiscal prudence that the People's Action Party has come to symbolise?

He disagrees: 'The original brand of the PAP, as I remember it, was pragmatically meeting the needs of the ordinary citizen and often exceeding expectations in doing so on a universal basis. And it did so from the 1950s to 1980s.

'Back then, their policies were revolutionary and ahead of time, because they anticipated and drove and mastered the future. I would love to see them recapture that original brand.'

Life after GIC

LAST June, Mr Yeoh left GIC to spend more time with his family, as well as outdoors, where he fishes, does ink sketches and pens poetry on nature. He intends to apply his economist training to 'social investigation' projects, especially on inequality and poverty.

He is a senior adjunct fellow at the Institute of Policy Studies at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, a fellow of Civil Service College and an adviser to Singapore Management University's economics faculty.

He is married to Dr Lai Ah Eng, a senior research fellow at the Asian Research Institute. Their son Lai Hsin, 16, studies at Victoria School, and their daughter Lai Lin, 19, at Cambridge University.

The self-styled 'Engaged Buddhist' says his goal in life is 'to seek peace of mind, happiness and freedom from suffering, for all sentient beings'.

The person he most admires is Vietnamese Zen Buddhist monk and peace activist Thich Nhat Hanh, who helped rebuild bombed villages, set up schools and resettle homeless families during the Vietnam War.

'In his books, he describes movingly how he went about rebuilding villages each time they were bombed and destroyed. I am convinced you need these deep- seated values: compassion, reverence for life and its beauty and a sense of the eternal rather than just chasing money, power or fame. Unless you have that spiritual foundation, it's very hard to stay sane or be truly effective.'