Today's Generation

When I look at this cartoon, I see something that is very familiar. There are about ten kids standing in the same area and they're all on their cell phones texting. One kid has a soccer ball next to him and is looking at it in confusion, not knowing what it is. Another kid who is standing fairly close to the kid with the soccer ball is sending him a text that asks him what the thing next to him is. The grammer of the text message is also very poor as if the child is uneducated. The line at the top of the cartoon says, "the 21st century playground" as if to say that this is the way that children play these days. The cartoon is saying that children don't even know what a soccer ball is and only 'play' on their cell phones all the time. I agree with this cartoon because I think that children these days are centered around electronics, especially cell phones. When I was growing up, I didn't have a cell phone and I actually went to a playground where there was sports and other fun things to do. I think that children should still be doing those things that I grew up doing because growing up around a cell phone is very sheltering and limits a child to many experiences that they would have if they played on a real playground and not the playground that is depicted in this cartoon.

"Average" kids

This image was made by a cartoonist named Rakesh and I believe that through this image he wanted to portray the life of all those children who are average in schools and colleges and how education seems to be a burden on their shoulders. In this picture the kid looks scared and confused surrounded by various mathematical and science notations. I think that the modern education system creates divide among students, isolating the "average" group while praising the top students.  Besides the average student's low self esteem driven by the pressure and humiliation from friends and family for not getting 'A's', sometimes bigger problems arise, they lose their hidden talents and skills in this fight for success. As we all know admission in  most good colleges or to getting a good job depend on how many A's the student got during his studies in school or college respectively. This not only makes the life of students who have hard time getting A's difficult but in the struggle to pass in class or get A's, sometimes, many kids lose their hidden talents and skills for which either they could not manage time for or could never realize their hidden talents. I would like to support this from my personal experience, my parents being doctors from a good college in India always pressurized me to be at the top of my class, but in order to do so I could not spend much time on my music. Struggling to meet my parents expectations, I could never spend time on something I really loved and enjoyed. There are countless times when I gave up an opportunity to play on stage or practice because of this pressure. These kinds of situations are much more common in countries like China, India, etc.. I believe that if observed thoroughly, this image highlights one of the major problems which leads to loss of talent in kids. 

Cute Comic!

From this picture, I saw a man in a suit with a bow tie, he looks like a host man. There is a golden board hang on the desk witting with:"Nobel". Apparently, this is a Nobel reward. The host man wants to give the winner --Liu Xiaobo the medal of peace, but the man coming to the desk is not Liu Xiaobo, he is North Korea. So what can I say is this is a super ironic comic,Liu is a activist to support reform of the government, during his fourth prison term, he was awarded the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize for "his long and non-violent struggle for fundamental human rights in China(Wikipedia)." In the picture, the host man is holding the medal with two fingeres which is quite abnormal in a reward, he doesn't bother to give him the award? or he doesn't think the N. Korea man should get it? I think the argument of the comic is China has an serious issue on human right, they think human right as a western concept, but China also has been conservative for thousands years. Avoiding is not the right way to deal with it!

Can China engineer a soft economic landing?

Can China engineer a soft economic landing?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2BT7JXgnoGU&feature=relmfu
The main argument in this vedio clip is that Chinese economy can make a soft landing by using policy tools and ability to increase consumptions.
Firstly, he analyze the component of Chinese economic growth, which are export and investment spending. Now export is affected by negative European recession, and investment spending is slowing down. That's why many people are concerning about Chinese economy.
Secondly, he point out although net export and investment spending are slowing down, there is another important thing that will help to facilitate a soft landing for Chinese Economy: Domestic Comsuption. He points out that Chinese officals will focus on consumption as Chinese major economic growth in the future five years. Nowadays, consumptions only counted as one-third of Chinese total economic growth. In the contrast, Consumptions is counted as 70 percent in American Economy. Therefore, he argues that there is a huge potential for Chinese domestic consumption to grow. 
In the end, he said that althought there is some uncertainty in Chinese future ecnonmic growth, but we have good reason to believe that Chinese economic can make a soft landing.
I feel this analyst's argument is very convincing. He analyst all the components of Chinese economic growth thoroughly. Also, he give us some numbers to support his argument, which is very important in financial market analysis.

Vet vs Cop

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k8-ycSkoYfc&oref=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fresults%3Fsearch_query%3Dveteran%2Bvs%2Bcop%26oq%3Dveteran%2Bvs%2Bcop%26aq%3Df%26aqi%3D%26aql%3D%26gs_l%3Dyoutube.3...1146.5064.0.5327.4.3.0.0.0.0.1008.1008.7-1.1.0...0.0.AbacZq8OcpI

***Viewer discretion is advised***


My video is about a cop that pulls over a Vietnam veteran and inevitably ends up being killed by the vet. I first saw the video a year ago and it had a lasting impact on my life. I feel the video shows first hand what the effects of war can have on the soldiers. The man kept referencing being a veteran and curses continuously at the cop. He is clearly not in the right state of mind and is under the influence of either a mental condition or maybe just alcohol. Due to the man’s reactions and stability I would lean  more towards the side of mental disorder. Post-traumatic Stress Disorder is what quickly comes to mind. War causes many greater impacts than people realize. This man was not mentally stable and needed medical treatment, he defended our country when we needed him and now suffers because of this. Is it really the man’s fault for his actions? Is he to be held accountable for mental state? Sadly yes. He did commit the crime, so, he must do his time.

Poor child

This is a picture I found on Weibo(which is kind of twitter, but not exactly the same). This children is apparently a chinese child who is maybe 5 or 6 years old. The description below the picture is what is junk food to us is exactly the birthday surprise for the child. We can not do anything the help, what we can do is spread the picture let more people know.

In this picture, the children is pretty dirty. His clothes is not his size. The room he sitting in is very dirty, dark, messy and full of dirty things. The food in the big bowl in front of the little child is instant noodles. I think the price in China of this kind of noodles is around 3 Yuan, 0.5 dollars which is very cheap. Parents do not want children to eat instant noodle because it is junk food, but it is a birthday present for the little boy in the picture. The face of the boy is very red and I don't think the red is a healthy red. I think it is caused by being in the cold wind for a to much time. His face is sad and looking at something to someone, maybe is his parents. Apparently, the family of him is pretty poor and can not afford a better life. 

The interesting point is not only how poor the life of the child and his family is, but also how the description. It is written we can not do anything to help.

With the lives of Chinese people getting better and better, most people in the big cities in China tend to be blind to all the lives to other people. They just enjoy their own rich and wonderful life and they do not anything about how some poor people is suffering from right now. The description said we can not help but the truth is we can help. We neglect how other's lives look like and we are told that we can not do anything to help.

Looking at this photo, I see the faces of two familiar figures. A former president, George Bush, and our current commander and chief Barrack Obama. This illustration was painted up onto a public wall in what seems to appeal to the community's beliefs about a specific ideal, and thus establishes ethos. We see here that a claim is being made about Mr. Obama. Mainly that his character and the manifestation of his administration is nothing short of resembling the former Bush administration. It could perhaps be highlighting the thought that the subtle differences that separate these two figures politically are petty in light of the big picture, and that those differences that we might identify between Bush and Obama may be less pronounced than what many have convinced themselves to believe. Another possible suggestion is that the leaders we enable to lead us are merely pawns in the game, set in place by determining forces out of our control. Yes, on the outside these two people are different, but they do serve the same purpose and the extent to which they have served it seems to reflect closely.