The devastating earthquake in Sichuan, China killed over 80,000 people and injured hundreds of thousands. Entire China was mobilized for disaster relief. Donations from around the world flowed in to help the victims. The Chinese government's quick action probably saved hundreds of lives and generally received positive comments.

Here I want to bring your attention to a fact that few western journalists have picked up on during their reports of the earthquake and the rescue operation, a fact that is also not talked about very much in the Chinese media.

Well-known forensic scientist Henry Lee
wrote to CNN and announced that he will not appear on CNN until CNN apologizes for Cafferty's anti-China remarks,
reported by Taiwan's United Daily News.

On opposing the anti-China hysteria by western MSM, the population of China and Taiwan are displaying remarkable agreement. Taiwan is a democracy, has no media censorship, and its government has not taken a stand on the Tibet issue. However, this has not stopped Taiwan people from being sympathetic to Chinese, and being supportive of Beijing Olympic.

Asian Americans have become a reliable Democratic voting block during the past decade. Clinton lost the Asian vote twice in the 90's. Gore won it in 2000 marking the first time Asian vote swung to Democrats in a presidential election. Kerry also carried the Asian vote in 2004 by a landslide. Turning out the Asian voting block in the battle ground states should be a key ingredient of Obama's November victory.

Radio France International is certainly not the mouthpiece of the PRC government. Their April 2, 2008 news included an interview (in Chinese) of an official in the Tibet Exile Government. At first when I heard this I thought it was a cruel April Fools Day joke. But was it?

The Tibetan violence of 3.14 has taught me one thing. By and large, the DKos community don't know Tibet. I don't dare to say that I do. But I do know that the Dalai Lama is not the glowing living saint that the western media makes him. Quite the contrary, I'm afraid that His Holiness may represent another religious fundamentalism that is completely opposite to the modern western values.

In a previous diary I reported on two German TV stations apologizing for incorrectly using videos/photos of Nepal police beating protesters for coverage of ethnic violence in Tibet. It turns out that these are not isolated mistakes.

Two German TV stations admitted today that they had mistakenly showed footages or photos of police crackdown of protestors in Nepal in their coverages of Tibetan violence. This is not getting reported here in the US at all - in fact, there is evidence that some US outlets (in particular FOX) had also used Nepal or India protest videos/photos and claimed them to be Tibet.

No wonder a lot of Chinese are indignant over the western media coverage.

The taiwan UN referendum, which many view as the first step towards independence, fails to draw 50% participation to pass. This indicates that Taiwan population are more willing to keep the status quo than push for independence.

His confusion about Iran and al Qaeda yesterday combined some his other behaviors may point to a possibility that many would not dare to think of, that McCain may be in the early stage of Alzheimers disease.

Instead of hiding the problem of the disease from the public like what the MSM did with Reagan, perhaps this time the media should be more open and tell us the truth.

The feds backed a takeunder of Bear Stearns (BSC) by JP Morgan (JPM) with a $30 billion special financing. JP Morgan will buy Bear for about $2 per share or $236 million, a 93% discount from $30 close on Friday. This week so far, BSC shares, although suffered a monumental loss, always traded significantly above the $2 mark. The lowest it got was $2.84. Now it is trading close to $7, a full 250% above the takeunder price. The market is simply not buying the Feds BS and don't believe that the deal would go through or is necessary.

The violence shown in this video is shocking. This is not likely to be reported by the American media

A little known outfit called "Decision Analyst" published two polls in TX and OH, showing Obama with significant leads in both states. In TX, Obama leads Clinton by 14%, 57% to 43%. In OH, Obama leads by 8%, 54% TO 46%. The margins of error of both polls are 3.7% and 3.6%.

This really blew my mind. How can Americans be so stupid?

The Asian American organization 80-20 just issued a call to defeat Obama's candidacy:

In response to Sen. Obama's steadfast refusal to address the grievance faced by Asian Ams, and given that the presidential primary season will begin in 7 days, the Board of 80-20 has voted unanimously to defeat Sen. Obama's candidacy in the Democratic primary unless he replies to OUR questionnaire with all yeses. This resolution has been formally transmitted to Sen. Obama.

  Until further notice, please vote in the Dem. Primary for Senators Biden or Clinton or Dodd or Edwards or Gravels who have readily replied to OUR questionnaire with all yeses. They even emphasized that remedying such inequities was one reason they wanted to be the President. Regrettably, none of the Republican candidates have replied with a single yes yet, so they have not earned our support.

Will someone (in the Obama campaign) please respond to this? The As-Am vote (1-2% in Iowa and new Hampshire, 4% nationally) could be a critical swing factor in a close race.

A post is making rounds in Chinese blogsphere that demonstrates why fair trade, not "free trade," is good for everyone. This link is from one of the major Chinese blog sites on sina. The same post is reposted all over the websites in China. The title of the post is "Working girls in China shout: Long live USA!" The story is that an American business made a purchase order attached with the conditions on workers' rights, environments. The Chinese factory obliged, resulting in greatly improved working conditions for the workers. Thus one purchase order won over many Chinese hearts.

Kos' frontpage diary repeated a great story about an 8th grade educated car mechanic doing what Detroit claimed was impossible - green cars that do 100 mpg and little polution. It sounds too good to be true, that kos "had to do additional research to confirm that it was indeed true."

Well, a little more research shows that it is indeed too good to be true. Details below the fold.

Several diaries have mentioned the 2001 study (here)commissioned by MinnDOT on the I-35W bridge that collapsed yesterday. This study concluded that

Mn/DOT does not need to prematurely replace this bridge because of fatigue cracking, avoiding the high costs associated with such a large project.

This study was seriously flawed. Detailed analysis below