Tag Archives: china

05/16/18

Sanctions Work – ZTE

Sanctions, Big Red Car? How dreary for such a sunny, lovely day in the ATX, yawn! OK, Big Red Car tell me about how sanctions work. Maybe a real world example?

Dear reader, let us take up the case of Zhongxing Telecommunications Equipment, known as ZTE. They are a maker of inexpensive smartphones and other telecom equipment in more than 160 countries and employ 75,000 workers.

ZTE is no small fry on the international scene. When the Chinese government wants to wiggle into bed with a country, they often provide loans as an economic development tool.  Those loans? What are they used for? To set up a nationwide cellular network built by … wait for it … ZTE!

ZTE is an important element of Chinese international policy.

The Chinese also see that a large company like ZTE can break the stranglehold that American tech companies have on China. It is a nationalistic undertaking.

But, ZTE ran afoul of American sanctions. How?

Continue reading →

04/11/17

North Korea Syria Connection

Big Red Car here on a cloudy Texas day. This is a lot of clouds, y’all, but we like them. Syria and North Korea are a couple of lawless, outlaw regimes, but did you know they have had a relationship for years?

Syria is the bunch run by Bashar al Assad who has killed 500,000 of his countrymen, internally displaced 6,000,000 more, and turned 5,000,000 into refugees. [Can you imagine any scenario in which this shithead continues to run Syria?]

North Korea is the bunch run by Kim Jong Un whose family has lorded over his country like a penal colony and has literally starved them so badly that the average height of a North Korean has diminished three inches in the last forty years. [To be technically correct, a South Korean is, on average, three inches taller than a North Korean. Same gene pool, different nutrition.]

Kim 2

Kim Jong Un — a fat, expando-pants wearing guy who hasn’t missed a meal in a while, no? This is a guy who starves his people while spending the nation’s wealth on developing nuclear weapons and ICMB delivery systems.

So what have they been up to? Continue reading →

04/23/16

North Korea — WTF?

North Korea — today, we talk about North Korea.

Big Red Car here on a glorious Texas, cool, crisp morning. It is incredible to be alive in the ATX. On Earth as it is in Texas, y’all.

Hey, the world needs to keep an eye on this guy in North Korea. He is up to no good and he’s a maniac.

Kim pic

North Korea’s Kim Jong-on — Oh no!

Here’s the scoop.

Continue reading →