Comet- System restore just remembers previous settings your computer had, its not some kind of second by second record of every funtion made by your computer. All this “go back in time” stuff is just MS marketing hype.

First you say this:

“as for ‘reuniting on equal terms’, well, with no disrespect, but ur a little nieve to think that’ll happen. NO nation or leader on earth would accept those therms if they were in the PRC’s shoes,”

And then you say this:

“we’re not asking them to just ‘junk their system of government/law and assimilate into this economic progression that the geniuses of PRC are planning’. ever hear of the ‘one nation two rules’ ‘thingy’? ppl like u were predicting that hong kong and marco would become communist armed camps where the ppl have to eat what they r given, do waht they are told and even take a pi$$ when they’re ordered. “

So which is it?

You say that PRC has a claim on Taiwan because chang ki shek (spelling?) stole money and resouces from the mainland? I guess the UK has a claim on current US wealth because the colonists took british resources when they claimed independance. Howabout money/resources Hitler took, or Napolean? I could probably give you a few a hundred examples of countries that have spit or been conquered in the past 200 years where one country could claim damages or money owed from another. This arguement carrys no weight.

I am in the process of trying to become a Mexican citizen. And yes Im very concerned that the mainland Chineese economy is going to empoverish the Mexican economy. Ofcourse I dont want Mexico to remain a source of labor for other countrys, Id like to see industrial development here. But until that happens, Id like to see a good level of minimum living standards for factory labor. Believe it or not, I AM actually concerned about Chineese industrial development more than their labor competition. If it wasnt China making it difficult for Mexico now, it could easily be somewhere else, Africa for example.

adonis played a big part in getting this discussian forum rolling with lots of good threads when it was first formed a little over a year ago. I sure hope he recovers well and is back to his old self soon.

“china dont treat taiwan like a ‘”defeated” renegade rebel province’, well, not for a few decades anyways.

glad to hear youve pared down on that

“the current fairly hardline stance by the PRC is a result of over a decade of repeated provacations and retoric by succesive pro-independence governments.”

Taiwan is an independant nation, they owe nothing to PRC. They have no obligation to give lip service to your provacations. PRC is the only one spewing retoric.

“its a long and very complicated list, but to sum things up, taiwan, well li deng hui (the former taiwanese ‘president’) and chen shui bian (the current ‘president’) first intensified arms purchases from abroad, then tried to go back on old treaties which specifically states that there is only one china and that taiwan is a part of china. couple that with proacative war games (in one taiwan did a mock bombing run to simulate an attack on the new three gorages dam) and retoric (‘one nation on both isde of straits’ speeches, thinly vailed threats made by high ranking taiwanese officals that taiwan would bomb hong kong if the PRC reacted to taiwan declearing independence, there is even talk of taiwan lauching a pre-emptive first strike to knock out the PRC’s ability to repond just before taiwan declears independence). with all that in mind, im actually suprised that the PRC hadnt taken more serious action then just ignoring chen. ( i strongly doubt any ‘western’ nation would have put up with half the things the PRC did).”

I would fight against hostile invaders just as anyone in any country would. What do you expect, that they lay down and let you control them?

“as for ‘reuniting on equal terms’, well, with no disrespect, but ur a little nieve to think that’ll happen. NO nation or leader on earth would accept those therms if they were in the PRC’s shoes,”

You’re nieve to think that Taiwan should except unequal terms

“do u think that china’s leaders are more stupid then all others?”

I dont call anyone stupid in a way that would imply that they have inferior mental capacity. I do call many people stupid who who make dumb choices and expect me to accept it as the only way of doing things. This quote illustrates my concept of stupidity:

“Trying to understand this is made harder by the wooden propaganda in which the Communist party is always “great, glorious and correct”.

Your brand of capitalism/democracy sounds just as corny as the quote above. All I seem to hear from China are flowery discriptions about “progress” being made and the countrys need to “maintain unity and order”.
Ill admit, I dont know what the political, social, econmic realitys are right now for the PRC, but I am getting tired of hearing things like:

“what is important is that while china’s social and economic systems still have many flaws that need to be ironed out, we are doing exactly that. just look at the progress we have made already. in little more then two decades, we have transformed china from a poor and backward secretive communist state, not very unlike the n.korea of today to the prosperous and vibrent nation of today, and china is still changing for the better with every day passed, to become a more open and free nation. it is not incredible at all to predict that in another 20 years china could become the most open, free and prosprous nation in asia.”

This is just a bunch of hot air that anyone could spout about any country, do you mind giving some specifacs?

or how about this:

“and anyways, taiwan’s economy isnt doing so well nowadays, shanghai is beating taiwan in almost every feild economically.”

yeah, Taiwan just cant compete with those sweatshops LMFAO

You want stupid? This is stupid:

“but thats beside the point, a country is not like ur hair, u cant just decide to change it today and have it done by tommorrow. transition from one social and economic system to another is a long and arduaus process, if u rush into it and try to change the nation overnight they u’ll end up like the former USSR. the ‘years of needless struggle’ is not needless at all, if u try to do away with those years, u’ll just end up having to go through many more years of struggle.”

Taiwan is supposed to “unify” with this kind of thinking?

Now this one really kills me:

“also, i doubt that taiwan’s leaders are in the same league as the PRC’s, almost all of china’s top leaders are from qing hua or bei da (china’s equivilent to oxford and cambridge/ harverd and yal(spellings)).”

plawolf, Im glad your country has all these qing hua graduates running things, we’ll definately wont have a shortage of dirt cheap tv sets and radios with these guys “maintaining order”.

which leads to this kind of thinking:

“while china’s leaders are not elected, the large majority to the 1.3 bn chinese like and support them, especially hu jin tao (the new chinese president). but few on the mainland have much warm feelings towards chen and co, even if the government offered chen china’s No2 postion, the ppl would not stand for it ( yes, even china’s leaders have to pay close attention to what the ppl want).”

sorry, but you can push that on someone else, I dont trust you as a source for what 1.3 bn people in China want.

And as to:

“1) lack of understanding about what ‘reunificantion’ really means.”

I suppose this is what it means then:

“florida has a GDP higher then most nations, do u suggest that bush should listen to the opinons of the florida govener before making a decision? after all, the florida governer was elected by the ppl of florida, and florida has a legal and economic system that is distinctly different in many ways from all other parts of the USA……”

Wow, thanks for the lesson in democracy! Problem is that Taiwan a country of 18 million has an ecomomy that puts your 1 billion people to shame on a per capita level.

But the Taiwaneese can rest assured because:

“as china becomes richer and more like the west, more and more ‘taiwanese’ are now begining to feel that being chinese may not be as bad as they though, and so more and more ppl are supporting reunification. that is why the ‘one china’ principle was never a problem for the taiwan government before”

And there you have it! Taiwaneese just have to junk their system of government/law and assimilate into this economic progression that the geniuses of PRC are planning, to become the democratic and capalist wonder that plawolf says it will be.

Youve certainly swayed my vision of China, I certainly wont fall for those stereotypes you list below LMFAO

2) lack of knowledge abt what china is really like. most still hold the same steriotypes and cliches as those in the west. this state of ‘misunderstanding’ is not helped by the taiwan governments manipulation of the press and blocking of mainland television and radio stations (didnt hear abt that on CNN did u?).

3) the image of china as percived by the west. because of the ‘poorness’ and ‘backwarderness’ that many in the west automatically association with the word ‘china’ many ppl from taiwan that go abroad find that they are treated with more respect if they refered to themselves as ‘taiwanese’ instead of ‘chinese’.

4) the extensive government programs run by the taiwanese government to try to differentiate ‘taiwanese’ from ‘chinese’ and to try to build their own ‘national indentity'(taiwanese schoolkids are now tought lessons designed to promote taiwanese independence).

“but as china become more prospurous and open, and as world opions of china start to change, these factors are having an ever decreasing effect.”

Then why dont you try and opening up the internet in China so the people can speak for themselves instead of having people like you speak for them?

“what i find most ironic and even a little funny is that the PRC is not the one desperate to find a quick solution(as many western media seem to suggest), since, time is on our side.”

time is on our side too. Thanks again for the cheap tv sets.

I will say that american press usually reports about “capatalist success storys” or about protests and human rights of the lower class, so there is no clear picture of what day to day life is like in mainland china. I dont want to dig up any kind of debate that went on in the last thread about china, but I have to say Im puzzled about China treating Taiwan as a “defeated” renegade rebel province rather than reuniting with a prosperous 1st world nation on equal terms. Taiwan is an industrialized nation that competes on an equal level with the likes of Japan, Korea, USA, Germany, etc, etc. I know its a hard pill to swallow, but if China would align itself to Taiwans government and laws, they would eliminate years of needless struggle to convert to being a free market society. There is nothing to fear of Taiwan being some kind of dominating power, if indeed there was complete integration between the two nations. You cant compare Taiwan with Hong Kong either. Hong Kong has always just been a trading city, not a self sufficient nation.

Its very easy for portuguese speakers to understand spoken spanish. Its almost impossible for spanish speakers to understand portuguese being spoken. I can barely pick anything up when I listen to portuguese, but when I read it Id say I recognize about 50% as common to spanish.

It really amazes me that the people of the US treat Pakistan like undeserving crap considering all they have done to aid the US. The US has been a very bad ally to Pakistan and it says alot that they have stayed on the side of the US with their very large islamic fundamentalist population. It would be very easy for Pakistan to provide terrorists with an A-bomb if indeed they wanted to support terrorism.

5 is Eric Johnson (cant stand him, he sounds like a punch drunk church organist)