American narrative, everything is fine, economy doing very well....

Meanwhile USA supermarts are closing like nobody's business. Some of the biggies like Walmart, Sears, BHG and other biggies we have seldom heard of over here, are closing stores by the hundreds, having lost millions over the years. How many employees are being laid off is up to you to imagine. Of course, that also means more job creations in other lower paid jobs, take it or leave it. Job creation is glowingly reported but job attrition goes under the radar.

The job market in USA is still interpreted as very strong. Yeah, the USA economy is also strong, but in the next breath they pricked the balloon, saying there are also strong headwinds. This is always the same old narrative. Very strong going forward but there may be signs of slowing they will tell you. What are they saying? Basically nothing, but bullshiting.

All these store closures are the result of online shopping. Now, where do those products on online platforms come from? Mostly from China of course. The USA mainland produces nothing that their citizens need, except if they want guns, which are plentiful, and tanks and fighter jets. Even tanks are not being produced in numbers large enough to supply to Ukraine. Wait a year or two they promised Zelenskyy.

Consumers have now found out during COVID19 and subsequent lockdowns that much cheaper things can be bought online. Shein, for example, is also discreetly taking the market by storm, and together with others, are cannibalising the business of the conventional shopping outlets and malls. Without the high rentals necessary for a cool presence in malls, they are able to offer products that are so much cheaper, such that you honestly cannot think twice about buying. That is why the USA Government is cracking down on those Chinese online business platforms, with fabricated claims about the dangers of Chinese products. Everything is capable of spying on them and must be demonised. They are also posing competition to Amazon.

The USA will regret what they wish for, if Chinese companies do take up the de-coupling narrative and move out of the USA, providing only online shopping presence in the USA. After all, this is the de factor modus operandi of Chinese businesses selling their products for years already. They have even been providing regular customers with updates on new products via their mobile phones. Such is the ease of doing business today.

Here in Red Dot, they can reinvent all they want with those shops in Orchard Road with what they claim 'new shopping experience', but it is not going to improve the shopping environment. It will only result in even higher rentals that will eventually drive those tenants out of business for good.

Anonymous

Shein and Temu storming the US online market

WASHINGTON: Shopping online at Temu, Laurie Silva paid just US$1.25 for earrings and US$15 for a cardigan - she is among millions of US consumers the Chinese platform is wooing with low-cost bargains and a dizzying array of products.

Temu topped US app download rankings in early April, a spot it held since January, but its rapid rise comes as platforms with links to China face growing scrutiny and when a ban on youth favourite TikTok appears increasingly inevitable.

According to Sensor Tower data, some of the most popular platforms downloaded in the US currently have Chinese roots, including TikTok, video editor CapCut and fashion upstart Shein.  CNA

 

Shein and Temu are the number one and two non American online shops in the USA and are the top challengers to Amazon. The wide varieties of goods and the unbelieveable prices would soon knock out Amazon and also Walmarts.

It is looking like after TikTok, Shein and Temu would be the next two obvious targets to be banned, in the name of securities and data collection. What else is new.

What is pertinent about these two online shops is that they brought great values to the average Americans, bringing them goods at prices they cannot refuse. Banning these two online shops on fictitious and clumsy excuses would not work as it would affect the pockets of the average Americans. They would be the people that would be hurt most. It would be the perfect storm waiting to happen. There would be violent protests and demonstrations on the streets if Washington clowns dare to touch these two online shops. 

TikTok could be more for fun and leisure to many, though many also used it for business. But Shein and Temu are totally different kind of fish. It hurts the pockets of average Americans and their cost of living. They are going to riot if Shein and Temu are banned by the unthinking rogues that only think about scoring political points.

Just watch how this develops. The losers would be the average American consumers and they would not take it lying down.

Elon Musk's Starship blew up with a positive spin

LOS ANGELES : The spectacular explosion of SpaceX's new Starship rocket minutes after it soared off its launch pad on a first flight test is the latest vivid illustration of a "successful failure" business formula that serves Elon Musk's company well, experts said on Thursday.

Rather than seeing the fiery disintegration of Musk's colossal, next-generation Starship system as a setback, experts said the dramatic loss of the rocket ship would help accelerate development of the vehicle.

Images of the Starship tumbling out of control some 20 miles up in the sky while mounted to its Super Heavy rocket booster before the combined vehicle blew to bits dominated media coverage of the highly anticipated launch....

But SpaceX executives including Musk - the founder, CEO and chief engineer of the California-based rocket company - hailed the test flight for achieving the major objective of getting the vehicle off the ground while providing a wealth of data that will advance Starship's development. CNA

Above is quoted from CNA. See the positive spin put into the failure of the takeoff? What would the American news be reporting if it was a Chinese rocket that blew up? I think if it was a NASA rocket, it would be reported as a huge success, yes, just to lift off the ground.

The question is why would Musk be reinventing the wheel when the Americans had already the most powerful rockets that could take them to the moon in the late 1960s? When don't Musk just buy the blue prints and walla, he will have success proven rockets that can fly to the moon without having to try something new that could fail? As a commercial enterprise, cost is very important.

The other options available for Musk is to talk to Kim Jung Un. Make it a business proposition and Kim would be happy to sell him some blue prints of the best rockets he has. The North Koreans are very good at building rockets that can fly, unlike the Japanese or the South Koreans...and now Musk.

Another option is to buy the blue prints from China. China also has many working rockets and for a price, could be for sale to a commercial enterprise like SpaceX, not to NASA of course. And NASA would not want to buy anything Chinese because NASA has their own working and proven to work rockets since 1969. NASA is going to space again but committing the same silly mistake of wanting to build new experimental rockets and not wanting to use their proven 1960s rockets. Why are they doing this, to spend public money, when they could do it cheaply and successfully with old rockets of the 1960s?

How many more super rockets is Musk going to blow up and claim more successes?

 

PS. Happy Hari Raya Aidilfitri to all Muslim friends.

American playbook on demonising China

When they want to keep down the rise of anything, especially from China, when they failed to compete, is that they will hide the pros and hype up the cons or demonise the products completely. Remember they were talking about all the ill effects of those 5G towers erected by Huawei, how dangerous they were in affecting health and all that horseshit. Now they are erecting even more such towers, more closely for their 5G signals, using different wavelengths for their system, and these are even affecting communication of planes at airports nearby. Has that problem been solved yet? Oh, sorry they are already experimenting with 6G or 7G now. They are so advanced technologically that they can leapfrog a generation or two. Many however, thinks it is more like just still tinkering with 4.5G.
The other modus operandi that they always use in their playbook is trotting out the National Security argument and targeting and banning anything made in China, blaming spying on China made mobile phones, electrical transformers, solar panels, bread toasters, washing machines, weather balloons, Huawei and now TikTok among others. The fact that they are now starting the narrative on AI and its inherent dangers tells us that they are targeting Chinese made EV. Soon, even shadows cast by any Chinese walking on the streets in USA will be suspected of spying.

This morning I woke up to a new discovery - Light pollution. Too many lights on at night is causing chronic and mental illness they claimed. Hyping up the dangers will see a coming clampdown on too many lights on buildings, streets and in the house at night. Will this result in less energy usage and was that the purpose of such a study? Hey, it will result in lowering inflation at least. Any study can be skewed to produce the result to support an agenda. Did the world learned any lesson from the COVID19 vaccine fiasco, with studies purported to prevent infections - touted day and night to be 96% effective. What was the infection result after vaccination and was it true?

Oh, by the way, Bill Gates is investing heavily in a new Covid oral spray, in 'anticipation' of a new pandemic originating in Brazil in 2025 which he predicted. He was reported to have already made US$500 million investing in vaccine manufacturing during the COVID19 outbreak in 2020/22. Wonder how much more he is going to make from Brazil in 2025. Such a futuristic mind and able to predict coming catastrophies to make money. Wonder how he did that? Silly asking about 'getting rich' secrets from one of the richest man in the world.

Anonymous

ROC Taiwan - more American provocations

200 US military trainers now in Taiwan as US intends to 'turn Taiwan into battlefield'

TAIPEI — The U.S. has reportedly sent more than 200 troops to Taiwan to provide military training to Taiwan's armed forces.

On Sunday, military sources said the U.S. Indo-Pacific Command has dispatched more than 200 military trainers to Taiwan to assist local forces in training and propose improvements.

Among the more than 200 instructors, 80% are from the U.S. army. Most of the American instructors are stationed at new training centers and reserve brigades of Taiwan's Army.

The U.S. army instructors are to provide on-the-spot evaluations of training and will propose improvements. Next year, Taiwan will resume the one-year compulsory service period, and recruit training will adopt the combat training programs proposed by the U.S. military to cope with the People's Liberation Army.

More than 160 of the instructors sent by the U.S. Indo-Pacific Command are non-commissioned officers with combat experience. In addition to being stationed in the main combat units of Taiwan's Army, most of these instructors go to army recruiting centers and reserve brigades to check on basic training and propose improved training methods to enhance the overall combat effectiveness of Taiwan's Army.

In early April, U.S. military instructors reportedly entered Chiashan Air Force Base in Hualien County to re-evaluate the safety of the bunkers, such as explosion-proof and protective facilities, especially the safety of areas where fighter planes and ammunition are stored. In addition, they assessed whether it is difficult for satellites to detect ammunition stored in the open air and the area where fighter jets are housed. They then proposed methods to strengthen bunker security facilities to reduce the damage caused by weapons.

Most of the U.S. Army trainers are stationed in the Taiwan Army's new training center and the reserve brigades, to check whether the training of recruits and the teaching and training of reserve soldiers meet the needs of defensive operations.

The Biden administration has said that it would help train Taiwan's armed forces to fight a guerrilla war on the island.

People in Taiwan will be the ultimate victims if the US turns the island region into a battlefield for a proxy war with China.

Media reports alleged that the US has been considering plans to destroy the island in the event of a military conflict across the Taiwan Strait.

Anonymous