The government’s appeal to bar an overseas lawyer from defending Jimmy Lai takes place tomorrow. Commentary in the state-owned local press rails against foreign counsel as NatSec threats and suggests sending Lai to the Mainland for trial.
Hong Kong’s NatSec enforcers have a big budget and manpower. They must find more than Jimmy Lai and pro-dem politicians to arrest and prosecute, even the obscure or pitiful. From yesterday, anthem-related ‘sedition’ (commenting and sharing posts online) cases in which an 18-year-old pleads guilty and a 42-year-old courier is denied bail. Among other things, how much are these trials and detentions costing taxpayers?
Is it more than Covid testing, or less? Weird statistic of the day: Hong Kong produces 55 tonnes of used RAT tests per day. (Trying to picture how big a pile that would be – the kits can’t weigh more than an ounce a piece. What’s the total for China? On a related matter, things getting wild at the Foxconn plant. Background here.)
With hopes of a quiet Friday so I can finish Kevin Carrico’s book – some weekend reading…
Diplomat interview with Andrew Small, author of No Limits: The Inside Story of China’s War with the West.
Journal of Democracy on Xi Jinping’s move away from prioritizing the economy…
Had [Xi] chosen to continue the economy-centered program rather than introduce the “struggle for security,” he would have had no excuse to stay in power, and the Twentieth Party Congress would have witnessed his handover of power to someone else.
CSIS paper on why invading Taiwan would be more trouble than it’s worth for Beijing.
There’s an irony not lost on anyone who has had a formal education that at the same time as Hong Kong leaders suggest that the populace needs more education on civics and the law, the same leadership and “thought leaders” of the local illuminati continually push for the city to be more like the Mainland and it’s opaque horror of a legal system, or to use it for specific cases.
Backwards dystopian horror show any way you look at it.
Well I’m glad I did my part for the environment and just took new photos of the same RAT result for several consecutive days to upload to the gov’t website.
Every time I throw a used RAT test kit into the garbage can, it reminds me that this test kit will now get deposited as part of the 13’000 tons/day of household waste in a landfill, and rot there for hundreds of years, rather than being sent to a waste-to-energy incinerator as fuel for the production of electricity.
Thank you Lantau NIMBYs and thank you misguided environmental zealots who delayed the incinerator which is currently being built on Shek Kwu Kau, chasing your grandiose knickers-for-jet-fuel technology!
@Kwun Tong Bypass – I take it we can safely assume you do not live on Lantau?
Dear Kwun Tong Bypass,
I have been working on the new incinerator project for the past four years, and saw previous iterations years before that. I do genuinely believe that it will bring great and necessary benefit to Hong Kong, despite being the usual government funded shit show.
As I understand it, the only reason the project site needs to be built on yet more reclamation, on prime porpoise feeding grounds, is because Mr Lau (both senior and junior) of Hung Yee Kuk fame didn’t want it in their back yard. However, building it adjacent to Castle Peak Power Station would have been far easier, cheaper and quicker. Plus it could have been fed by road rather than only by boats from transfer stations. The IWMF is designed specifically to accommodate existing ageing waste transfer vessels, which are imminently being replaced with new, larger versions, which will consequently not fit properly in the berthing area currently under construction. You couldn’t make it up. As a government department, the EPD doesn’t need splitting up into various functions, with yet more managers; it needs to be euthanized.
Sounds
What is this sound I hear? The rustle
Of wild boar in the hills;
The hawkers in the markets’ hustle;
Pneumatic drills.
What is this sound I hear? The hum
Of insects in the heat;
The rumbling buses go and come;
The jostling street.
Now, sotto voce, this I hear:
“Glory ting-ting-ting.”
Dark notes played in South Korea;
Risky to sing.
Worse, even worse, a sound that rises:
Piff, and puff, and clatter;
Glorious patriots fired up by this
Important matter.
Ho Ma Fan speaks the truth.
We fought the incinerator on the pristine island of Shek Kwu Chau on two grounds:
1. outdated technology
2. location
Location because instead of trashing a pristine island close to South Lantau it should have been located in the already trashed vacant area at Black Point, Castle Peak. But Uncle Fat had his way – not in HIS back yard prevailed.
I know exactly what Jimmy Lai’s QC will be doing. He won’t even get near discussing the various charges against the man. He will simply rip into the court proceedings; pointing out how none of it is compliant with either common law or the basic law. He will humiliate both the government and those muppets of the Justice Department; and when ejected from the courtroom and the territory, will take his report back to Europe and the United Nations, which will result in further sanctions against HK and those running the place. Jimmy’s going to jail anyway. He’s going to go there with the satisfaction of knowing the territory ‘elite’ will be further isolated from the global community.
On other matters. I’d hate to see inside the brain of whomsoever came up with the concept and form of Bloomy the Tree.
https://www.info.gov.hk/gia/general/202211/24/P2022112400296.htm
@DelBoy
agree with you!
Can’t resist re. Incinerator:
– no I do not live on Lamma but within the summer stink plume of the TKO landfill as long as they still landfilled knickers etc. there.
– landfills are a crime on humanity
– if you all could do math you would realize that in order to get rid of 13’000 tons per day of household garbage Hong Kong will need THREE incinerators of Shek Kwu Chau size. Even with the most optimistic reduction through recycling. So don’t worry, the Kukers will get theirs in Castle Peak! You see, and I have that from a reliable source, Shek Kwu Chau was to have the first one because it was considered the more controversial location. And once that one is done Castle Peak will be a shoe in.
And for the third the commies will reclaim some land in the Victoria harbour, I mean why not. Maybe fill in the whole harbour and make a huge waiting area for Alphards. Solves yet another problem.
– Lapsap. What happened to the “outdated technology”? ?Are you at least man enough to admit that you were wrong with your knickers to jet fuel phantasy?
Re Bloomy the Tree; A cynic would assume that any shop sporting the logo is Blue and keep walking.
And why does every initiative come with a childish cartoon emblem? How can they be taken seriously?
@ Kwun Tong Bypass
“Lapsap. What happened to the “outdated technology”? ?Are you at least man enough to admit that you were wrong with your knickers to jet fuel phantasy?”
The jury does seem to be still out on plasma arc, I”ll man up to that:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plasma_gasification
However, no matter how many incinerators HK ends up with, beyond most of our life-times, HK will need to vastly step ip its recycling.
“What recycling??” you might justifiably ask…..
250 islands in HKSAR, many uninhabited, and none can be found to host one or more landfills?
@stanley
Interesting thought you have with regards to landfills… as a jurisdiction where oversight and rule of law are relatively strong and seismic activity relatively low, I wonder if a couple of those HK uninhabited islands would be a good place to start a toxic waste burying business
I’m just drooling over @KwunTongBypass’s suggestion to combine a waiting area for Alphards with an incinerator / landfill (don’t mind which).
Now that’s sustainable planning.
@AsiaSeen
Re Bloomy Tree:
On top of the clunky visual, what exactly does the govt hope to achieve by ‘promoting social enterprises’ en bloc? If such a brand entity exists, association with government will surely weaken it?