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American Idol 8: Ranking The Top 11 – After The Double Massacre
by Sting7 -- 03/16/2009
The American Idol game has definitely changed. This week, we learned about the new rule – the judges’ save! The time is now to show you are save-worthy! Some Idols have proven to be indispensable. Others, not so much. Into which group does Kris (right) fall? Who is heading for the finale, and who is late for the door? Sting7 ranks the remaining 11 contestants.
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Two down, ten to go before we get to the winner of American Idol 2009! They all want to win, but who is putting in the hard yards to do it? Just a reminder, these rankings are not just based on singing skill. It's that and all the intangibles. It's who has captured the public’s imagination. Who are they talking about around the water coolers and in the break rooms? Who's gaining, sustaining, and losing momentum? Who is looking the most Idolesque? Put all of those things together, and you get the rankings.
Here's how it all comes together. (The contestants' position last week are show in parentheses.)
1. (1) Danny Gokey – He is still The Guy. Interesting that he was the only performer who chose to punch his arrangement during Michael Jackson week. What it says is that Danny knows what he's doing! Maybe that music director experience? But no matter what you do to an arrangement, you have to deliver it. Danny just does. Time after time. His “P.Y.T.” wasn't pitch perfect, but it was absolutely joyous. He seemed to be lost in the music and he took us with him.
from: foxesonidol
Monday, March 16, 2009
After The Double Massacre
Nepal on verge of losing palace massacre eyewitnesses
KATHMANDU: Eight years after Nepal lost its beloved king Birendra, his queen Aishwarya and eight other members of the royal family in a midnight
massacre in the tightly-guarded Narayanhity royal palace in Kathmandu, the nation is on the verge of losing a key eyewitness who could have thrown light on the national tragedy that led to the unravelling of monarchy in the world’s only Hindu kingdom.
Sarala Shrestha, now almost 92, entered the palace as a teen after she caught the eye of King Tribhuvan, the grandfather of the last king Gyanendra, and became his concubine. After the king, who had two legally married queens, died in 1955, Sarala continued to live on in the palace with the status of a junior wife of the dead king.
She witnessed the reign of Tribhuvan’s ambitious son Mahendra, who seized power with the help of a coup in 1960 and banned the political parties. She also witnessed Gyanendra’s decision to follow in his father’s footsteps in 2005.
In between, she also witnessed the stunning carnage in 2001 which wiped out Birendra’s entire family and paved the way for Gyanendra’s ascension. During the shootout, which was initially blamed on Birendra’s drinks and drugs-crazed son Dipendra, Sarala was inside the palace with Mahendra’s wife, former queen mother Ratna.
However, the three-member high-level enquiry commission formed by the then prime minister Girija Prasad Koirala did not question either of the women. Now, with the new Maoist government of Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal Prachanda ordering a fresh investigation into the dark deed, it could be too late for Sarala to throw light on the enigma.
The 91-year-old has been admitted to a private nursing home in the capital. Besides breathing troubles and fever, she is also suffering from lapses in her memory. She remembers Tribhuvan and his death but professes to be unaware of the fall of monarchy in Nepal and the transformation of the palace into a museum.
White-haired and gaunt, she is now dependant on Ratna for her upkeep. The former queen mother is also the only member of the erstwhile royal family to visit her.
Though conditioned by the code of secrecy and silence that prevailed in the palace, Sarala however does not believe the enquiry commission report that s frustrated crown prince Dipendra, whose parents were opposing his wedding plan and threatening to disinherit him in favour of his younger brother Nirajan, killed nine people before turning the gun on himself.
"It is a mystery," she repeatedly told Nepal’s official media in her first interview. "It is a mystery who fired the gun and how he did it.
from: indiatimes.com
China Eases Overseas Investment Rules for Companies
By Li Yanping
March 16 (Bloomberg) -- China said it will make it easier for its companies to invest overseas as cheaper commodity and share prices encourage bargain-hunting in industries from autos to energy.
The approval process will be simplified and mainly handled by local rather than central government, Ministry of Commerce spokesman Yao Jian said at a briefing in Beijing today. The procedures take effect May 1, a separate statement said.
China announced $22 billion of planned overseas spending last month, including a $19.5 billion investment in Rio Tinto Group, the world’s third-largest mining company. China’s outbound foreign direct investment may top inflows this year for the first time, Standard Chartered Plc says.
“The ‘Going Out’ policy to encourage more of China’s firms to invest overseas has been in place for a number of years,” said Stephen Green, head of China research at Standard Chartered in Shanghai. “We believe that 2009 will be the year when it really gains some scale.”
In 2008, China’s overseas investment doubled to $52.2 billion, including financial-sector investment, according to the commerce ministry. This year, in February alone, the total was $65 billion, according to a tally by Standard Chartered.
Eighty-five percent of applications for outbound investment that previously needed central government approval will be handled by local authorities in future, Yao said.
Energy, Minerals
The commerce ministry will scrutinize investment plans of more than $100 million and those which involve multiple countries, the ministry said in a separate statement. Provincial commerce authorities will vet smaller deals and those involving energy and minerals, it said.
China’s Minmetals Group is awaiting shareholder and government approvals for a A$2.6 billion ($1.7 billion) takeover of Melbourne-based OZ Minerals Ltd., the world’s second-largest zinc mining company.
Hunan Valin Iron & Steel Group agreed in February to buy a A$1.2 billion ($776 million) stake in Australia’s third-largest iron ore exporter Fortescue Metals Group Ltd. to secure supplies of the raw material.
China Shipping (Group) Co., the nation’s second-biggest sea-cargo company, said last week that it was looking for opportunities to buy assets overseas as shipping lines and port operators struggle with slumping world trade.
A strong currency, cheaper commodity prices and the need for many foreign companies to pay off debt are creating “the perfect opportunity” for China’s firms to ramp up investment abroad, Standard Chartered’s Green said.
‘Flurry of Deals’
“The beginning of 2009 has seen a flurry of deals in which Chinese investors have secured ownership or long-term supply contracts to such things,” he added.
Cnooc Ltd., China’s biggest offshore oil explorer, is seeking opportunities to acquire overseas assets made cheaper by the global financial crisis, Chairman Fu Chengyu said March 5. China, the world’s second-largest energy consumer, entered into oil-for-loans accords with Venezuela, Brazil and Russia last month.
Automakers are being to encouraged to make overseas acquisitions, according to Miao Wei, vice minister of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology.
Today’s announcement came after China’s government said last week that it will simplify approvals for overseas capital entering the nation by giving local governments more authority to approve such spending.
More outbound investment “will help to improve China’s balance of payments while China is still running a relatively large trade surplus,” Yao said.
Foreign direct investment in China fell 15.8 percent in February, the fifth straight monthly decline, as companies cut spending to weather the global financial crisis, the commerce ministry said today.
To contact the reporters on this story: Li Yanping in Beijing at yli16@bloomberg.net
Chinese band "Dublingers" puts the Irish in Beijing
BEIJING (Reuters Life!) - The crowd is happy, the music is swirling, and two men jump up, Guinnesses in hand, for a quick jig. It could be any Irish pub on St. Patrick's Day, except that the musicians are Chinese and the pub is in Beijing.
"Dublingers" is a unique band, bringing together four Chinese who taught themselves Irish music and a French jazz player living in Beijing. Their name shows they have one foot in the Chinese capital and the other on the Emerald Isle.
The stories that led the band to perform Irish music are as unusual as their line-up.
"Years ago, I saw the movie Titanic, and I was really taken by the scene when they were all dancing below deck," said Cheng Yafei, a burly coal mining machine salesman by day and blues guitarist by night.
"I thought, Hey! this music sounds great. Where does it come from?"
Cheng, who had migrated to the blues after discovering the guitar and the Beatles in college, then taught himself to play Irish music.
He was invited to join the infant Dublingers by percussionist Li Hong, who learned Irish music while playing in a rock-and-roll band at an Irish pub in Beijing. He picked up the bodhran, or Irish drum, at a music fair in Shanghai.
Violinist Zhang Yang rounds out the band, which plays about three times a month in Beijing and had a busy round of gigs this week.from:reuters.com
College fire put out in Beijing
Thick smoke and flames in a two-story, sheet-metal dormitory building that accommodated security guards, students and some staff were reported to the police at 10:10 a.m.
More than 140 fire-fighters with 24 fire appliances managed to extinguish the fire after two hours.
One man was taken to hospital after suffering smoke inhalation, but his condition was unknown, said an official with the fire-fighters.
Police are investigating into cause of the fire. Their findings are expected to come out in about three days.
Fire-fighting authorities in Beijing have warned students against using high-voltage stoves and electric appliances.
The college was in the eastern Chaoyang district, where the new China Central Television (CCTV) headquarters is located. A new and unoccupied hotel building in the complex was destroyed by fire on Feb. 9, China's traditional Lantern Festival, and one fire-fighter died trying to extinguish the blaze.
Beijing raises stakes with tit-for-tat deployment in South China Sea
Beijing has increased tension in a disputed part of the South China Sea by sending a patrol ship to protect fishing boats after the United States deployed a destroyer in the area. The American move was in response to alleged Chinese harassment of one of its surveillance vessels.
The Yuzheng 311, a converted naval rescue vessel, is the largest and most modern patrol ship in the Chinese Navy, the Beijing News said. It was due to arrive in the Paracel Islands yesterday to patrol China’s exclusive economic zone and to "strengthen fishery administration" in the South China Sea. It will patrol the waters around the Paracels and the Spratly Islands, protecting Chinese fishing boats and transport vessels.
The remote reefs and atolls that comprise the Spratly islands are claimed by China, Vietnam, Malaysia, the Philippines, Brunei and Taiwan. The islands lie on major shipping routes for oil tankers travelling between the Middle East and Japan, South Korea and China. They may also be above undersea oil reserves.
Beijing was enraged by a law passed last week by the Philippines laying claim to the disputed islands, describing the action as illegal.
Related Links
* Obama sends warships to South China Sea
* China condemns US warship deployment
Multimedia
* Where war could begin
The timing of the deployment of the patrol vessel appeared to be a response to a build-up of American might in the region. The United States dispatched a destroyer armed with torpedoes and missiles to escort its surveillance ships after harassment earlier this month by the Chinese Navy.
Five Chinese ships engaged in what the Pentagon described as aggressive and co-ordinated manoeuvres around the unarmed surveillance ship Impeccable, forcing it to respond by dousing the Chinese ships with fire hoses.
Chinese naval officers said that the US ship was on a spying mission. It said it had made repeated representations to the US to stop sailing so close to Chinese waters and within its exclusive economic zone. Washington says that the confrontation took place in international waters, but Beijing claims nearly all of the South China Sea as its own.
froM : timesonline.co.uk
Olympics-Bird's Nest in battle to avoid white elephant tag
By Nick Mulvenney
BEIJING, March 16 (Reuters) - Six months after 91,000 people packed the Bird's Nest to watch the closing ceremony of the Paralympics bring down the curtain on Beijing's Olympic Summer, its owners are struggling to find a role for the iconic arena.
There are no shortage of examples of Olympic hosts building vast stadiums that are rarely used after the Games and with a price tag of over $500 million, the National Stadium always had the potential to become the mother of all white elephants.
"Most stadiums in the world run in normal methods are not able to make profit," Zhang Hengli, deputy general manager of the CITIC Consortium Stadium Operation Company, told Reuters.
"But China is different. Firstly we have a large population. The other thing is the stadiums in Beijing are mostly located in busy areas so we can guarantee a certain flow of people, which is a foundation of our profit.
"I believe in good economic conditions, the venue in Beijing could quite possibly make a profit."
Economic conditions may not be good, but Zhang said revenue from the 20 to 30,000 tourists currently visiting the site every day could cover the 70 million yuan ($10.24 million) maintenance costs and the 80 to 90 million yuan a year in interest payments.
Zhang recognised, though, that as potent as the memories of the exploits of sprinter Usain Bolt and the spectacular opening and closing ceremonies were, they will eventually fade.
"The Olympics ... endowed the stadium with rich cultural meaning, but such meanings will be expiring with the next Olympics coming up," Zhang said.
"So our task is to make new meanings for it. We are going to add more culture activities into it to attract the tourists visually and psychologically."
The plan, Zhang explained, was to put on two shows a day, one in the afternoon with a sporting theme and another in the evening which he hoped would become a fixture on Beijing's nightscene.
A performance of the opera Turandot is planned for the one-year anniversary of the opening of the Olympics on Aug. 8 and permission is being sought for another large concert in May.
It may, however, be a while until a full house of 80,000 -- the capacity was reduced after the Games -- cheer on athletes at a sporting event.
Plans for the Beijing Guoan soccer team to play their home matches at the stadium were cancelled and the authorities have yet to invite tenders to host the IAAF Diamond League athletics meeting that will take place in China from 2010.
"To be honest, it's not very easy to find regular uses for a stadium," he said. "We have to understand this situation and be innovative."
The cultural performances, moreover, make it more difficult to host sporting events, Zhang said.froM: reuters .com
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