Categories
Japan News Politics

On Japanese Earthquake 2011.

MapofDisaster

(Thanks to CNN for the Original Map)

On this blog I post quite a bit of quirky information about Japan, so I thought it would be good for me to post about something fairly important. Unless you have found residence on the underside of a rock you are aware of the situation in Japan right now. If not, here is a quick synopsis. On March 11, 2011 at 2:46 pm a 9.0 magnitude earthquake occurred off the coast of Japan. The worst in Japanese history and the 5th largest in the world. I want to write this for a couple reasons: to preserve this so people don’t forget and because there is so much misinformation flying around. 24-hour news networks are sensationalizing the effects of the quake or at the very worst providing patently false information. I will try my best not to get into the politics of the matter, but just try my best to help people understand what is really going on as well as what should be focused on. I have modified a map from CNN with some pertinent information about the disaster.

A large tsunami was created following the quake which is what happens when you have sea floor that is moved due to an earthquake and that created a large wave which moves inland. This caused thousands of people in northeast area of Japan to relocate due to their destroyed homes and businesses. If you can picture a wave washing up on shore and destroying a sandcastle it’s like that but on a bigger scale. It’s devastating when it rolls in as well as when it recedes back into the ocean. Probably the biggest city hit the hardest during the quake was Sendai, which I pointed out on the map. It has a population of over 1 million. Tokyo was minimally affected despite many claims. It did experience an extended quake, but it was most likely around 6-ish on the Richter Scale, a far cry from 9.0 in the northeast. It is about 200 miles from Sendai and about 230 miles from the epicenter, a pretty sizable difference. Most of my friends in Japan are situated in or around Tokyo and everyone has said that while it was scary, life is relatively back to normal. The really terrible damage happened in the northeast.

Now to the most mis reported part of the whole disaster. The Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. First, I’ll give a pronunciation because it is important to a certain extent. Foo-koo-shi-ma Die-itchy. It’s not proper, but you can say it now! Here’s the scoop on what’s going on. Due to the earthquake and how close to the shore the plan was it experienced some heavy damage. This damaged the facility and cooling systems. The concern is that not being able to cool the spent nuclear fuel rods will cause radioactive spills. The situation as of this writing is that they have sent firetrucks with water canons to shoot water to cool the fuel rods down until the cooling system can be restored. Power has been restored to some of the cooling systems and from here it appears they are starting to gain the upper hand in containing the reactors. An area of 20 kilometers has been evacuated around the plant. The concerns are talking about how this is the next Chernobyl and how people in Tokyo are receiving all this harmful radiation and how everyone is now a zombie. Not true. Chernobyl was a meltdown and far older technology. Nothing has melted down and it seems to be contained. While there is more radiation in Tokyo and in Japan, it is about 4 times background radiation. Which to put that into perspective. You receive more that while in an airport and on an airplane. It’s nothing to be concerned about.

The current dead or missing toll is over 21,000 as posting this. If you want to help I will put a link to donate. It is really the northeast who needs help as they are running low on supplies and medication for the people who require it. Anything you can donate can help, too. Sorry, for so many please donate posts, but this one should take precedence now, obviously.

Donate to Japanese Red Cross

Again, anything you give will help out in this horrible event.

I am providing a video from a guy I have been following for a couple years who lives and works in Tokyo. He is a bit crass, but he does a good job explaining what is happening.

 

Here is some photos from people on Twitter showing people in Tokyo following the quake. The ones with the bare shelves are a day after, due to panicking people. They were fully restocked the next day and are currently stocked. I urge you to watch the video above for some good insight. Thanks to @johntv @tokyocooney @cvxfreak and whoever else I took pictures from. If you want most accurate news coverage about the disaster you should go to the NHK world website and watch their free English stream. It is the Japanese governments broadcast and is in my opinion the best source.

 

255927900

255964680

2z86xjl

34yy8nl

Vq1f8g

Zg1nq

Cdblb

Zivubd

 

Categories
Politics

The Future: Accoring to the Far-Right

I would like to preface this article by saying this is purely and exercise in creative writing. The opinions and views expressed in this fake article are not the ones I personally hold. It’s probably the polar opposite to my belief system. I though it was kind of an interesting concept though. What if all those crazy accusations made by the far-right came true? What would the future be like. So, I wrote a diary entry from the not-so-distant future outlining what America is like. It’s absurd and I doubt a single person outside of Rush Limbaugh actually believes that this is what will happen, but I have been surprised before. Anyway, enjoy.

June 27, 2010

I am writing this letter not for present, but future generations. The world as we once knew is simply a crinkled page in a history book. If they only had listened! I am getting ahead of myself, let me explain the whole terrible tale from the beginning.

The 2008 Presidential Election is what I would call the turning point. The liberal, left-wingers shot down every warning we sent. We tried to inform the American people that Obama has a streak of terrorist associations; that he was in fact a secret Muslim. We even uncovered the fact that he was not even an American citizen. Why people didn’t listen is beyond me. They are paying for it now, paying with their freedom and with their lives.

After winning the election, Obama tried to play coy, like he was just a normal guy. The veil of that came off around September of last year. He held a national press conference to inform America that we were pulling every last troop of ours out of Iraq. What a mistake that was, or perhaps from his perspective, the ideal move. Most of the country applauded his effort, but us skeptics knew this didn’t feel right. Without proper infrastructure in Iraq it was only a matter of time. The country soon feel to Al-Qaeda, the Taliban, and other extremist, terrorist groups. With anit-American sentiment growing in the Middle-East by magnitudes in only few short weeks another terrorist attack on US soil was immanent.

Remember Swine Flu, or H1N1 as we all refer to it now? Well, just as some suspected it was indeed an act of bio-terrorism. The first outbreak was just too small to work. Only a month after Iraq fell people began dropping like flies. The terrorist group responsible for the production of H1N1 have come forth and admitted the delivery method for the virus were indeed the Mexican immigrants coming over the border, illegally. Lou Dobbs saw this and tried to warn everyone to no avail. Half the US population is now dead thanks to H1N1, it has been likened to the black plague if the black plague had super powers.

The economy is almost non-existent here in America; the repercussions are far worse than any photograph you can find of the great depression. Socialism is the grandfather of all these horrible conditions. The nationalization of the free-market has been a horrible mistake that we can’t come back from. The banks were the first to fall thanks to sneaky wording in agreements with TARP funds. Then the car manufactures fell prey to the golden apple that was TARP as well. The government was becoming more socialist by the second and we were powerless to stop it. With the new taxes on big business and the rich the wealth was being spread around. Without large corporations to combat the growing government it soon took control over our lives.

Deviating slightly, I would like to say thanks to the current administration I can no longer marry out of love. We tried to protect the sanctity of marriage; man and woman, just like the Bible says. With Prop 8, changing one of the most liberal states over to outlawing same-sex marriages, I though we put the who mess to bed. I was wrong. Once Iowa voted to allow same-sex marriages many other states followed suit. Soon all fifty states allowed same-sex marriages with Texas being the last to give in. Now that the United States had become same-sex friendly, opposite-sex marriages were becoming frowned upon, especially since the divorce rate was so high. Soon states started outlawing true marriage in favor of a same-sex only system! With out last stand being yet again Texas we now stare at a bleak and same-sex only future.

Another dicey subject that was recently settled was the abortion issue. As we all know life begins at conception, but not to the newly elected government. In a strange turn, (even for the government) the newly appointed chief justice, Keith Olbermann, convinced all his peers to add an amendment allowing all forms of abortion. It’s maddening how crazy it’s become. This story informs the next.

Roughly three months ago Obama came out and openly admitted that he has been a practicing Muslim for years and everything he said about being a Christian was solely to become elected. On top of that “startling news” he admitted to not being born American, but moved here as a baby. The congress having a Democratic majority voted to allow him to continue in his current position. As the days past you saw the White House become more and more sympathetic to the Muslim plight and eventually almost every Democratic senator or congressman was praising the glory of Allah. Staring to piece things together we saw what the government had truly become. Islamic nationalists now held the highest seat in American Government. With the amendment declaring all forms of abortion legal they soon instated “random” mandatory abortions. They were targeted at pregnant Christian women, but with the whole government now Muslim controlled, opposition was stamped out almost immediately.

With the government owning many large corporations many of it’s profits have been secretly embezzled and funneled to help extremist nations in the Middle-East. It would appear that America’s glory days are behind her and America as we know it is gone. Our cries have gone ignored and now with millions dead and thousands more being killed every day we are finally given an ear. I’m afraid it might be too little too late though. There is one hope on the horizon though. A small militia is forming in the backwoods of Alaska. They are gaining numbers and manpower with every growing day; headed by our once rising star Sarah Palin. With her expertise with assault rifles, skills with hunting, and collection of snow machines she was able to outrun Obama’s “Muslim Missionary” forces. If you are reading this please join us and help us take our country back. We need to go back to the way things were, when we were the ones doing the oppressing.

Categories
Politics

Enough already!

First off, we get it. Tea bagging. It’s a double entendre. It doesn’t need to be pointed out any longer. Second, I have a little beef with the people who are doing such bagging of tea. Your symbol is a bag of tea and you are assumed to be perpetrators of a “Modern day Boston Tea Party.” I am not impressed by your lack of historical knowledge. It’s either that or a stand skewing of history to fit your specific situation. Honestly, I am not sure which is it. Let me provide you with a refresher. The date is December 16, 1773, and the colonists are pissed. They want to know why they should have to pay taxes on tea to their British overload without even so much as a say in Parliament. The colonists get together and decide, “You know what? We are tired of this, let’s do something about it, k?” They assembled on a boat and dumped three shipments of tea headed for the motherland right into the Boston Harbor. History is made.

Now can you spot the fundamental difference between these two events? The “revolutionaries” of today are quite represented by their….representatives in congress. They are pissed because they don’t like what Obama is doing. I am afraid to say it, but that’s Democracy. Democracy doesn’t work on a system of everyone gets what they want. It’s based upon a majority vote. Now, it sucks that you don’t like it, and all I can say to that is keep trying to get your message out and protesting and perhaps people will listen and elect officials that will vote in your favor, but DO NOT go around comparing yourself to the revolutionaries of olde. You are represented, find another symbolic gesture.

Please don’t misinterpret this. I think protesting and questioning things is fantastic. People should be involved in their government and if something is fishy to them; they should get involved and try to fix it. That I believe is the true American way. STARS AND BARS! EMERICA! THESE COLORS DON’T RUN! *cough* excuse me.