NOV 21 – The last time America had to borrow money to finance a war was during the Revolution and a cash-strapped Continental Congress took loans from France to fund a surge against the British. That worked out pretty well.

But it’s hard to feel the spirit of 1776 in President Obama’s journey to China. He went as a representative of a borrowing nation to its primary lender amid a call for yet another costly military surge in the Long War that is escalating in Afghanistan even if it is hopefully winding down in Iraq.

As the president completes his journey to Asia, he returns to Washington to face what is the most consequential foreign policy decision of his presidency, a decision that this administration has not yet fully thought through.

Nov 21 — What do our politicians take us for? One minute they fight among themselves, say nasty things about each other and pull every trick in the cloak and dagger “game”.

The next minute they smile, hug each other and proudly announce they have made peace. And how many times have we heard of politicians “making sacrifices” for our sake.

Not theirs or their families’.

NOV 21 — Several days ago, I received an urgent message from a friend inviting me to a seminar on “Corruption Prevention in Business Sector 2009” organised jointly by the MACC, MACC Consultation and Prevention of Corruption Panel and the Business Ethics Institute of Malaysia.

The friend – whose name I need not mention here – is an MACC advisory committee member who knows full well my scathing opinion of the MACC and its work to date. “Come to the seminar as my guest and hear them out” he urged me. “Rome was not built in a day; we must be constructive not destructive”.

NOV 21 — Suruhanjaya Pencegahan Rasuah Malaysia (SPRM) akan menyerahkan kepada Peguam Negara berhubung tindakan membuat rayuan keputusan mengehadkan waktu menyoal siasat saksi hanya pada waktu pejabat.

Ini bermakna keputusan Mahkamah Tinggi kelmarin berhubung tatacara siasatan SPRM yang telah termaktub di dalam akta suruhanjaya itu masih belum muktamad.

Masih ada ruang untuk SPRM membuat rayuan — lantaran keputusan tersebut dilihat ada baik dan buruknya. Hakim yang berkenaan sememangnya memberi tumpuan kepada sudut positif terutama dalam menafsirkan penggunaan perkataan “sehari ke sehari”.

NOV 21 — Those who argue that the United States is in decline point to some compelling empirical evidence: a struggling economy, a discredited model of economic and social planning, and of course, the apparent growth of China’s power.

While these changes are beyond doubt, the implications are debatable. A recent ubiquitous implication has been that US President Barack Obama’s visit to the region instantiates the irrevocably diminishing position of the US in Asia. This is seen, it is argued, in the visit’s accent on seeking growth and markets from Asia, an explicit willingness to accommodate the interests of China rather than contain it, and the difficulty in rebuilding America’s troubled relations with allies like Japan.

NOV 20 - Twitter’s been making a lot of changes lately. They’ve introduced new technologies like lists — which is kind of like a friend filter on Facebook — and a new way to share one another’s Tweets.

Usage on the company’s website has taken off like a rocket, up 1,703 per cent year-over-year in September, and that doesn’t even count people who access the service through text messaging or specialised applications on their smartphones or computers.

But today was perhaps the most radical change of all. Twitter changed its cosmically deep and evocative signature query, “What are you doing?”

Now, Twitter wants to know, “What’s happening?”

NOV 20 — When the MCA delegates decided to sack both Datuk Seri Ong Tee Keat and Datuk Seri Dr. Chua Soi Lek in the Oct 10 EGM (“1010 EGM”), the Chinese community stood up and took notice of the courage of the MCA delegates. This has not happened for a very long time, but what the delegates did on 1010EGM obviously earned the respect and admiration of many in the community.

But later when Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak said the 1010 EGM decision is ultimate and must be adhered to, Ong and Chua decided to ignore it.

NOV 20 — The United States Time magazine had recently listed five things the US can learn from China.

Since Americans are so generous, Chinese people should not behave like niggards. If Americans can learn from Chinese, then Chinese people can also learn from Americans.

Moreover, isn't it a loss for Chinese if Americans have learned all of their strong points?

NOV 20 — MCA central committee member Datuk Ti Lian Ker recently made some untruthful allegations against Sin Chew Daily in his article posted on his blog. English-language daily The Star accorded the story significant space and quoted Ti’s statement.

In relation to Ti’s intentionally misleading statement, our responses are as follows:

NOV 20 — According to a recent poll, Datuk Seri Najib Razak’s approval rating remains at 60 per cent. It is indeed good news. However, there are also two pieces of bad news: 74 per cent of the people are dissatisfied with the government's performance in fighting corruption and abuse of power, and Malaysia's corruption ranking has fallen to 56, from 47 last year.