China beats off competition from Japan to build railway in Indonesia

China has been awarded a contract by the Indonesian government to build a railway across the country, fending off competition from Japan who were originally expected to win the bid.

After vying for months to build a high-speed railway through Indonesia only to be told by the government that they wanted a conventional railway instead, China and Japan once again locked horns and resubmitted bids for the new project.

According to AFP, Japan's top government spokesman Yoshihide Suga said an Indonesian government envoy had informed him Tuesday that Tokyo's bid had been rejected.

"Japan offered the best possible proposal," he told reporters. "The envoy came here to explain that the Indonesian government has welcomed the Chinese proposal. "I can't understand that at all. I frankly told the envoy that it was extremely regrettable."

Reports indicate that China offered the Indonesians an incredibly sweet deal which some say is almost too good to be true. Under the Chinese proposal, the Indonesian government will not be required to take on any financial burden or make any guarantees for the project.

While Indonesia is yet to confirm the decision, State-Owned Enterprises Minister Rini Soemarno suggested that the Japanese had lost: "The government stressed that [the project] should not have government funding nor a guarantee - Japan's proposal asked for a government guarantee."

The news will come as a blow to the Japanese railway industry who looked sure bets to win the original contract for the high-speed line before the Chinese jumped in with a counter offer.

China has in recent years been looking to capitalize on their experience building the world's largest high-speed rail network, hoping to win contracts for the construction of railway lines around the world. They're expected tobegin work on a line crossing Thailand later this year.

Angela Merkel caught on HOT MIC confronting Facebook’s CEO to CENSOR anti-migrant posts

Attending a luncheon on the sidelines of a United Nations development summit in New York on Saturday, Merkel and Zuckerberg were overheard on a live transmission broadcast on the UN website as participants took their seats.

After Merkel confronted Zuckerberg about anti-migrant posts, the Facebook CEO is heard responding that “we need to do some work” on the issue.

Ha!

This is so typical of the elites. They control policy, they control the media, they control the culture — but they can’t control the people. And this make them crazy. If they could, they would change the people.

Hitler tried to do that.

The truth is that almost all of my readers connect on Facebook. it is the individual’s media arm — I dislike Facebook’s business practices, but they are essential to the work. The only media telling the truth about the Muslim invasion in Europe is websites like mine, and Facebook is key to distribution. So you aren’t following me on Facebook — like this page, share the posts. It’s difficult. They block us, ban us, etc. Surf the wave. Shuck and jive. We are building an army.

Take, for example, this post — the media would never report this horror.

This is worrisome:

Earlier this month, Facebook vowed to clean up what it deemed was racist content on the German version of its website. At the time, the social network said it would partner with a non profit group to oversee hate postings.

Who decides what’s hate? “Hate speech” is a subjective category. There is no agreed-upon type of speech that everyone recognizes as “hate speech.” The label “hate speech” is used by certain parties in order to demonize and marginalize the speech of their opponents. The label “hate speech” can all too easily become a tool in the hands of the powerful, of tyrants, to silence those who are standing for freedom.

Angela Merkel caught on hot mic griping to Facebook CEO over anti-immigrant posts,” Javier E. David, CNBC, September 27, 2015

German Chancellor Angela Merkel was overheard confronting Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg over incendiary posts on the social network, Bloomberg reported on Sunday, amid complaints from her government about anti-immigrant posts in the midst of Europe’s refugee crisis.

On the sidelines of a United Nations luncheon on Saturday, Merkel was caught on a hot mic pressing Zuckerberg about social media posts about the wave of Syrian refugees entering Germany, the publication reported.

The Facebook CEO was overheard responding that “we need to do some work” on curtailing anti-immigrant posts about the refugee crisis. “Are you working on this?” Merkel asked in English, to which Zuckerberg replied in the affirmative before the transmission was disrupted.

In recent weeks, hundreds of thousands of Syrian refugees have washed up on Europe’s shores, seeking asylum from the raging civil war in their homeland. As Europe’s largest economy, Germany has sheltered the majority of them, leading to widespread objections within the country.

Earlier this month, Facebook vowed to clean up what it deemed was racist content on the German version of its website. At the time, the social network said it would partner with a non profit group to oversee hate postings.

Yet any action from Facebook is likely to stoke concerns about free speech. In the past, the social network has come under suspicion for suppressing or deleting posts and groups that advocate unpopular beliefs.

Bloomberg’s full report can be found on its website.

The 10 Biggest Celebrity Body Transformations

We’ve all seen movie stars and celebrities go back and forward from being skinny to ripped or fat to ripped, all for a role, but what we don’t get to see is the sheer amount of hard work that goes into  these transformations. Even though it may seem like it hardly takes any amount of time, these celebrities are usually working out in the gym for many hours a day, making sure that they are tuning their bodies to be as fit as possible. And alongside them working out all the time, they make sure that everything they’re eating goes towards their fitness goal, rather than towards satisfying their appetites. This all means that even though these celebrities have been able to transform themselves from very skinny, or overweight, to very fit, there has usually been big sacrifices along the way. Thankfully, these celebrities have spoken at length about their transformations in interviews and in photoshoots, so we can see just what they have been working at to stay fit.

Because there are so many celebrity fitness transformations, the guys over at Epic Mashups have been able to put together just that, an epic mashup of the 10 biggest celebrity body transformations. Take a look below –