Tropical storm Talas, directly south of Japan, is heading right for the center of the nuclear damaged island nation.
It’s predicted that by 29 August 2011 Talas will be a category 1 typhoon. Japan is still recovering from the 11 March 2011 quake and tsunami. Also, the damaged nuclear plant Fukushima Daiichi could get hit.
The Germany auto industry has seen skyrocketing sales this year, mainly in China and India. But a Center Automotive Research at the University of Duisburg-Essen, Germany, study predicts dire sales in the near future.
CAR boss Ferdinand Dudenhöffer, says the growing debt problems of Europe, United States, and even Japan, will eventually drag down the world economy. He predicts a “significant fall in growth” for the German auto industry.
Germany has the strongest performing car makers in the world. According to the Center of Automotive Management, VW holds 1st place, Daimler 2nd, and BMW holds 4th place (Korea’s Hyundai holds 3rd).
However, Center of Automotive Management predicts German car sales in China will soon drop off. So far Germany has seen 20% to 30% sales gains year after year. CAM analysts believe that in the near future German car makers will be lucky to see 5% sales growth in China and India.
5% sales growth will not be enough to make up for predicted loses in other markets (like the U.S.): “The gains that will be made in China and India won’t be able to compensate for the slight losses in other markets.”-Ferdinand Dudenhöffer, Center Automotive Research
The Non-Life Insurance Rating Organization of Japan said insurance companies gained more than 2.51 million new earthquake contracts, since the 11 March 2011 megadisaster.
Not surprisingly the biggest gains were in the areas hardest hit: Fukushima Prefecture saw a 49.6% increase. Iwate Prefecture 26.4% increase. Miyagi Prefecture up 22.3%.
The Japanese government is about to vote on a standardized decontamination plan.
Here’s a list of suggested decontamination procedures for cities and towns:
High pressure washing of homes and buildings, including rain gutters.
Trimming of outer leaves and branches on bushes and trees.
Pulling up smaller plants and removal of top soil.
Washing roads, including flushing joints on asphalt and concrete roads, removing mud and dirt along roadsides.
All removed soil and plant material must be treated as nuclear waste.
The Japanese government will vote on a standardized plan on 26 August 2011. The amazing thing is that it’s been more than five months since the start of the ongoing nuclear disaster, and they’re just now coming up with a standardized national government decontamination plan.
The North Anna nuclear power plant, outside Richmond, Virginia, has shut down.
The plant is on the coastline, just seven miles from the epicenter of the 5.9 quake (earlier reports said it was 5.8).
Diesel generators are supplying power to basic systems at the plant.
Nine nuke plants from New Jersey, Virginia, Pennsylvania to Maryland have declared unusual events. They have not shut down.
“In our opinion, the longer-term deficit reduction framework adopted as part of the Budget Control Act of 2011 (BCA) could undermine the already fragile economic recovery and complicate aspects of state and local government fiscal management.”-Gabriel Petek, S&P’s
Standard & Poor’s has already downgraded the credit rating of Nevada, New Jersey and several U.S. counties, for 2011.
Many counties and cities got super downgrades, meaning credit rankings of triple B, or less. S&P’s says many local governments are in very bad shape fiscally.
Six states were actually upgraded. They are Idaho, Nebraska, Wyoming, Oregon, South Dakota and Louisiana. But only Wyoming and Nebraska made the triple A rating.
In a statement issued by S&P’s on August 18, they indicate more downgrades for state and local governments are coming. It’s all based on state budget plans, and what happens with the Federal Debt Limit Deal (Budget Control Act of 2011).
S&P’s will make more credit rating decisions in November.
When orders were finally given to evacuate areas around Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, government officials led people to believe it would only be a few months.
It’s more than five months, and now the government realizes the level of contamination is so bad that it will be “…a long, long time…” before some city and towns can be considered safe for people to live in.
A meeting is being arraigned with local officials to explain the severity of the situation, and to better explain to evacuees why they might never be able to return home.
The day after the Japanese government announced it was lifting the contaminated cattle ban on Fukushima cows, four cows tested for cesium levels above safe limits.
Then, the very next day five more cows showed up with cesium contamination.
The contaminated cows had already been shipped to a slaughter house in Yokohama. It was there that the beef was found to be highly contaminated.
To make matters worse, the cow farmers swear they were not feeding the cows local rice hay, but more expensive imported hay. The imported hay had been stored indoors.
This means that the cows could be getting contaminated on their way to the slaughter house. Officials are trying to figure it out.
And yes, the Japanese government suspended the lifting of the contaminated cattle ban.
Afghan officials have told British media that the U.S. and Afghanistan have agreed to keep thousands of U.S. troops in country until 2024!
The deal would allow U.S. forces to use Afghan military bases, provide facilities to store massive numbers of U.S. military equipment, and allow thousands of military personnel to stay, including special forces.
Russian officials pointed out that the deal doesn’t make sense: “If the job is done, if terrorism is defeated and peace and stability is brought back, then why would you need bases? If the job is not done, then several thousand troops, even special forces, will not be able to do the job that 150,000 troops couldn’t do. It is not possible.”-Andrey Avetisyan, Russian Ambassador to Afghanistan
The Russians should know, they got their butts kicked by the Afghans back when Russia was part of the Soviet Union. They did exactly what the U.S. is doing now, trying to train up the Afghan government to take on the “terrorists”. The Soviet Union left Afghanistan in 1989, but continued to supply weapons and trainers to the Afghan government. The Afghan government lasted until 1992, brought down by a civil war that lasted until 1996. The civil war ended in 1996 when the Taliban took control of the country.
President Obama’s budget chief Jacob Lew has ordered government agencies to submit budgets that are at least 5% less than the past fiscal year’s budgets.
It was also suggested that the different government agencies find ways to cut another 10% through out the next fiscal year. This is part of the Debt Limit Deal (Budget Control Act of 2011) passed a few weeks ago.