China has voiced its opposition to the "provocative military acts" on the Korean peninsula after the North escalated tensions by shelling the South earlier this week.

Officials in Beijing have also criticised plans for a US-South Korean joint naval exercise in response to the North's deadly artillery barrage on the island of Yeonpyeong on Tuesday.

Seen as one of the North's closest diplomatic allies, China made its first comments today on the attacks which left two South Korean marines and two civilians dead.

The comments come as a North Korean military official warned of more attacks if there was any more South Korean "provocation".

Chinese premier Wen Jiabao has urged all sides to show restraint.

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http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/11/25/3076577.htm

Barbara Bush has sharply contradicted her son George W Bush’s recent disclosure, described by The First Post’s US columnist Alexander Cockburn, that when he was a teenager she handed him a jar containing the foetus of her miscarried child, and asked him to take it to the hospital.

Former President Bush told Matt Lauer of NBC television, in an interview to plug his memoir Decision Points, that it was the transformative moment that made him pro-life.

But Barbara has undercut her son. She says it was her housekeeper who gave the jar to George.

"I didn't put it in the jar," Barbara Bush said, adding that it wasn't "in the library" on display. "Paula [the housekeeper] put it in the jar. And I was shocked when she gave it to him to - but, you know, memories dim a little bit..."

Comments Cockburn: "“Here's George's transformative moment, and he can't even remember who the transformer was."

http://www.thefirstpost.co.uk/71983,people,news,barbara-bush-corrects-son-over-foetus-in-a-jar-story

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Sarah Palin on Wednesday dismissed the criticism of former First Lady Barbara Bush, who recently suggested that Palin stay in Alaska rather than run for president, referring to the Bush family as “blue-bloods.”

Speaking on Laura Ingraham’s talk radio show, Palin warned that critics like Bush “don’t understand competition is good.”

"I think the majority of Americans don't want to put up with the blue bloods -- and I say it with all due respect because I love the Bushes -- but the blue bloods who want to pick and choose their winners instead of allowing competition to pick and choose the winners,” Palin said.

Palin was responding to comments the former first lady made during a recent appearance on CNN’s “Larry King Live,” in which offered her unvarnished take on Palin’s possible presidential ambitions.

“I think she's very happy in Alaska,” Bush said, “and I hope she'll stay there.”

In the interview with Ingraham, Palin also suggested that the same “blue bloods” bore some responsibility for problems with the American economy.

“They kind of do some of this with the economic policies that were in place that got us into these economic woeful times, too,” Palin told the conservative talk radio host. “I don't know if that kind of stuff is planned out, but it is what it is. We deal with it, and we forge ahead and we keep doing what we're doing.”

Throughout the interview, Ingraham complained that "there seems to be a line of people who are, for some reason, so concerned about you and so concerned about a possible run, that they're trying to take you out now."

Palin agreed.

"Why don't we just embrace this idea of competitive primaries where healthy debate and duking it out in a world of ideas will allow that ideal candidate to surface," Palin said. "I don't know why they won't come along there with that idea, Laura. I think it's just so -- it's inefficient, it's unprofessional, it's immature."

http://blogs.abcnews.com/thenote/2010/11/sarah-palin-takes-on-the-bushes-theyre-blue-bloods.html

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Gus: is the world going to be ruled by prospective competitive idiots, after having been ruled by liars — like the Bushes, the Blair and the Howards?...

Cobert I King

Exactly two years ago today, an Associated Press headline read: "World economy shaky despite massive bank rescues." The story was about the U.S. government's decision to rescue banking giant Citigroup.

Economic conditions at home and abroad were the worst since the Great Depression. The outlook was so dire that the U.S. Treasury secretary pressured high-profile giant American banks to sell shares to the federal government as part of a financial rescue package - a Washington action until then unimaginable.

Yet the vilification of President Obama as a socialist began before he had fully unpacked at the White House. It has been relentless ever since, even though the charge misrepresents the truth.

Said Rush Limbaugh on Fox's "Sean Hannity" program on Jan. 22, 2009, just two days after Obama took the oath of office: "So I shamelessly say, no, I want him to fail. . . . Why would I want socialism to succeed?

Six months later, Sarah Palin weighed in on "Hannity": "Our country could evolve into something we do not even recognize. . ." Hannity interrupted her: "Socialism?" Palin: "Well, that's where we are headed."

Listening to those rantings, one might think Obama's entry into the White House was the dawn of the attack on American free enterprise.

Alas, some memories seem to fade with time - or succumb to political opportunism and the urge to lie.

History tells another story.

The architects of that breathtaking marketplace intrusion in 2008 were President George W. Bush and his Treasury secretary, Hank Paulson. And the Republican administration didn't stop there.

see toon at top... Welcome to "the Age of Deceit".