“U.S. supports Serbia’s European path”

hahaha yup thats right USA show them that you can beat them and love them at the same time!

U.S. ambassador to Serbia Mary Warlick said that the doors of NATO are open to Serbia, but the decision must be made by Serbia on its own.

NOTHING could be further from the truth.....the US is trying to manipulate EVERYTHING in Serbia, including a decision to join NATO, to give up on Kosovo, to collectively put the guilt only on the Serbs for Srebrenica, push for the Vojvodina Statues, etc. ad nauseum. All of these actions are purposely intertwined to promote the West's agenda to marginalize and break up Serbia. The US has forgotten that Serbia was one of it's most faithful allies during the previous two World Wars- yet today, there is nothing but lies, half-truths and manipulations coming from Washington towards the Serbs. As an American, I am ashamed at America's betrayal towards the Serbian people....I'm afraid that Ms. Warlick and Ms. Brush are simply in Belgrade not to bring the two peoples together, but to further shaft and divide the Serbian people. Shame on America....this is the time when the Serbs need to be clever, perhaps even deceiving the "Western deceivers". And remember, Ms Warlick- you are the guest of the Serbian people....and guests are not welcome if you're coming in on a "trojan horse".

Another boilerplate speech from an American official. EU integration is something Serbia has been working on long before Warlick settled into her posh residence in Dedinje. NATO membership is something Serbia simply cannot and should not accept. There is absolutely no need for it and the Belgrade government needs to do more than make indirect hints it doesn't want to join. What country is threatening Serbia today that isn't already in NATO?

We don't need any US support nor NATO membership. No - thanks!!

“I think that it is important to be completely clear that the doors to NATO membership are open for Serbia,” Warlick said. "

Do you notice how the US is doing a lot of hard sell on Nato membership to Serbia these days? Warlick sounds so eager, even desperate.

Of course times have changed dramatically since 1999. The US is no longer economically supreme, not with the entire world avoiding its financial instruments like the plague. It tried to be too clever and took on more than it could chew wtih the likes of Iraq and Afghanistan. To this day, the world's supposedly top military power was made to run in circles by the relatively lightly armed Talaban. And it is getting more and more desperate to find enough foreign suckers to help shore up its beleagued Yankee soldiers in Afghanistan, which even Croatia and Albania obviously couldn't or wouldn't supply enough of.

Ok Serbian friends you have no choice but to do as you are told join the NATO in 10 to 15 years and as a result EU (if still standing)

NATO is there to keep Russia in its seat and keep an eye on China.

If Serbia was not moving towards NATO there would not be Russian growling days in a row.

If they dont you will suffer, look i have seen post here where you make Serbia a Switzerland on steroids.

Serbia is a small country in debt and with nothing to offer that its neighbors dont.

Cheep labor all over, education nothing higher than Rumania, croatia ....

Tell me why is average salary in Serbia around 300 to 400 Euros at the best where are all those great things you are offering Zastava, Bambi P.S I love Plazma keks this is amazing stuff.

So please stop making it seem like you are so special you are 3rd world country no wonder you compeat with K-albanians and Montenegro to feel better.

Thanx....

But no thanks...
You've got everybody you need when you go against Iran.
You don't need Serbia's help.

Good luck on that conquest.

"The US is no longer economically supreme, not with the entire world avoiding its financial instruments like the plague.

(lowe, 6 February 2010 5:46)"

What ever gave you that idea? or is it just a wish? The dollar is rising because U.S. Treasury debt is the safest place to park money during times of trouble, which is what the EU and Japan are experiencing at the moment. The U.S. has its troubles, but other countries have even worse ones.

It looks like the US needs young blood to persue their killocracy around the world!
Do like we do, participate in peace missions (which should their only goal 2day), but stay out of it!

First picture I've seen of her. She looks nice.

"Lowe, since you like to ask others to presents proofs and citations, would you mind doing this sometimes yourself. Can you cite, show us or provide references where you saw the stats which indicate that the world is avoiding US financial instruments. Thank You
(icj1, 7 February 2010 05:54) "

Be my guest -- see for example the 2 biggest buyers of US instruments: http://www.dialogue-yemen.org/en/modules.php?name=News&file=print&sid=13011

And ask yourself what was Geithner and Mdm Clinton doing in Beijing quite recently after Obama took office? Sightseeing obviously wasn't their top priority.

And oh, by the way, everyone is still waiting impatiently for your URL links on the 1244 procedures in the other post. What's taking you so long?

"What ever gave you that idea? or is it just a wish? The dollar is rising because U.S. Treasury debt is the safest place to park money during times of trouble, which is what the EU and Japan are experiencing at the moment. The U.S. has its troubles, but other countries have even worse ones.
(Amer, 6 February 2010 21:39)"

Stop living in self-denial, no one is in worse shape than the US! http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock/

@rick

how about serbs apologists finally trying to take a shred of responsibility for something once in your lives

there is no manipulation, conspiracy or any of the other hundred things serbs apologists try to blame for their own state of affairs.

if you are not happy with your own state of affairs... too bad, your own choices have led you here

"Good, we are making some progress here, but not enough. You said the "entire world" not the biggest two buyers. Don't be selective with the aim of distorting the facts.

Please provide proof that the ***ENTIRE WORLD*** is avoiding the public debt US.
(icj1, 7 February 2010 20:31) "

for goodness sakes, anyone with common sense can see that I was referring to the major buyers. Do you really expect to find stats for buyers from the likes of Tivalu, Timbuktu and even "Kosova"? Get real!

"The US is no longer economically supreme, not with the entire world avoiding its financial instruments like the plague.

(lowe, 6 February 2010 5:46)

Lowe, since you like to ask others to presents proofs and citations, would you mind doing this sometimes yourself. Can you cite, show us or provide references where you saw the stats which indicate that the world is avoiding US financial instruments. Thank You

"Sorry to the others for going off topic here, but Lowe, the only thing I have to provide here is evidence, online or not. If I find evidence in paper and give you all the references you need, and you reject it just because you are lazy to follow up and find it the same way I did, that's your problem my friend, not mine.

I provided you author, date, document number, document page and the place where you find it. Let me know where my reference to the document is incomplete as per legal standards.
(icj1, 7 February 2010 20:39) "

the only problems as we both know is that your so-called evidence are dubious and deliberatly omissive of material facts. The onus should be on you to make sure that the CONTENTS of the evidence are available and reliable. Merely quoting the sources is not enough -- how do we know the contents in them are as you claimed?

"Lowe, this link proves that US has a very large debt; but you forgot the other side of the equation; it also has a very large economy. USD 1 million of debt for (say) Kosovo may very bad but USD 1 billion of US is nothing.

Anyway, regardless of that US public debt being good or bad, you said that the world is avoiding it. Where is the proof please of such avoidance ?
(icj1, 7 February 2010 17:36) "

well, if everyone in this very large economy of yours owes over $40K, you really should be more worried than complacent.

I have posted a link (one of quite a few that you can easily find on your own from the search engines). I hope B2 posts it.

As for you, I am still waiting with bated breath for your online evidence in the other post about 1244 which is now a week old.

Be my guest -- see for example the 2 biggest buyers of US instruments: [link]

(lowe, 7 February 2010 18:12)

Good, we are making some progress here, but not enough. You said the "entire world" not the biggest two buyers. Don't be selective with the aim of distorting the facts.

Please provide proof that the ***ENTIRE WORLD*** is avoiding the public debt US.

Going to the substance now, are you convinced that even if you did the research for the entire world, your statement remains true that the entire world is avoiding US public debt?

"Foreign investors had simply not appeared, the demand for Uncle Sam's offering so often a sure fire thing had fallen flat. Unlike anytime previously, the world's treasury buyers had suddenly decided to keep their hands in their pockets, invest their oil dollars elsewhere; some in the euro treasuries, others in their own local currencies."
Overseas institutions, private investors and foreign central banks had quietly and almost totally unnoticed grown dangerously bearish on the US economy.
"It was amazing," Paul Calvetti of Barclays Capital Inc said as the Treasury Department announced that Wall Street traders, and not foreigners, had bought virtually the entire $90bn. "I don't think I have ever seen this before."

The "Entire World" excluding one's self of course.

On another note did you know,
The autism spectrum, also called autism spectrum disorders (ASD) or autism spectrum conditions (ASC), autism, is a spectrum of psychological conditions characterized by widespread abnormalities of social interactions and communication, as well as severely restricted interests and highly repetitive behavior. Individuals with AS may collect volumes of detailed information on a relatively narrow topic such as weather data or star names, without necessarily having genuine understanding of the broader topic.

“Sure, let’s assume what you said, that the US twisted the context, the FRY rep said much more, etc., etc….

What do you mean “Isn’t there a possibility of dishonesty on the part of the US submission to the ICJ in this regard” ? Yes, there is, about the context, how they interpret it, etc, etc, but not about what the words of the FRY rep were since US was just ***QUOTING***. Serbia never claimed that the US presented false evidence for this in the ICJ, even though Serbia may not agree now with the US ***INTERRPETATION*** of that evidence.

So do you still think after the proof that you saw online that the FRY rep did not say the following: “in operative paragraph 11, the draft resolution establishes a protectorate, provides for the creation of a separate political and economic system in the province and opens up the possibility of the secession of Kosovo and Metohija from Serbia and the FRY”

I never said that the US twisted anything, I am just stating that the possibility exists.
You have missed my point about what the FRY rep. All along I have been saying that you cannot take just one sentence presumably uttered by him and dwell on that without taking into account what else he said in the context of that UNSC meeting. You must look at the speech in its entirety and there has to be online evidence for that precisely because this is an online forum.



“No, 1244 did not say that Kosovo solution is the UDI, but on the same time did not forbid it. That’s why the FRY rep interpreted it as 1244 opening up the possibility of secession for Kosovo.

And I don’t understand the issue about the verbal sentence overriding the entire written document for 1244. There is a sentence in the preambular paragraph (not the entire document – you still did not learn about being careful when you use words such as “entire”) about the territorial integrity of the FRY. What that sentence’s actionable implications are is open to interpretation, and since the FRY is the directly affected party, of course its interpretation is authoritative. “

In my view, because 1244 recognized Belgrade’s sovereignty, it cannot at the same time support any UDI.
As for the verbal sentence, I was saying that, at the end of the day, it is 1244 itself that occupied the UNSC’s and ICJ’s attention, not what the Serbian rep or other reps apparently said back in 1999. The statement about respect for Belgrade’s sovereignty is clear enough to me, however much you may doubt its clarity. And 1244 must be taken as a whole, not for you or anyone else to conveniently ascribe more importance to some parts of it than others.



“No, this is factually incorrect. Please cite the date and number of the UNSC meeting which did not accept the UDI ? On the other hand I can provide you evidence that the UN organs involved (UNSC and the UNSG) were both explicitly asked by Serbia to annul the UDI as illegal, but both did not do what Serbia requested.

Kosovo remains regulated by the relevant provisions of 1244 which is still in force and fortunately nobody can override it.”

There has been no UNSC meeting to date that accepted the UDI or else resulted in any change in Kosovo’s status under 1244 as a province.



“I did not say publically available online. I said publically available. I’m not aware of any rule that requires online evidence for online discussions.”

Unless you are able to provide the evidence online, don’t expect me to take you seriously. Because all we are left is only your word that such a document exists and that its contents are as described by you.


“No, the judge would rule on the evidence only if the other party presents arguments that the evidence is false. But obviously the other party can’t say the evidence is false without going to read it first. Of course if a party does not provide precise references, the judge can force it to either provide the precise reference or bring in the text if it’s not publicly available. “

I don’t see how his honor can rule on evidence that is not presented to him (and the jury and the other side’s lawyer).
In this online forum, you do not expect every reader to have public access to your specific article. So naturally to be taken seriously here you will need to bring that evidence online. One only wonders why you have been reluctant to do this to date.



“It’s not overriding anything. The “overriding” word you use starts from the assumption that your interpretation is correct. Why ? I could say the opposite, a preambular paragraph about the FRY’s territorial integrity cannot override the actions prescribed or not forbidden by the rest of the resolution. And the FRY’s rep agreed with me and not with you. As I said above, he is the affected party so his interpretation is authoritative. “

Here we go yet again, your conveniently giving more importance to some parts of 1244, an interpretation which I do not agree with. For me, every sentence, every clause in 1244 must be considered.



“That’s not consistent with what Belgrade said when the 1244 was adopted. Also, I can wake up in the morning and say Kosovo belongs to Mars; does that mean it is correct ?! Where are the arguments ? “

And until I see your fabled but still-missing-after-2-weeks verbatim records online, I will, at best have to reserve judgment on that. And what has Mars to do with this anyway?



“No, I explained above. The FRY’s rep sentence is in line with 1244, so it’s not a matter of being more or less important.

You hinted that Belgrade may have changed position when you said in another post “Isn’t what Tadic’s elected government think today more important for policy towards Kosovo than what was purportedly commented back in 1244”.

But let’s assume they have not changed position. So their position is the one they stated in the UNSC meeting 4011 in 1999 that 1244 opens up the possibility of secession for Kosovo.”

The document 1244 itself is the one that’s important, not what someone purportedly said back in 1999 which was not part of the resolution.

I didn’t say that Belgrade did change its position over 1244. As far as I know, they have always claimed sovereignty over Kosovo and among other things, cited 1244’s recognition of their sovereignty.
As for records of that UNSC meeting, I have already mentioned so many times already that until I see your evidence online, don’t expect me (or anyone else) to accept your position prima facie.



“Why not c, i.e. both ? “

Option a asks for ICJ to review the question. And I don’t see what your re-re-re-re quiz is getting at. Can you get to the point or am I also supposed to look for the answer myself online?


Again, I did not state “many without vested interest”. I just said “many”.

And I already told you that people with vested interest cannot be seen as objective sources contributing to the credibility of your arguments. Judges have to be impartial for their judgments to be accepted without a pinch of salt.


“So I have not made a statement about my affection towards you. According to your logic, it means that officially I hate you.”

But by your logic, it means that as long as I don’t say I hate you, then it means I love you! That’s where your contradiction lies!



“That depends; sometime they may support Kosovo membership in int’l organizations; sometimes not. For UN we don’t know since it’s not been put to a vote in the GA yet.”

It wouldn’t even get to the GA. From Russian and Chinese statements, there is no chance for Kosovo’s membership to make it past the UNSC.

As for support for Kosovo's membership to international organizations, do you mean those that do not require statehood as a prerequisite? True for bodies like the World Bank.



“The sentence did not say Factor A and Factor B; but did say “will of A” and “opinion of B”. So your example is not correct. “

Well, it is obvious to me that Factor A = Will of A and Factor B = Opinion of B. It is also obvious that the sentence did not say that Factor A is more (or less) important than Factor B. Therefore both must be considered notwithstanding that one is about “will” and the other merely (to you) an “opinion”. For me, it means that B’s opinion is as important as A’s will.



“I provided you the online evidence where the verbatim records were quoted. For the full text, go a law library and follow the reference.”

I have already mentioned that you shouldn’t expect to be taken seriously online if you can’t produce the actual evidence online. You are free to disagree but it doesn’t help make your case more credible online here.


"I granted you that Belgrade is a relevant authority (quod non). I did single out for Belgrade’s opinion not to be taken into account because you singled it out for analysis and I was responding to you. But there was no requirement that ALL opinions should be taken into account. It’s perfectly legal to not take into account any of the opinions (be that Belgrade, Pristina, or whatever relevant authority you prefer) because the text said “opinion of relevant authorities” NOT “opinion of ALL relevant authorities”.
You can’t rule something illegal because not ALL opinion were taken into account, when the ALL was not legally required. “

For me that statement was clear enough, opinions put forth by a relevant authority must be considered. And can you tell me who is qualified to decide that Belgrade’s views can be discarded? You? The US?



“Simple, I don’t have too. Legal arguments don’t require online evidence. You have to live with it.
(icj1, 16 February 2010 00:10)”

Then don’t expect me and others online here to take your arguments at face value.

Stop living in self-denial, no one is in worse shape than the US! [link]/
(lowe, 7 February 2010 06:02)

Lowe, this link proves that US has a very large debt; but you forgot the other side of the equation; it also has a very large economy. USD 1 million of debt for (say) Kosovo may very bad but USD 1 billion of US is nothing.

Anyway, regardless of that US public debt being good or bad, you said that the world is avoiding it. Where is the proof please of such avoidance ?

You said the "entire world" not the biggest two buyers. Don't be selective with the aim of distorting the facts. Please provide proof that the ***ENTIRE WORLD*** is avoiding the public debt US.
(icj1, 7 February 2010 20:31)

for goodness sakes, anyone with common sense can see that I was referring to the major buyers. Do you really expect to find stats for buyers from the likes of Tivalu, Timbuktu and even "Kosova"? Get real!
(lowe, 8 February 2010 00:18)

No, common sense can’t bring anyone to interpret your words to mean “major buyers” because you did use the term “world”, and even reinforced it by saying the “entire world” in case it was not clear enough that you were referring to the entire world. Did you at least research how closely the entire world can be approximated with these two major buyers in matters related to US public debt.

So, YES, you have to do the research for the entire world; otherwise don’t use the words “entire world” hoping that it can pass undisputed. I advised you in another post, do the research first, and then make sweeping conclusions. If you make the conclusions first and then try to find the facts supporting them, you are not always going to succeed (as it happened in this case).

Going to the substance now, are you convinced that even if you did the research for the entire world, your statement remains true that the entire world is avoiding US public debt?

"Please ignore the US arguments from above – just take the evidence about the FRY rep’s statement. Just wanted to show you that the FRY representative did say that the resolution “opens up the possibility of the secession of Kosovo and Metohija from Serbia and the FRY” and that was not a product of my fantasy. Please don’t come back to say that the US presented false evidence to the ICJ and Serbia’s lawyers were so incompetent as not to catch it ?
(icj1, 8 February 2010 21:17) "

Ignore the blatant falsity on the part of the US? Actually many readers like me here have already known for years that Uncle Sam is zilch as far as integrity is concerned. And if the US is caught being dishonest here, nobody, least of all me, will be at all surprised!


“No, common sense can’t bring anyone to interpret your words to mean “major buyers” because you did use the term “world”, and even reinforced it by saying the “entire world” in case it was not clear enough that you were referring to the entire world. Did you at least research how closely the entire world can be approximated with these two major buyers in matters related to US public debt.

So, YES, you have to do the research for the entire world; otherwise don’t use the words “entire world” hoping that it can pass undisputed. I advised you in another post, do the research first, and then make sweeping conclusions. If you make the conclusions first and then try to find the facts supporting them, you are not always going to succeed (as it happened in this case).

Going to the substance now, are you convinced that even if you did the research for the entire world, your statement remains true that the entire world is avoiding US public debt?
(icj1, 8 February 2010 03:24)”

For someone who can’t even provide the URL to his 1244 claim, you sure have the audacity to equate my passing figure of speech with your specific allegations about the Serbian representative at UN in 1999.

Okay, so as not to be a spoil sport, let me rephrase my earlier statement about the entire world and rephrase it more accurately to suit your petulance:
‘The entire world is no longer buying the US’s financial instruments the way they did in the past. The ‘entire world’ in this case, refers of course to the major buyers whose purchase matters to the US. They do not include the likes of “Kosova” which continues to drain the coffers of the West’ by its dependence for massive amounts of aid. Entities like “Kosova” are clearly in no position to afford to buy US financial instruments in any quantity that will make a real difference to the latter’s humongous debts.’

There, are you happy now?

Oh, and here’s some more URLs with my compliments: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aRADYHh._dKQ
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSN2926552620090729
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/10_07/b4166016257740.htm

And I still continue to bet that you can’t produce, after 2 whole weeks, any credible URL evidence on the 1244 post!

“I showed you the online link to the evidence presented in ICJ proceedings and it appears to me that you did not say that such evidence is false. “

But you did not and remains unable to show the online evidence that matters – the one about the context in which the Serbian rep talked about 1244. Of course, bottom line still remains that 1244 recognized Belgrade’s sovereignty over Kosovo regardless of who said what.



“If I make a claim in place X it is not a requirement that the evidence be in place X. That may be true if I quote evidence which is only in my possession. But in this case I’m citing a publicly available document (publicly is not equal to “online”). “

Yes, but you decided to discuss and take a position on that document through an online mode, you are obliged to provide the document online if you expect to be taken seriously. And this you failed to do so as I have already mentioned so many times earlier.



“No sir, passing or not passing figure of speech, “entire world” can’t be used as synonym of “two major buyers” especially when you say (below) the latter are less than 50%. As for the Serbia’s statement I provided you the link. “
We will just have to disagree about my passing figure of speech then. I have made my position abundantly clear to you already.

The link that you provided was the one by the US rep to the ICJ. It was not the one in question about the verbatim records when 1244 was passed and the context in which the Serbian rep purported mentioned those statements.



“Ahhhhhhhh, less than 50%.... And you take something that is less than 50% to represent the 100%. Are you sure that if we consider the 100%, the result will not be different (just asking because between less than 50% and 100% there is an enormous difference).

As for trips to Beijing or any other place of the world where Clinton or Geither go, I don’t see how they support your point. Clinton was to Haiti recently. Following your logic, that country must be very important for the selling of the US public debt since Clinton visited it. “

I don't think some of the other main buyers like Russia and Brazil are crazy about buying ever more US debts. If anything, the Russians in particular are talking about replacing the greenback as the currency of trade purchase of these debts are supporting.

And I don’t see any article online by any country enthusiastically praising the value of buying more US debts and supporting the dollar do you? Mr Clinton was asked to help out in the Haitian earthquake. Very different from what his wife went to Beijing for. You can easily verify this online. http://www.rightpundits.com/?p=2937





“I can easily provide you evidence that this “insanity” is very normal and actually the “insanity” may have been the month of April :). My friend, as you used before the less than 50% to make statements about the 100%, you are doing again the same error: use one month’s data to make sweeping conclusions about trends. “

Then I am waiting with bated breath for your wonderful but so far unproduced evidence!



“Great, just wanted to make sure that you don’t still continue to bet that I can’t produce, after 2 whole weeks, any credible URL evidence on the 1244 post “

Well you haven’t produced those verbatim records online anyway. So your credibility is still zilch.


“As for “recognizes Belgrade’s sovereignty over Kosovo” that’s your interpretation which is not shared by the interested party (i.e. FRY – Serbia). Of course you have the right to your opinion, but if all parties involved (i.e. FRY-Serbia on one side and Kosovo and its supporters on the other side) including the directly affected party (FRY-Serbia) all interpreted the resolution the same way, then your argument is about an issue not in dispute between the parties involved.

For analogy, you have two parties in a contract, Party A and Party B, which are in full agreement about the contract’s interpretation. Now you have a Party C which is not part of the contract which tells Parties A and B you should disagree and interpret the contract differently !!!!!!!!!

Obviously Parties A and B would tell C that it’s not its business :)
(icj1, 13 February 2010 18:15)”

I believe my interpretation is shared by Tadic and his government. Otherwise why is Serbia still claiming Kosovo? You are putting words into Belgrade’s mouth! If Belgrade knew our debate here, I am confident that far from them telling me that it is none of my business, more likely you will be the one who will be told this by them!

"If we take your method of comparison, i.e. the number of months which are positive/negative in 2008 vs. 2009, there were 2 negative months in 2008 (18.7 and 9.6 billion negative) and 2 negative months in 2009 (0.9 and 8 billion negative). How does that show that the entire world is avoiding US domestic securities ?

I'll post a separate reply for the rest.
(icj1, 15 February 2010 19:33)"

Well, Column 22 shows a negative trend anyway for most of 2009 for net foreign holdings of short-term US securities.

I stand corrected about Column 3 though and therefore retract the “entire world” words in my original post. This should please you right?

My initial assumption was based on the article that I came across about the Japanese and Chinese governments proposing to cut purchase of US debt instruments and various news reports that appeared to support this trend by other foreigners.

“Lowe, did you read what I wrote ? I was not discussing the falsity or not of the US arguments, and if it really pleasures you we can assume that Uncle Sam is zilch as far as integrity is concerned. I just brought you the link to show you that the FRY rep said the words as per evidence (not arguments) presented to the ICJ. I’m assuming that evidence is correct otherwise that party’s credibility is totally lost in the ICJ proceedings. So are you saying that the evidence presented was false ? If so, please rush to the Jeremic’s office to tell him that before ICJ’s decision because the Serbian lawyers missed that during ICJ proceedings :) “

Good, then let us go with the line that the Yankees’ integrity is zero since you are in agreement. The bottom line still remains that unless I see actual evidence of the sources you cite, don’t expect me to accept it without question.



“I never claimed a URL exists. I told you since the beginning where to find the document. Get out of your chair and do your research my friend, as I did mine.”

But when you make a specific claim online, the onus is on you to satisfy us all with online evidence. I already suggested a blog to you but obviously you have no intention to following up with that for obvious reasons. So don’t blame me if you sounded far from convincing.



“How can the “entire world” refer to the “major buyers” if you don’t specify here what portion of the entire world these major buyers are in purchasing US public debt ? If the major buyers are, for example 95% of the world, you are correct. If they are, for example, 45% you are wrong. It amazes me how you can infer something for the entire world based on major buyers when you have no idea what portion of the world these major buyers are.

Also when you say, the entire world is no longer buying the US’s financial instruments the way they did in the past, what do you mean by past and what is the present. What are the periods we are comparing here?”

I have already clarified that the “entire world” phrase is a passing figure of speech to refer to the much reduced demand for US IOUs. It is different from your specific allegation about what a particular Serbian said about 1244 at a specific location at a specific context and at a specific time. So convenient for you to assume these 2 scenarios are the same when anyone with enough common sense can see the difference.
As a figure of speech, the entire world must refer to the major buyers because only the major buyers have the financial clout to cause the US great concern over any drop in purchase. Do you think Uncle Sam will have sleepless nights should the likes of “Kosova” decide to cut back on any meager amounts that they might purchase? Do you think the Yankees even bother to keep online statistics for such peanuts investors?”
The 2 major buyers China and Japan alone own almost half of US debt. The percentage may seem trivial to you but worried Mrs Clinton and Geithner enough to make trips to Beijing – to no avail of course. And I would think they are better placed to judge how important are the Chinese and Japanese than you professed to be. You don’t see them travel to the likes of “Kosova” to do a hard sell of their IOUs do you? This fact about Chinese and Japanese holdings of US debts together with the other online articles that I have also already provided you online about world reduction in purchase of US IOUs should support my point clear enough. On the other hand, to date you have not been able to provide online the article that was the whole crux of your claim about 1244.

By the way, the time periods for comparison must surely be before and after the subprime mortgage and banking crisis that started in the US in late 2007. Only a hermit cut off from the outside world would not know this already.




“One link says “investors could abruptly lose confidence in the U.S”. So “could” not “did”. The other one refers to the month of April only. And the other one shows that one US public debt auction had weak demand when the US does dozens of such auctions in a year. So none of these could serve as evidence of sweeping conclusion that the entire world is avoiding US public debt. They do start to provide some pieces of evidence for your point, but, for example you’d need 12 articles (one per consecutive month) like the one for April to prove your point. You’d need demand data for all US public debt auctions in a year to prove your point. Do you have any evidence that say, US public debt held by the entire world, except US, was 100 in 2008 and 80 in 2009, i.e. that decreased year over year as per most recent stats ? Just hard data that speaks for itself. You don’t have to quote hundreds of articles from google that you and I could easily find contradicting each other. “

And you expect the low demand in April to suddenly soar to record heights in May and then to fluctuate back to the pits in June? What kind of insane logic is that? The articles that I provided give the info that demand for US debts by foreigners around the stated period of the article is in a certain direction -- decidedly downwards.



“Let’s see how convinced you are… What would you bet that I can’t produce definitive evidence that the FRY’s rep to the UN did say the following during the UNSC 4011th meeting:

“the Security Council draft resolution should contain the following positions: a firm and unequivocal reaffirmation of full respect for the territorial integrity and sovereignty of the FRY”

“In sub-item (a) and (b) of operative paragraph 9, the draft resolution requests in all practical terms that the FRY renounce a part of its sovereign territory”

“in operative paragraph 11, the draft resolution establishes a protectorate, provides for the creation of a separate political and economic system in the province and opens up the possibility of the secession of Kosovo and Metohija from Serbia and the FRY”
(icj1, 10 February 2010 08:05)”

You don’t seem to be following what I have been saying all along. 1244 recognizes Belgrade’s sovereignty over Kosovo – REGARDLESS of what Serbia says or what Pristina says or US says or what the Martians say. End of the day, I would like to see the entire article online, not bits and pieces like what you are providing above.

"The FRY’s rep was speaking in the UNSC meeting which was approving 1244 to convince the UNSC members not to approve the 1244. This is the context; I think I explained it before."

We are talking online evidence, not merely your assurance that such an evidence exist.



“You open with “Yes” to my statement that “I make a claim in place X it is not a requirement that the evidence be in place X” and then continue to say that if that X = online the evidence must be in X, i.e. online. Please make up your mind if the “Yes’ or the rest of your statement are correct as I don’t know which part to answer :) “

My yes was to acknowledge that you did claim that the evidence existed online. But the bottom line is that you were unable to bring that evidence online even though you saw it fit to use the online mode to present your views. Another attempt by you no doubt to deflect from the issue here – your failure to provide the online evidence to date.




“This is a matter of you making a serious misleading statement with the hope that will pass undisputed. This is a matter of fact, it’s not a matter of interpretation that we agree or disagree. So I'm forced to mention it until you apologize for trying to mislead other readers. “

I do not see the need to apologize as I do not consider myself to have made any “serious misleading statement” and have clarified whatever needed to be clarified. In your case, it is the pot calling the kettle black when you could not produce the verbatim records online.



“The US presented as evidence to the ICJ the FRY’s rep statement. So, I just showed you that. If you claim that the US presented false evidence to the ICJ, please just ***STATE**** it; that the US evidence presented to the ICJ was false and then we continue from there. You can’t have it both ways; i.e. you don’t want to state the evidence is false but on the same time you don’t want to consider it because you don’t like it.”

And we are supposed to accept what the US alluded to be necessarily true? Isn’t it possible that the US twisted the facts in their ICJ submission to their own advantage? I can’t be sure and that’s why I am asking.



“Ahhhhhhhh, less than 50%.... And you take something that is less than 50% to represent the 100%. Are you sure that if we consider the 100%, the result will not be different (just asking because between less than 50% and 100% there is an enormous difference). "

“So that’s what I asked you. Do you have evidence that if instead of less than 50% we consider the 100% (i.e. including Brazil, Russia and all the others) the result remains the same ? This is not about what I think or you think. Do you have evidence ?

As for Clinton visits, I see now that you are saying that’s not just the fact that she goes to a country, but why she goes. So, regarding her visit to China for Clinton, do you have some evidence that she was there because the entire world has been avoiding the US public debt ? “

I was giving an opinion within a passing sstatement when I mentioned “entire world”. You deliberately chose to make a mountain out of a molehill on these 2 words despite my subsequent clarification, obviously to deflect attention from your inability to produce the verbatim records on 1244 evidence online.

As for your “This is not about what I think or what you think”, you are basically in the wrong online forum. This is a political forum in which readers state what they think.

Ms Clinton went to Beijing to do a hard sell to the Chinese to buy US financial instruments. The news archives of major online newspapers would testify to this. See for example http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/02/22/world/main4818429.shtml
Of course the Chinese were not impressed.


“Here is an example; I think is the month just before the one you mentioned
[link]

But, unlike you, I’m not claiming that I can make an inference just from this month that the purchases of US public debt by foreigners show a rising trend. I need (as you need) many more months to claim that (or the opposite in your case). “

Again double standards on your part. You can use one month’s data and others can’t?
Anyway do go to http://www.ustreas.gov/tic/ticsec2.shtml Once you are there, click on the no. 2 link name “historical data”. It will open up a spreadsheet. Look at columns 16 to 18 for net foreign purchase of the various US financial instruments. You will see that while about half the months in 2008 show positive net foreign purchases, the figures for the months of 2009 were mostly negative.

“I produced the online citation of the verbatim records in evidence presented at the ICJ. As long as you don’t ***STATE*** here that such evidence presented to the ICJ was false, you can’t reach to the conclusion that my credibility is still zilch.

This is beside the fact that such statement about credibility is laughable coming from somebody who makes a statement about the “entire world” based on facts (which may be true or not) for less than 50%.”

Your online citation is no substitute from the actual evidence brought online. And yet again you chose to deflect his point by conveniently using my “entire world” passing statement as equivalent to your specific claim about what a specific person said during a specific occasion on a specific topic in a specific context, and specific verbatim records that purportedly supported your arguments. Who are you kidding?



“That’s not what FRY-Serbia said when the 1244 was adopted. What Tadic & Co say now is legally irrelevant for the interpretation of 1244 (even though may be good for political consumption). If you agree what a legal text means when it was adopted, you can't change it whenever you like. That's it; if you want to say how you interpret it, that's your chance, during the adoption, not after.

Sir, I’m not putting words into Belgrade’s mouth. Again, evidence (for which I gave you the online link) was presented to the ICJ that the FRY rep said in the UNSC the following “in operative paragraph 11, the draft resolution establishes a protectorate, provides for the creation of a separate political and economic system in the province and opens up the possibility of the secession of Kosovo and Metohija from Serbia and the FRY”. If you think such evidence is false, please state it, and if it is false I’m the first that will immediately apologize to you for citing false evidence.

Belgrade does not know the debate here, but it knows (unless its lawyers were totally incompetent) that such evidence was presented to the ICJ and it did not claim that it is false.
(icj1, 14 February 2010 17:32)”

You conveniently chose to harp no end on what the Serbian rep said back in 1999 even though what he purportedly said was NOT part of the 1244 document itself. How binding is that even if we were to take your position about its legal relevance or irrelevance in 2010? Isn’t what Tadic’s elected government think today more important for policy towards Kosovo than what was purportedly commented back in 1244 which in any case is not “operative” (your favorite word) because his words were not part of the 1244 document itself that was approved by the UNSC.

As for whether the US statement is false or not, why don’t we wait for the ICJ’s pronouncement? We are getting nowhere merely asserting whether it is false or not. I distrust the US enough to suspect lack of credibility in their submissions but will wait for the ICJ to give their verdict.

As for you, I am still waiting with bated breath for your online evidence in the other post about 1244 which is now a week old.
(lowe, 7 February 2010 19:31)

Sorry to the others for going off topic here, but Lowe, the only thing I have to provide here is evidence, online or not. If I find evidence in paper and give you all the references you need, and you reject it just because you are lazy to follow up and find it the same way I did, that's your problem my friend, not mine.

I provided you author, date, document number, document page and the place where you find it. Let me know where my reference to the document is incomplete as per legal standards.

"Foreign investors had simply not appeared, the demand for Uncle Sam's offering so often a sure fire thing had fallen flat. Unlike anytime previously, the world's treasury buyers had suddenly decided to keep their hands in their pockets, invest their oil dollars elsewhere; some in the euro treasuries, others in their own local currencies."
Overseas institutions, private investors and foreign central banks had quietly and almost totally unnoticed grown dangerously bearish on the US economy.
"It was amazing," Paul Calvetti of Barclays Capital Inc said as the Treasury Department announced that Wall Street traders, and not foreigners, had bought virtually the entire $90bn. "I don't think I have ever seen this before."
The "Entire World" excluding one's self of course.
(Dan, 8 February 2010 16:24)

Dan was this intended to show that the entire world is avoiding US public debt ? Where is the data, source of the data, etc. that Mr. Calvetti has used in making his statements. Where is the data showing that, for example, in 2008 the US public debt held by foreigners was 100 and in 2009 was 80. I’m not one of those who reach to conclusions just because Mr. Calvetti says so. I want to see where did Mr. Calvetti based his opinion to weight it then against the opinion of others who may or may not concur with Mr. Calvetti. Then I form my opinion based on the hard data and facts and these experts’ opinions. But I usually do not make conclusion without seeing the data myself.

Come on man, I assume you are a person who has your own intellect and don’t blindly believe or reject other people’s (like Mr. Calvetti) arguments because you are able to interpret facts and data on your own.

As for the rest, you gave a long lecture of psychology here, which by the way was very interesting and showed your extensive expertise in that field, but you did not say how did that contribute to illuminate the readers here about Lowe’s assertion that the entire world has been avoiding the US public debt.

By the way, who is this Mr. Calvetti ?

the only problems as we both know is that your so-called evidence are dubious and deliberatly omissive of material facts. The onus should be on you to make sure that the CONTENTS of the evidence are available and reliable. Merely quoting the sources is not enough -- how do we know the contents in them are as you claimed?
(lowe, 8 February 2010 00:22)

Again sweeping conclusions without doing the research first !!! Man, you are really incorrigible. How can you say that my evidence is “dubious and deliberatly omissive of material facts” if you have not read it (besides the parts I cited).

I quoted as per legal standards (you did not show where I failed to follow such standards). How do you know the contents in them are as I claimed? Simple… follow the reference I gave you (author (UNSC), document date (10 June 1999), document number (S/PV.4011), page (5&6), place (UN library or probably any good int’l law library should have access to UN official documents not available in internet)). You can’t expect to participate in legal arguments without making an effort to do the research, including research on paper records since a good portion of the law sources are in paper only.

However, I already did some research, for you, and I found some of my quotes mentioned in written proceedings in front of the ICJ. See the link below, end of page 78 and beginning of page 79:

http://www.icj-cij.org/docket/files/141/15640.pdf

Please ignore the US arguments from above – just take the evidence about the FRY rep’s statement. Just wanted to show you that the FRY representative did say that the resolution “opens up the possibility of the secession of Kosovo and Metohija from Serbia and the FRY” and that was not a product of my fantasy. Please don’t come back to say that the US presented false evidence to the ICJ and Serbia’s lawyers were so incompetent as not to catch it ?

Ignore the blatant falsity on the part of the US? Actually many readers like me here have already known for years that Uncle Sam is zilch as far as integrity is concerned. And if the US is caught being dishonest here, nobody, least of all me, will be at all surprised!
(lowe, 9 February 2010 00:48)

Lowe, did you read what I wrote ? I was not discussing the falsity or not of the US arguments, and if it really pleasures you we can assume that Uncle Sam is zilch as far as integrity is concerned. I just brought you the link to show you that the FRY rep said the words as per evidence (not arguments) presented to the ICJ. I’m assuming that evidence is correct otherwise that party’s credibility is totally lost in the ICJ proceedings. So are you saying that the evidence presented was false ? If so, please rush to the Jeremic’s office to tell him that before ICJ’s decision because the Serbian lawyers missed that during ICJ proceedings :)

For someone who can’t even provide the URL to his 1244 claim, you sure have the audacity to equate my passing figure of speech with your specific allegations about the Serbian representative at UN in 1999.
(lowe, 9 February 2010 00:48)

I never claimed a URL exists. I told you since the beginning where to find the document. Get out of your chair and do your research my friend, as I did mine.

Okay, so as not to be a spoil sport, let me rephrase my earlier statement about the entire world and rephrase it more accurately to suit your petulance:
‘The entire world is no longer buying the US’s financial instruments the way they did in the past. The ‘entire world’ in this case, refers of course to the major buyers whose purchase matters to the US. They do not include the likes of “Kosova” which continues to drain the coffers of the West’ by its dependence for massive amounts of aid. Entities like “Kosova” are clearly in no position to afford to buy US financial instruments in any quantity that will make a real difference to the latter’s humongous debts.’
(lowe, 9 February 2010 00:48)

How can the “entire world” refer to the “major buyers” if you don’t specify here what portion of the entire world these major buyers are in purchasing US public debt ? If the major buyers are, for example 95% of the world, you are correct. If they are, for example, 45% you are wrong. It amazes me how you can infer something for the entire world based on major buyers when you have no idea what portion of the world these major buyers are.

Also when you say, the entire world is no longer buying the US’s financial instruments the way they did in the past, what do you mean by past and what is the present. What are the periods we are comparing here ?

There, are you happy now?
Oh, and here’s some more URLs with my compliments:
(lowe, 9 February 2010 00:48)

One link says “investors could abruptly lose confidence in the U.S”. So “could” not “did”. The other one refers to the month of April only. And the other one shows that one US public debt auction had weak demand when the US does dozens of such auctions in a year. So none of these could serve as evidence of sweeping conclusion that the entire world is avoiding US public debt. They do start to provide some pieces of evidence for your point, but, for example you’d need 12 articles (one per consecutive month) like the one for April to prove your point. You’d need demand data for all US public debt auctions in a year to prove your point. Do you have any evidence that say, US public debt held by the entire world, except US, was 100 in 2008 and 80 in 2009, i.e. that decreased year over year as per most recent stats ? Just hard data that speaks for itself. You don’t have to quote hundreds of articles from google that you and I could easily find contradicting each other.

And I still continue to bet that you can’t produce, after 2 whole weeks, any credible URL evidence on the 1244 post!
(lowe, 9 February 2010 00:48)

Let’s see how convinced you are… What would you bet that I can’t produce definitive evidence that the FRY’s rep to the UN did say the following during the UNSC 4011th meeting:

“the Security Council draft resolution should contain the following positions: a firm and unequivocal reaffirmation of full respect for the territorial integrity and sovereignty of the FRY”

“In sub-item (a) and (b) of operative paragraph 9, the draft resolution requests in all practical terms that the FRY renounce a part of its sovereign territory”

“in operative paragraph 11, the draft resolution establishes a protectorate, provides for the creation of a separate political and economic system in the province and opens up the possibility of the secession of Kosovo and Metohija from Serbia and the FRY”

Good, then let us go with the line that the Yankees’ integrity is zero since you are in agreement. The bottom line still remains that unless I see actual evidence of the sources you cite, don’t expect me to accept it without question.
(lowe, 11 February 2010 00:02)

I showed you the online link to the evidence presented in ICJ proceedings and it appears to me that you did not say that such evidence is false.

But when you make a specific claim online, the onus is on you to satisfy us all with online evidence. I already suggested a blog to you but obviously you have no intention to following up with that for obvious reasons. So don’t blame me if you sounded far from convincing.
(lowe, 11 February 2010 00:02)

If I make a claim in place X it is not a requirement that the evidence be in place X. That may be true if I quote evidence which is only in my possession. But in this case I’m citing a publicly available document (publicly is not equal to “online”).

I have already clarified that the “entire world” phrase is a passing figure of speech to refer to the much reduced demand for US IOUs. It is different from your specific allegation about what a particular Serbian said about 1244 at a specific location at a specific context and at a specific time. So convenient for you to assume these 2 scenarios are the same when anyone with enough common sense can see the difference.
(lowe, 11 February 2010 00:02)

No sir, passing or not passing figure of speech, “entire world” can’t be used as synonym of “two major buyers” especially when you say (below) the latter are less than 50%. As for the Serbia’s statement I provided you the link.

As a figure of speech, the entire world must refer to the major buyers because only the major buyers have the financial clout to cause the US great concern over any drop in purchase. Do you think Uncle Sam will have sleepless nights should the likes of “Kosova” decide to cut back on any meager amounts that they might purchase? Do you think the Yankees even bother to keep online statistics for such peanuts investors?”. The 2 major buyers China and Japan alone own almost half of US debt. The percentage may seem trivial to you but worried Mrs Clinton and Geithner enough to make trips to Beijing – to no avail of course.
(lowe, 11 February 2010 00:02)

Ahhhhhhhh, less than 50%.... And you take something that is less than 50% to represent the 100%. Are you sure that if we consider the 100%, the result will not be different (just asking because between less than 50% and 100% there is an enormous difference).

As for trips to Beijing or any other place of the world where Clinton or Geither go, I don’t see how they support your point. Clinton was to Haiti recently. Following your logic, that country must be very important for the selling of the US public debt since Clinton visited it.

By the way, the time periods for comparison must surely be before and after the subprime mortgage and banking crisis that started in the US in late 2007. Only a hermit cut off from the outside world would not know this already.
(lowe, 11 February 2010 00:02)

Ok, what are the specific timeframes you want to compare ? Just say mm/yyyy vs. mm/yyyy and give us the numbers which support your point.

And you expect the low demand in April to suddenly soar to record heights in May and then to fluctuate back to the pits in June? What kind of insane logic is that? The articles that I provided give the info that demand for US debts by foreigners around the stated period of the article is in a certain direction -- decidedly downwards.
(lowe, 11 February 2010 00:02)

I can easily provide you evidence that this “insanity” is very normal and actually the “insanity” may have been the month of April :). My friend, as you used before the less than 50% to make statements about the 100%, you are doing again the same error: use one month’s data to make sweeping conclusions about trends.

You don’t seem to be following what I have been saying all along. 1244 recognizes Belgrade’s sovereignty over Kosovo – REGARDLESS of what Serbia says or what Pristina says or US says or what the Martians say. End of the day, I would like to see the entire article online, not bits and pieces like what you are providing above.
(lowe, 11 February 2010 00:02)

Great, just wanted to make sure that you don’t still continue to bet that I can’t produce, after 2 whole weeks, any credible URL evidence on the 1244 post

As for “recognizes Belgrade’s sovereignty over Kosovo” that’s your interpretation which is not shared by the interested party (i.e. FRY – Serbia). Of course you have the right to your opinion, but if all parties involved (i.e. FRY-Serbia on one side and Kosovo and its supporters on the other side) including the directly affected party (FRY-Serbia) all interpreted the resolution the same way, then your argument is about an issue not in dispute between the parties involved.

For analogy, you have two parties in a contract, Party A and Party B, which are in full agreement about the contract’s interpretation. Now you have a Party C which is not part of the contract which tells Parties A and B you should disagree and interpret the contract differently !!!!!!!!!

Obviously Parties A and B would tell C that it’s not its business :)

But you did not and remains unable to show the online evidence that matters – the one about the context in which the Serbian rep talked about 1244. Of course, bottom line still remains that 1244 recognized Belgrade’s sovereignty over Kosovo regardless of who said what.
(lowe, 14 February 2010 06:28)

The FRY’s rep was speaking in the UNSC meeting which was approving 1244 to convince the UNSC members not to approve the 1244. This is the context; I think I explained it before.


“If I make a claim in place X it is not a requirement that the evidence be in place X. That may be true if I quote evidence which is only in my possession. But in this case I’m citing a publicly available document (publicly is not equal to “online”). “

Yes, but you decided to discuss and take a position on that document through an online mode, you are obliged to provide the document online if you expect to be taken seriously. And this you failed to do so as I have already mentioned so many times earlier.
(lowe, 14 February 2010 06:28)

You open with “Yes” to my statement that “I make a claim in place X it is not a requirement that the evidence be in place X” and then continue to say that if that X = online the evidence must be in X, i.e. online. Please make up your mind if the “Yes’ or the rest of your statement are correct as I don’t know which part to answer :)

We will just have to disagree about my passing figure of speech then. I have made my position abundantly clear to you already.
(lowe, 14 February 2010 06:28)

This is a matter of you making a serious misleading statement with the hope that will pass undisputed. This is a matter of fact, it’s not a matter of interpretation that we agree or disagree. So I'm forced to mention it until you apologize for trying to mislead other readers.

The link that you provided was the one by the US rep to the ICJ. It was not the one in question about the verbatim records when 1244 was passed and the context in which the Serbian rep purported mentioned those statements.

(lowe, 14 February 2010 06:28)

The US presented as evidence to the ICJ the FRY’s rep statement. So, I just showed you that. If you claim that the US presented false evidence to the ICJ, please just ***STATE**** it; that the US evidence presented to the ICJ was false and then we continue from there. You can’t have it both ways; i.e. you don’t want to state the evidence is false but on the same time you don’t want to consider it because you don’t like it.

“Ahhhhhhhh, less than 50%.... And you take something that is less than 50% to represent the 100%. Are you sure that if we consider the 100%, the result will not be different (just asking because between less than 50% and 100% there is an enormous difference).

As for trips to Beijing or any other place of the world where Clinton or Geither go, I don’t see how they support your point. Clinton was to Haiti recently. Following your logic, that country must be very important for the selling of the US public debt since Clinton visited it. “

I don't think some of the other main buyers like Russia and Brazil are crazy about buying ever more US debts. If anything, the Russians in particular are talking about replacing the greenback as the currency of trade purchase of these debts are supporting.

And I don’t see any article online by any country enthusiastically praising the value of buying more US debts and supporting the dollar do you? Mr Clinton was asked to help out in the Haitian earthquake. Very different from what his wife went to Beijing for. You can easily verify this online. [link]
(lowe, 14 February 2010 06:28)

So that’s what I asked you. Do you have evidence that if instead of less than 50% we consider the 100% (i.e. including Brazil, Russia and all the others) the result remains the same ? This is not about what I think or you think. Do you have evidence ?

As for Clinton visits, I see now that you are saying that’s not just the fact that she goes to a country, but why she goes. So, regarding her visit to China for Clinton, do you have some evidence that she was there because the entire world has been avoiding the US public debt ?

Then I am waiting with bated breath for your wonderful but so far unproduced evidence!
(lowe, 14 February 2010 06:28)

Here is an example; I think is the month just before the one you mentioned
http://money.cnn.com/2009/03/16/news/economy/treasury_international_capital/index.htm

But, unlike you, I’m not claiming that I can make an inference just from this month that the purchases of US public debt by foreigners show a rising trend. I need (as you need) many more months to claim that (or the opposite in your case).

Well you haven’t produced those verbatim records online anyway. So your credibility is still zilch.
(lowe, 14 February 2010 06:28)

I produced the online citation of the verbatim records in evidence presented at the ICJ. As long as you don’t ***STATE*** here that such evidence presented to the ICJ was false, you can’t reach to the conclusion that my credibility is still zilch.

This is beside the fact that such statement about credibility is laughable coming from somebody who makes a statement about the “entire world” based on facts (which may be true or not) for less than 50%.

I believe my interpretation is shared by Tadic and his government. Otherwise why is Serbia still claiming Kosovo? You are putting words into Belgrade’s mouth! If Belgrade knew our debate here, I am confident that far from them telling me that it is none of my business, more likely you will be the one who will be told this by them!
(lowe, 14 February 2010 06:28)

That’s not what FRY-Serbia said when the 1244 was adopted. What Tadic & Co say now is legally irrelevant for the interpretation of 1244 (even though may be good for political consumption). If you agree what a legal text means when it was adopted, you can't change it whenever you like. That's it; if you want to say how you interpret it, that's your chance, during the adoption, not after.

Sir, I’m not putting words into Belgrade’s mouth. Again, evidence (for which I gave you the online link) was presented to the ICJ that the FRY rep said in the UNSC the following “in operative paragraph 11, the draft resolution establishes a protectorate, provides for the creation of a separate political and economic system in the province and opens up the possibility of the secession of Kosovo and Metohija from Serbia and the FRY”. If you think such evidence is false, please state it, and if it is false I’m the first that will immediately apologize to you for citing false evidence.

Belgrade does not know the debate here, but it knows (unless its lawyers were totally incompetent) that such evidence was presented to the ICJ and it did not claim that it is false.

Anyway do go to [link] Once you are there, click on the no. 2 link name “historical data”. It will open up a spreadsheet. Look at columns 16 to 18 for net foreign purchase of the various US financial instruments. You will see that while about half the months in 2008 show positive net foreign purchases, the figures for the months of 2009 were mostly negative.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:42)

Good, very good Lowe… Starting to do some research here finally :) Remember my advice, do this before making statements, not after.

That being said, columns 16 and 18 are the wrong ones :) (beside the 18 being already included in 16) because they show the purchases of foreign assets by US residents. Man, even for once when you do some serious research, you botch it :)

The explanations are two: (i) you still have room to improve on your interpretation abilities; or (ii) you just choose to twist facts, another one in the list of misleading statements you've made here and that you have to apologize for.

Do you really believe that I had not seen this table (and some others) :). I knew this table since the beginning my friend, but I asked you to prove the “entire world” thing because it was funny to see how you were going to jump around to prove the un-provable… ha, ha, ha

The correct ones are columns 3 (foreign purchases of domestic US long term securities) combined with column 22 (for the foreign purchases of domestic US short term securities). See the link below which explains the data in words and compare them to the Excel file so you can understand what each column means in the Excel file.

http://www.ustreas.gov/press/releases/tg510.htm

Columns 3 and 22 combined show that in the last 12 months for which there is data (12/2008 – 11/2009) there have been positive net foreign purchases in 10 of them, except April 2009 (which you mentioned before) and October 2009. That’s why I said previously that April which you cited could be the “insanity” because I had seen this table before :) and April 2009 was not usual. And even for the two which are negative, the negative amounts (0.9 and 8 billion) are much smaller than the positive ones which are 52.6 billion per month on average in the period above.

If we take your method of comparison, i.e. the number of months which are positive/negative in 2008 vs. 2009, there were 2 negative months in 2008 (18.7 and 9.6 billion negative) and 2 negative months in 2009 (0.9 and 8 billion negative). How does that show that the entire world is avoiding US domestic securities ?

I'll post a separate reply for the rest.

I am still not convinced about the context within which that quoted statement was purportedly made by the Serbian side. Presumably he said much more than that and US side can’t just conveniently pluck off one sentence from the whole and zero it on just that one sentence. You have to look at the entire context within which that one sentence was made. Isn’t there a possibility of dishonesty on the part of the US submission to the ICJ in this regard?
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

Sure, let’s assume what you said, that the US twisted the context, the FRY rep said much more, etc., etc….

What do you mean “Isn’t there a possibility of dishonesty on the part of the US submission to the ICJ in this regard” ? Yes, there is, about the context, how they interpret it, etc, etc, but not about what the words of the FRY rep were since US was just ***QUOTING***. Serbia never claimed that the US presented false evidence for this in the ICJ, even though Serbia may not agree now with the US ***INTERRPETATION*** of that evidence.

So do you still think after the proof that you saw online that the FRY rep did not say the following: “in operative paragraph 11, the draft resolution establishes a protectorate, provides for the creation of a separate political and economic system in the province and opens up the possibility of the secession of Kosovo and Metohija from Serbia and the FRY”

Even if I were to assume for a moment that the Serbian rep really did say this after the resolution was adopted, does this mean that this one verbal sentence is enough to override the entire written document of 1244 which recognized Belgrade’s sovereignty? Did 1244 itself clearly state that Kosovo’s secession through a UDI is a possibility?
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

No, 1244 did not say that Kosovo solution is the UDI, but on the same time did not forbid it. That’s why the FRY rep interpreted it as 1244 opening up the possibility of secession for Kosovo.

And I don’t understand the issue about the verbal sentence overriding the entire written document for 1244. There is a sentence in the preambular paragraph (not the entire document – you still did not learn about being careful when you use words such as “entire”) about the territorial integrity of the FRY. What that sentence’s actionable implications are is open to interpretation, and since the FRY is the directly affected party, of course its interpretation is authoritative.

As it is, even the UNSC itself has not accepted Kosovo’s UDI up to now
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

No, this is factually incorrect. Please cite the date and number of the UNSC meeting which did not accept the UDI ? On the other hand I can provide you evidence that the UN organs involved (UNSC and the UNSG) were both explicitly asked by Serbia to annul the UDI as illegal, but both did not do what Serbia requested.

and so the way I see it Kosovo under 1244 remains to the UN as it was back in 1999 -- a province.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

Kosovo remains regulated by the relevant provisions of 1244 which is still in force and fortunately nobody can override it.

But it is obviously not publicly available online. And when you chose to post your arguments ONLINE, of course the onus remains on you to provide that evidence online. And this you have failed to do so to date.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

I did not say publically available online. I said publically available. I’m not aware of any rule that requires online evidence for online discussions.

When you submit an evidence in court, it is open to scrutiny by everyone there, including the judge and jury, and not just the other party’s lawyer. I can just imagine the judge’s face when you tell his honor to go hunt for and photocopy the actual document himself! A contempt of court charge would probably be slapped on you on the spot. End of the day, YOU are the one who has to provide the evidence online to everyone’s satisfaction.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

No, the judge would rule on the evidence only if the other party presents arguments that the evidence is false. But obviously the other party can’t say the evidence is false without going to read it first. Of course if a party does not provide precise references, the judge can force it to either provide the precise reference or bring in the text if it’s not publicly available.

As I mentioned earlier, I do not buy your argument that one purported verbal statement (context in which it was made unclear) can override the entire 1244.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

It’s not overriding anything. The “overriding” word you use starts from the assumption that your interpretation is correct. Why ? I could say the opposite, a preambular paragraph about the FRY’s territorial integrity cannot override the actions prescribed or not forbidden by the rest of the resolution. And the FRY’s rep agreed with me and not with you. As I said above, he is the affected party so his interpretation is authoritative.

You are wrong simply because Belgrade maintains that the UDI was illegal.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

That’s not consistent with what Belgrade said when the 1244 was adopted. Also, I can wake up in the morning and say Kosovo belongs to Mars; does that mean it is correct ?! Where are the arguments ?

Again you are relying on the one sentence purportedly mentioned by the Serbian rep as being more important than the entire 1244. And conveniently not taking into account the entire speech's context in which that one sentence was purportedly said. You claimed that Belgrade “changed” its position. As far as I know, they never gave up their claims to Kosovo.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

No, I explained above. The FRY’s rep sentence is in line with 1244, so it’s not a matter of being more or less important.

You hinted that Belgrade may have changed position when you said in another post “Isn’t what Tadic’s elected government think today more important for policy towards Kosovo than what was purportedly commented back in 1244”.

But let’s assume they have not changed position. So their position is the one they stated in the UNSC meeting 4011 in 1999 that 1244 opens up the possibility of secession for Kosovo.

Anyway, speaking as a non-lawyer, I would go with the first option.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

Why not c, i.e. both ?

You used the “many” to support your argument while omitting the material information that they are people with vestetd interest. This would mislead people who read your post into thinking that these were objective people whose opinion could be considered reliable but are in fact not.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

Again, I did not state “many without vested interest”. I just said “many”.

I never said that the 2/3 ever made any statements about not recognizing Kosovo. (Do you honestly think Kosovo is that important to them?)
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

Good, we agree here. And yes, Kosovo is not important to them so who cares what they say. The ones who matter Russia, Serbia, China, US, European & Balkans countries, have a clear position on the issue.

However since they have not made statements to recognize Kosovo, it means that officially they still do not recognize Kosovo.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

So I have not made a statement about my affection towards you. According to your logic, it means that officially I hate you.

If they wanted to recognize Kosovo, set up diplomatic relations etc, then they would state this intent. To date however these 2/3 have not done so.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

It’s not a requirement to state their intent or set up diplomatic relations. 2/3 have not made a statement, and here I agree with you. If we want to analize what their position is, we can analyze other facts. But sometimes we may not get anything, so we can't say anything about their position.

So silence means they don’t love or hate you and Kosovo – they are indifferent towards you and Kosovo
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

Precisely, they are indifferent.

– they will not lend a hand to promote Kosovo’s UDI, UN membership etc.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

That depends; sometime they may support Kosovo membership in int’l organizations; sometimes not. For UN we don’t know since it’s not been put to a vote in the GA yet.

Fine with me as long as we are clear that silence is not tantamount to acquiescence.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

Silence it tantamount to silence. I said nothing more in the absence of other facts.

But Kosovo would LOVE to be considered a country by the UN – with no prospects of that in sight.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

Sure, we agree here.

I understand English enough to know that when Factor A and Factor B appears in a sentence and that sentence did not specify that one factor is more important than the other, then it must mean that they are both of equal importance. Hence will of the people (Factor A) and relevant authorities’ opinions (Factor B) are of equal importance. Again I don’t see any confusion here and I don’t I think a PhD in English to see that!
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

The sentence did not say Factor A and Factor B; but did say “will of A” and “opinion of B”. So your example is not correct.

The online evidence for the verbatim records. But I have already given up any hope of your ability to provide that.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

I provided you the online evidence where the verbatim records were quoted. For the full text, go a law library and follow the reference.

But Belgrade is a relevant authority and you can’t deny this no matter how you twist and turn. So their opinions must be considered period. Why do you specifically single out for Belgrade’s opinion not to be taken into account? Who is to assume the role of judge to decide to discard Belgrade’s views? You? The USA? The West?
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

I granted you that Belgrade is a relevant authority (quod non). I did single out for Belgrade’s opinion not to be taken into account because you singled it out for analysis and I was responding to you. But there was no requirement that ALL opinions should be taken into account. It’s perfectly legal to not take into account any of the opinions (be that Belgrade, Pristina, or whatever relevant authority you prefer) because the text said “opinion of relevant authorities” NOT “opinion of ALL relevant authorities”. You can’t rule something illegal because not ALL opinion were taken into account, when the ALL was not legally required.

Not good enough when you decide to bring your arguments online and expect netizens to go on a wild goose chase to look for documents themselves when you could have easily established your case once and for all by putting those documents into an online blog. One would surely wonder why you would not bring yourself to do this to date.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

Simple, I don’t have too. Legal arguments don’t require online evidence. You have to live with it.

Well, Column 22 shows a negative trend anyway for most of 2009 for net foreign holdings of short-term US securities.
(lowe, 16 February 2010 00:49)

Column 22 (long term securities) and 3 (short term securities) go together. Short term US securities held by foreigners were 8.3% of the total US securities held by foreigners (as of the last data available; June 30, 2008). The long term ones are decisive (more than 90% of the total).

I stand corrected about Column 3 though and therefore retract the “entire world” words in my original post. This should please you right?
(lowe, 16 February 2010 00:49)

Thank you

My initial assumption was based on the article that I came across about the Japanese and Chinese governments proposing to cut purchase of US debt instruments and various news reports that appeared to support this trend by other foreigners.
(lowe, 16 February 2010 00:49)

Even for those two countries US debt data for the last 12 months ending Nov. 2009 shows that Japan actually increased US debt holdings yoy and there was a reduction in only 2 of the last 12 months. For China too, the US debt holdings increased yoy, and decreased in only 4 of the last 12 months.

Ok Serbian friends you have no choice but to do as you are told join the NATO in 10 to 15 years and as a result EU (if still standing)

NATO is there to keep Russia in its seat and keep an eye on China.

If Serbia was not moving towards NATO there would not be Russian growling days in a row.

If they dont you will suffer, look i have seen post here where you make Serbia a Switzerland on steroids.

Serbia is a small country in debt and with nothing to offer that its neighbors dont.

Cheep labor all over, education nothing higher than Rumania, croatia ....

Tell me why is average salary in Serbia around 300 to 400 Euros at the best where are all those great things you are offering Zastava, Bambi P.S I love Plazma keks this is amazing stuff.

So please stop making it seem like you are so special you are 3rd world country no wonder you compeat with K-albanians and Montenegro to feel better.

“I think that it is important to be completely clear that the doors to NATO membership are open for Serbia,” Warlick said. "

Do you notice how the US is doing a lot of hard sell on Nato membership to Serbia these days? Warlick sounds so eager, even desperate.

Of course times have changed dramatically since 1999. The US is no longer economically supreme, not with the entire world avoiding its financial instruments like the plague. It tried to be too clever and took on more than it could chew wtih the likes of Iraq and Afghanistan. To this day, the world's supposedly top military power was made to run in circles by the relatively lightly armed Talaban. And it is getting more and more desperate to find enough foreign suckers to help shore up its beleagued Yankee soldiers in Afghanistan, which even Croatia and Albania obviously couldn't or wouldn't supply enough of.

We don't need any US support nor NATO membership. No - thanks!!

"The US is no longer economically supreme, not with the entire world avoiding its financial instruments like the plague.

(lowe, 6 February 2010 5:46)"

What ever gave you that idea? or is it just a wish? The dollar is rising because U.S. Treasury debt is the safest place to park money during times of trouble, which is what the EU and Japan are experiencing at the moment. The U.S. has its troubles, but other countries have even worse ones.

Thanx....

But no thanks...
You've got everybody you need when you go against Iran.
You don't need Serbia's help.

Good luck on that conquest.

Another boilerplate speech from an American official. EU integration is something Serbia has been working on long before Warlick settled into her posh residence in Dedinje. NATO membership is something Serbia simply cannot and should not accept. There is absolutely no need for it and the Belgrade government needs to do more than make indirect hints it doesn't want to join. What country is threatening Serbia today that isn't already in NATO?

U.S. ambassador to Serbia Mary Warlick said that the doors of NATO are open to Serbia, but the decision must be made by Serbia on its own.

NOTHING could be further from the truth.....the US is trying to manipulate EVERYTHING in Serbia, including a decision to join NATO, to give up on Kosovo, to collectively put the guilt only on the Serbs for Srebrenica, push for the Vojvodina Statues, etc. ad nauseum. All of these actions are purposely intertwined to promote the West's agenda to marginalize and break up Serbia. The US has forgotten that Serbia was one of it's most faithful allies during the previous two World Wars- yet today, there is nothing but lies, half-truths and manipulations coming from Washington towards the Serbs. As an American, I am ashamed at America's betrayal towards the Serbian people....I'm afraid that Ms. Warlick and Ms. Brush are simply in Belgrade not to bring the two peoples together, but to further shaft and divide the Serbian people. Shame on America....this is the time when the Serbs need to be clever, perhaps even deceiving the "Western deceivers". And remember, Ms Warlick- you are the guest of the Serbian people....and guests are not welcome if you're coming in on a "trojan horse".

@rick

how about serbs apologists finally trying to take a shred of responsibility for something once in your lives

there is no manipulation, conspiracy or any of the other hundred things serbs apologists try to blame for their own state of affairs.

if you are not happy with your own state of affairs... too bad, your own choices have led you here

It looks like the US needs young blood to persue their killocracy around the world!
Do like we do, participate in peace missions (which should their only goal 2day), but stay out of it!

As for you, I am still waiting with bated breath for your online evidence in the other post about 1244 which is now a week old.
(lowe, 7 February 2010 19:31)

Sorry to the others for going off topic here, but Lowe, the only thing I have to provide here is evidence, online or not. If I find evidence in paper and give you all the references you need, and you reject it just because you are lazy to follow up and find it the same way I did, that's your problem my friend, not mine.

I provided you author, date, document number, document page and the place where you find it. Let me know where my reference to the document is incomplete as per legal standards.

hahaha yup thats right USA show them that you can beat them and love them at the same time!

"What ever gave you that idea? or is it just a wish? The dollar is rising because U.S. Treasury debt is the safest place to park money during times of trouble, which is what the EU and Japan are experiencing at the moment. The U.S. has its troubles, but other countries have even worse ones.
(Amer, 6 February 2010 21:39)"

Stop living in self-denial, no one is in worse shape than the US! http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock/

"Lowe, this link proves that US has a very large debt; but you forgot the other side of the equation; it also has a very large economy. USD 1 million of debt for (say) Kosovo may very bad but USD 1 billion of US is nothing.

Anyway, regardless of that US public debt being good or bad, you said that the world is avoiding it. Where is the proof please of such avoidance ?
(icj1, 7 February 2010 17:36) "

well, if everyone in this very large economy of yours owes over $40K, you really should be more worried than complacent.

I have posted a link (one of quite a few that you can easily find on your own from the search engines). I hope B2 posts it.

As for you, I am still waiting with bated breath for your online evidence in the other post about 1244 which is now a week old.

Be my guest -- see for example the 2 biggest buyers of US instruments: [link]

(lowe, 7 February 2010 18:12)

Good, we are making some progress here, but not enough. You said the "entire world" not the biggest two buyers. Don't be selective with the aim of distorting the facts.

Please provide proof that the ***ENTIRE WORLD*** is avoiding the public debt US.

You said the "entire world" not the biggest two buyers. Don't be selective with the aim of distorting the facts. Please provide proof that the ***ENTIRE WORLD*** is avoiding the public debt US.
(icj1, 7 February 2010 20:31)

for goodness sakes, anyone with common sense can see that I was referring to the major buyers. Do you really expect to find stats for buyers from the likes of Tivalu, Timbuktu and even "Kosova"? Get real!
(lowe, 8 February 2010 00:18)

No, common sense can’t bring anyone to interpret your words to mean “major buyers” because you did use the term “world”, and even reinforced it by saying the “entire world” in case it was not clear enough that you were referring to the entire world. Did you at least research how closely the entire world can be approximated with these two major buyers in matters related to US public debt.

So, YES, you have to do the research for the entire world; otherwise don’t use the words “entire world” hoping that it can pass undisputed. I advised you in another post, do the research first, and then make sweeping conclusions. If you make the conclusions first and then try to find the facts supporting them, you are not always going to succeed (as it happened in this case).

Going to the substance now, are you convinced that even if you did the research for the entire world, your statement remains true that the entire world is avoiding US public debt?

"The US is no longer economically supreme, not with the entire world avoiding its financial instruments like the plague.

(lowe, 6 February 2010 5:46)

Lowe, since you like to ask others to presents proofs and citations, would you mind doing this sometimes yourself. Can you cite, show us or provide references where you saw the stats which indicate that the world is avoiding US financial instruments. Thank You

Stop living in self-denial, no one is in worse shape than the US! [link]/
(lowe, 7 February 2010 06:02)

Lowe, this link proves that US has a very large debt; but you forgot the other side of the equation; it also has a very large economy. USD 1 million of debt for (say) Kosovo may very bad but USD 1 billion of US is nothing.

Anyway, regardless of that US public debt being good or bad, you said that the world is avoiding it. Where is the proof please of such avoidance ?

First picture I've seen of her. She looks nice.

"Good, we are making some progress here, but not enough. You said the "entire world" not the biggest two buyers. Don't be selective with the aim of distorting the facts.

Please provide proof that the ***ENTIRE WORLD*** is avoiding the public debt US.
(icj1, 7 February 2010 20:31) "

for goodness sakes, anyone with common sense can see that I was referring to the major buyers. Do you really expect to find stats for buyers from the likes of Tivalu, Timbuktu and even "Kosova"? Get real!

"Lowe, since you like to ask others to presents proofs and citations, would you mind doing this sometimes yourself. Can you cite, show us or provide references where you saw the stats which indicate that the world is avoiding US financial instruments. Thank You
(icj1, 7 February 2010 05:54) "

Be my guest -- see for example the 2 biggest buyers of US instruments: http://www.dialogue-yemen.org/en/modules.php?name=News&file=print&sid=13011

And ask yourself what was Geithner and Mdm Clinton doing in Beijing quite recently after Obama took office? Sightseeing obviously wasn't their top priority.

And oh, by the way, everyone is still waiting impatiently for your URL links on the 1244 procedures in the other post. What's taking you so long?

I am still not convinced about the context within which that quoted statement was purportedly made by the Serbian side. Presumably he said much more than that and US side can’t just conveniently pluck off one sentence from the whole and zero it on just that one sentence. You have to look at the entire context within which that one sentence was made. Isn’t there a possibility of dishonesty on the part of the US submission to the ICJ in this regard?
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

Sure, let’s assume what you said, that the US twisted the context, the FRY rep said much more, etc., etc….

What do you mean “Isn’t there a possibility of dishonesty on the part of the US submission to the ICJ in this regard” ? Yes, there is, about the context, how they interpret it, etc, etc, but not about what the words of the FRY rep were since US was just ***QUOTING***. Serbia never claimed that the US presented false evidence for this in the ICJ, even though Serbia may not agree now with the US ***INTERRPETATION*** of that evidence.

So do you still think after the proof that you saw online that the FRY rep did not say the following: “in operative paragraph 11, the draft resolution establishes a protectorate, provides for the creation of a separate political and economic system in the province and opens up the possibility of the secession of Kosovo and Metohija from Serbia and the FRY”

Even if I were to assume for a moment that the Serbian rep really did say this after the resolution was adopted, does this mean that this one verbal sentence is enough to override the entire written document of 1244 which recognized Belgrade’s sovereignty? Did 1244 itself clearly state that Kosovo’s secession through a UDI is a possibility?
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

No, 1244 did not say that Kosovo solution is the UDI, but on the same time did not forbid it. That’s why the FRY rep interpreted it as 1244 opening up the possibility of secession for Kosovo.

And I don’t understand the issue about the verbal sentence overriding the entire written document for 1244. There is a sentence in the preambular paragraph (not the entire document – you still did not learn about being careful when you use words such as “entire”) about the territorial integrity of the FRY. What that sentence’s actionable implications are is open to interpretation, and since the FRY is the directly affected party, of course its interpretation is authoritative.

As it is, even the UNSC itself has not accepted Kosovo’s UDI up to now
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

No, this is factually incorrect. Please cite the date and number of the UNSC meeting which did not accept the UDI ? On the other hand I can provide you evidence that the UN organs involved (UNSC and the UNSG) were both explicitly asked by Serbia to annul the UDI as illegal, but both did not do what Serbia requested.

and so the way I see it Kosovo under 1244 remains to the UN as it was back in 1999 -- a province.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

Kosovo remains regulated by the relevant provisions of 1244 which is still in force and fortunately nobody can override it.

But it is obviously not publicly available online. And when you chose to post your arguments ONLINE, of course the onus remains on you to provide that evidence online. And this you have failed to do so to date.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

I did not say publically available online. I said publically available. I’m not aware of any rule that requires online evidence for online discussions.

When you submit an evidence in court, it is open to scrutiny by everyone there, including the judge and jury, and not just the other party’s lawyer. I can just imagine the judge’s face when you tell his honor to go hunt for and photocopy the actual document himself! A contempt of court charge would probably be slapped on you on the spot. End of the day, YOU are the one who has to provide the evidence online to everyone’s satisfaction.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

No, the judge would rule on the evidence only if the other party presents arguments that the evidence is false. But obviously the other party can’t say the evidence is false without going to read it first. Of course if a party does not provide precise references, the judge can force it to either provide the precise reference or bring in the text if it’s not publicly available.

As I mentioned earlier, I do not buy your argument that one purported verbal statement (context in which it was made unclear) can override the entire 1244.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

It’s not overriding anything. The “overriding” word you use starts from the assumption that your interpretation is correct. Why ? I could say the opposite, a preambular paragraph about the FRY’s territorial integrity cannot override the actions prescribed or not forbidden by the rest of the resolution. And the FRY’s rep agreed with me and not with you. As I said above, he is the affected party so his interpretation is authoritative.

You are wrong simply because Belgrade maintains that the UDI was illegal.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

That’s not consistent with what Belgrade said when the 1244 was adopted. Also, I can wake up in the morning and say Kosovo belongs to Mars; does that mean it is correct ?! Where are the arguments ?

Again you are relying on the one sentence purportedly mentioned by the Serbian rep as being more important than the entire 1244. And conveniently not taking into account the entire speech's context in which that one sentence was purportedly said. You claimed that Belgrade “changed” its position. As far as I know, they never gave up their claims to Kosovo.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

No, I explained above. The FRY’s rep sentence is in line with 1244, so it’s not a matter of being more or less important.

You hinted that Belgrade may have changed position when you said in another post “Isn’t what Tadic’s elected government think today more important for policy towards Kosovo than what was purportedly commented back in 1244”.

But let’s assume they have not changed position. So their position is the one they stated in the UNSC meeting 4011 in 1999 that 1244 opens up the possibility of secession for Kosovo.

Anyway, speaking as a non-lawyer, I would go with the first option.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

Why not c, i.e. both ?

You used the “many” to support your argument while omitting the material information that they are people with vestetd interest. This would mislead people who read your post into thinking that these were objective people whose opinion could be considered reliable but are in fact not.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

Again, I did not state “many without vested interest”. I just said “many”.

I never said that the 2/3 ever made any statements about not recognizing Kosovo. (Do you honestly think Kosovo is that important to them?)
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

Good, we agree here. And yes, Kosovo is not important to them so who cares what they say. The ones who matter Russia, Serbia, China, US, European & Balkans countries, have a clear position on the issue.

However since they have not made statements to recognize Kosovo, it means that officially they still do not recognize Kosovo.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

So I have not made a statement about my affection towards you. According to your logic, it means that officially I hate you.

If they wanted to recognize Kosovo, set up diplomatic relations etc, then they would state this intent. To date however these 2/3 have not done so.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

It’s not a requirement to state their intent or set up diplomatic relations. 2/3 have not made a statement, and here I agree with you. If we want to analize what their position is, we can analyze other facts. But sometimes we may not get anything, so we can't say anything about their position.

So silence means they don’t love or hate you and Kosovo – they are indifferent towards you and Kosovo
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

Precisely, they are indifferent.

– they will not lend a hand to promote Kosovo’s UDI, UN membership etc.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

That depends; sometime they may support Kosovo membership in int’l organizations; sometimes not. For UN we don’t know since it’s not been put to a vote in the GA yet.

Fine with me as long as we are clear that silence is not tantamount to acquiescence.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

Silence it tantamount to silence. I said nothing more in the absence of other facts.

But Kosovo would LOVE to be considered a country by the UN – with no prospects of that in sight.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

Sure, we agree here.

I understand English enough to know that when Factor A and Factor B appears in a sentence and that sentence did not specify that one factor is more important than the other, then it must mean that they are both of equal importance. Hence will of the people (Factor A) and relevant authorities’ opinions (Factor B) are of equal importance. Again I don’t see any confusion here and I don’t I think a PhD in English to see that!
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

The sentence did not say Factor A and Factor B; but did say “will of A” and “opinion of B”. So your example is not correct.

The online evidence for the verbatim records. But I have already given up any hope of your ability to provide that.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

I provided you the online evidence where the verbatim records were quoted. For the full text, go a law library and follow the reference.

But Belgrade is a relevant authority and you can’t deny this no matter how you twist and turn. So their opinions must be considered period. Why do you specifically single out for Belgrade’s opinion not to be taken into account? Who is to assume the role of judge to decide to discard Belgrade’s views? You? The USA? The West?
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

I granted you that Belgrade is a relevant authority (quod non). I did single out for Belgrade’s opinion not to be taken into account because you singled it out for analysis and I was responding to you. But there was no requirement that ALL opinions should be taken into account. It’s perfectly legal to not take into account any of the opinions (be that Belgrade, Pristina, or whatever relevant authority you prefer) because the text said “opinion of relevant authorities” NOT “opinion of ALL relevant authorities”. You can’t rule something illegal because not ALL opinion were taken into account, when the ALL was not legally required.

Not good enough when you decide to bring your arguments online and expect netizens to go on a wild goose chase to look for documents themselves when you could have easily established your case once and for all by putting those documents into an online blog. One would surely wonder why you would not bring yourself to do this to date.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:56)

Simple, I don’t have too. Legal arguments don’t require online evidence. You have to live with it.

"Foreign investors had simply not appeared, the demand for Uncle Sam's offering so often a sure fire thing had fallen flat. Unlike anytime previously, the world's treasury buyers had suddenly decided to keep their hands in their pockets, invest their oil dollars elsewhere; some in the euro treasuries, others in their own local currencies."
Overseas institutions, private investors and foreign central banks had quietly and almost totally unnoticed grown dangerously bearish on the US economy.
"It was amazing," Paul Calvetti of Barclays Capital Inc said as the Treasury Department announced that Wall Street traders, and not foreigners, had bought virtually the entire $90bn. "I don't think I have ever seen this before."
The "Entire World" excluding one's self of course.
(Dan, 8 February 2010 16:24)

Dan was this intended to show that the entire world is avoiding US public debt ? Where is the data, source of the data, etc. that Mr. Calvetti has used in making his statements. Where is the data showing that, for example, in 2008 the US public debt held by foreigners was 100 and in 2009 was 80. I’m not one of those who reach to conclusions just because Mr. Calvetti says so. I want to see where did Mr. Calvetti based his opinion to weight it then against the opinion of others who may or may not concur with Mr. Calvetti. Then I form my opinion based on the hard data and facts and these experts’ opinions. But I usually do not make conclusion without seeing the data myself.

Come on man, I assume you are a person who has your own intellect and don’t blindly believe or reject other people’s (like Mr. Calvetti) arguments because you are able to interpret facts and data on your own.

As for the rest, you gave a long lecture of psychology here, which by the way was very interesting and showed your extensive expertise in that field, but you did not say how did that contribute to illuminate the readers here about Lowe’s assertion that the entire world has been avoiding the US public debt.

By the way, who is this Mr. Calvetti ?

the only problems as we both know is that your so-called evidence are dubious and deliberatly omissive of material facts. The onus should be on you to make sure that the CONTENTS of the evidence are available and reliable. Merely quoting the sources is not enough -- how do we know the contents in them are as you claimed?
(lowe, 8 February 2010 00:22)

Again sweeping conclusions without doing the research first !!! Man, you are really incorrigible. How can you say that my evidence is “dubious and deliberatly omissive of material facts” if you have not read it (besides the parts I cited).

I quoted as per legal standards (you did not show where I failed to follow such standards). How do you know the contents in them are as I claimed? Simple… follow the reference I gave you (author (UNSC), document date (10 June 1999), document number (S/PV.4011), page (5&6), place (UN library or probably any good int’l law library should have access to UN official documents not available in internet)). You can’t expect to participate in legal arguments without making an effort to do the research, including research on paper records since a good portion of the law sources are in paper only.

However, I already did some research, for you, and I found some of my quotes mentioned in written proceedings in front of the ICJ. See the link below, end of page 78 and beginning of page 79:

http://www.icj-cij.org/docket/files/141/15640.pdf

Please ignore the US arguments from above – just take the evidence about the FRY rep’s statement. Just wanted to show you that the FRY representative did say that the resolution “opens up the possibility of the secession of Kosovo and Metohija from Serbia and the FRY” and that was not a product of my fantasy. Please don’t come back to say that the US presented false evidence to the ICJ and Serbia’s lawyers were so incompetent as not to catch it ?

Ignore the blatant falsity on the part of the US? Actually many readers like me here have already known for years that Uncle Sam is zilch as far as integrity is concerned. And if the US is caught being dishonest here, nobody, least of all me, will be at all surprised!
(lowe, 9 February 2010 00:48)

Lowe, did you read what I wrote ? I was not discussing the falsity or not of the US arguments, and if it really pleasures you we can assume that Uncle Sam is zilch as far as integrity is concerned. I just brought you the link to show you that the FRY rep said the words as per evidence (not arguments) presented to the ICJ. I’m assuming that evidence is correct otherwise that party’s credibility is totally lost in the ICJ proceedings. So are you saying that the evidence presented was false ? If so, please rush to the Jeremic’s office to tell him that before ICJ’s decision because the Serbian lawyers missed that during ICJ proceedings :)

For someone who can’t even provide the URL to his 1244 claim, you sure have the audacity to equate my passing figure of speech with your specific allegations about the Serbian representative at UN in 1999.
(lowe, 9 February 2010 00:48)

I never claimed a URL exists. I told you since the beginning where to find the document. Get out of your chair and do your research my friend, as I did mine.

Okay, so as not to be a spoil sport, let me rephrase my earlier statement about the entire world and rephrase it more accurately to suit your petulance:
‘The entire world is no longer buying the US’s financial instruments the way they did in the past. The ‘entire world’ in this case, refers of course to the major buyers whose purchase matters to the US. They do not include the likes of “Kosova” which continues to drain the coffers of the West’ by its dependence for massive amounts of aid. Entities like “Kosova” are clearly in no position to afford to buy US financial instruments in any quantity that will make a real difference to the latter’s humongous debts.’
(lowe, 9 February 2010 00:48)

How can the “entire world” refer to the “major buyers” if you don’t specify here what portion of the entire world these major buyers are in purchasing US public debt ? If the major buyers are, for example 95% of the world, you are correct. If they are, for example, 45% you are wrong. It amazes me how you can infer something for the entire world based on major buyers when you have no idea what portion of the world these major buyers are.

Also when you say, the entire world is no longer buying the US’s financial instruments the way they did in the past, what do you mean by past and what is the present. What are the periods we are comparing here ?

There, are you happy now?
Oh, and here’s some more URLs with my compliments:
(lowe, 9 February 2010 00:48)

One link says “investors could abruptly lose confidence in the U.S”. So “could” not “did”. The other one refers to the month of April only. And the other one shows that one US public debt auction had weak demand when the US does dozens of such auctions in a year. So none of these could serve as evidence of sweeping conclusion that the entire world is avoiding US public debt. They do start to provide some pieces of evidence for your point, but, for example you’d need 12 articles (one per consecutive month) like the one for April to prove your point. You’d need demand data for all US public debt auctions in a year to prove your point. Do you have any evidence that say, US public debt held by the entire world, except US, was 100 in 2008 and 80 in 2009, i.e. that decreased year over year as per most recent stats ? Just hard data that speaks for itself. You don’t have to quote hundreds of articles from google that you and I could easily find contradicting each other.

And I still continue to bet that you can’t produce, after 2 whole weeks, any credible URL evidence on the 1244 post!
(lowe, 9 February 2010 00:48)

Let’s see how convinced you are… What would you bet that I can’t produce definitive evidence that the FRY’s rep to the UN did say the following during the UNSC 4011th meeting:

“the Security Council draft resolution should contain the following positions: a firm and unequivocal reaffirmation of full respect for the territorial integrity and sovereignty of the FRY”

“In sub-item (a) and (b) of operative paragraph 9, the draft resolution requests in all practical terms that the FRY renounce a part of its sovereign territory”

“in operative paragraph 11, the draft resolution establishes a protectorate, provides for the creation of a separate political and economic system in the province and opens up the possibility of the secession of Kosovo and Metohija from Serbia and the FRY”

Good, then let us go with the line that the Yankees’ integrity is zero since you are in agreement. The bottom line still remains that unless I see actual evidence of the sources you cite, don’t expect me to accept it without question.
(lowe, 11 February 2010 00:02)

I showed you the online link to the evidence presented in ICJ proceedings and it appears to me that you did not say that such evidence is false.

But when you make a specific claim online, the onus is on you to satisfy us all with online evidence. I already suggested a blog to you but obviously you have no intention to following up with that for obvious reasons. So don’t blame me if you sounded far from convincing.
(lowe, 11 February 2010 00:02)

If I make a claim in place X it is not a requirement that the evidence be in place X. That may be true if I quote evidence which is only in my possession. But in this case I’m citing a publicly available document (publicly is not equal to “online”).

I have already clarified that the “entire world” phrase is a passing figure of speech to refer to the much reduced demand for US IOUs. It is different from your specific allegation about what a particular Serbian said about 1244 at a specific location at a specific context and at a specific time. So convenient for you to assume these 2 scenarios are the same when anyone with enough common sense can see the difference.
(lowe, 11 February 2010 00:02)

No sir, passing or not passing figure of speech, “entire world” can’t be used as synonym of “two major buyers” especially when you say (below) the latter are less than 50%. As for the Serbia’s statement I provided you the link.

As a figure of speech, the entire world must refer to the major buyers because only the major buyers have the financial clout to cause the US great concern over any drop in purchase. Do you think Uncle Sam will have sleepless nights should the likes of “Kosova” decide to cut back on any meager amounts that they might purchase? Do you think the Yankees even bother to keep online statistics for such peanuts investors?”. The 2 major buyers China and Japan alone own almost half of US debt. The percentage may seem trivial to you but worried Mrs Clinton and Geithner enough to make trips to Beijing – to no avail of course.
(lowe, 11 February 2010 00:02)

Ahhhhhhhh, less than 50%.... And you take something that is less than 50% to represent the 100%. Are you sure that if we consider the 100%, the result will not be different (just asking because between less than 50% and 100% there is an enormous difference).

As for trips to Beijing or any other place of the world where Clinton or Geither go, I don’t see how they support your point. Clinton was to Haiti recently. Following your logic, that country must be very important for the selling of the US public debt since Clinton visited it.

By the way, the time periods for comparison must surely be before and after the subprime mortgage and banking crisis that started in the US in late 2007. Only a hermit cut off from the outside world would not know this already.
(lowe, 11 February 2010 00:02)

Ok, what are the specific timeframes you want to compare ? Just say mm/yyyy vs. mm/yyyy and give us the numbers which support your point.

And you expect the low demand in April to suddenly soar to record heights in May and then to fluctuate back to the pits in June? What kind of insane logic is that? The articles that I provided give the info that demand for US debts by foreigners around the stated period of the article is in a certain direction -- decidedly downwards.
(lowe, 11 February 2010 00:02)

I can easily provide you evidence that this “insanity” is very normal and actually the “insanity” may have been the month of April :). My friend, as you used before the less than 50% to make statements about the 100%, you are doing again the same error: use one month’s data to make sweeping conclusions about trends.

You don’t seem to be following what I have been saying all along. 1244 recognizes Belgrade’s sovereignty over Kosovo – REGARDLESS of what Serbia says or what Pristina says or US says or what the Martians say. End of the day, I would like to see the entire article online, not bits and pieces like what you are providing above.
(lowe, 11 February 2010 00:02)

Great, just wanted to make sure that you don’t still continue to bet that I can’t produce, after 2 whole weeks, any credible URL evidence on the 1244 post

As for “recognizes Belgrade’s sovereignty over Kosovo” that’s your interpretation which is not shared by the interested party (i.e. FRY – Serbia). Of course you have the right to your opinion, but if all parties involved (i.e. FRY-Serbia on one side and Kosovo and its supporters on the other side) including the directly affected party (FRY-Serbia) all interpreted the resolution the same way, then your argument is about an issue not in dispute between the parties involved.

For analogy, you have two parties in a contract, Party A and Party B, which are in full agreement about the contract’s interpretation. Now you have a Party C which is not part of the contract which tells Parties A and B you should disagree and interpret the contract differently !!!!!!!!!

Obviously Parties A and B would tell C that it’s not its business :)

But you did not and remains unable to show the online evidence that matters – the one about the context in which the Serbian rep talked about 1244. Of course, bottom line still remains that 1244 recognized Belgrade’s sovereignty over Kosovo regardless of who said what.
(lowe, 14 February 2010 06:28)

The FRY’s rep was speaking in the UNSC meeting which was approving 1244 to convince the UNSC members not to approve the 1244. This is the context; I think I explained it before.


“If I make a claim in place X it is not a requirement that the evidence be in place X. That may be true if I quote evidence which is only in my possession. But in this case I’m citing a publicly available document (publicly is not equal to “online”). “

Yes, but you decided to discuss and take a position on that document through an online mode, you are obliged to provide the document online if you expect to be taken seriously. And this you failed to do so as I have already mentioned so many times earlier.
(lowe, 14 February 2010 06:28)

You open with “Yes” to my statement that “I make a claim in place X it is not a requirement that the evidence be in place X” and then continue to say that if that X = online the evidence must be in X, i.e. online. Please make up your mind if the “Yes’ or the rest of your statement are correct as I don’t know which part to answer :)

We will just have to disagree about my passing figure of speech then. I have made my position abundantly clear to you already.
(lowe, 14 February 2010 06:28)

This is a matter of you making a serious misleading statement with the hope that will pass undisputed. This is a matter of fact, it’s not a matter of interpretation that we agree or disagree. So I'm forced to mention it until you apologize for trying to mislead other readers.

The link that you provided was the one by the US rep to the ICJ. It was not the one in question about the verbatim records when 1244 was passed and the context in which the Serbian rep purported mentioned those statements.

(lowe, 14 February 2010 06:28)

The US presented as evidence to the ICJ the FRY’s rep statement. So, I just showed you that. If you claim that the US presented false evidence to the ICJ, please just ***STATE**** it; that the US evidence presented to the ICJ was false and then we continue from there. You can’t have it both ways; i.e. you don’t want to state the evidence is false but on the same time you don’t want to consider it because you don’t like it.

“Ahhhhhhhh, less than 50%.... And you take something that is less than 50% to represent the 100%. Are you sure that if we consider the 100%, the result will not be different (just asking because between less than 50% and 100% there is an enormous difference).

As for trips to Beijing or any other place of the world where Clinton or Geither go, I don’t see how they support your point. Clinton was to Haiti recently. Following your logic, that country must be very important for the selling of the US public debt since Clinton visited it. “

I don't think some of the other main buyers like Russia and Brazil are crazy about buying ever more US debts. If anything, the Russians in particular are talking about replacing the greenback as the currency of trade purchase of these debts are supporting.

And I don’t see any article online by any country enthusiastically praising the value of buying more US debts and supporting the dollar do you? Mr Clinton was asked to help out in the Haitian earthquake. Very different from what his wife went to Beijing for. You can easily verify this online. [link]
(lowe, 14 February 2010 06:28)

So that’s what I asked you. Do you have evidence that if instead of less than 50% we consider the 100% (i.e. including Brazil, Russia and all the others) the result remains the same ? This is not about what I think or you think. Do you have evidence ?

As for Clinton visits, I see now that you are saying that’s not just the fact that she goes to a country, but why she goes. So, regarding her visit to China for Clinton, do you have some evidence that she was there because the entire world has been avoiding the US public debt ?

Then I am waiting with bated breath for your wonderful but so far unproduced evidence!
(lowe, 14 February 2010 06:28)

Here is an example; I think is the month just before the one you mentioned
http://money.cnn.com/2009/03/16/news/economy/treasury_international_capital/index.htm

But, unlike you, I’m not claiming that I can make an inference just from this month that the purchases of US public debt by foreigners show a rising trend. I need (as you need) many more months to claim that (or the opposite in your case).

Well you haven’t produced those verbatim records online anyway. So your credibility is still zilch.
(lowe, 14 February 2010 06:28)

I produced the online citation of the verbatim records in evidence presented at the ICJ. As long as you don’t ***STATE*** here that such evidence presented to the ICJ was false, you can’t reach to the conclusion that my credibility is still zilch.

This is beside the fact that such statement about credibility is laughable coming from somebody who makes a statement about the “entire world” based on facts (which may be true or not) for less than 50%.

I believe my interpretation is shared by Tadic and his government. Otherwise why is Serbia still claiming Kosovo? You are putting words into Belgrade’s mouth! If Belgrade knew our debate here, I am confident that far from them telling me that it is none of my business, more likely you will be the one who will be told this by them!
(lowe, 14 February 2010 06:28)

That’s not what FRY-Serbia said when the 1244 was adopted. What Tadic & Co say now is legally irrelevant for the interpretation of 1244 (even though may be good for political consumption). If you agree what a legal text means when it was adopted, you can't change it whenever you like. That's it; if you want to say how you interpret it, that's your chance, during the adoption, not after.

Sir, I’m not putting words into Belgrade’s mouth. Again, evidence (for which I gave you the online link) was presented to the ICJ that the FRY rep said in the UNSC the following “in operative paragraph 11, the draft resolution establishes a protectorate, provides for the creation of a separate political and economic system in the province and opens up the possibility of the secession of Kosovo and Metohija from Serbia and the FRY”. If you think such evidence is false, please state it, and if it is false I’m the first that will immediately apologize to you for citing false evidence.

Belgrade does not know the debate here, but it knows (unless its lawyers were totally incompetent) that such evidence was presented to the ICJ and it did not claim that it is false.

"Sorry to the others for going off topic here, but Lowe, the only thing I have to provide here is evidence, online or not. If I find evidence in paper and give you all the references you need, and you reject it just because you are lazy to follow up and find it the same way I did, that's your problem my friend, not mine.

I provided you author, date, document number, document page and the place where you find it. Let me know where my reference to the document is incomplete as per legal standards.
(icj1, 7 February 2010 20:39) "

the only problems as we both know is that your so-called evidence are dubious and deliberatly omissive of material facts. The onus should be on you to make sure that the CONTENTS of the evidence are available and reliable. Merely quoting the sources is not enough -- how do we know the contents in them are as you claimed?

Going to the substance now, are you convinced that even if you did the research for the entire world, your statement remains true that the entire world is avoiding US public debt?

"Foreign investors had simply not appeared, the demand for Uncle Sam's offering so often a sure fire thing had fallen flat. Unlike anytime previously, the world's treasury buyers had suddenly decided to keep their hands in their pockets, invest their oil dollars elsewhere; some in the euro treasuries, others in their own local currencies."
Overseas institutions, private investors and foreign central banks had quietly and almost totally unnoticed grown dangerously bearish on the US economy.
"It was amazing," Paul Calvetti of Barclays Capital Inc said as the Treasury Department announced that Wall Street traders, and not foreigners, had bought virtually the entire $90bn. "I don't think I have ever seen this before."

The "Entire World" excluding one's self of course.

On another note did you know,
The autism spectrum, also called autism spectrum disorders (ASD) or autism spectrum conditions (ASC), autism, is a spectrum of psychological conditions characterized by widespread abnormalities of social interactions and communication, as well as severely restricted interests and highly repetitive behavior. Individuals with AS may collect volumes of detailed information on a relatively narrow topic such as weather data or star names, without necessarily having genuine understanding of the broader topic.

"Please ignore the US arguments from above – just take the evidence about the FRY rep’s statement. Just wanted to show you that the FRY representative did say that the resolution “opens up the possibility of the secession of Kosovo and Metohija from Serbia and the FRY” and that was not a product of my fantasy. Please don’t come back to say that the US presented false evidence to the ICJ and Serbia’s lawyers were so incompetent as not to catch it ?
(icj1, 8 February 2010 21:17) "

Ignore the blatant falsity on the part of the US? Actually many readers like me here have already known for years that Uncle Sam is zilch as far as integrity is concerned. And if the US is caught being dishonest here, nobody, least of all me, will be at all surprised!


“No, common sense can’t bring anyone to interpret your words to mean “major buyers” because you did use the term “world”, and even reinforced it by saying the “entire world” in case it was not clear enough that you were referring to the entire world. Did you at least research how closely the entire world can be approximated with these two major buyers in matters related to US public debt.

So, YES, you have to do the research for the entire world; otherwise don’t use the words “entire world” hoping that it can pass undisputed. I advised you in another post, do the research first, and then make sweeping conclusions. If you make the conclusions first and then try to find the facts supporting them, you are not always going to succeed (as it happened in this case).

Going to the substance now, are you convinced that even if you did the research for the entire world, your statement remains true that the entire world is avoiding US public debt?
(icj1, 8 February 2010 03:24)”

For someone who can’t even provide the URL to his 1244 claim, you sure have the audacity to equate my passing figure of speech with your specific allegations about the Serbian representative at UN in 1999.

Okay, so as not to be a spoil sport, let me rephrase my earlier statement about the entire world and rephrase it more accurately to suit your petulance:
‘The entire world is no longer buying the US’s financial instruments the way they did in the past. The ‘entire world’ in this case, refers of course to the major buyers whose purchase matters to the US. They do not include the likes of “Kosova” which continues to drain the coffers of the West’ by its dependence for massive amounts of aid. Entities like “Kosova” are clearly in no position to afford to buy US financial instruments in any quantity that will make a real difference to the latter’s humongous debts.’

There, are you happy now?

Oh, and here’s some more URLs with my compliments: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aRADYHh._dKQ
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSN2926552620090729
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/10_07/b4166016257740.htm

And I still continue to bet that you can’t produce, after 2 whole weeks, any credible URL evidence on the 1244 post!

“Lowe, did you read what I wrote ? I was not discussing the falsity or not of the US arguments, and if it really pleasures you we can assume that Uncle Sam is zilch as far as integrity is concerned. I just brought you the link to show you that the FRY rep said the words as per evidence (not arguments) presented to the ICJ. I’m assuming that evidence is correct otherwise that party’s credibility is totally lost in the ICJ proceedings. So are you saying that the evidence presented was false ? If so, please rush to the Jeremic’s office to tell him that before ICJ’s decision because the Serbian lawyers missed that during ICJ proceedings :) “

Good, then let us go with the line that the Yankees’ integrity is zero since you are in agreement. The bottom line still remains that unless I see actual evidence of the sources you cite, don’t expect me to accept it without question.



“I never claimed a URL exists. I told you since the beginning where to find the document. Get out of your chair and do your research my friend, as I did mine.”

But when you make a specific claim online, the onus is on you to satisfy us all with online evidence. I already suggested a blog to you but obviously you have no intention to following up with that for obvious reasons. So don’t blame me if you sounded far from convincing.



“How can the “entire world” refer to the “major buyers” if you don’t specify here what portion of the entire world these major buyers are in purchasing US public debt ? If the major buyers are, for example 95% of the world, you are correct. If they are, for example, 45% you are wrong. It amazes me how you can infer something for the entire world based on major buyers when you have no idea what portion of the world these major buyers are.

Also when you say, the entire world is no longer buying the US’s financial instruments the way they did in the past, what do you mean by past and what is the present. What are the periods we are comparing here?”

I have already clarified that the “entire world” phrase is a passing figure of speech to refer to the much reduced demand for US IOUs. It is different from your specific allegation about what a particular Serbian said about 1244 at a specific location at a specific context and at a specific time. So convenient for you to assume these 2 scenarios are the same when anyone with enough common sense can see the difference.
As a figure of speech, the entire world must refer to the major buyers because only the major buyers have the financial clout to cause the US great concern over any drop in purchase. Do you think Uncle Sam will have sleepless nights should the likes of “Kosova” decide to cut back on any meager amounts that they might purchase? Do you think the Yankees even bother to keep online statistics for such peanuts investors?”
The 2 major buyers China and Japan alone own almost half of US debt. The percentage may seem trivial to you but worried Mrs Clinton and Geithner enough to make trips to Beijing – to no avail of course. And I would think they are better placed to judge how important are the Chinese and Japanese than you professed to be. You don’t see them travel to the likes of “Kosova” to do a hard sell of their IOUs do you? This fact about Chinese and Japanese holdings of US debts together with the other online articles that I have also already provided you online about world reduction in purchase of US IOUs should support my point clear enough. On the other hand, to date you have not been able to provide online the article that was the whole crux of your claim about 1244.

By the way, the time periods for comparison must surely be before and after the subprime mortgage and banking crisis that started in the US in late 2007. Only a hermit cut off from the outside world would not know this already.




“One link says “investors could abruptly lose confidence in the U.S”. So “could” not “did”. The other one refers to the month of April only. And the other one shows that one US public debt auction had weak demand when the US does dozens of such auctions in a year. So none of these could serve as evidence of sweeping conclusion that the entire world is avoiding US public debt. They do start to provide some pieces of evidence for your point, but, for example you’d need 12 articles (one per consecutive month) like the one for April to prove your point. You’d need demand data for all US public debt auctions in a year to prove your point. Do you have any evidence that say, US public debt held by the entire world, except US, was 100 in 2008 and 80 in 2009, i.e. that decreased year over year as per most recent stats ? Just hard data that speaks for itself. You don’t have to quote hundreds of articles from google that you and I could easily find contradicting each other. “

And you expect the low demand in April to suddenly soar to record heights in May and then to fluctuate back to the pits in June? What kind of insane logic is that? The articles that I provided give the info that demand for US debts by foreigners around the stated period of the article is in a certain direction -- decidedly downwards.



“Let’s see how convinced you are… What would you bet that I can’t produce definitive evidence that the FRY’s rep to the UN did say the following during the UNSC 4011th meeting:

“the Security Council draft resolution should contain the following positions: a firm and unequivocal reaffirmation of full respect for the territorial integrity and sovereignty of the FRY”

“In sub-item (a) and (b) of operative paragraph 9, the draft resolution requests in all practical terms that the FRY renounce a part of its sovereign territory”

“in operative paragraph 11, the draft resolution establishes a protectorate, provides for the creation of a separate political and economic system in the province and opens up the possibility of the secession of Kosovo and Metohija from Serbia and the FRY”
(icj1, 10 February 2010 08:05)”

You don’t seem to be following what I have been saying all along. 1244 recognizes Belgrade’s sovereignty over Kosovo – REGARDLESS of what Serbia says or what Pristina says or US says or what the Martians say. End of the day, I would like to see the entire article online, not bits and pieces like what you are providing above.

“I showed you the online link to the evidence presented in ICJ proceedings and it appears to me that you did not say that such evidence is false. “

But you did not and remains unable to show the online evidence that matters – the one about the context in which the Serbian rep talked about 1244. Of course, bottom line still remains that 1244 recognized Belgrade’s sovereignty over Kosovo regardless of who said what.



“If I make a claim in place X it is not a requirement that the evidence be in place X. That may be true if I quote evidence which is only in my possession. But in this case I’m citing a publicly available document (publicly is not equal to “online”). “

Yes, but you decided to discuss and take a position on that document through an online mode, you are obliged to provide the document online if you expect to be taken seriously. And this you failed to do so as I have already mentioned so many times earlier.



“No sir, passing or not passing figure of speech, “entire world” can’t be used as synonym of “two major buyers” especially when you say (below) the latter are less than 50%. As for the Serbia’s statement I provided you the link. “
We will just have to disagree about my passing figure of speech then. I have made my position abundantly clear to you already.

The link that you provided was the one by the US rep to the ICJ. It was not the one in question about the verbatim records when 1244 was passed and the context in which the Serbian rep purported mentioned those statements.



“Ahhhhhhhh, less than 50%.... And you take something that is less than 50% to represent the 100%. Are you sure that if we consider the 100%, the result will not be different (just asking because between less than 50% and 100% there is an enormous difference).

As for trips to Beijing or any other place of the world where Clinton or Geither go, I don’t see how they support your point. Clinton was to Haiti recently. Following your logic, that country must be very important for the selling of the US public debt since Clinton visited it. “

I don't think some of the other main buyers like Russia and Brazil are crazy about buying ever more US debts. If anything, the Russians in particular are talking about replacing the greenback as the currency of trade purchase of these debts are supporting.

And I don’t see any article online by any country enthusiastically praising the value of buying more US debts and supporting the dollar do you? Mr Clinton was asked to help out in the Haitian earthquake. Very different from what his wife went to Beijing for. You can easily verify this online. http://www.rightpundits.com/?p=2937





“I can easily provide you evidence that this “insanity” is very normal and actually the “insanity” may have been the month of April :). My friend, as you used before the less than 50% to make statements about the 100%, you are doing again the same error: use one month’s data to make sweeping conclusions about trends. “

Then I am waiting with bated breath for your wonderful but so far unproduced evidence!



“Great, just wanted to make sure that you don’t still continue to bet that I can’t produce, after 2 whole weeks, any credible URL evidence on the 1244 post “

Well you haven’t produced those verbatim records online anyway. So your credibility is still zilch.


“As for “recognizes Belgrade’s sovereignty over Kosovo” that’s your interpretation which is not shared by the interested party (i.e. FRY – Serbia). Of course you have the right to your opinion, but if all parties involved (i.e. FRY-Serbia on one side and Kosovo and its supporters on the other side) including the directly affected party (FRY-Serbia) all interpreted the resolution the same way, then your argument is about an issue not in dispute between the parties involved.

For analogy, you have two parties in a contract, Party A and Party B, which are in full agreement about the contract’s interpretation. Now you have a Party C which is not part of the contract which tells Parties A and B you should disagree and interpret the contract differently !!!!!!!!!

Obviously Parties A and B would tell C that it’s not its business :)
(icj1, 13 February 2010 18:15)”

I believe my interpretation is shared by Tadic and his government. Otherwise why is Serbia still claiming Kosovo? You are putting words into Belgrade’s mouth! If Belgrade knew our debate here, I am confident that far from them telling me that it is none of my business, more likely you will be the one who will be told this by them!

"The FRY’s rep was speaking in the UNSC meeting which was approving 1244 to convince the UNSC members not to approve the 1244. This is the context; I think I explained it before."

We are talking online evidence, not merely your assurance that such an evidence exist.



“You open with “Yes” to my statement that “I make a claim in place X it is not a requirement that the evidence be in place X” and then continue to say that if that X = online the evidence must be in X, i.e. online. Please make up your mind if the “Yes’ or the rest of your statement are correct as I don’t know which part to answer :) “

My yes was to acknowledge that you did claim that the evidence existed online. But the bottom line is that you were unable to bring that evidence online even though you saw it fit to use the online mode to present your views. Another attempt by you no doubt to deflect from the issue here – your failure to provide the online evidence to date.




“This is a matter of you making a serious misleading statement with the hope that will pass undisputed. This is a matter of fact, it’s not a matter of interpretation that we agree or disagree. So I'm forced to mention it until you apologize for trying to mislead other readers. “

I do not see the need to apologize as I do not consider myself to have made any “serious misleading statement” and have clarified whatever needed to be clarified. In your case, it is the pot calling the kettle black when you could not produce the verbatim records online.



“The US presented as evidence to the ICJ the FRY’s rep statement. So, I just showed you that. If you claim that the US presented false evidence to the ICJ, please just ***STATE**** it; that the US evidence presented to the ICJ was false and then we continue from there. You can’t have it both ways; i.e. you don’t want to state the evidence is false but on the same time you don’t want to consider it because you don’t like it.”

And we are supposed to accept what the US alluded to be necessarily true? Isn’t it possible that the US twisted the facts in their ICJ submission to their own advantage? I can’t be sure and that’s why I am asking.



“Ahhhhhhhh, less than 50%.... And you take something that is less than 50% to represent the 100%. Are you sure that if we consider the 100%, the result will not be different (just asking because between less than 50% and 100% there is an enormous difference). "

“So that’s what I asked you. Do you have evidence that if instead of less than 50% we consider the 100% (i.e. including Brazil, Russia and all the others) the result remains the same ? This is not about what I think or you think. Do you have evidence ?

As for Clinton visits, I see now that you are saying that’s not just the fact that she goes to a country, but why she goes. So, regarding her visit to China for Clinton, do you have some evidence that she was there because the entire world has been avoiding the US public debt ? “

I was giving an opinion within a passing sstatement when I mentioned “entire world”. You deliberately chose to make a mountain out of a molehill on these 2 words despite my subsequent clarification, obviously to deflect attention from your inability to produce the verbatim records on 1244 evidence online.

As for your “This is not about what I think or what you think”, you are basically in the wrong online forum. This is a political forum in which readers state what they think.

Ms Clinton went to Beijing to do a hard sell to the Chinese to buy US financial instruments. The news archives of major online newspapers would testify to this. See for example http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/02/22/world/main4818429.shtml
Of course the Chinese were not impressed.


“Here is an example; I think is the month just before the one you mentioned
[link]

But, unlike you, I’m not claiming that I can make an inference just from this month that the purchases of US public debt by foreigners show a rising trend. I need (as you need) many more months to claim that (or the opposite in your case). “

Again double standards on your part. You can use one month’s data and others can’t?
Anyway do go to http://www.ustreas.gov/tic/ticsec2.shtml Once you are there, click on the no. 2 link name “historical data”. It will open up a spreadsheet. Look at columns 16 to 18 for net foreign purchase of the various US financial instruments. You will see that while about half the months in 2008 show positive net foreign purchases, the figures for the months of 2009 were mostly negative.

“I produced the online citation of the verbatim records in evidence presented at the ICJ. As long as you don’t ***STATE*** here that such evidence presented to the ICJ was false, you can’t reach to the conclusion that my credibility is still zilch.

This is beside the fact that such statement about credibility is laughable coming from somebody who makes a statement about the “entire world” based on facts (which may be true or not) for less than 50%.”

Your online citation is no substitute from the actual evidence brought online. And yet again you chose to deflect his point by conveniently using my “entire world” passing statement as equivalent to your specific claim about what a specific person said during a specific occasion on a specific topic in a specific context, and specific verbatim records that purportedly supported your arguments. Who are you kidding?



“That’s not what FRY-Serbia said when the 1244 was adopted. What Tadic & Co say now is legally irrelevant for the interpretation of 1244 (even though may be good for political consumption). If you agree what a legal text means when it was adopted, you can't change it whenever you like. That's it; if you want to say how you interpret it, that's your chance, during the adoption, not after.

Sir, I’m not putting words into Belgrade’s mouth. Again, evidence (for which I gave you the online link) was presented to the ICJ that the FRY rep said in the UNSC the following “in operative paragraph 11, the draft resolution establishes a protectorate, provides for the creation of a separate political and economic system in the province and opens up the possibility of the secession of Kosovo and Metohija from Serbia and the FRY”. If you think such evidence is false, please state it, and if it is false I’m the first that will immediately apologize to you for citing false evidence.

Belgrade does not know the debate here, but it knows (unless its lawyers were totally incompetent) that such evidence was presented to the ICJ and it did not claim that it is false.
(icj1, 14 February 2010 17:32)”

You conveniently chose to harp no end on what the Serbian rep said back in 1999 even though what he purportedly said was NOT part of the 1244 document itself. How binding is that even if we were to take your position about its legal relevance or irrelevance in 2010? Isn’t what Tadic’s elected government think today more important for policy towards Kosovo than what was purportedly commented back in 1244 which in any case is not “operative” (your favorite word) because his words were not part of the 1244 document itself that was approved by the UNSC.

As for whether the US statement is false or not, why don’t we wait for the ICJ’s pronouncement? We are getting nowhere merely asserting whether it is false or not. I distrust the US enough to suspect lack of credibility in their submissions but will wait for the ICJ to give their verdict.

Anyway do go to [link] Once you are there, click on the no. 2 link name “historical data”. It will open up a spreadsheet. Look at columns 16 to 18 for net foreign purchase of the various US financial instruments. You will see that while about half the months in 2008 show positive net foreign purchases, the figures for the months of 2009 were mostly negative.
(lowe, 15 February 2010 03:42)

Good, very good Lowe… Starting to do some research here finally :) Remember my advice, do this before making statements, not after.

That being said, columns 16 and 18 are the wrong ones :) (beside the 18 being already included in 16) because they show the purchases of foreign assets by US residents. Man, even for once when you do some serious research, you botch it :)

The explanations are two: (i) you still have room to improve on your interpretation abilities; or (ii) you just choose to twist facts, another one in the list of misleading statements you've made here and that you have to apologize for.

Do you really believe that I had not seen this table (and some others) :). I knew this table since the beginning my friend, but I asked you to prove the “entire world” thing because it was funny to see how you were going to jump around to prove the un-provable… ha, ha, ha

The correct ones are columns 3 (foreign purchases of domestic US long term securities) combined with column 22 (for the foreign purchases of domestic US short term securities). See the link below which explains the data in words and compare them to the Excel file so you can understand what each column means in the Excel file.

http://www.ustreas.gov/press/releases/tg510.htm

Columns 3 and 22 combined show that in the last 12 months for which there is data (12/2008 – 11/2009) there have been positive net foreign purchases in 10 of them, except April 2009 (which you mentioned before) and October 2009. That’s why I said previously that April which you cited could be the “insanity” because I had seen this table before :) and April 2009 was not usual. And even for the two which are negative, the negative amounts (0.9 and 8 billion) are much smaller than the positive ones which are 52.6 billion per month on average in the period above.

If we take your method of comparison, i.e. the number of months which are positive/negative in 2008 vs. 2009, there were 2 negative months in 2008 (18.7 and 9.6 billion negative) and 2 negative months in 2009 (0.9 and 8 billion negative). How does that show that the entire world is avoiding US domestic securities ?

I'll post a separate reply for the rest.

"If we take your method of comparison, i.e. the number of months which are positive/negative in 2008 vs. 2009, there were 2 negative months in 2008 (18.7 and 9.6 billion negative) and 2 negative months in 2009 (0.9 and 8 billion negative). How does that show that the entire world is avoiding US domestic securities ?

I'll post a separate reply for the rest.
(icj1, 15 February 2010 19:33)"

Well, Column 22 shows a negative trend anyway for most of 2009 for net foreign holdings of short-term US securities.

I stand corrected about Column 3 though and therefore retract the “entire world” words in my original post. This should please you right?

My initial assumption was based on the article that I came across about the Japanese and Chinese governments proposing to cut purchase of US debt instruments and various news reports that appeared to support this trend by other foreigners.

Well, Column 22 shows a negative trend anyway for most of 2009 for net foreign holdings of short-term US securities.
(lowe, 16 February 2010 00:49)

Column 22 (long term securities) and 3 (short term securities) go together. Short term US securities held by foreigners were 8.3% of the total US securities held by foreigners (as of the last data available; June 30, 2008). The long term ones are decisive (more than 90% of the total).

I stand corrected about Column 3 though and therefore retract the “entire world” words in my original post. This should please you right?
(lowe, 16 February 2010 00:49)

Thank you

My initial assumption was based on the article that I came across about the Japanese and Chinese governments proposing to cut purchase of US debt instruments and various news reports that appeared to support this trend by other foreigners.
(lowe, 16 February 2010 00:49)

Even for those two countries US debt data for the last 12 months ending Nov. 2009 shows that Japan actually increased US debt holdings yoy and there was a reduction in only 2 of the last 12 months. For China too, the US debt holdings increased yoy, and decreased in only 4 of the last 12 months.

“Sure, let’s assume what you said, that the US twisted the context, the FRY rep said much more, etc., etc….

What do you mean “Isn’t there a possibility of dishonesty on the part of the US submission to the ICJ in this regard” ? Yes, there is, about the context, how they interpret it, etc, etc, but not about what the words of the FRY rep were since US was just ***QUOTING***. Serbia never claimed that the US presented false evidence for this in the ICJ, even though Serbia may not agree now with the US ***INTERRPETATION*** of that evidence.

So do you still think after the proof that you saw online that the FRY rep did not say the following: “in operative paragraph 11, the draft resolution establishes a protectorate, provides for the creation of a separate political and economic system in the province and opens up the possibility of the secession of Kosovo and Metohija from Serbia and the FRY”

I never said that the US twisted anything, I am just stating that the possibility exists.
You have missed my point about what the FRY rep. All along I have been saying that you cannot take just one sentence presumably uttered by him and dwell on that without taking into account what else he said in the context of that UNSC meeting. You must look at the speech in its entirety and there has to be online evidence for that precisely because this is an online forum.



“No, 1244 did not say that Kosovo solution is the UDI, but on the same time did not forbid it. That’s why the FRY rep interpreted it as 1244 opening up the possibility of secession for Kosovo.

And I don’t understand the issue about the verbal sentence overriding the entire written document for 1244. There is a sentence in the preambular paragraph (not the entire document – you still did not learn about being careful when you use words such as “entire”) about the territorial integrity of the FRY. What that sentence’s actionable implications are is open to interpretation, and since the FRY is the directly affected party, of course its interpretation is authoritative. “

In my view, because 1244 recognized Belgrade’s sovereignty, it cannot at the same time support any UDI.
As for the verbal sentence, I was saying that, at the end of the day, it is 1244 itself that occupied the UNSC’s and ICJ’s attention, not what the Serbian rep or other reps apparently said back in 1999. The statement about respect for Belgrade’s sovereignty is clear enough to me, however much you may doubt its clarity. And 1244 must be taken as a whole, not for you or anyone else to conveniently ascribe more importance to some parts of it than others.



“No, this is factually incorrect. Please cite the date and number of the UNSC meeting which did not accept the UDI ? On the other hand I can provide you evidence that the UN organs involved (UNSC and the UNSG) were both explicitly asked by Serbia to annul the UDI as illegal, but both did not do what Serbia requested.

Kosovo remains regulated by the relevant provisions of 1244 which is still in force and fortunately nobody can override it.”

There has been no UNSC meeting to date that accepted the UDI or else resulted in any change in Kosovo’s status under 1244 as a province.



“I did not say publically available online. I said publically available. I’m not aware of any rule that requires online evidence for online discussions.”

Unless you are able to provide the evidence online, don’t expect me to take you seriously. Because all we are left is only your word that such a document exists and that its contents are as described by you.


“No, the judge would rule on the evidence only if the other party presents arguments that the evidence is false. But obviously the other party can’t say the evidence is false without going to read it first. Of course if a party does not provide precise references, the judge can force it to either provide the precise reference or bring in the text if it’s not publicly available. “

I don’t see how his honor can rule on evidence that is not presented to him (and the jury and the other side’s lawyer).
In this online forum, you do not expect every reader to have public access to your specific article. So naturally to be taken seriously here you will need to bring that evidence online. One only wonders why you have been reluctant to do this to date.



“It’s not overriding anything. The “overriding” word you use starts from the assumption that your interpretation is correct. Why ? I could say the opposite, a preambular paragraph about the FRY’s territorial integrity cannot override the actions prescribed or not forbidden by the rest of the resolution. And the FRY’s rep agreed with me and not with you. As I said above, he is the affected party so his interpretation is authoritative. “

Here we go yet again, your conveniently giving more importance to some parts of 1244, an interpretation which I do not agree with. For me, every sentence, every clause in 1244 must be considered.



“That’s not consistent with what Belgrade said when the 1244 was adopted. Also, I can wake up in the morning and say Kosovo belongs to Mars; does that mean it is correct ?! Where are the arguments ? “

And until I see your fabled but still-missing-after-2-weeks verbatim records online, I will, at best have to reserve judgment on that. And what has Mars to do with this anyway?



“No, I explained above. The FRY’s rep sentence is in line with 1244, so it’s not a matter of being more or less important.

You hinted that Belgrade may have changed position when you said in another post “Isn’t what Tadic’s elected government think today more important for policy towards Kosovo than what was purportedly commented back in 1244”.

But let’s assume they have not changed position. So their position is the one they stated in the UNSC meeting 4011 in 1999 that 1244 opens up the possibility of secession for Kosovo.”

The document 1244 itself is the one that’s important, not what someone purportedly said back in 1999 which was not part of the resolution.

I didn’t say that Belgrade did change its position over 1244. As far as I know, they have always claimed sovereignty over Kosovo and among other things, cited 1244’s recognition of their sovereignty.
As for records of that UNSC meeting, I have already mentioned so many times already that until I see your evidence online, don’t expect me (or anyone else) to accept your position prima facie.



“Why not c, i.e. both ? “

Option a asks for ICJ to review the question. And I don’t see what your re-re-re-re quiz is getting at. Can you get to the point or am I also supposed to look for the answer myself online?


Again, I did not state “many without vested interest”. I just said “many”.

And I already told you that people with vested interest cannot be seen as objective sources contributing to the credibility of your arguments. Judges have to be impartial for their judgments to be accepted without a pinch of salt.


“So I have not made a statement about my affection towards you. According to your logic, it means that officially I hate you.”

But by your logic, it means that as long as I don’t say I hate you, then it means I love you! That’s where your contradiction lies!



“That depends; sometime they may support Kosovo membership in int’l organizations; sometimes not. For UN we don’t know since it’s not been put to a vote in the GA yet.”

It wouldn’t even get to the GA. From Russian and Chinese statements, there is no chance for Kosovo’s membership to make it past the UNSC.

As for support for Kosovo's membership to international organizations, do you mean those that do not require statehood as a prerequisite? True for bodies like the World Bank.



“The sentence did not say Factor A and Factor B; but did say “will of A” and “opinion of B”. So your example is not correct. “

Well, it is obvious to me that Factor A = Will of A and Factor B = Opinion of B. It is also obvious that the sentence did not say that Factor A is more (or less) important than Factor B. Therefore both must be considered notwithstanding that one is about “will” and the other merely (to you) an “opinion”. For me, it means that B’s opinion is as important as A’s will.



“I provided you the online evidence where the verbatim records were quoted. For the full text, go a law library and follow the reference.”

I have already mentioned that you shouldn’t expect to be taken seriously online if you can’t produce the actual evidence online. You are free to disagree but it doesn’t help make your case more credible online here.


"I granted you that Belgrade is a relevant authority (quod non). I did single out for Belgrade’s opinion not to be taken into account because you singled it out for analysis and I was responding to you. But there was no requirement that ALL opinions should be taken into account. It’s perfectly legal to not take into account any of the opinions (be that Belgrade, Pristina, or whatever relevant authority you prefer) because the text said “opinion of relevant authorities” NOT “opinion of ALL relevant authorities”.
You can’t rule something illegal because not ALL opinion were taken into account, when the ALL was not legally required. “

For me that statement was clear enough, opinions put forth by a relevant authority must be considered. And can you tell me who is qualified to decide that Belgrade’s views can be discarded? You? The US?



“Simple, I don’t have too. Legal arguments don’t require online evidence. You have to live with it.
(icj1, 16 February 2010 00:10)”

Then don’t expect me and others online here to take your arguments at face value.