US preparing for war with China?

[Phanerothyme]

What about the Spratly Islands?

[tinfoilhat]

I thought America and china had nuclear weapons pointing at each other since lord knows when ? Getting ready for war ? Unless they are going down the modern warfare 2/ red Dawn model of fantasy they've been ready since the Korean war.

[buck]

Your Walmart sounds a lot more colourful than ours Sierra. No ladies selling tamales or bare foot kids but the merchandise is the same no doubt.

 

My wife goes there to buy the big containers of washing liquid. Twice the size and half the price of the same brands sold in the supermarkets.

 

I go to buy the music CDs and the 5 dollar movie DVDs they have piled up willy nilly in the big containers. The clothes are rubbish and some of the prices on other things are a litttle higher than in Costco in some cases

 

We buy huge amounts of stuff from Costco especially paper towels, table napkins, toilet rolls, boxes of tissues, bottled water, trash bags, vitamins and I always buy new tires for my truck and the cars there also

 

I remember going into the Super Walmart where my sister lives on the Gulf Coast of Florida. It was full of snow birds down there for the winter. They were so old most of them that we looked like a couple of kids by comparison.

They were buying stuff by the wagon load. They're like locusts. They buy up everything in the local stores and hog the cafes and restaurants for months until April comes. The beaches are packed and there isn't a parking space to be found after 11:00 AM

 

Makes me glad I live in California.

Walmart is getting more expensive lately. We have begun shopping at the Aldi store. A German outfit we first used in Ireland. Milk , butter, eggs are about half the price of the supermarkets. The meats are first class, as so is just about everything we buy. We're saving 33% overall. You have to bag yourself, and put a quarter in to the locked cart to use it. You get the quarter back when you lock the cart back up. We go up to Mass for gas. Its about 20 cents cheaper a gallon.

Hope the muckraker don't get me, the french death:)

[Sierra]

Your Walmart sounds a lot more colourful than ours Sierra. No ladies selling tamales or bare foot kids but the merchandise is the same no doubt.

 

My wife goes there to buy the big containers of washing liquid. Twice the size and half the price of the same brands sold in the supermarkets.

 

I go to buy the music CDs and the 5 dollar movie DVDs they have piled up willy nilly in the big containers. The clothes are rubbish and some of the prices on other things are a litttle higher than in Costco in some cases

 

We buy huge amounts of stuff from Costco especially paper towels, table napkins, toilet rolls, boxes of tissues, bottled water, trash bags, vitamins and I always buy new tires for my truck and the cars there also

 

I remember going into the Super Walmart where my sister lives on the Gulf Coast of Florida. It was full of snow birds down there for the winter. They were so old most of them that we looked like a couple of kids by comparison.

They were buying stuff by the wagon load. They're like locusts. They buy up everything in the local stores and hog the cafes and restaurants for months until April comes. The beaches are packed and there isn't a parking space to be found after 11:00 AM

 

Makes me glad I live in California.

 

It depends on which Walmart I go to. In our metropolitan area, there are several. It all depends on how I'm feeling, what they have and what I need. The one closer to our house is more upscale (Walmart and upscale, an oxymoron if ever there was one, right? )

 

The one on the south end of town in "little Mexico" has the ladies with the buckets of tamales, the mariachi bands on every corner, the guys in the parking lot with bags of oranges or crates of strawberries, and don't go after dark. And the kids, kids, kids. Wow. We once stopped to watch about 5 kids in the toy department, obviously brothers and sisters. They were totally unattended and having a great time, playing on the swing sets and trying out the bikes. One little girl was so cute. She was wearing a too big pair of denim overalls, pinned in the back. She'd stop every couple of steps to hitch up her drawers. After a couple minutes, my husband commented that he felt uncomfortable. "I feel like I'm watching monkeys in the zoo!" Of course the people who work there don't appreciate this, and who can blame them?

 

Walmart Bingo

 

I love Costco. Costco/Kirkland products are hard to beat for price or quality. Milk, paper towels, smoked salmon, the Indiana cinnamon sugar kettle corn, raw pecans (to make sugared nuts for Christmas gifts) their bakery stuff is wonderful, especially the bagels. Household products, bath mats, rugs, sheets, blankets, shoes, socks, underwear, you name it. The only thing that's bad lately is the compacter bag scandal. We have one of these contraptions and it needs special bags. Kirkland's used to be good, but lately, they've gotten shorter, so they don't hold as much. Oh, and the whole roasted chickens for $5. Is this a good deal or what? Their jewelry is pretty nice, too. I always wait for the coupon booklets!

[Harleyman]

Walmart is getting more expensive lately. We have begun shopping at the Aldi store. A German outfit we first used in Ireland. Milk , butter, eggs are about half the price of the supermarkets. The meats are first class, as so is just about everything we buy. We're saving 33% overall. You have to bag yourself, and put a quarter in to the locked cart to use it. You get the quarter back when you lock the cart back up. We go up to Mass for gas. Its about 20 cents cheaper a gallon.

Hope the muckraker don't get me, the french death:)

 

The British supermarket chain Tesco opened several stores here called Fresh N' Easy. I went to the one nearest us on opening day hoping to find some hard to find imported food from Britain but.... zilch !

 

If I want steak and kid pies, sausage rolls. HP sauce, Marmite. mulagatawney soup, English mustard. Gloucester cheese I still have to drive to Santa Monica.... 50 odd miles but no worries..... a day at the seaside and a couple of pints at the King's Head and a game of darts with the missus. I showed her how to play years ago and now she beats me every time

[Cavegirl]

As wildly exciting as reading about American and British supermarkets isn't, I thought I'd offer some more recent news stories that are actually relevant to the thread title:

 

BBC news; Obama stirs up China's sea of troubles:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-15795088

 

China warns US on territory disputes:

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/ad940196-11d2-11e1-9d4d-00144feabdc0.html

 

I don't know whether this is all leading towards a conflict, but I seriously hope not.

 

Perhaps our American friends here won't even notice if it does...by the sounds of it they'll be too dazzled by the bright lights of shopping malls and supermarkets...that is until the shelves start to empty of course...then there'll be riots.

[Harleyman]

It depends on which Walmart I go to. In our metropolitan area, there are several. It all depends on how I'm feeling, what they have and what I need. The one closer to our house is more upscale (Walmart and upscale, an oxymoron if ever there was one, right? )

 

The one on the south end of town in "little Mexico" has the ladies with the buckets of tamales, the mariachi bands on every corner, the guys in the parking lot with bags of oranges or crates of strawberries, and don't go after dark. And the kids, kids, kids. Wow. We once stopped to watch about 5 kids in the toy department, obviously brothers and sisters. They were totally unattended and having a great time, playing on the swing sets and trying out the bikes. One little girl was so cute. She was wearing a too big pair of denim overalls, pinned in the back. She'd stop every couple of steps to hitch up her drawers. After a couple minutes, my husband commented that he felt uncomfortable. "I feel like I'm watching monkeys in the zoo!" Of course the people who work there don't appreciate this, and who can blame them?

 

Walmart Bingo

 

I love Costco. Costco/Kirkland products are hard to beat for price or quality. Milk, paper towels, smoked salmon, the Indiana cinnamon sugar kettle corn, raw pecans (to make sugared nuts for Christmas gifts) their bakery stuff is wonderful, especially the bagels. Household products, bath mats, rugs, sheets, blankets, shoes, socks, underwear, you name it. The only thing that's bad lately is the compacter bag scandal. We have one of these contraptions and it needs special bags. Kirkland's used to be good, but lately, they've gotten shorter, so they don't hold as much. Oh, and the whole roasted chickens for $5. Is this a good deal or what? Their jewelry is pretty nice, too. I always wait for the coupon booklets!

 

 

My wife's a coupon collector also. What I like about Costco is the big packaging. We have enough paper towels and all that other stuff to last months. I never have to do an Archie Bunker in the bathroom and start bellowing that we're completely out of toilet paper .

We've spent as much as 500 dollars a time on the stuff we buy but if we bought the same quantities at the supermarket it would probably be around 150 dollars on top of that

The only thing I dont like about Costco is they dont sell coffee at the snack stand

[Harleyman]

As wildly exciting as reading about American and British supermarkets isn't, I thought I'd offer some more recent news stories that are actually relevant to the thread title:

 

BBC news; Obama stirs up China's sea of troubles:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-15795088

 

China warns US on territory disputes:

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/ad940196-11d2-11e1-9d4d-00144feabdc0.html

 

I don't know whether this is all leading towards a conflict, but I seriously hope not.

 

Perhaps our American friends here won't even notice if it does...by the sounds of it they'll be too dazzled by the bright lights of shopping malls and supermarkets...that is until the shelves start to empty of course...then there'll be riots.

 

I dont know how old you are Cavegirl but I lived through 50 years of Cold War with the Soviets. You should learn to distinguish political rhetoric and bluster from that of real threats. If you arent old enough to remember the Cuban missile crisis you dont know what doomsday brinkmanship really is.

 

China needs the US for it's export market and the US needs China to buy up it's debts.

Just go to bed tonight. get a good night's sleep and quit your worrying. It puts wrinklles on your forehead

[Harleyman]

As wildly exciting as reading about American and British supermarkets isn't, I thought I'd offer some more recent news stories that are actually relevant to the thread title:

 

BBC news; Obama stirs up China's sea of troubles:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-15795088

 

China warns US on territory disputes:

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/ad940196-11d2-11e1-9d4d-00144feabdc0.html

 

I don't know whether this is all leading towards a conflict, but I seriously hope not.

 

Perhaps our American friends here won't even notice if it does...by the sounds of it they'll be too dazzled by the bright lights of shopping malls and supermarkets...that is until the shelves start to empty of course...then there'll be riots.

 

I dont know how old you are Cavegirl but I lived through 40 years of Cold War with the Soviets. You should learn to distinguish political rhetoric and bluster from that of real threats. If you arent old enough to remember the Cuban missile crisis you dont know what doomsday brinkmanship really is.

 

China needs the US for it's export market and the US needs China to buy up it's debts.

Just go to bed tonight. get a good night's sleep and quit your worrying. It puts wrinklles on your forehead

[Sierra]

As wildly exciting as reading about American and British supermarkets isn't, I thought I'd offer some more recent news stories that are actually relevant to the thread title:

 

BBC news; Obama stirs up China's sea of troubles:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-15795088

 

China warns US on territory disputes:

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/ad940196-11d2-11e1-9d4d-00144feabdc0.html

 

I don't know whether this is all leading towards a conflict, but I seriously hope not.

 

Perhaps our American friends here won't even notice if it does...by the sounds of it they'll be too dazzled by the bright lights of shopping malls and supermarkets...that is until the shelves start to empty of course...then there'll be riots.

 

Cavegirl, I don't mean to sound so superficial. Shopping at Costco, or shopping the way we yanks do I know isn't what people in the UK do. Sure there are those that go crazy and overspend. But generally, we go to Costco about once every six weeks. The quantities are large; 12 packs of paper towels, 10 packs of albacore tuna, etc. The idea is to buy in bulk so that the price per item is lower, and for non perishable items, you won't need to buy it again for awhile. So you save time and money. Some items can be frozen , but I might go once every 10 days and just get milk, eggs, fresh fish, butter, cheese or bread if I'm out that way. They have sales and coupons and some items they may have on special because they're seasonal. We can get contact lens solution, vitamins and over the counter meds. They also have a pharmacy where members can get good discounts on prescription medications and eyeglasses. They offer discounts on new cars, home and auto insurance, all manner of electronics, office supplies, furniture, and their return policy is the best anywhere. I believe they even sell caskets! I once mentioned to an employee that I'd bought a set of cookware the year before and wasn't entirely happy with it. He told me to return it, I did and got a full refund. I couldn't believe it. They also offer different levels of membership, and many small businesses take advantage of this and get office supplies and check printing at steep discounts.

 

It is very easy to get carried away, and dazzled by the good deals, so you have to be selective and only buy what you know your family will use/eat/wear. It's not a bargain if it rots or goes to waste. I have an elderly neighbor and we frequently will split items and I take her there to get her meds because the price is cheaper than at the local pharmacy. I also used to do this with a girlfriend when our children were small. We split the cost and bought diapers and wipes in bulk.

 

andygardner made an astute observation upthread. Go back and read what he wrote. We aren't going to repay China. No one repays money they owe here. The attitude is, you can't squeeze blood from a turnip. Peter Schiff The Chinese are far from dumb. What they plan to do about it, I sure don't know. Let 'em bluster and threaten. They don't play by the rules. Surprise! We don't either. The comments that follow the video are a little out there, but I thought the video was just too funny not to share. If you could see how some people walk from their debts and mortgages and they sound just like Peter Schiff. Only he's joking somewhat and they're not! They really feel they shouldn't have to pay it back.

 

P.S. Harleyman, try the Latte Freeze at the Food Court. It's not traditional hot coffee, but it's half the price of Starbucks, twice as big and just as good. Maybe better.