Word: ironical
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Still, there are hints of good news. Rates charged by large coal and iron-ore carriers recently jumped by more than 50%, mostly because demand for Australian coal is rising again. The huge port of Newcastle on Australia's east coast is busier than it was even a few weeks ago. Could shipping have bottomed out already...
...bottom line: Bush's projections of future defense spending "substantially understate" just how much money it will take to run Obama's Pentagon, the CSBA says in its report. Luckily, Defense Secretary Robert Gates plans to hang around to try to iron out the problem...
...Leaving aside whether Camara's promises can be trusted - Conté himself seized power days after Guinea's first president Sekou Toure died and then ruled with an iron fist for 24 years - Guineans' enthusiastic welcome of the new junta is a measure of how desperate they are for change. Guinea has half the world's reserves of bauxite - vital in the production of aluminium - as well as gold, diamonds and hardwoods. Yet the average Guinean earns just $91 a month. Civil servants last year joined in food riots because their salaries were no longer enough...
...uneasy alignment of Abhisit and Newin reflects a fundamental rift in Thai society between disaffected rural voters and a disgusted urban elite that cannot fathom the string of populist - and sometimes iron-fisted - leaders whom the masses have been choosing to represent them. Bangkok may gleam with malls and high-rises, but most of Thailand is still a poor country of rice farmers. The Democrats, with the exception of a support base in the Muslim-dominated south, have yet to convince rural voters that their party has the best interests of most Thais in mind. Abhisit has had a hard...
...longer. Starting in early November, four of the five factories abruptly informed their workers that they were switching to a three-day week. Then the layoffs started. The cast-iron foundry, which pays the best wages, cut 80 of its 1,200 workers, and managers announced that they might have to fire up to 600 more. The cable factory - which just this year started up a new production line - laid off 40 people, and cut pay for those who remained by 15%. At least they're being paid: the machinery factory nearby is two months in arrears. "People woke...