Beijing has been ramping up its anti-spitting campaign for quite a while now, but there is a particular earnestness as the 2008 Olympics near. Chinese authorities want to clean up the image of the city, and having tourists and Olympians seeing everyone from the factory worker to the grandmother to the petite young college coed hocking up big lugies is not the image of a refined 5000-year-old civilization China wants to present.

Now, the signs and advertisements pleading with residents to stop spitting have amounted to nothing. Perhaps it is because the air in Beijing is un-breathable, and the only way to not choke to death on the morning commute is to continuously expectorate. Or perhaps it has just become an element of the local culture – New Yorkers are rude, Beijingers spit.

But Beijing is now going high-tech in the War Against Spitting People (WASP), deploying a $125,000 camera-equipped vehicle capable of catching spitters on tape day or night, and thereby giving enforcement officials all the evidence they need to guarantee the offenders have to fork over the $2.50 fine. After 50,000 spitters fined, they will have recouped the vehicle cost (not counting operation, maintenance, tapes, fuel, salaries of officers...).

And they are off to a good start. On the first full day in operation on the Dongcheng District Feb. 24, after a 10 hour operation involving the crew of the surveillance vehicle and beat cops, they had caught a total of NINE evil, vile, Communist spitters (oh wait, they are all communist...). At that rate, they will capture and fine enough spitters to repay the spit-mobile in just 5555 and a half days, or just over 15 years.

There is an interesting comment over at Bingfeng Teahouse about changes in the pop media portrayal of the KMT in China. Rather than treating Taiwan’s Nationalist Kuomintang (KMT) like a traitor, opponent or other problem, the shows portray the KMT as a co-fighter of the Japanese with the Chinese Communists.

This sort of subtle manipulation of popular sentiments was seen in South Korea, with the 1999 release of The Spy, and moving through other movies like Swiri and JSA; all of which altered impressions of North Koreans, from being evil to being figures deserving at least of sympathy.

For Beijing, this is part of a broader campaign to undermine Taiwan's ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) and to portray a pan-national sense of "Chineseness," that draws on all ethnic Chinese (Taiwan, Singapore, Indonesia...) to build up a greater China rather than having arguments within the Chinese community.

Instead, Beijing uses Japan as its foil, something Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi seems ever willing to assist with through his Yasukuni visits.

This is designed to keep Taiwan from going too far down the independence road and encourages economic and technological cooperation with ethnic Chinese throughout East Asia and the world. And contributing to this lofty goal are the subtle changes in public perception due to popular television.

There has been plenty of talk in Korea and in the expat and foreign blogs watching Korea over the claims by a Pusan man that he is U.S. skier Toby Dawson's biological father. One main issue raised by western observers is that they would never have simply abandoned the search for their lost child, and they cannot see how someone would not have gone to the police. The self-claimed father, Kim Jae Su, told reporters "I didn't think reporting it to the police would be of any help, so I went around looking for him myself."

While it is hard to fathom now that someone wouldn't go to the police to find their lost child, one must look back at that time in history. Through the 1970s and into the 1980s, the police in Korea were not approachable for "little problems" like lost Children. They were tools of an autocratic and militant regime, and a source of enforcement, not a source of assistance to the "common man."

I know of other, much less public, figures (relatives included) who were lost as children, and their parents didn't go to the police. The police wouldn't have helped even if they had shown up. In one case, it was more sinister than being taken to an orphanage - the young girl was picked up by a lady recruiting for a brothel. Luckily, she was a well known little girl in the neighborhood, and was seen and her father was able to recover her before any harm was done.

This is a sad story, but it is a reflection of the significant difference in social and cultural norms in Korea in the 1970s and even into the 1980s. Remember, the Kwangju massacre occurred in 1980, just a year before Kim Jae Su claims to have lost Toby Dawson. This was not an open and friendly regime, and police were not the servants of the people.

The 1988 Olympics in Seoul ushered in some internally enforced political and social change, the Asian economic crisis in 1997 brought in more. But it has been just a quarter of a century since South Korea was deploying paratroopers against its own citizens in ChollaNamDo, and it was in this atmosphere that Mr. Kim claims he lost his son and didn't turn to the police.

I make no justification for Kim, nor do I have an opinion one way or another as to whether Dawson is his son. But there is a distinct holier-than-thou attitude among foreign observers that fails to understand the reality of daily life in South Korea 25 years ago, and if one forgets to look to history, one is doomed to repeat its mistakes.

Kim Sung Do and his wife Kim Shin Yul, 66 and 68 respectively, moved into their new home on Tok-do Feb. 19, nearly 10 years after their previous home on the disputed islet was wiped out in a storm. The new home is part of a $1.75 million reconstruction project on the rocky outcroppings funded by the Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries (MOMAF)that also included upgraded port facilities.

The two Kims, who have been living on nearby Ulleung-do for the past decade, will reportedly be sharing their island with poet Pyung Bu Kyung in April, according to Korea.net.

The return to Tok-do comes a week before a group of motorcycling students embark on a 23 nation eight month tour of the world promoting Korea's sovereignty over Tok-do. The so-called 2006 World Cross Project Dokdo Rider, which has yet to activate the English language part of its website, will travel first to California March 1, and during its travels will spend time in Germany for the World Cup. A noble excuse for a rather extensive college road trip, apparently.

All the rush to remind the world that Tok-do is Korean territory (despite the fact that no one asked) is due in part to the fact that Feb. 22 will be the first Takeshima Day, as designated by Japan's Shimane Prefecture last March. Shimane's prefectural assembly decided that, as 2005 marked the 100th anniversary of Japan's claim of sovereignty over Takeshima (as Japan calls Tok-do), they would create a day to memorialize the ownership (and yearly annoy the Koreans). Thus South Korea made sure its civilians moved back out to Tok-do before the first Takeshima Day, and the Dokdo Rider group is getting additional publicity.

Of course, this raises another important question: if Tok-Do is in the East Sea and Takeshima is in the Sea of Japan, why is everyone arguing?