Records

Ted Balaker got a point in this article. It's something to think about.

The 22nd Vietnamese Baptist Annual Convention opened tonight at the Crown Plaza in Addison. We heard from Rev. Charles Wade, the executive director of the General Baptist Convention of Texas. We got to enjoy the band from the Barcross Cowboy Church. In attendance was also GBCT president Michael A. Bell.

I enjoyed watching the video recording of Nortel annual shareholder meeting. The subject of corporate responsibility came up in whether Nortel should do business with country like China, who does not respect universally recognized basic human rights. Google and Yahoo were cited as companies that do not set so good of an example.

I registered with Jajah. Downloaded and installed the Firefox plugin so now all the phone numbers became a hyperlink and I could click to call. However, there were some account numbers that were mistaken for a phone number as well.

Nortel today announced that they will eliminate the pension plan effective January 1st of 2008 and move everyone to 401(k). Pension or guaranteed retirement benefit has become too costly. American Airlines should do the same to become more competitive because the unfunded liability of the pension plan is why we cannot get rid of the Wright Amendment outright because that would sink AA.

Each employee was given the choice of pension or 401(k) at hiring time. I chose 401(k) to begin with so it's not as much of an impact for me. Nortel has been matching dollar for dollar of my own contribution to my 401(k) up to 6% of my salary. Beginning January 1st, 2008, it would be 2% automatic Nortel contribution to my 401(k), plus 50% matching of my contribution up to 6% of my salary. That would give a net 5% max, one percent less than what I am getting right now.

Went to the range after work today and put two hundred .40 S&W rounds through my Sigarms P229. I am much more accurate this time. I still jerked my hands in anticipation of the shot going off a little bit but if I can see the muzzle flash, I hit the target right on.

I can't stand Kofi Annan and the ilks like Rebecca Peters and this whole UN Small Arms Branch thing. They have a complete disregard for the US sovereignty and the US Constitution.

Went to Hoang's place soon after the service at church for a meeting where all the judges, who are VPS Dallas members, can go over all the applications and discuss and come up with the final list of the awardees who will be given scholarships by the Vietnamese Community of Greater Dallas.

Afterward, we all got together to celebrate Trang's birthday at Zander's House.

I am building with Habitat today at 2728 Rogers for a family of displaced New Orleans residents who have decided to settle here in Dallas. All the walls were built in California January 29th and shipped here, with a lot of messages of hope and blessing written on the studs. One thing that stood out was that they had big old 4x6 on top of every door frame, apparently for earthquake, I was told.

My friend and fellow director on the board of Dallas/Fort Worth Asian American Citizens Council, Lothar Katz, president of Leadership Crossroad, finally has his book, Negotiating International Business available on Amazon.

Michigan incumbent Democratic governor Jennifer Granholm is trailing Republican challenger Dick DeVos 41% to 48% according to RealClearPolitics. At one time, she was considered the Democratic version of Arnold Schwarzenegger, foreign born governor who draw interest to amend the US Constitution to allow foreign born naturalized citizen to run for the presidency.

It felt like the Mavericks gave up all of the points they got from all the turnovers during first quarter in the fourth quarter.

I just finished listening to the audiobook A firing offense by David Ignatius, really like it.

Since game 5 between Dallas Mavericks and Miami Heat does not start until 7:30, we stayed back after our Father's Day picnic at church to work on the playground that Larry and my brother have been building on the side of the church.

Three missionaries of the church of the Latter-Day Saints came by, asking about our meeting during the week because they will be starting an English class in the neighborhood and does not want it to coincide with our evening meetings. I asked them the two EE questions. Their answers to the first question were that they know for certain beyond a shadow of a doubt that they would spend eternity with God in heaven. To the second question, they answered because they followed the commandments to the best of their abilities. I went through and shared with them the gospel. I pointed out that the last thing Christ said on the cross was that "It's finished." In Greek, it a commercial term meaning "the debt is paid in full." They however would not agree with the statement that the death of Christ is necessary and sufficient for salvation. That one must combined the grace of God and good works, which I pointed out to them that implicitly they have declared that what Christ did on the cross was insufficient for salvation. I also pointed out that one of the two criminals who was crucified at the same time with Christ had no chance to do good work but Jesus had said that he would be in paradise with Christ that day. How much good work is good enough for salvation. For the Bible said unless you are perfect as your Father in heaven is perfect, Matthew 5:48, you have no hope of gaining salvation by yourself. It appeared that they weren't too certain about where they would spend eternity and it was hard for them to comprehend that all it takes is to accept what Christ has done on the cross. They however said they would prayerfully studied what I pointed out to them and then left.

We finished putting together the sliding tube and left to watch the game at home.

Finally there's a group standing up saying that those protests by the illegal immigrants are not the representative view of the people of hispanic descent: You don't speak for me.

Went to the DFWAACC board meeting today before going shopping at Costco to pick up a couple cases of Gatorade and water bottles. Stopped by Foley's to pick up a new dress belt for myself before going home and then church for our evangelistic service tonight.

Got to hear from Shell Oil Company President John Hofmeister at a luncheon today. He talked about three things involving energy security (not independent): 1) Access to fossil fuel resources, both conventional and unconvention, 2) Diversity in the type of energy, and 3) demand management.

Access, he would love to have access to the 100 billion plus recoverable barrells of fossil fuel available domestically in Alaska and off the west coast of Florida (eastern gulf of Mexico). Shell has utilized available technologies to responsibily access these resources. One example was how to leave minimum footprint in Wyoming by using offshore drilling techniques on dry flat prairie. Shell and Exxon are also exploring and drilling in east Russia. Shell also is exploring in Arkansas, Colorado, Washington and Wyoming.

Fossil fuel will continue to remain at the heart of the energy supply because of its abundance and efficiency. However, Shell is using its 25 billion/year profit, 6 billion profit this first quarter, beside heavily investing in finding new sources of fossil fuel, is committed to research in wind, hydrogen, and solar energy. Shell along with the governor of Hawaii will be unveiling a wind energy facility next month. Shell is working with California governor Schwarzenegger for a hydrogen highway between Los Angeles and San Francisco. Similarly a hydrogen highway is being worked out between New York and Washington DC. Mr. Hofmeister mentioned of the hydrogen refueling station in Washington DC that the president visited earlier this year. Shell has built the station in partnership with GM whose vans run on hydrogen fuel cell. Shell also has coal extraction project in 12 states. At the same time, Shell is committed in research for 2nd generation of ethanol, which is produced from corn stock, grass and tree instead of grain based first generation ethanol which is produced from corn and sugar. He said being blamed for gas is enough. Oil companies do not want to be blamed for driving up the prices of corn, which is used to feed cattle, chicken, and therefore driving up the prices of eggs and milk.

Managing demands includes partnering with Motiva in expanding capacity at the Port Authur refinery so that it becomes the largest refinery in the US. There has been no new refinery built in the US since 1976. Gas prices would go down if the tree huggers let us build more refinery plants. Daily, 85 million barrels of crude oil are produced and 84 million barrels are consumed so there is not a lack of crude oil supply. With China's and India's demand for energy grow at an exponential rate, the problem is only going to get worse from here on out.

The tree huggers would be please to hear that Shell has reduced carbon dioxide emission. Out of a dollar, 55 cents are the cost of crude oil, 18 cents are the cost of refining, 19 cents go toward taxes, and only 8 cents are profit, which go toward paying the share holders and reinvestment.

A few pictures from our clean up work in Biloxi.

Starting out in the morning, Karl Ninh and Vietnamese Professionals Society - Dallas chapter


Taking a water break, Karl Ninh with a big trash bag


ABC local affiliate WLOX reporter Toni Miles with her camera


Toni giving us her contact info, Karl Ninh taking it down


Group picture, Karl Ninh on the right hand side

A group of friends took me out for lunch at my favorite restaurant Abuelo's yesterday. Wish I could leave the decoration up permanently for my cube but I guess I better do some tidying up today.

Our church has Vacation Bible School all of this week. I came home late on Monday so yesterday was my first day helping with it.

VPS Dallas, of which yours truly is the chapter president, had 24 volunteers down in Biloxi, Mississippi from Friday through Monday to help cleaning up neighborhoods and helping local residents there to get back on their feet. Check out the two news reports by Toni Miles of the local ABC affiliate WLOX TV here. We were on the 5:30 pm Sunday night news as well as the 11:00 pm one, right after the 2nd Mavericks game.

Will be going to Zander's House for lunch today to celebration my birthday, June 13th, and a couple of other guys' birthday in my group at work today. All three of us have birthday in June. I am ready to fly down to New Orleans and then drive to Biloxi to help clean up down there this weekend, especially east Biloxi. Will be coming back on Monday night.

I don't turn 30 until next Tuesday, June 13th, but the folks at work decided that they are going to decorate my cube today. This is how it looked when I got to work this morning:


30 reasons to vote for Karl Ninh


Karl Ninh's cube, the outside


Entrance into Karl Ninh's cubicle


Inside Karl Ninh's cube


Karl Ninh with a group of co-workers

I am getting pretty good with handling chokes, where from the front, the side or the back, with or without a push. However, I need to find sometimes to get to the gun range for regular target practice and also need to order another 1,000 rounds of ammo. I have been waiting but there's been no sale recently from .40 S&W rounds.

Here is the 2006 Republican Party of Texas platform.

I woke up to radio alarm with the news of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi's death. Also saw on Drudge Report that the tickets sale for the Dixie Chicks is only 5,000 to 6,000 in 20,000 seats venue in major markets, and even less in secondary markets. They got their wish of smaller group of fans I guess. Everyone is happy, this is a great day for America.

Still having trouble with my laptop. My desktop is not exactly where I need either. Thus I am not so much in the mood of writing and posting.

My friend Bobby Eberle lost the race for vice chair of the Republican Party of Texas. Another friend, Karl Voitsberger, lost the race for State Republican Executive Committeeman for Senate District 8.

On the bright side, three young Republicans are now on the SREC: John Fowler, Rex Lamb and Jason Moore.

There were attempts to remove term limit for the national committeeman and committeewoman as well as state chair and vice chair. Both amendments were defeated on the floor. National committeeman and woman are limited to two terms, four years each. State chair and vice chair are limited to four terms, two years each.

Karl Ninh at ground zero during the 2004 Republican National Convention:

Got to the Menger Hotel around 9:30 am and was able to check in, make sure I have internet access in the room before I headed over to the Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center for the Texas Republican State Convention.

After all the activities on Thursday, got back to my hotel room and what I got was a blue screen of death on my laptop. Turned it off and couldn't turn it back on. Tried and tried but it just wasn't working. I thought it was a goner and decided that I didn't have time to tinker with it until after the convention, when I get back home. I got it on once I was home but then it hung in the middle of me doing something and I was too tired, will have to deal with it later but at least I know that it's still there, not a goner.

Karl Ninh by the Texas delegation seating area: