From China's point of view, it is better to preserve North Korea's few remaining economic lifelines than risk nudging Kim Jong Il's regime towards an implosion that could send millions pouring across the Chinese border.
DETROIT — With its access to a government lifeline possibly at risk, General Motors executives were locked in intense negotiations Monday with leaders of the United Automobile Workers over ways to cut its vast bills for retiree health care.
Given that they currently supply around 90percentt of the country's fuel and energy, that's a pretty solid lifeline Kim Jong Un's risking having cut off.
The deal throws a lifeline to Chrysler, which risks having to repay an emergency $4 billion loan to the federal government and losing the chance of further help if it cannot provide evidence of a credible turnaround plan.
Now that lifeline, too, is at risk.
Basic consideration is made on how comprehensively we can evaluate potential seismic risk of lifeline systems and gain an insight into the safety by way of information entropy, which transmits information of various kinds under uncertainties.
Any existing lifelines at high risk should be mitigated to meet acceptable performance standards.
Yet it has already thrown a lifeline to people at high risk of losing insurance or being uninsured, including young adults and people with chronic health problems, and it has made a start toward reforming the costly, dysfunctional American health care system.
The upgraded maternal and child health clinics and hospitals have become a lifeline for women with high-risk pregnancies who come to be monitored regularly.
Just imagine how empowering it would be for those at grave risk to themselves, from Tripoli to Tehran, to know they have a lifeline of caring people prepared to risk their own life and limb in brotherly and sisterly solidarity!
