Wednesday, March 17, 2010

Around Asia: China on the Prowl

Hey, like any cat they can sense danger:

QUIET WELCOME - President Obama welcomed the Dalai Lama to  the White House yesterday and lauded his goals for the Tibetan people,  but he kept the visit low-key in an attempt to avoid inflaming tensions  with China. Obama told the exiled spiritual leader that he backs the  preservation of Tibet’s culture and supports human rights for its  people.
QUIET WELCOME
- President Obama welcomed the Dalai Lama to the White House yesterday and lauded his goals for the Tibetan people, but he kept the visit low-key in an attempt to avoid inflaming tensions with China. Obama told the exiled spiritual leader that he backs the preservation of Tibet’s culture and supports human rights for its people. (White House Photo By Pete Souza)."

I know it is not a popular thing to say, but the good guy is
CIA.

That's why the college loved him so much, 'eh?

The non-violence always sounds good to the ear; however, one then must turn and reconcile the fart mist with the Empirical Reality of the AmeriKan Military Machine, if you know what I mean.

Confirmation of the CIA connection
:

"China and Tibet: A message in a meeting

President Obama’s meeting yesterday with the Dalai Lama was presented as a purely private chat rather than a public event endowed with the aura of a state visit. Despite this shading of protocol meant to placate China’s leaders, the encounter of the two Nobel Peace Prize laureates delivered a message that can only please Tibetans and displease the regime in Beijing....

Oh, yeah, Obama has one of them, too. Shows you how discredited that award is as well as the undeserved bestowing of such upon Obama. And I'm an American.

Whassat? GHANDI never won one?

Pfffft!


On the crucial issues of trade, currency valuation, and nuclear proliferation, Obama has no choice but to seek mutually beneficial compromises with China.

Btw, those happen to override all others.


But on human rights, religious freedom, and the cultural survival of Tibetans, there should be no compromising.

I read that conclusion and I think of torture, U.S. support of Israel, and the inability of the myopic Boston Globe to see it -- whether willful or not.


Of course, the rest of the coverage and selective choices in the newspaper makes sense now.


Let's get down to the real nitty-gritty:

"Poll suggests US influence waning as China’s grows; Americans predict smaller role in world economy" by John Pomfret and Jon Cohen, Washington Post | February 26, 2010

WASHINGTON - Facing high unemployment and a difficult economy, most Americans think the United States will have a smaller role in the world economy in the coming years, and many believe that while the 20th century may have been the “American Century,’’ the 21st century will belong to China.

These results come from a new Washington Post-ABC News poll conducted during a time of significant tension between Washington and Beijing.

Odd seeing as the American people seem reconciled to reality.

“China’s on the rise,’’ said Wayne Nunnery, 56, a retired US Air Force employee from Bexar, Texas, who was one of 1,004 randomly selected adults polled. “I don’t worry about a Chinese century, but I do wonder how it’s going to be for my three sons.’’

Look, the economic crap we can figure out; I just don't see the need for "tensions" or a WAR, 'kay?

Asked whether this century would be more of an “American Century’’ or a “Chinese Century,’’ Americans were divided evenly in terms of the economy (41 percent say Chinese, 40 percent American) and tilted toward the Chinese in terms of world affairs (43 percent say Chinese, 38 percent American).

Yes, EVEN the BRAIN-DEAD AmeriKan public recognizes that WE are the THREAT (due to our slavishness to Israel; there is no other explanation. I have no beef with the Chinese, Iranians, or anyone else we have already invaded and occupied).

A slim majority said the United States will play a diminished role in the world’s economy this century, and nearly half foresee the country’s position shrinking in world affairs more generally.

Yeah, we know we are on the decline. The question is what do we do about it, and do we have the time to do it?

The results are consistent with recent polls by Gallup, the Pew Research Center, and others that have tracked a significant public concern about China’s growing prominence on the world stage, as its economy has expanded into what is arguably the second biggest in the world.

I'm sorry, agenda-pushing, war-promoting press, but that's not the way I read those numbers.

In 2000, for example, when the US economy was booming, 65 percent of Americans polled by Gallup said the United States had the world’s strongest economy. By last year, the United States and China ran neck and neck on the question.

So you would prefer people stick their heads in s*** and ignore what is right in front of their sniffer when they answer a poll?

Just the response we want, please.

Actually, that puts the MSM polls into a whole new perspective and explains a lot.

Analysts say the bubbling anti-China sentiment in the United States could constitute a problem for US policy toward that country if the polls also coincide, as they seem to, with growing support for trade protectionism.

Anti-China sentiment? From where? An enraged public that sees "Made in China" on every product as their economy sheds jobs like a cat and closes factories? Since when did anyone in power listen to them?

Of course, that doesn't stop them from hitting Wal-Mart on the weekend to replace cheap crap from China that is falling apart after a year with more cheap crap from China that will fall apart in a year. Price is right, you know.

Ever feel like a cat chasing your tail, American?

Annetta Jordan, another poll participant, said in a follow-up interview that she has witnessed the shifting economic strength firsthand. Jordan, a mother of two from Sandoval, N.M., was working at a cellular telephone plant in the early 1990s as production and hiring were ramped up. By 1992, the plant had 3,200 workers. “Then this whole China thing started and we were very quickly training Chinese to take our jobs,’’ she said. The plant has 100 people left.

“We’re transferring our wealth to China,’’ she said. “I see that as a very negative thing. When I was younger, a lot of corporations had a lot of pride and patriotism toward America. But corporations have changed. If we in the US go down, that’s OK; they’ll just move their offices to Beijing.’’

Yeah, becau$e it i$ all about the you-know-what now, reader$.

Carla Hills, the former US trade representative who negotiated China’s entry into the World Trade Organization in the late 1990s, said any shift in American public opinion away from China is a concern.

Why? Globalist project at risk?

“I really worry about public opinion in both countries getting ahead of where we want to be,’’ she said. “I worry about the public discourse here that ‘it’s all China’s fault,’ and the reverse in China that says we’re trying to push China around.’’

One can't blame China for feeling that way after centuries of mistreatment at the hands of colonialists as well as our current round of double-talking.

Related: Around Asia: In a Land Down Under

And, of course, China is very active in another active and competitive resource zone in Africa, readers. And therein lies your tensions despite all the friendship talk.

In a poll last year in urban areas of China done by the Lowy Institute, Australia’s premier think tank, Chinese respondents picked the United States as the number one threat to China’s rise by a factor of two over Japan and India, which were tied for second place.

Yeah, the WHOLE WORLD sees the USraeli Empire as the NUMBER ONE THREAT.

Despite the mutual wariness, most Americans in the Post-ABC News poll said a diminished US role in the world’s economy or affairs would be positive or “neither good nor bad.’’

If it is the CURRENT ROLE or the WRONG ROLE, yeah; however, WE COULD DO THINGS RIGHT if we were to ROLL BACK the EMPIRE and TRULY ENGAGE the WORLD!

Of course, that means cutting Israel loose and in turn the wrath of the bankers.

For Andrew Kohut, president of the Pew Research Center, increasing public concerns with China remind him of America’s reaction to another rising Asian nation three decades ago: Japan.

“Anyone who would say that China has eclipsed the United States hasn’t been in a Chinese house,’’ he said.

Yeah, the vast number of people live in poverty because of the slave wages and underdeveloped rural regions.

But, he added, an “inflated view of what China is today’’ could have ramifications.

That's true about anyone and anything, and the first thought that comes to my mind is the hollering about Iran and a nuke bomb.

Then again, we have to have a threat out there or else there is no need for an empire, huh?

--more--"

So if the economy won't scare Americans, maybe this will:

"China boosts social spending, targets minorities" by Charles Hutzler, Associated Press Writer | March 4, 2010

BEIJING --China's government pushed ahead Friday with plans to strengthen economic growth while dampening social tensions, introducing a budget intended to narrow a rich-poor gap and bring growth to rebellious ethnic areas.

I have to tell you, this is not what I am looking at on my desk. The printed clipping is different, and this will again make three different rewrites and reedits of one story regarding China's budget.

WTF, MSM? I'm sick of the s***ty censorship and games, MSM.

In a speech that is China's equivalent of a state-of-the-nation address, Premier Wen Jiabao said the government would more than halve the increase in spending, to 11.4 percent, as it eases off the heavy stimulus that warded off last year's global recession. Still, Wen promised hefty outlays for pensions, education, health care and subsidies for farmers to buy small cars and household appliances -- all to spread prosperity more fairly.

Don't you wish you had such a government, Americans, rather than one that doles out your tax dough to banksters, war-looters, and well-connected corporations and clients?

"Everything we do, we do to ensure that the people live a happier life with more dignity and to make our society fairer and more harmonious," Wen told the nearly 3,000 deputies gathered in the Great Hall of the People for the opening of the National People's Congress....

Yeah, it sounds good, but the Chinese government is no picnic, either. All governments are self-promoting, self-serving liars anyway.

Wen's address mixed restrained triumphalism over China's growing power with hints of anxiety about percolating international and domestic troubles.

Yeah, the Chinese are arrogant s***s, right, Zionist MSM.

Now some near verbatim paragraphs:

With China having escaped the worst of the global downturn by ordering a flood of $1.4 trillion in bank lending and government stimulus, Chinese leaders see their model of heavy state intervention as having outperformed the capitalist West.

Yeah, how come your stimuloot didn't work, 'murkn?

Wen hailed the communist leadership for shepherding the recovery. China is now the world's largest auto market, its Internet users outnumber the U.S. population and its economy is on track to replace Japan as the globe's No. 2. Many Chinese take pride in the country's prosperity and global respect.

Why shouldn't they? Haven't we for so long, AmeriKa -- despite all the mayhem, chaos, and slaughter we have caused?

Yet Beijing is jutting elbows with the U.S. and Europe over climate change, Iran's nuclear program and the Chinese currency, which critics say is set artificially low to give China an unfair trade advantage.

Of course, if the advantages were in favor of the globalists.... they wouldn't be complaining, would they? They thought the Chinese Communists were just going to be a slave government over a slave society. Chinese leaders had other ideas in mind.

At home, Chinese are worried about rising housing prices and tiring of widespread official corruption and government policies that are seen as benefiting the communist elite, the wealthy and the connected; protests have become common to draw attention to land seizures, unpaid wages and other acts of unfairness....

Okay, wait a minute. PROTESTS COMMON in CHINA?

Not the impression my MSM has given me lo these may years.

And is it NOT SAD that the Chinese Communists are more worried about their public opinion than U.S. leaders are worried about theirs?

And the main thrust of my printed article:

Overall, government spending is projected to rise 11.4 percent from last year....

Significantly the increases were higher than that given the military, which is projected to receive a 7.5 percent budget boost, its lowest in two decades.

Oh, yeah, THAT SURE ISN'T GOING to FRIGHTEN you, is it, America?

And yet here Obomber sent over the largest request (and got it) ever last year: Over $700 BILLION dollars in "defense" alone.

Despite the emphasis on public fairness, the congress is highly staged political theater.

Like the AmeriKan press should be pointing fingers!

With all decisions made ahead of time by the leadership, the party-dominated congress -- and a simultaneous meeting of a government advisory body -- are more about networking than lawmaking, adding to public cynicism.

Oh, sort of like leadership in Congress hammering out things in the back room and then demanding passage before anyone can read 'em?

And I didn't know "networking" was Chinese for "lobbying," did you?

"It's a political carnival. Officials from all sectors from across the country pour into Beijing, bringing their aides and entourage," said Yang Fengchun, a professor of government at Peking University. "Negative public sentiment and social instability are increasing rapidly in China. These issues are not new ones. Only now they have become more severe and more evident, and they could carry social and political costs."

Think of it as China's Washington D.C., readers.

The annual session -- the most public event the authoritarian government holds -- took place amid heavy security in Beijing to prevent disruptions. Police in recent days warned and detained political activists. Uniformed and plainclothes police searched bags and blocked off vast Tiananmen Square, next to the meeting hall. More than two dozen people who hoped to petition officials for redress of grievances or who raised suspicion were bundled into a police bus and driven away.

Yeah, good thing that stuff never happens in AmeriKa!

--more--"

Weird. Web version was a total rewrite:

"China forecasts 8% economic growth this year" by Charles Hutzler, Associated Press | March 5, 2010

That's odd.

Same article in my printed paper; however, the headline is "In shift, China plans smaller defense increase."

BEIJING - China said today it will target economic growth of 8 percent this year, increase spending on social programs, and direct more development money at ethnic areas....

Wen gave his speech a day after the government announced it will propose its smallest increase in defense spending in two decades.

A spokesman for the national legislature said yesterday that the Cabinet plans to raise spending on its increasingly formidable military 7.5 percent to $77.9 billion....

That's it?!!!

We are spending TEN TIMES THAT MUCH, Americans!

Is it WORTH IT? Not exactly protecting YOUR ECONOMIC INTERESTS, are they?

And the war-promoting MSM sure did minimize that aspect of the story, huh?


Though specialists say China’s true military budget is higher, the rate of increase is the lowest since the 1980s, and analysts said that was directly tied to the new fiscal priorities.

“China has not fully recovered from the sluggish foreign trade and employment, and to some extent the government has financial difficulties,’’ said Ni Lexiong of Shanghai University of Politics and Law.

Hey, that paragraph appeared in my printed paper!

Wen’s speech was delivered in the Great Hall of the People on the edge of Tiananmen Square. The square was under heavy security. Police searched bags and blocked off the massive square with security tape, barring petitioners who come to Beijing during the legislative meetings in a desperate bid to seek help on various grievances.

Yeah, they are sure to get a nice, big, full paragraph on the oppression.

But protests are common. Somehow that didn't make this version.

--more--"

Also see: Changhong ‘Tina’ Yuan, 41; immigrated to raise her son

Just another piece of the agenda I guess.

Want some catnip, readers?

"11 Siberian tigers die at zoo in China" by Associated Press | March 13, 2010

Siberian tigers are  one of the world’s rarest species, with an estimated 300 left in the  wild, 50 in China. Above, some of the tigers ran around in another zoo  in China in January.
Siberian tigers are one of the world’s rarest species, with an estimated 300 left in the wild, 50 in China. Above, some of the tigers ran around in another zoo in China in January. (Ng Han Guan/ Associated Press)

What a great photograph!!

Lead cat has something in its mouth, doesn't it?


BEIJING — Eleven rare Siberian tigers have died at a wildlife park in a startling case that activists say hints at unsavory practices among some zoos and animal farms in China: They are overbreeding endangered animals in the hopes of making illicit profit on their carcasses.

The deaths of the tigers occurred in the past three months at the zoo in China’s frigid northeast, officials and state media said yesterday. Reports said the tigers starved to death, having been fed nothing but chicken bones, while a zoo manager said unspecified diseases killed the animals.

If you are malnourished you will get diseases, yup.

Either way, the animals had been ill-kept and ill-fed. The Shenyang Forest Wild Animal Zoo has struggled financially, even withholding pay from staff, said a woman in charge of corporate planning there who would only give her surname, Wang. The zoo had been up for auction for some time without any bidders, she said....

But the world has plenty of money for banks, wars, corporations.

But taking care of animals and treating them with respect for the sentient life forms they are?

Nah!

The deaths underscore conflicting signals in China’s attempts to save its dwindling number of tigers. While extensive conservation efforts are under way, animal protection groups say zoos and wildlife parks may be deliberately breeding more animals than they can afford, hoping to sell off the carcasses onto a black market where tiger parts fetch a high price for use in traditional medicines and liquor....

Yeah, no matter what the government$ name it alway$ $eem$ to come back to money.

--more--"

$peaking of which
:

"China says Google must abide by its rules on censorship" by Bloomberg News | March 13, 2010

HONG KONG — China said Google Inc. would be “unfriendly and irresponsible’’ if it defies rules to censor online content, escalating a dispute between the government and the owner of the most popular search engine.

Related: Giving China the Googley Eye

“The company will have to bear the related results’’ if rules are violated, said Li Yizhong, minister of industry and information technology, at a briefing yesterday in Beijing. “I hope Google will abide by Chinese laws and regulations,’’ he said, adding that it was up to Google to decide whether to stay.

Li’s comments intensify a feud that began in January, when Google said it would stop filtering search results in China after its computers were targeted by “highly sophisticated’’ attacks. Google may have to bow to the demands of Chinese authorities to stay in the country, said Joseph Cheng, a professor of politics at the City University of Hong Kong.

Censorship of Web content “is a matter of very high priority for the Chinese leadership,’’ Cheng said. “If Google intends to remain in China, it has to largely satisfy China’s demands.’’

Jessica Powell, a Tokyo-based spokeswoman at Google, declined to comment.

Google said on Jan. 12 that the cyber attacks targeted proprietary information as well as personal data belonging to human-rights activists who use the company’s e-mail service. The Chinese government denied involvement in the incident.

At least 20 other international companies in the technology, finance, and chemical industries were similarly targeted, Google said at the time. The company said it may have to pull out of China pending the talks.

China censors online content that it considers critical of the government by shutting down local websites and blocking access to overseas sites including Facebook Inc., Twitter Inc., and Google’s YouTube.

Related: FBI Goes Undercover on Facebook

Glad I'm not on any of them. What you see is what you get.

It also controls the media through state ownership of all newspapers, TV and radio stations.

Yeah, here in AmeriKa they play this self-deluded game that the media doesn't self-censor and serve government.

Yeah, that's why the rewritten, reedited, and scrubbed articles make me suspicious. Always wonder what they are concealing this time.

--more--"

And the Chinese might lose Google?

"Google’s reach in China is wide; Any pullout might hamper range of services" by Joe McDonald, Associated Press | March 17, 2010

BEIJING — China without Google — a prospect that looks increasingly likely — could mean no more maps on mobile phones.

Oh, heavens.

A free music service that has helped fight piracy might be in jeopardy.

Oh, $omething el$e at stake.

China’s fledgling Web outfits would face less pressure to improve, eroding their ability to one day compete abroad.

Chinese news reports say Google Inc. is on the verge of making good on a threat to shutter its China site, Google.cn....

Am I looking like I care?

The extent of a possible pullout from China is unclear. Services that might be affected range from advertising support for Chinese companies to online entertainment to its immense search engine.

“If Google leaves, it’s a lose-lose scenario, instead of Google loses and others gain,’’ said Edward Yu, president of Analysys International, a Beijing research firm.

Then the Chinese win, don't they?

Google says it is in talks with Beijing following its Jan. 12 announcement that it no longer wants to comply with Beijing’s extensive Web controls.

But they will hand over all your web searches to the U.S. government and the NSA!

But China’s industry minister insisted Friday the company must obey Chinese law, which appears to leave few options other than closing Google.cn, which has about 35 percent of China’s search market.

Such a step could have repercussions for major Chinese companies as well as local Web surfers.

It would deliver a windfall to local rival Baidu Inc., China’s major search engine, with 60 percent of the market.

So I guess China would win, huh?

But other companies rely on Google for search, maps, and other services....

Those must be the U.S. and western companies doing business in China.

That's why this is such a concern and a business story.

A key issue is whether Beijing, angry and embarrassed by Google’s public defiance, would allow the company to continue running other operations, including advertising and a fledgling mobile phone businesses, in China if Google.cn closes.

China promotes Internet use for business and education but bars access to sites run by human rights and political activists and some news outlets. Officials, who defend China’s controls by pointing to countries that bar content such as child pornography, are stung that Google has drawn attention to how much more pervasive Chinese limits are.

Yeah, how come those sites are rampant and never seem to get shut down?

See:

Government-Hosted Porn

Porn On the Web

Oh.

Related: Sunday Globe Chop Shop: Cutting Room Floor

I'll laugh in your face, a**holes. I never go to those sick s*** sites; I'm too busy getting behind here and reading newspapers.

Chinese Web surfers are blocked from seeing Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, and major blog-hosting services abroad, and a Google pullout would leave them increasingly isolated.

Oh, so they can't hook up with the FBI, 'eh?

Google hopes to keep operating its Beijing research and development center, advertising sales offices, and mobile phone business, according to a person familiar with the company’s thinking. But the person said the company won’t do that if it believes its decision to stop censoring search results will jeopardize employees in China. Industry analysts estimate Google has a work force of 700 in China....

Don't you wish they cared about you, Americans?

Uncertainty also surrounds Google’s China music portal, a free, advertising-supported service launched last year in partnership with four global music companies and 14 independent labels. Industry analysts say it has helped to undercut China’s rampant music piracy by offering an alternative to unlicensed copying.

Maybe the artists have a point; however, I really am sick of their whining.

Take anything you want from me and spread it wide, readers.

--more--"

Also see: Googling Control of Congress

Google trying to buy the world?