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China, Tibet and the Propaganda
Olympics
WILLIAM BLUM
Counterpunch
Monday, March 31, 2008
The latest protests in Tibet and crackdown by Chinese authorities
have brought up the usual sermonizing in the West about Chinese
government oppression and illegitimate control of the Tibetans.
Although I have little love for the Chinese leaders -- I think
they run a cruel system -- some proper historical perspective
is called for here.
Many Tibetans regard themselves as autonomous or independent,
but the fact remains that the Beijing government has claimed Tibet
as part of China for more than two centuries. The United States
made its position clear in 1943:
"The Government of the United States has borne in mind
the fact that the Chinese Government has long claimed suzerainty
over Tibet and that the Chinese constitution lists Tibet among
areas constituting the territory of the Republic of China. This
Government has at no time raised a question regarding either
of these claims. (See "Foreign Relations of the United
States, 1943, China", Department of State, 1957, p.630.)
After the communist revolution in 1949 US officials tended to
be more equivocal about the matter.
Even as the Chinese were attacking Tibetan protestors, New York
City Police were beating up and literally threatening to kill
"Free Tibet" protestors in front of the United Nations.
It's all on video.
(Article continues below)
The Washington Post recently ran a story about how the Chinese
people largely support the government suppression of the Tibetan
protesters. The heading was: "Beijing's Crackdown Gets Strong
Domestic Support. Ethnic Pride Stoked by Government Propaganda."
The article spoke of how Beijing officials have "educated"
the public about Tibet "through propaganda".
That's a rather interesting concept. Imagine the Post or any
other American mainstream media saying that those Americans who
support the war in Iraq do so because they've been educated by
government propaganda. ... Ditto those who support the war in
Afghanistan. ... Ditto those who supported the bombing of Yugoslavia.
... Ditto scores of other US invasions, bombings, overthrows,
and miscellaneous war crimes spanning more than half a century.
Now Germany's foreign minister has warned China that its response
to the crisis in Tibet may jeopardize the Summer Olympics in Beijing.
"The German federal government is saying to the Chinese government:
be transparent! We want to know exactly what is going on in Tibet."
He also warned China to avoid any violent measures in its standoff
with Tibetan protesters. Human rights organizations have demanded
that Coca-Cola, Visa, General Electric, and other international
companies explain their dealings with the Chinese government as
it prepares to host the Summer Games. The French Foreign Minister
floated the prospect of boycotting the Games' opening ceremony
because of China's response to the protests. And the president
of the European Parliament said European countries should not
rule out threatening China with a boycott if violence continued
in Tibet.
It's nice to see the West's conscience stirred up. They're real
good about such things, when the target is not one of their own,
particularly against a communist country. In 1980, 62 nations
-- including the United States, Canada, West Germany, Japan, and
Israel -- boycotted the Olympics in Moscow because the previous
year the Soviet Union had invaded Afghanistan. Four years later,
the Olympics were held in Los Angeles. Not a single member of
"The Free World" boycotted it, even though the previous
year the United States had invaded Grenada and overthrown the
government, with a lot less political justification than the Russians
had for invading Afghanistan. The Grenada invasion was as much
lacking in legality and morality as the invasion of Iraq in 2003.
The Soviet Union and 13 of its allies stayed away from the Los
Angeles Olympics, but when the Russians announced the boycott
they cited only security concerns. President Reagan had declared
at the time of the invasion that Grenada was "a Soviet-Cuban
colony being readied as a major military bastion to export terror
and undermine democracy, but we got there just in time."
One would think that Moscow would have mentioned Grenada at least
for the satisfaction of throwing Afghanistan and the 1980 boycott
in Washington's face. The fact that the Russians made no such
mention was a measure of how unconcerned they were about the tiny
island nation and its alleged future as a major Soviet military
bastion. The magnitude and variety of Reagan administration lies
that accompanied the invasion of Grenada may have stood as a record
until the Bush administration topped it in Iraq 20 years later.
Tough Enough to be President?
Genghis Khan "too soft", Some Voters Say
A recurring theme of Hillary Clinton's campaign for the presidency
has been that she has more of the right kind of experience needed
to deal with national security and foreign policy issues than
Barack Obama. Her notorious campaign ad tells us: It's three a.m.
and your children are safe and asleep; but there's a phone in
the White House and it's ringing; something really bad is happening
somewhere; and voters are asked who they want answering the phone.
Of course they should want Hillary and her marvelous experience.
(If she's actually explained what that marvelous experience is,
I missed it. Perhaps her near-death experience in Bosnia?)
Typical of Clinton's growing corps of conservative followers,
the Washington Times recently lent support to this theme. The
right-wing newspaper interviewed a group of "mostly conservative
retired [military] officers, industry executives and current defense
officials", who cite Mr. Obama's lack of experience in national
security.
And so it goes. And so it has gone for many years. What is it
with this experience thing for public office? It was not invented
by Hillary Clinton. If I need to have my car repaired I look for
a mechanic with experience with my particular car. If I needed
an operation I'd seek out a surgeon with lots of experience performing
that particular operation. But when it comes to choosing a person
for political office, the sine qua non consideration is what their
politics are. Who would you choose between two candidates -- one
who was strongly against everything you passionately supported
but who had decades of holding high government positions, or one
who shared your passion on every important issue but had never
held any public office? Is there any doubt about which person
almost everyone would go for? So why does this "experience"
thing keep coming up in so many elections?
A recent national poll questioned registered voters about the
candidates' "approach to foreign policy and national security".
43 per cent thought that Obama would be "not tough enough"
(probably a reflection of the "experience" factor),
while only 3 per cent thought he'd be "too tough". For
Clinton the figures were 37 per cent and 9 per cent. The evidence
is overwhelming that decades of very tough -- nay, brutal -- US
policies toward the Middle East has provoked extensive anti-American
terrorism; the same in Latin America in earlier decades, yet this
remains an alien concept to most American voters, who think that
toughness works (even though they know it doesn't work on Americans
-- witness the reaction to 9/11).
John McCain, who is proud to have dropped countless bombs on
the people of Vietnam, who had never done him or his country any
harm until he and his country invaded them, who now (literally)
sings in public about bombing the people of Iran, and who tells
us he's prepared to remain in Iraq for 100 years, is still regarded
as "not tough enough" by 16 per cent and "too tough"
by only 25 per cent. What does it take to convince Americans that
one of their leaders is a bloody psychopath? Like the two psychos
he may replace. How has 225 years of our grand experiment in democracy
wound up like this? And why is McCain regularly referred to as
a "war hero"? He was shot down and captured and held
prisoner for more than five years. What's heroic about that? In
most other kinds of work, such a record would be called a failure.
Winston Churchill said that "The best argument against democracy
is a five-minute conversation with the average voter." And
if that doesn't do it for you, try a five-minute conversation
with almost any American politician. This thing called democracy
continues to be used as a substitute for human liberation.
One parting thought about Obama: Is he prepared to distance himself
from Rev. Martin Luther King as he has from his own minister,
Rev. Jeremiah Wright? King vehemently denounced the Vietnam War
and called the United States "the most violent nation in
the world". Like Wright, he was strongly condemned for his
remarks. As T.S. Eliot famously observed: "Humankind can
not bear very much reality."
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INFOWARS:
BECAUSE THERE'S A WAR ON FOR YOUR MIND
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