Two posts at the Captain's Journal give us more information than we want to know and the 2008 Report to Congress, U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, just the executive summary, gives us an expanded view of the vulnerable position we have been placed in.
More information can be found at A Jacksonian.
One quotation from the Conclusions of the 2008 Report to Congress may be of particular interest: "The Chinese government has created an information control regime intended to regulate nearly every venue that might transmit information to China's citizens: the print and broadcast media, the Internet, popular entertainment, cultural activities, and education." pg. 15
Further: "Personnel working in the media, educational, and cultural fields have been conditioned into self-censorship by the rewards and punishments of China's information control system and also face possible fines, demotion, termination of employment, and even prison for publishing information contrary to the party's preferred narratives." pg. 15
Additionally: "The Chinese government has established an extensive physical infrastructure to screen and monitor information on the Internet. An Internet police force of large but indeterminate size monitors and censors information on the Internet." pg. 15
Is this the control we want against differences of political opinion in America? This control, this intolerance and stifling of "freedom of speech" is the purpose of the "Fairness Doctrine". As long as we have a political system which allows us to change leadership through elections, we cannot afford to re-enact unconstitutional legislation such as the "Fairness Doctrine".
We have to guard our freedoms - for the safety of all of us. We have enough external folks waging "war" against us declared or not; we don't need anymore than we already have here at home.
The Chinese use of State controlled companies to go after western technology is one of the most underappreciated aspect of how China works. An example of how they worked to get an agreement with 3COM to then utilize that knowledge to duplicate Cisco routers and then produce knock-offs until Cisco sued them is but one example of how this works. Huawei is one of the worst offenders in this, but there are numerous State companies with direct ties to the Peoples Liberation Army and INTEL officers that direct companies to go after certain technologies and markets. This flies under western radar as it is intellectual property theft, and yet it is one of the cheapest and fastest ways for the Chinese State to gain advanced technology.
ReplyDeleteThat said their economy is built on Non-Performing Loans at a clip that makes the Asian bubble of the late '80s look like a minor hiccup. If the Japanese bubble burst with a mere 10% of the economy based on bad loans, what will the Chinese one look like with 30-60% based on such loans? In trying to reach out, China is destroying its agricultural base while not getting long-term production up to any modern standards. Who needs efficient equipment when you have so much cheap labor?
Thus China, as a problem, has been festering for nearly two decades. Their inroads into organied crime via ethnic groups is slowly unraveling their commercial base, the global downturn now puts millions out of work in a single quarter and all western analysis of Chinese economics indicates the leadership 'pads' its numbers horrifically to make the place 'look good'.
The question of Chinese leadership understanding even a fraction of this comes to mind, as the ethnic tensions that are in the far western parts of China are now staring to call into question the control of the State, itself, over them. Going after the west to raise funds, bring down competitors and such actually doesn't do much for China internally... and if the US fails in Afghanistan or Pakistan goes into the tank, China will then find itself having to deal with terror exporting groups that will have no way to be bought off this time. Something is going to 'give' in China. And central asia thrown into turmoil is something we truly do not need... and yet it is what China is asking for.