Friday, March 4, 2011

Asia's "End Game": China

If #Saudi Arabia is the "end game" in uprising in north Africa and Middle East, the "end game" in Asia will be #China.

Aside from the phony "Jasmine" revolution, which does look to be one of those Soros/US government-funded "color revolutions", the Communist regime in China seems to be feeling the heat. Not from their own citizens (not yet, anyway) but from Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Bahrain, Yemen, now Saudi Arabia, where the ruled have finally said "enough is enough". In Asia, pockets of protests have started to appear in Communist Vietnam and North Korea, and South Koreans are busy withdrawing their money from their banks.

So, what do they do? Preemptive strike: Placate the populace quickly before they start to get funny ideas in spite of the government banning #Egypt from Twitter.

From Al Jazeera (3/5/2011):

China's government has vowed to clamp down on inflation and urgently raise incomes, as Wen Jiabao, the country's premier, devoted most of his country's equivalent of the US 'State of the Union' speech to addressing citizens' economic concerns.

Addressing the opening of the National People's Congress on Saturday, Jiabao said that the country's working class and rural residents would receive more assistance from the government, in a move aimed at sharing the benefits of rapid economic growth across more sectors of society.

Living standards are rising in China, but there have been complaints about accompanying rises in prices, as well as a lack of equitability in the benefits of national economic growth.

"We must make improving the people's lives a pivot linking reform, development and stability ... and make sure people are content with their lives and jobs, society is tranquil and orderly and the country enjoys long-term peace and stability," Wen told the legislature's nearly 3,000 members.

It is very true that the Chinese are more "economic"-minded than other races; as long as they have money and are well-fed, they couldn't care less about political issues.

Now, however, thanks to Ben "Bernank" of the US Federal Reserve and also to the long-standing Chinese policy of pegging (officially or not, tightly or loosely, it is "pegged") the currency to US dollar to keep their exported (junky) goods competitive, the money people have is worth less and less each day. The food prices have gone so much in a short time that the Chinese government has decided to reduce weight of foods in their CPI.

So what tool that's still left? State propaganda:

Chinese media, meanwhile, warned citizens against attempting to emulate popular protest movements in the Middle East and North Africa, warning that any threats to Communist Party-led stability could bring "disaster".

"Everyone knows that stability is a blessing and chaos is a calamity," said the Beijing Daily newspaper, which is the mouthpiece of the Communist Party administration for China's capital.

Yeah. Try to tell that to Tunisians and Egyptians and Libyans. The mouthpiece sounds like Saif al-Islam Gaddafi, actually.

Everybody knows that dice are loaded
Everybody rolls with their fingers crossed
Everybody knows the war is over

Everybody knows the good guys lost
Everybody knows the fight is fixed
The poor stay poor, the rich get rich
That's how it goes
Everybody knows

(Leonard Cohen "Everybody Knows")

And against that "fixed" fight people in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, and other Middle East countries have risen. Can the Chinese government succeed in keep fixing the fight?

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