Aug 08 2008
President Bush Pokes China In Its Oppressive Eye By Being At Olympics
President Bush, by personally being at the Olympics in China, is representing what the Chinese leaders fear most – Freedom. Â Freedom of speech, freedom to make personal choices, the neutering of government power compared to the independence of the individual. Â As leader of the Free West, Bush is doing the right thing by attending the Olympics so all of China can be reminded of the differences, and our greatness.
The Chinese leaders are reacting to each hint of a political jab by Bush, and it makes them look so small and cowardly in comparison. Â Bush represents the idea that government cannot fear expression, China represents how cowering leaders use government to stamp out free expression. Â What better foil to China’s cowardly oppression than to have the news following the leader of the free world, moving freely and expressing himself freely, in the capitol of China.
I salute Bush, who is not cowering back here in the states like so many others. He is up front and center representing America, cheering on our athletes, and poking the Chinese oppressor right in the eye. You can’t do that sitting here in America watching it all on TV.
OH let me cry over this new Anti-Americanism.
It’s nothing new. America has always been hated and always will be hated.
Read this from Mark Twain , responding to an ex-pat in France during the Spanish-American war:
A Word Of Encouragement For Our Blushing Exiles
“…Well, what do you think of our country now? And what do you think of the figure she is cutting before the eyes of the world? For one, I am ashamed.”
[Extract from a long and heated letter from a Voluntary Exile, Member of the American Colony, Paris.]
And so you are ashamed. I am trying to think out what it can have been that has produced this large attitude of mind and this fine flow of sarcasm. Apparently you are ashamed to look Europe in the face; ashamed of the American name; temporarily ashamed of your nationality. By the light of remarks made to me by an American here in Vienna, I judge that you are ashamed because:
1. We are meddling where we have no business and no right; meddling with the private family matters of a sister nation; intruding upon her sacred right to do as she pleases with her own, unquestioned by anybody.
2. We are doing this under a sham humanitarian pretext.
3. Doing it in order to filch Cuba, the formal and distinct disclaimer in the ultimatum being very, very thin humbug, and easily detectable by you and virtuous Europe.
4. And finally you are ashamed of all this because it is new, and base, and brutal, and dishonest; and because Europe, having had no previous experience of such things, is horrified by it and can never respect us nor associate with us any more.
Brutal, base, dishonest? We? Land Thieves? Shedders of innocent blood? We? Traitors to our official word? We? Are we going to lose Europe’s respect because of this new and dreadful conduct? Russia’s, for instance? Is she lying stretched out on her back in Manchuria, with her head among her Siberian prisons and her feet in Port Arthur, trying to read over the fairy tales she told Lord Salisbury, and not able to do it for crying because we are maneuvering to treacherously smouch Cuba from feeble Spain, and because we are ungently shedding innocent Spanish blood?
Is it France’s respect that we are going to lose? Is our unchivalric conduct troubling a nation which exists to-day because a brave young girl saved it when its poltroons had lost it – a nation which deserted her as one man when her day of peril came? Is our treacherous assault upon a weak people distressing a nation which contributed Bartholomew’s Day to human history? Is our ruthless spirit offending the sensibilities of the nation which gave us the Reign of Terror to read about? Is our unmanly intrusion into the private affairs of a sister nation shocking the feelings of the people who sent Maximilian to Mexico? Are our shabby and pusillanimous ways outraging the fastidious people who have sent an innocent man (Dreyfus) to a living hell, taken to their embraces the slimy guilty one, and submitted to indignities Emile Zola – the manliest man in France?
Is it Spain’s respect that we are going to lose? Is she sitting sadly conning her great history and contrasting it with our meddling, cruel, perfidious one – our shameful history of foreign robberies, humanitarian shams, and annihilations of weak and unoffending nations? Is she remembering with pride how she sent Columbus home in chains; how she sent half of the harmless West Indians into slavery and the rest to the grave, leaving not one alive; how she robbed and slaughtered the Inca’s gentle race, then beguiled the Inca into her power with fair promises and burned him at the stake; how she drenched the New World in blood, and earned and got the name of The Nation With The Bloody Footprint; how she drove all the Jews out of Spain in a day, allowing them to sell their property, but forbidding them to carry any money out of the country; how she roasted heretics by the thousands and thousands in her public squares, generation after generation, her kings and her priests looking on as at a holiday show; how her Holy Inquisition imported hell into the earth; how she was the first to institute it and the last to give it up – and then only under compulsion; how, with a spirit unmodified by time, she still tortures her prisoners to-day; how, with her ancient passion for pain and blood unchanged, she still crowds the arena with ladies and gentlemen and priests to see with delight a bull harried and persecuted and a gored horse dragging his entrails on the ground; and how, with this incredible character surviving all attempts to civilize it, her Duke of Alva rises again in the person of General Weyler – to-day the most idolized personage in Spain – and we see a hundred thousand women and children shut up in pens and pitilessly starved to death?
Are we indeed going to lose Spain’s respect? Is there no way to avoid this calamity – or this compliment? Are we going to lose her respect because we have made a promise in our ultimatum which she thinks we shall break? And meantime is she trying to recall some promise of her own which she has kept?
Is the Professional Official Fibber of Europe really troubled with our morals? Dear Parisian friend, are you taking seriously the daily remark of the newspaper and the orater about “this noble nation with an illustrious history”? That is mere kindness, mere charity for a people in temporary hard luck. The newspaper and the orator do not mean it. They wink when they say it.
And so you are ashamed. Do not be ashamed; there is no occasion for it.
[Mark Twain. Written in 1898, first published in 1923 – Ed.]
So I say to you snivelling Leftists and sanctimonious craven cowards, I dont give a crap what you think.
Our countries didn’t get where they are today because of you lilliputians… though you will be our downfalls.
VinceP1974 wrote:
OH let me cry over this new Anti-Americanism.
[TWAIN]
I’ve never seen that. Very good.
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What about the Portugese, French, Arabs, Romans, Chinese and the English? At least the English proudly stuck by their “British Law” and the King proclaimed in 1836 that no part of South Australia except wasteland should be taken from the natives.
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They took it anyway but it’s never been legal. Still, one third of this whole continent has been returned to the owners so far.
Ray
This is also why Obama will not be popular with the real power brokers and the war hawks. He will be bad for business
Wrong son. Obama is backed by the same “defence” industry honchos as the Republicans. He’s also got plenty of Council on Foreign Relations hacks in his campaign. The problem is not Republican America. The problem is America itself. It is the enemy of the Western world. All of the countries under the American Empire have been infected with the cultural Marxism the Americans export through their political, economic, and cultural domination of formerly free nations. The danger with Obama is that he may make the American Empire attractive to many. (Witness the idiot German provincials paying homage to their future Emperor in Berlin the other week).
As leader of the Free West, Bush is doing the right thing by attending the Olympics so all of China can be reminded of the differences, and our greatness.
I swear if I read that anywhere but Stratasphere I would consider it a fine parody.
The Chinese people don’t want freedom. They are highly ethnocentrist nationalists whether they live in China or the West. The Chinese see the individual as a part of a group. Individualism to them is decadent and selfish.
Point of clarification, Ray – you can say “returned to it’s original state before discovery” but you cannot say “returned to it’s owners.” Aboriginal culture had no concept of land ownership which entails a concept of property rights, so it is an imposition of your own culture to claim that they “owned” the land. They did not – no one did. And not even they would have argued that they had, except those who were culturally contaminated by western philosophy and rights systems.
They lived on the land in its natural state, and it may well be beneficial to preserve that arrangement and prevent newcomers from taking advantage, but they did not, by any stretch of the imagination, “own” the land.
Isn’t it fascinating to read the posts of those who truly hate America…which really means they are jealous as hell of what we have.
Yeah, we’re all so jealous of your desolute cities that look like war zones, your dull philistine suburbs, strip malls, chain stores, black on white racial violence, obese women, evolution deniers, and, of course, your incompetent military (have they bombed a wedding party this week or killed some British/Canadian soldiers in a ‘friendly fire’ incident?) That’s right. We’re so jealous! LOL.
Russia seems to be invading Georgia
You mean the way the US invaded Iraq?
Given the way the US supported Kosovo’s independence I don’t see why Russia can’t support South Ossetia. The Kosovo ‘exception’ Condi Rice spoke of may now become the ‘Kosovo precedent’.
WWS wrote:
Point of clarification, Ray – you can say “returned to it’s original state before discovery†but you cannot say “returned to it’s owners.†Aboriginal culture had no concept of land ownership which entails a concept of property rights, so it is an imposition of your own culture to claim that they “owned†the land. They did not – no one did. And not even they would have argued that they had, except those who were culturally contaminated by western philosophy and rights systems.
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They lived on the land in its natural state, and it may well be beneficial to preserve that arrangement and prevent newcomers from taking advantage, but they did not, by any stretch of the imagination, “own†the land.
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I’m familiar with most of cliches and their real meanings, but that’s only playing with words. They didn’t “own” land in the sense that WE own land and can sell it, but any Aboriginal lawman who has “walked his land” (many thousands of kilometres in some cases) will tell you what one of them told me. Each TRIBE has always owned their land and they know exactly where their boundaries are. This whole continent is mapped and shows each tribes boundaries and many of the sub-divisions within them.
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Today for example there is no way any tribe can sell any part of THEIR land to the Australian government or anyone else. They can certainly give permission for people to enter or stay in their land – as one tribal council expressly and ceremonially did for me and my extended family.
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Aboriginal people, whom I’ve mix with a lot for a few decades, never considered that they owned the air above them either, but they like us, would have done something about it if the air above them (that they didn’t actually “own” was messed with).
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One thing I’ve always remembered about the first settlers arriving on a particular tribe’s land is that the people had no fear of the visitors staying too long or try to take it “Because they will miss their OWN land and need to return to it soon”
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Their own attachment to their land was so strong that they couldn’t comprehend strangers being any different. I suppose we all had ancestors who were the same before the Industrial Revolution when families stayed in the same area for centuries.
Ray
Jules where are you from?
Since criticizing Bush’s policies appears to be considered anti-american by most of you conservatives, does that mean that if Obama wins this election (a) you will not criticize any of his policies because you are true americans or (b) you will become the new traitor and anti-american wing of the country?
Jules Roy wrote:
Isn’t it fascinating to read the posts of those who truly hate America…which really means they are jealous as hell of what we have.
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Yeah, we’re all so jealous of your desolute cities that look like war zones, [……]
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I’m not jealous of the prison situation. I saw the other day that 1 in 4 people on the whole planet who are in jail are in American jails 🙁
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This is all getting a bit lop-sided. We need to throw in some of the good stuff to balance things up a bit.
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Oh, one more negative thing. The U.S. Administration should NEVER have allowed the magazine “The Saturday Evening Post” to fold because those fabulous pictures on the front cover were admired by the whole world, and did a lot to show sides of the U.S. that were not publicized enough anywhere else.
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I suppose we’ll get some Yank in here bragging about having SEEN one of those small towns or even lived in one!
Ray
conman wrote:
Since criticizing Bush’s policies appears to be considered anti-american by most of you conservatives, does that mean that if Obama wins this election:
(a) you will not criticize any of his policies because you are true americans or
(b) you will become the new traitor and anti-american wing of the country?
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All of this Tagging of people with funny names, some of which i don’t even understand, seems idiotic to me. It’s quite impossible for people to be one thing for a minute then the opposite in the next breath, just because the opinion seems to align with some political party or group.
It really IS idiotic.
It’s how 12 year old boys talk at school.
Ray
VinceP1974 wrote:
Jules where are you from?
I rarely ask questions like that myself because prejudice kicks in too quickly.
One problem with your argument, Bresch: we are not Nazi Germany.
I never said we were. But the unwillingness or inability of a people to tell its leaders “This is wrong” when they are doing wrong is not an admirable trait.
The element missing from this discussion is a good-faith relationship.
There are those who are not interested whatsoever in having a good-faith relationship with America/Americans.
It is so evident on this thread.
And Bresch, I repeat again: you do not know George W. Bush personally.
For the record he is one of the most decent, honorable, America-loving presidents we have ever had. For the record I would trust him with my life.
So we can agree to disagree. 🙂
ivehadit wrote:
The element missing from this discussion is a good-faith relationship.
There are those who are not interested whatsoever in having a good-faith relationship with America/Americans.
It is so evident on this thread.
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I’m not half as literate as I may sound. What is a ‘good faith relationship’?
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We’ve got some people whining about America- so are you suggesting it’s not possible to do that honestly – or what?
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Also, is it not possible to do it if you are from the wrong country?
I just don’t geddit — it sounds like some sort of whacky board game.
Ray
Ray – more Americans live in small towns than live in big ones. I guess you don’t realize that. I recently had the privilege of meeting with some New Zealanders and Ozzies visiting the States for the first time. (we were all in Florida at the time) The one thing they all kept repeating was that they couldn’t believe how green and open everything was, compared to the way the US is portrayed to them. Jules “desolute cities” remark reminded me of them.
They were all continually astonished that what they were regularly shown on their media bore no relation at all to what being in the US is actually like. I found it rather amusing, in a nice kind of way. Rather like the Brit who came over and wrote about how, in spite of (HA! he sure didn’t get it!) the cowboy reputation, walking the streets anywhere in the US feels far safer and far more peaceful than walking the streets of London, or any other major UK city.
Maybe it’s because the criminals and thugs are actually in jail here – imagine that. As far as the jail stat you quoted – oh, you actually believe China reports any numbers honestly at all? And you ignore the fact that most of Russia’s psychiatric hospitals contain “medical” patients who have been put there for criticizing Putin? All that stat means is that the US is probably the only country who actually deals with it’s problems (the way the UK doesn’t) and then reports honestly about it. The real point is that these criminals aren’t put in jail by the Federal Govm’t, federal prosecutions are a very small percentage of criminal proceedings. (probably less than 1% of the total, although I need to look tht up) They are all put there by the citizens of their local communities. And the law-abiding members of these communities are all far safer because of it.
One other funny thing I noticed about the New Zealanders and Ozzies I met, which I was reminded of by the “Not jealous of the strip malls” comment – we all get pretty bored by the malls, except when we need something. But the New Zealanders! To a man (or I should say, woman!) they spent an entire day at the local mall, (I went to the beach) and they all came back saying it was the most wonderful thing they’d ever seen. I’d say “it’s just a mall” and they’d say “No, but it had everything, stuff we’d never seen, and it was so big!!!” Yeah, it’s a mall, what’d you expect? “But we’d never seen anything like it, we didn’t want to leave!!!”
The things everyone here takes for granted amaze the rest of the world, even Ozzies.
ivehadit wrote:
And Bresch, I repeat again: you do not know George W. Bush personally.
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This is all getting mind-numbingly ridiculous. (The concept of not judging facts unless one knows the person personally).
WWS wrote:
“Maybe it’s because the criminals and thugs are actually in jail here – imagine that. As far as the jail stat you quoted – oh, you actually believe China reports any numbers honestly at all?”
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Well you know what they say about stats, but in any case the figures per 100,000 seem to be about 5 times higher than most other places. They shot up like a rocket in about 1980. What the hell happened then?
Ray