I should not be reading nor commenting on confidential diplomatic material, but who can resist the temptation? Up to now, there is nothing in them to change one's world view, on the contary, they confirm what it is obvious. The Chinese leadership comes through as rational, decent, hardworking people, which in my opinion they are. They are also incredibly sensitive to how they are perceived by others and tending to hysterical over-reaction in that area. Like the bloody conflict triggered by tricking someone to dress informally for a formal social event (the story is Japanese, but serves to illustrate the idea). Google, one of America's largest companies, was almost thrown out of China. Now we know what caused this very serious problem and it was none other than...
XXXXXXXXXXXXX, CDA Dan Piccuta and XXXXXXXXXXXX talked XXXXXXXXXX about the increasing censorship pressure Google is facing.XXXXXXXXXXXX said Politburo Standing Committee member XXXXXXXXXXXX recently discovered that Google's worldwide site is uncensored, and is capable of Chinese language searches and search results. XXXXXXXXXXXX allegedly entered his own name and found results critical of him.The Communist Party's Standing Committee has 150 members and is China's governing organization.
The pic is (possibly) unrelated to the context. In my opinion, most conflicts and mental disorders are caused by people taking themselves too seriously. We should relax and contemplate that nothing is really important, and in a few million years, the sun will explode and no trace of us will remain.
6 comments:
Politburo standing committee member XXXXXXXX is Li Changchun. Another exercise in cultures talking past each other - the communist apparatchik cannot conceive of the idea of a private business that would dare print insulting information about the #5 ranking Politburo member but the 21st century search engine recognizes no limits. On the other hand, China's economic development depends on the free flow of information. This will ultimately be the communists undoing - you cannot have a market system and centralized control at the same time - they are like matter and anti-matter and can not co-exist.
K
K,
We shouldn't read other people's private correspondence. But since we are doing it, the cable mentions Politburo member XXXXXXXXXXXX and not Uncle Li. And it is not Google that "printed" offensive comments but the commenter. Anyway, I find the episode funny, Google probably didnt.
The Wikileaks story is pretty incredible. One rougue PFC can lay to waste all the elaborate protocols that a superpower constructs around its secret communications. US embassy staff all over the world look like chumps now. This reminds of another PFC, actually the ex-PFC Wintergreen in Joseph Heller's Catch-22 who had similar powers.
I don't blame the PFC. Who designed a system where lowly PFCs had access to the entire database of diplomatic cables and was able to download them? Also, I thought that gays were prohibited from serving in the military and yet they let this one remain. He was apparently depressed over a breakup with his boyfriend.
The NYT "outs" Uncle Li as being the XXXXXX in question. They only respect privacy when it suits them politically.
The idea that Google does not "print" anything but is merely a search engine is surely lost on Uncle Li - all he knows is that if you type his name (in Chinese characters no less) on Google you get back insults. This must be stopped or his job at the top of the information control hierarchy is worthless. Google is PFC Manning to him and PFC Manning sits in jail. From the Chinese POV, they have a legal system of what is and is not permissible to "print" and anyone who circumvents it is a law breaker. Maybe this type of speech is protected speech in the West but not under their system. Google wanted to do business in China. If Baidu came to the US could they operate under Chinese laws instead of American?
K
Uncle Li is an old Communist who is used to Pravda or its Chinese equivalent. If he and others like him succeed, the free exchange of information on the internet will have lasted about a decade. Already, the anonimity on the web is an illusion. I know people who has stopped using mobile phone and email. The future belong to people like Barak Obama who has left no paper track and published almost nothing and possibly never wrote a personal letter. I write because am old and have no future.
Uncle Li thinks that he has won but he has lost - the Chinese people (those who care to) have access to information anyway (if they didn't they couldn't function economically which is the #1 priority of everyone in China including the gov.). And now Li's actions have backfired - if you google his name now (even in Chinese) there are many more negative references to him than ever. When you try to stamp out a brush fire on the internet, all you do is spread a thousand sparks.
K
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