China Blocks Typepad, Prompts Weblog Blackout 422
dcm writes "As U.S. Ambassador Richard Williamson prepares to introduce a resolution at the U.N. Human Rights Commission to censure the Chinese Communist Party's (CCP) government for increasing 'repression of its people using the Internet, democratic dialogue, religious expression,' the regime continues to block discourse.On Friday, China began blocking access to Typepad, a paid weblog hosting service in San Mateo, California. The communist regime previously blocked access to BlogSpot, Blogger's free hosting site. Yan Sham-Shackleton filed a report on the Glutter weblog, mentioning China is '...now using blocking software to stop information from leaking into the county via personal sites, an increasingly vibrant China Internet community, and a place where users are slipping in banned information. Some sites in the blogging community are turning black in protest of this event while others are reporting the incident.'"
Please help us (Score:2, Funny)
Hello,
I am Kim Yee Ho Foo Yun Duck [mailto] and I live in China. Recently our interweb be blocked by communist party. We don't like communist party but can't have others won't let us vote other. Today we find that China now block sites like blogs.
Please tell your honorable President Bush to liberate us! Tell honorable President Bush we have oil if he need convincing!
Communist party must be stopped at all cos.1!~~
(0fv... . . #@(*!
NO CARRIER
Re:Please help us (Score:5, Insightful)
Holding Back The Inevitable (Score:5, Insightful)
Q: Why are the chinese communists so afraid of free exchange of ideas and criticism?
A: They're afraid they'll have to give up power and find real jobs.
It's not the security of the country tyrants desire, it's their own security. It's unfair to call them leaders.
The more you tighten your grip, Tarkin, the more star systems will slip through your fingers.
Re:Holding Back The Inevitable (Score:4, Insightful)
A: They're afraid they'll have to give up power and find real jobs.
That's exactly why communism looks great on chalkboards but never pans out in reality. It becomes hard to avoid eventual corruption in the leadership... a stable government requires a way to overthrow the leaders with a fair election.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Holding Back The Inevitable (Score:3, Interesting)
when was communism ever tried in reality? i believe you're referring to a system called state capitalism [wikipedia.org] that has often been mistaken as "communism" in the west.
if you want to discuss communism, i'd suggest you first investigate catalonia from '36 to '38 [blackened.net].
Not Indefinitly (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Not Indefinitly (Score:3, Informative)
Anyway, to bring this back on topic, last week's Economist (don't be put off by the title, grasshopper) had a great survey of Chinese politics, culture and business. [economist.com] A fun read and enlightening, too.
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Not Indefinitly (Score:3, Interesting)
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Holding Back The Inevitable (Score:5, Insightful)
When did communism ever look great on chalkboards?
During the design phase, before it was actually implemented, communism sounded great. Utopia here we come! Not that it hasn't suffered from lack of trying. Kind of like Death March programming projects.
To be fair, capitalism, also great looking on the chalkboard, grows warts over time. And much for the same reasons as communism does; the actual implementation involves Real People that care zero about other people. It's hard to program around that.
Re:Holding Back The Inevitable (Score:3, Insightful)
When you consider people as static variables and not prone to natural human influences. That's why you need checks and balances in any successful (and just) political system. It's terribly inefficient, but its a necessary price. As Franklin said:
"Democracy is the worst form of government there is... except for all others."
The basic idea is great (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Holding Back The Inevitable (Score:5, Insightful)
And a fail safe [findlaw.com] for when "fair elections" aren't, as well.
Re:Holding Back The Inevitable (Score:3, Insightful)
. . . not just communism. ANY authoritarian system has this flaw.
Diebold intends to fix that flaw. . .
Re:Holding Back The Inevitable (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem with "pure" communism (the reason why it doesn't pan out in reality) is that it doesn't provide personal incentives to produce - all production is seized and redistributed by the state. Similarly, there are incentives only to demonsrate need in order to obtain an undue portion of the redistribution. Under such a system, the dishonest are rewarded by not having to work according to ability and obtaining more than fair share of "need". The honest are punished.
Even the U.S. has adopted many socialist programs (Medicare, Social Security, welfare, public education), but it's difficult to determine where the balance between socialism and pure capitalism lies. Allowing the market free rein implies that there is no such thing as a public good, which is difficult to argue.
The more power in the central government, the more corruption, no matter what form of government it is. This is one of the reasons our founding fathers intended to limit the power of the fed, a lesson that not even the current Republican party seems to have taken to heart.
Re:Holding Back The Inevitable (Score:3, Interesting)
To expand, wealth is produced only by voluntary trade. Wealth cannot be produced by force. (Wealth may be transferred by force, but never created.) This is a basic principle of economics which not many people seem to understand.
For example, in the case of robbery, wealth is not created but simply transferred f
Re:Holding Back The Inevitable (Score:3, Informative)
Maybe you'd like to tell us how to insert the peg in both holes, so that your ballot is ambiguous?
Re:Holding Back The Inevitable (Score:3, Interesting)
A: They're afraid they'll have to give up power and find real jobs.
OK, so they have not decided to offer full democracy to everyone and are maintaining control on the strings of power.
Good. The last thing we need is a nuclear nation of 1.2bn (last UN estimate) plunged into democracy.
Why?
Because, as Plato pointed out over 2000 years ago, democracy is a dangerous thing. The populace can be taken advantage of - n
Re:Holding Back The Inevitable (Score:2, Informative)
I thoroughly recommend you read Plato's 'The Republic' - not a hard read but a concise critic of democracy and its pitfalls.
96 years back the Manchu dynasty met its end. Maintain
Re:Holding Back The Inevitable (Score:5, Insightful)
This seems like an odd tack to take in the argument--since neither China during the Cultural Revolution nor the Soviet Union under Lenin and Stalin had substantive democratic institutions. In point of fact, Lenin and Stalin and Mao each in their time took deliberate actions (such as the brutal suppression of the Kronstadt uprising, the dismantling of the Workers' Opposition, the creation of the secret police and the gulag, and, well, the Cultural Revolution) to crush local democratic power, concentrate power in the hands of party bosses, and create a totalitarian environment in which people do not dare to express dissent for fear of hearing a knock on the door in the middle of the night.
(In such an environment, by the way, it also seems to me to be rather tendentious, to say the least, to claim to have any clear knowledge of what people thought about the rulers -- since part of the purpose of the totalitarian apparatus was to keep people from honestly saying what they though about things.)
I thoroughly recommend you read some of the descriptions of the power struggles in post-Revolutionary Russia, such as Emma Goldman's My Disillusionment in Russia or The Workers' Opposition.
Re:Holding Back The Inevitable (Score:5, Interesting)
It definitely is. A democracy is, simply stated, a majority-dictatorship. The framers and founders of the USA created a Democratic Republic, that is not a democracy but rather a Republic with liberty and choice. Our republic made up of the populus, voted democratically by the populus.
Many people misinterpret the US government as a democracy when in fact it is a democratic republic. One of the strenghts is that people are believed to have unalienable rights, rights given to them by their creator that cannot be taken away by any law. The point of this is not religious, but rather that no one can take away unalienable [loc.gov] rights. Thus the formation of a body (the US goverment) to protect these rights, versus in the case of many systems (ie a democracy), a government that grants rights.
This is truly power in the peoples hands, rights that one cannot give nor take away, rights that we are created with. Thus the freedom we have is innate, not a privledge or amenity.
Re:Holding Back The Inevitable (Score:5, Informative)
I really don't care to take pointers on democracy from a guy that's been dead for 2 millenia AT HIS OWN HAND because his government told him to drink the kool-aid. Gimme a break.
And I don't care to take pointers on anything from a guy who doesn't know the difference between Plato [wikipedia.org] and Socrates [wikipedia.org].
Re:Holding Back The Inevitable (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Holding Back The Inevitable (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Holding Back The Inevitable (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Holding Back The Inevitable (Score:4, Insightful)
The younger generations are beginning to be raised on capitalism and American consumerist "culture". It's unclear what that will mean for the political future of the PRC, but fascism and unrestrained capitalism aren't entirely at odds with each other.
Some other posts on this topic have mentioned the threat of the PRC to US global dominance. This is especially true in the economic realm as China has vast production capability while at the same time a relatively low standard of living. That gives the PRC tremendous economic clout.
Not surprising (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Not surprising (Score:4, Funny)
It's akin to a murderer claiming at least he didn't kill more people.
Re:Not surprising (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Not surprising (Score:2)
Pretty soon, they will have the largest dam, a space program, and still have the worlds largest population.
Re:Not surprising (Score:4, Informative)
And your point? We could build the world's largest dam if we were so inclined -- but most dam building in the United States was stopped due to the environmental damage that it causes. Have you read about some of the health and environmental impacts [irn.org] of the Three Gorges dam? It's an impressive engineering feat to be sure but nothing I'd want in my backyard. How many species will be wiped out by this monstrosity? How many people will be displaced?
Is that really something that China should be proud of?
Re:Not surprising (Score:4, Insightful)
Sadly, the gap is closing from the US side, for the good of the country and all that rot.
Re:Not surprising (Score:5, Insightful)
the gap is closing from the US side,
It's occurred to me, too, that the government/corporate system of the United States and of China are a lot closer in practice than people might think.
Yes, in China you get these weird laws where "slander of the state" and "revealing state secrets" put people in jail for expressing dissent.
But, in the US, if you criticize a business, eg, make disparaging comments about the healthiness of eating beef or provide a web link to a DeCSS site, you can get slammed with heavy legal action.
In China, the government powers have become corrupt as they hand out valuable contracts to cronies and have tolerated cheating bosses not paying their workers.
In the US, the government powers have become corrupt as they accept money from special interests to craft legislation favorable to those interests. Substantial growth in non-unionized workforce has meant stagnation in wage growth for blue collar workers in the US.
Government policies are not far apart between the US and China; corporate influence will tend to drive them even closer together.
Re:The "gap" is still pretty damn wide. (Score:3, Informative)
I'm skeptical, so let's do a scientific test.
Rather than a straw-man test, why not paint up a placcard that says something like "Bush Sucks" or "Get US out of Iraq" and visit one of his campaign stops.
They have these nice little lots, well away from where the president is actually speaking for protesters. That, my dear friend, is a limi
As if people can't get around the block (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:As if people can't get around the block (Score:2, Interesting)
This is the other side of the blade for China. They want an educated, technologically savvy population. People with such skillz and of an attitude will find a way and always be one step ahead. They should just call it a game and let the people have their way. At the very least, it could generate some goodwill toward the government. Holding
Technically impossible (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Technically impossible (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Technically impossible (Score:3, Interesting)
That's why it's so important to develope real wireless solutions. If the net is ever going to be truly free, we must cut out corporate control of the "wire". Under the current set up, the multinationals are saying, "All your ISP are belong to us". Same goes for the data going through those ISP's. Truly mobile and wireless access will be the only way to bring about absolute anonymity and privacy to the users. Rapidly changing IP
Re:Technically impossible (Score:3, Informative)
<sarcasm>Yeah cuz the multinationals and Government types don't have any control over the airwaves [fcc.gov]. If we can just get the net off the wire controlled by the evil corporations it will truly be free of outside control!</sarcasm>
You can put the tin-foi
FAQ 3.2 (Score:3, Funny)
A: The short answer is "Gay Movable Type Blogger." This does not quite paint the full picture, however.
A GMTB uses a Mac. A GMTB is excited about "wireless hot spots" and "cafes." The prototypical GMTB can be found at a Starbucks with a 15" PowerBook. He will be wearing a black turtleneck and will go on at length about the wonder years where web designers were paid like programmers.
The GMTB will blog about you. Do not be alarmed. In order to make sense of their fast moving and confusing world, GMTBers need to write at length about even the most trivial encounter. They will likely Google you and turn even the most minor conversation into an exploratory experience. Every experience is like that of the newborn boy who finds touching himself over and over to be a pleasurable experience.
Do not make the GMTB angry. The GMTB has natural defenses known as "Google juice." With the application of this "Google juice," the GMTB will sour any future searches on your name. While there is no physical harm to be done, they can make any attempt at finding relevant and useful information about you a linkfest of armchair philosophy, ill-formed opinions, and broad and insanely overblown reactions to everyday occurrences.
Should you find yourself confronted by a GMTB and wish to escape, one need only mention that their "CSS" is broken. The GMTB invariably considers the CSS "correctness" and "portability" to be a craft, and the output thereof to be an "art." By pointing out that the page renders poorly on the most esoteric browser you can imagine, you will be assured a quick and uneventful escape.
Chinese Technology? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Chinese Technology? (Score:5, Informative)
How to get around it, well the CIA didn't like those commi's blocking information, so they set up Anonymizer ( www.anonymizer.com ) that would allow a type of encrypted proxy so you could get around that. CoDC also set up some sort of browser that could get around it, but I didn't really investigate it much (Same guys who made Back-Oriface)..
Re:Chinese Technology? (Score:5, Interesting)
That's the part I don't get.
Why not let the packet go through, and simply log the session?
Chen Sixpack: Goes to www.freetibet.org, is disgusted by what he sees, and the only thing in his logfile is index.html
Jiang Sixpack: Goes to www.freetibet.org/index.html and spends six hours reading 20-30 pages of material.
If I block both of them at the router, I don't know who's the greater threat to domestic security - because I can't target everyone. If I let the packets through and log session information (particularly if I can aggregate Jiang's web traffic with his IM traffic, for instance -- thereby exposing Jiang's entire social network. Great data mining opportunities :), I can use that data to have a better idea of who's worth targeting.
By blocking at the firewall, the Chinese government is missing the point. A properly-configured Internet is like a self-registration system for domestic security threats.
Re:Chinese Technology? (Score:2)
Re:Chinese Technology? (Score:2)
China is blocking information, but US is blocking (Score:4, Insightful)
Which society would you rather live in?
Re:China is blocking information, but US is blocki (Score:3, Insightful)
(paraphrased from a great obscure movie)
Give me a break. (Score:5, Insightful)
Kindly go to a strip club, get HBO, google for "nipple", or buy a magazine in a brown wrapper ALL LEGALLY and THEN tell me how terrible the US is just because most people who live here think it might be smart to not allow nudity during the Superbowl.
It's a joke son (Score:2)
What you say is obvious, so obvious that what I said should be funny. Perhaps you need to check that site yourself.
Oh the outrage...... (Score:2, Insightful)
It's totally understandable that China's gov't will be overthrown if people are given free access to information, but it is totally unacceptable to see the FCC pulling these moves.
Re:Oh the outrage...... (Score:3, Insightful)
Stern's complaint is that he's being forced into moving his show onto a subscription-based satellite radio service. However, if he moves there the FCC won't have any abilty to complain about what he says anymore.
Meanwhile, the Chinese are filtering out any negative-to-the-government information of any kind from all forms of media. That's much more serious.
Re:Oh the outrage...... (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm not a big fan of Stern my self... I don't watch or listen to his program because I find it uninteresting. I appricate his need to protest our cencorships laws, and support him to that end. If he must move to a satellite radio service, that would be fine too, as he can protest all he wants na
Re:Oh the outrage...... (Score:2, Informative)
In America, we can show nudity, have "foul" language, and just about anything else on TV. Just not Frequency Broadcasted television. Do you have HBO? There is a clear moral difference. I am not saying I completely agree with what is going on, but I do feel this has absolutely nothing to do with
Re:Oh the outrage...... (Score:2)
So the FCC's job is to smash the 1st amendment? Is it to dictate during an ELECTION YEAR, the wishes of the president? Does "Democracy" mean a government "ruler" that makes his will the law??
What does this have to do with China? Well, the FCC is walking a very thin line here, sure, banning a shock jock or two may seem like a baby step, but add enough baby steps together and eventually you'll wind up in Washington.
Re:Oh the outrage...... (Score:4, Interesting)
It's totally understandable that China's gov't will be overthrown if people are given free access to information
Why do you say this? Have you been to China, asked anyone there what they think? Of course China is oppressive, and of course its views don't fall in line with those of the US. But that doesn't necessarily mean people would instantly overthrow it given the chance.
As an architect, I've been keeping a very close eye on growth in China. Quite simply, China is where it's at. The growth rate there is just insane, and with the Olympics coming up there is now intense international pressure on very accellerated modernization. Remember the dot com boom? China is like that right now, except their economy is based on tangible things.
I'm not saying that giving up freedom is worth some prosperity, but I am saying that if China were to all of a sudden take down its Great Firewall there is no guarantee that its people would want to risk destroying one of the largest economic expansions in history just because they can read the whiny ramblings of a 13 year old girl on Blogspot.
Ultimate Power... almost (Score:5, Funny)
They've implimented a system to block free exchange of ideas about religion, politics and current issues through blogs and the internet...
But even they can't stop spam.
Interesting.
Re:Ultimate Power... almost (Score:2)
Spam revenues are probably one of the largest sources of hard currency for the PRC, based on the amount I receive that originates from or points to Chinese IPs. Fortunately, blackholes.us [blackholes.us] includes a nice blacklist that includes Korea, as well.
Turning your weblog black? (Score:5, Funny)
Webloggers have always had a hugely inflated sense of self-importance, but this is just ridiculous.
no man (Score:3, Funny)
Freenet? (Score:5, Insightful)
Government-sanctioned censorship isn't anything new, though. We try to protect children with things like CIPA and the like. We've got watchdogs all over that won't allow us (folks in the US) to hear foul language over public airwaves, are looking to restrain violent video games, and in general trying to police what we do.
I'm not saying we're communistic, by any means. Just saying that censorship is censorship. Not as extreme, but the seeds are there.
In the end, it unfortunately comes down to "censorship is only bad when they're censoring something I believe in."
Re:Freenet? (Score:5, Insightful)
As long as FTP works, (Score:5, Informative)
Re:As long as FTP works, (Score:5, Interesting)
Just reading... (Score:3, Interesting)
Oh, bitter irony (Score:5, Insightful)
Somewhat ironic given that U.S. companies are profiting [wired.com] by selling censorship software to China. And of course, the U.S. requiring (or trying to require) libraries to censor the Internet, for the children, of course.
Re:Oh, bitter irony (Score:2)
Just as other posts are describing, cracks appear in the wall. Regardless of repression efforts, that there is an internet in china is a Good Thing for long-term prospects of government liberalization and change. Whie to some of you this may sound like a cop-out, normally skeptical me finds this to be a reasonable explan
Re:Oh, bitter irony (Score:3, Insightful)
Censoring adult content from computers in public libraries is completely different than blocking a nation's access to information because it opposes your government. In the US, you can get a connection for less than ten bucks a month and get whatever you want on the internet, whether it's adu
Re:Oh, bitter irony (Score:3, Informative)
But they're not just blocking porn. They're using software with "encrypted" databases that have been proven to block more than just porn. [eff.org] People are prevented from decrypting these filtering programs by the government thanks to the DMCA. This is an end run around censorship laws, though I will grant that it doesn't give the government the power they want to block all opposing v
Re:Oh, bitter irony (Score:3, Insightful)
Anyway, back to the topic at hand, keep in mind, a library is more than just a collection of books. It's a repository of (and, hence, access point to) knowledge. As a result, libraries often provide books, as well as magazines, audio (CDs and tapes), video (DVDs/VHS tapes), and many other resources. Similarly, the Internet is a massive repository of information.
really, guys, what did you expect? (Score:4, Insightful)
What's next? Slashdot. (Score:4, Interesting)
So, it seems any site that lets somebody post infomation without has got to go. It won't be long until they decide Slashdot is not something they should let their people see.
Why not the WTO instead of ONU? (Score:5, Insightful)
Could Gopher be used to defeat Censorship? (Score:4, Interesting)
Or do the block by IP or what?
Yea, Gopher is dead, but don't be insensitive.
Gopher was pretty cool, especially considering some of the terrible backgrounds and colors you sometimes get in http.
Or is this just like suggesting lynx?
Maybe it is a good thing that Apache 2 [slashdot.org] supports Gopher.
Stop laughing, I'm serious.
It wouldn't suprise me that the communist bastard politicians wouldn't know to block stuff outside http.
p2p is another possibility, but that's been discussed before I'm sure.
Re:Could Gopher be used to defeat Censorship? (Score:3, Interesting)
If you read the link from the story [ http://glutter.typepad.com/glutter/2004/03/all_ty p epad_sit.html ] you'll see in paragraph one there is a proxy link
[http://www.unipeak.com/getpage.php?_u_r_l_= aHR0cD ovL2dsdXR0ZXIudHlwZXBhZC5jb20vZ2x1dHRlci8yMDA0LzAz L2FsbF90eXBlcGFkX3NpdC5odG1s
While this isn't direct evidence as to what they are doing to block sites... it would sugest that a proxy without the censored text in the link will st
Cryptography... (Score:2, Informative)
http://www.t0.or.at/crypto/crossbow.htm [t0.or.at]
WTO: Casinos and Information Services (Score:5, Interesting)
Free Trade does not apply to China. (Score:5, Interesting)
This month, chipmakers Intel and Broadcom said they'll stop selling wireless Internet, or Wi-Fi, chips in China. A new law requires that the chips include a security technology licensed by Chinese companies.
The technology can hurt chips' performance and compatibility with other devices, says Intel spokesman Chuck Mulloy. And implementing it requires U.S. chipmakers to share valuable intellectual property with Chinese companies, says Semiconductor Industry Association President George Scalise.
The Wi-Fi dispute is one of several being waged between the U.S. and Chinese tech industries.
Semiconductor taxes. China slaps a 17% value-added tax on computer chips sold there. But it gives rebates of up to 14% to domestic chip plants. That makes it almost impossible for foreign chipmakers to compete, the SIA says.
This month, the U.S. trade office filed a case against China's semiconductor tax with the World Trade Organization (news - web sites), which China joined in 2001. China must abide by the WTO's decision or risk censure. Friday, China said it would enter talks with the United States.
Proprietary standards and practices. China is developing its own standards for 3G cell phone networks and DVD players. (The Chinese version is called EVD, or extended versatile disk.) If the standards are widely adopted, they will allow Chinese manufacturers to avoid paying some licensing fees to foreign companies and force tech firms to make special products only for China. Officials also have taken steps to keep government agencies from using non-Chinese software.
U.S. companies urgently want to do business in China because it's a huge, growing market. China has a $1.4 trillion economy and gross domestic product growth near 10%, according to the U.S. State Department. Political changes in recent years have increasingly opened the once-isolated country to foreign companies. U.S. tech firms are eager to sell PCs, DVD players and other products to China's 1.3 billion citizens.
Chinese officials talk about fair trade, yet "behave like a protective dictatorship when it serves their best interests," says Harris Miller, president of the Information Technology Association of America, a trade group. Chinese officials deny that and say they're working to understand U.S. concerns.
Nearly every country has some policies to boost and protect domestic industries. The U.S. gives tech companies a tax break for research and development, for example. But trade groups such as the ITAA say China's policies are so extreme, they infringe on free trade. In 2003, the USA exported $28 billion worth of goods to China and imported $152 billion.
--00--00--00--
Philippe Lacoste, director of French retail giant Lacoste and grandson of founder Rene Lacoste (L), gives a brief history of the company during a news conference in Shanghai March 29, 2004. French retailer Lacoste, frustrated over what it calls widespread piracy in China, may pull out of the market if it fails to stop a Singapore-based rival from also using a crocodile logo. REUTERS/Claro Cortes IV
Re:WTO: Casinos and Information Services (Score:3, Interesting)
Of course, I'm not sure what the current position on basic human rights violations by the USA is right now...
Silly question... what of Hong Kong? (Score:2, Interesting)
US should quit helping PRC (Score:2, Insightful)
Wireless blogging (Score:3, Insightful)
Would information really cause a change? (Score:5, Insightful)
That's not really the point, however. The point is, everyone claiming that information = insta-revolution well...I seriously doubt it. A lot of people left Hong Kong before PRC took it over...and then moved back when they saw that PRC didn't really change the system at all, and things were peaceful.
Seriously, they didn't really keep out outside information before; that fully explains the Tiananmen Square protests, as people knew that Communist leaderships everywere were falling appart so they wanted to try in China too. If people wanted a protest/revolution it would happen; I honestly don't think they do, and I don't think the internet will change that, blocked or unblocked.
And that shows... (Score:3, Interesting)
BC
Pot and Kettle (Score:3, Insightful)
The U.S. government made the absurd claim that Bin Laden was "sending secret messages to his supporters" through his speeches, when it was blatantly obvious that the U.S. was simply interested in suppressing him.
Understandably in fact. Bin Laden was making a whole lot of sense and sounded extremely reasonable when compared to Bush.
The U.S. does not have the moral standing to criticise other nations. To do so is the height of hypocrisy.
Re:Pot and Kettle (Score:5, Insightful)
I understand the Chinese government (Score:5, Funny)
It all started when Hao Feng Xi submitted a request for unemployment support:
This, of course, infuriated the whole fucking country, and now they're on a mission to stamp out this new form of "viral illiteracy."
It gets worse (Score:4, Informative)
The breadth of censored content there is simply amazing.
hypocracy (Score:4, Insightful)
I remember on CNN after two planes, of the anti-Castro group, were shot down by Cuba, a US polictican ( Helms...Burton? ) said that all the more reason to continue the economic boycott of Cuba.
The next story was on China and another politician speaking about China said that keeping dialogue open with China was the only way to make progress.
If the Internet in China, and also keeping dialogue open, is so important, why not do that for every enemy or the US?
China is so huge I wouldn't worry about the government controlling the Internet. They seem to be where the USSR was in the late 80's just before Communism fell.
Is not it disturbing... (Score:4, Interesting)
... how the same people tend to curse at US for being oppressive, aggressive, and otherwise evil, and yet completely ignore China's record on the same issues.
For example, the French -- among the noisiest critics of US nowadays lit/painted the Eiffel tower red to greet the Chinese leader and to comfort him with support for his hostility towards Taiwan.
Italians, protesting every one of the executions in US, seem to completely ignore the public executions in China, which sometimes take place in stadiums and are often caused merely by alleged economic crimes.
Now this (as if we did not know about the Great Chinese Firewall before)... Where are the condemnations from the people, accusing the US for "suffocating the independent media" -- because Howard Stern was kicked off by his employer?
Damn the man (Score:3, Funny)
Well thank God the all powerful blog-o-sphere is finally using its power to do something instead of just creating a rebellion symbol/meme and linking to real news sources.
Oh wait.
-Colin [colingregorypalmer.net]
i have been reading a lot about china lately (Score:5, Informative)
First of all: China is changing a such a rapid pace that no Cisco routers that are used to block a couple websites will have any major impact.
We are talking of about 100 million people rapidly moving up the social ladder. The communist party just aknowledged that they have to do something about the rest (more than 900 million btw), many of them on the way trying to get on board with the first group.
That said I would like to share some insight into history. Even though we know oppresive regimes are bad and the usual American only pokes at Communism with a 9 foot pole the regime served the majority of the Chinese people pretty well in the past 40-50 years. The cultural revolution was a major setback and the party says it was very wrong. Apart from that they had some great success at poverty reduction during the 70s and 80s.
Compare that to what You know about India, which has had a stable democracy during most of that time or South America which has been under US influence since the infamous "Teddy".
IMHO India lags behind China on the rights of the woman (in practial terms, theoratically all Communist coutries should be heaven for women, which never was) over all for example. I am sure You will find more.
At the moment the US govt. is using the "human rights tool" to apply pressure to China on the international diplomatic level. You know it, they know it and everyone else knows it too. (Saudi Arabia and human rights
Still we have an issue with free speech in China, since a corrupt govt. that has nothing left to justify its hold on power (they promote market economics for heavens sake) is trying to keep the country out of major shakeups. Remember what happened to Russia after the change? Live expectency is still going down there. Anyways, there are people in the party that try to move towards democracy, but that is not easy and they don't want civil war.
That said the most important problems that China is facing at the moment are corruption and trying not to loose the 900 million people on the way to wealth and prosperity. That is what the party is saying. IMHO the biggest problem is for the officials to stay on top of this huge moving mass that China represents at the moment. And it is gaining speed.
Exactly because of that the central government is trying to promote free speech to get more accurate reports from the various parts of China, since the official channels are slow and always change facts around so the local govt. looks good.
my god... (Score:3, Funny)
WHAT HAS THIS WORLD COME TO?!
China's internet censorship not as bad as it seems (Score:4, Informative)
Re:eek (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Glass houses and thrown stones (Score:2)
I don't know how much good that would do.
Oh sure...we'll ignore the blocking of indie sites and people who have [not corporate approved and polically correct] content. But, block somebody's income stream and Woa Boy are we gonna kick someone in the head.
Somedays I just love living the U.S. of Americash, where we're all equal under the dollar.
If so many concur with the CCP's stance... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:What's wrong with this picture (Score:5, Informative)
1. Should we intervene? That is, are the Xites being really, really offensive?
2. Can we intervene? That is, does X have a massive nuclear arsenal? (Note: China does, Iraq didn't but wanted one)
3. Is our interest being served? That is, does attacking X serve national strategic goals? Does X have it in for us in some way?
Your mileage may vary on how to answer these questions for Iraq and China, but my readings suggest that the US executive branch does think this way.
In a Platonic world of Good Smiting Evil, question #1 and #2 would be the only ones considered. But in our world question #3 must also be considered. Note also that the extent to which #3 outweighs #1 is the distance we are into the Gray Area (tm).