Thread: The View, from China

If I could watch Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, I’d stop everything to see it!

It's finished now. Dontcha just love the ending? Mind you, it is quite entertaining visualizing 'arry soiling his nappies too.


"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."

Moving right along:-


How Washington lost its 20-year 'war on terror'


Can fascism take over the United States? This question was put to Huey P. Long, US senator, demagogue and governor of Louisiana, in the 1930s. "Sure it can!" he replied. "Only it'll be called anti-fascism."

Former US president George W. Bush responded to the Sept 11, 2001, terrorist attacks by declaring a "global war on terror". To Bush, it didn't matter who was targeting whom in the "war...". In the name of spreading "democracy" and free speech, he smothered what remained of democracy and free speech in his own country. And after 20 years of US military operations in Afghanistan, the results are all too clear in that country too.

Bush's "global war on terror", or GWOT, pronounced "Gee-What?", has resulted in the victory for terrorism around the world－aided and fostered at every turn by the Bush administration and those that succeeded it. Only they all claimed it as a victory against terrorism.

Bush invaded and occupied the oil rich country of Iraq in defiance of all international laws. Not a single grain of evidence linking Saddam Hussein to al-Qaida had ever been found, or has been since.

Bush then used the rout of the Taliban as an excuse for permanent US occupation of the country and installed puppet leaders in power who didn't enjoy even the slightest support of the Afghan people. The expressed wishes of the Afghan people presented in early 2002 through one of their traditional national tribal assemblies was arrogantly rejected by Bush, and then US vice-president Dick Cheney and secretary of defense Donald Rumsfeld－arguably the most disastrous figure ever to hold that position.

Twenty years on, the outcome of the expenditure of more than $3 trillion in Iraq and Afghanistan (the equally unsuccessful "Gee-What?" cost trillions of dollars more) is clear: The Islamic State group in Iraq and Syria has been kept out of power in Iraq by the exertions and direct influence of Iran, not the US.

Qasem Solemani, Iranian major general and the Quds Force commander who played the foremost role in rolling back the IS group and its genocidal forces from 2014 to 2019, paid for his cooperation with the US with his life when previous US president Donald Trump approved his assassination following the urging of then national security advisor John Bolton, another architect and cheerleader of the Afghanistan and Iraq occupations.

As Edward Lozansky pointed out in his article in The Washington Times on Aug 31, according to the Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs of Brown University, more than 801,000 people have died in the direct "war on terror" violence and its wider effects, more than 335,000 civilians have been killed as a result of those fighting, and 38 million people have become war refugees and displaced persons.

Those wars, Lozansky said, also cost the lives of 11,000 Americans, more than three times the number of those who died in the 9/11 attacks－which many say took place because of the complacency, laziness and sheer incompetence of the Bush administration. More than 53,000 more Americans have become amputees, brain-damaged, or were doomed to a premature death because of their injuries, not to mention other post-traumatic disorders.

In addition, the US destroyed the previously stable states of Iraq, Syria and Libya, unleashing in those countries unprecedented levels of anarchy, chaos and violence.

Over the past 20 years, the prophecy of Huey Long has come true: The last remnants of national free speech, and honest, open debate in the US have been snuffed out in the name of defending democracy and free speech－and wars fanning terrorism around the world, especially across the Middle East and the heart of Asia, have been unleashed all in the name of fighting terrorism.

The "final, now-never-to-be reversed" US evacuation from Afghanistan ends a strategic absurdity that should never have been attempted in the first place. It also marks an end to the concept of GWOT－that global war on a will-o'-the-wisp abstraction so loved by Bush, Rumsfeld and their neocon Pentagon "geniuses".

The GWOT only caused terror to thrive wherever it was waged. It routinely killed dozens of innocent people in every air bombing, drone strike and land operation for every real terrorist it eliminated. It was a godsend for the biggest American and British weapons manufacturers－and for nobody else anywhere. It made a mockery of US claims to be the greatest democracy in the world, and lastingly shamed and discredited the cause of the very democracy it claimed to defend across the globe. It bankrupted the US economy and exhausted the US armed forces.

Bush's "global war on terror" was a total failure. The American people and the entire world are better off without it.

How Washington lost its 20-year 'war on terror' - Opinion - Chinadaily.com.cn

Originally Posted by sabang

Moving right along:-

care to reply to my comments?

The winner, a comment on the article.

Originally Posted by misskit

I don’t think anyone thinks the Chinese people should be eternally poor

Do you consider this as a fair statement by the topics' writer?

Originally Posted by sabang

the US to abandon its ambitions to crush China.

Simply a matter of changing the thread title to "The Three Stooges make yet another thread to fill with dreary chinky propaganda".

Job done.

Originally Posted by Samuel

Mods, I have responded to sabang, but my posts haven't been posted.

Samuel, turn your computer off and on, that will reset your system and maybe stop your problem.

Originally Posted by sabang

Who pushed forward China's rise? Who provided the fundamental driving force of this trend? As far as I see, this is the dream of several generations with noble aspirations and the Communist Party of China united the Chinese people. The Chinese people as a whole eventually turned the dream into a historic trend.

sounds rather pleasant

The Three Stooges

There is one 'Stooge Superpower' in this thread. It is me.

Freedom of expression and a free press is not available to the Chinese people. They depend on the view of their government to lead and direct them.
If a Chinese citizen wishes to express his view of the Chinese government, his views are quashed by the party machine because the machine disagrees with him.
This is not the freedom that you laud in the op. All views are relevant and should be heard, even if we disagree with them. Point well made, but such freedoms do not exist in the Chinese state!

The US fears that losing its powerful financial hegemony to China is under threat. It holds no such fears from the EU! Can you see the difference.

The requirement for our combined success in future, needs the USA to be less belligerent, and the PRC to be more open. At the moment, both are ruled by the fears of each other.

Let all people enjoy the freedom to express their views. In this way, the idiots and conspiracy theorists can easily be dismissed. The best ideas usually come from the most unexpected sources, usually while sitting on the toilet.

I propose equal access for all to modern plumbing. ����

The requirement for our combined success in future, needs the USA to be less belligerent, and the PRC to be more open.

Well put Sir!! I could not agree more.


Yer bloods worth bottling.

Originally Posted by sabang

And conspiracy theories and general garble not worth commenting on. Think you'll find the Delta variant from India is of more concern now anyway.

The Delta variant that sprung up by itself without any connection to the original Wuhan virus?

Not as I understand it anyway. What do you understand by the term 'Variant'?

And how much would you want to fine parts of Africa, for AIDS and Ebola? Or the USA, for Syphilis?


I think it extremely naive, this way of thinking. How to combat it, and prevent such recurring epidemics is the way forward. Or are you one of these Conspiracy Theorists, who think Covid was cooked up in a Wuhan Lab to ravage the West (but somehow not China, India etc). Na, that doesn't sound like you at all.

Originally Posted by Switch

Freedom of expression and a free press is not available to

Which countries would you suggest do have "a free press"?

Although I would include postings on internet fora are more available than the "press".

Originally Posted by lom

The Delta variant that sprung up by itself without any connection to the original Wuhan virus?

Only two more and we are up to the XI variant!

Originally Posted by OhOh

Which countries would you suggest do have "a free press"?

Although I would include postings on internet fora are more available than the "press".

Define 'free press'.

Originally Posted by Cujo

Define 'free press'.

Originally Posted by Cujo

Define 'free press'.

I suggest you ask the original poster.

Originally Posted by Switch

a free press

Originally Posted by Cujo

Define 'free press'.

When the public is not allowed to read a crap not only from some goofs but also from the sitting president...

How China’s GDP Growth Fails To Measure Its Standard Of Living: The Tragedy Of The Current Recentralization


Perhaps the most durable myth about China is that the Communist Party has “lifted a billion people out of poverty” and should be revered for that monumental contribution.

This is inaccurate for a number of reasons. First, poverty is not a static state that is cured by delivering a set of material goods. If it were, then the U.S. would still be thanking FDR and the Democratic Party for lifting us out of Great Depression poverty. Second, China’s abject state of poverty was, of course, created by Mao Zedong and the Communist Party in the first place. Other Asian countries leapt ahead during the 1960 and 1970s. China was held back.


But the most important reason to take this “lifting out of poverty” meme with a grain of salt is that poverty remains very real for two-thirds of Chinese, the two-thirds classified as “rural,” the two-thirds that investors in China never see.

It will come as a surprise to many, if not most, or the China-boosting crowd that China’s per capita income ranked 75th among countries in 2016, alongside Algeria and Thailand. Or that only 11% of rural people and 30% of the population in general graduate high school.

The best corrective to misunderstandings about this “invisible China” is a book that came out in 2020 and remains the most important book on China in a decade: Invisible China, by Scott Rozelle and Natalie Hell. The authors draw on years of work in China’s countryside, where they have conducted regular, extensive surveys. The above data points are from the book but are readily accessible from sources like the World Bank and the CIA’s World Factbook. China’s education attainment ranks lower than Brazil, Argentina, Mexico, Philippines, and South Africa. On a list of 42 countries, China is dead last in the proportion of the population with more than a junior-high education. High school is not only not compulsory in China, but attending an academic (instead of vocational) high school requires competitive exams and fees that are prohibitive for poor families.


Beyond the lag in education, the authors document a shocking health crisis in rural China. They report that, in rural areas, a quarter to a third of primary-school students suffer from uncorrected myopia, anemia, and intestinal worms, usually a combination of two or three of these. The anemia and worms sap their energy and reduce ability to concentrate. The myopia keeps them from learning.

They show that nutritional issues and antiquated child-rearing practices mean that “at least half” of China’s rural babies are developmentally delayed and may never “reach adult IQs above ninety.”


Potential consequences are sobering: the rural picture makes China look like a Mexico, stuck in a developmental trap. Low-skilled jobs are already leaving China for Vietnam, India, and other countries, yet the workforce is not equipped to shift into higher-skilled jobs. Human capital is the single most important predicate to emergence from the middle-income ghetto in which countries like Mexico wallow. Imagine nearly two-thirds of China’s population unable to find employment other than as trash pickers, street vendors, or the guys who stop you at intersections to clean your windshield.

Back in 2008, the MIT economist Yasheng Huang, in his book Capitalism with Chinese Characteristics, argued that China experienced a brief rural renaissance and a surge in growth during the 1980s. But the Communist Party’s fear of overthrow following Tiananmen led to a dramatic centralization of power and shift of economic privilege decisively away from rural areas. Huang showed that measures that track the standard of living across China and the general well-being of the Chinese people show deterioration after the centralization.


To climb out of the stagnation trap and deliver a better standard of living for its people, China must revert to a more liberal package of economic and political reforms characteristic of the 1980s. That would mean a loosening of control. Tragically, it will not happen.

How China’s GDP Growth Fails To Measure Its Standard Of Living: The Tragedy Of The Current Recentralization\\

I reckon there has to be someone else to blame for the Chinese being kept in poverty. The government won’t be able to raise the standard of living for the other two thirds.

Erm, I don't think a Forbes article represents "The View from China" MK. Nevertheless, interesting reading.
It does remain the fact that the post Mao CCP has pulled more people out of poverty than anyone else in World history.

^ Apparently the author has lived in China since 1993, is married to a Chinese citizen, and is stuck in the US because of COVID.

You reckon your opinion writer, Martin Sieff, is viewing from China?