Similar “Oily” Interests

February 24, 2010

China’s hunger for oil is not equal to America’s gluttony but it is getting there. Meanwhile, America and its allies blame China for the stalemate over stopping Iran’s nuclear ambitions.

This is my confession. I’m seeking God’s forgiveness for my sins. Every American who drives a car is an accessory to a crime—9/11.  The more oil, gas or diesel consumed, the more guilt.

There are two parts to this sin.

The first stage for this crime took place during America’s Cold War with Communism. If you haven’t seen Charlie Wilson’s War, rent it.  Americans were the mad scientists who created the Frankenstein, the metamorphosis of the wolf men—the demons we call al-Qaida.

The Taliban, who supported al-Qaida’s goal to eliminate all Western Cultures and create a Caliphate—a throwback to another era, learned their Islamic Fundamentalism from Saudi Arabia’s dominant faith, Wahhabism. Oil money paid for the Wahabi schools that Saudi Arabia built around the world.  These schools teach fundamentalist Islamic principles that grow future terrorists recruited by al-Qaida and the Taliban.

Saudi Oil Wells

And who feeds Saudi oil to their SUVs, cars, trucks, eighteen-wheelers and coast to coast freight trains and jet planes?

When China blocks action against Iran’s nuclear ambitions, because the Chinese people love American food and buy GM, Ford, Volkswagen and Toyota, isn’t their hunger the same?

See America Doing Business in China


Riding the American Bucking Bronco

February 23, 2010

China is making bids on slices of the American pie. Beware, Americans love to take risks and business, banking and real estate bubbles are bursting in the United States like a GM assembly line.

The China Price is all about China buying up American companies like the IBM brand name or companies like Maytag, an American icon.  The Asia Times reports that China’s ownership of US Treasuries is moving close to a trillion U.S. dollars while spending close to another thirty billion in merging and buying American Companies.

Will China suffer the same Wild West Blues that Japan suffered in the 1980s when the Japanese went nuts buying property in America before that bubble burst? From what I’ve read, Japan is still recovering from the losses and those that hung on are suffering even more from the recent real estate crash.

No one has tamed the Wild West yet, and I doubt China will succeed  where so many have failed considering the American love affair with credit cards.

See Doing Business in China


Roughed Up

February 23, 2010

“The police arrived, the guards apologized, and the reporter left without filing charges. Then the policeman told the reporter, ‘You’re free to do what you want, but this is Foxconn and they have a special status here. Please understand.'” So wrote Michael Grothaus for an RSS feed in a piece about “A Reuters employee who was investigating Apple’s legendary secrecy visited Foxconn’s walled city-like facility in Guanlan, China, and was reportedly roughed up by security.”

iPod

Well, yea. The competition is fierce in China for lucrative contracts.  If Foxconn has a contract with Apple and that company loses the contract amounting to millions if not billions of American dollars, it makes sense that their security would be tough on any suspected industrial, high-tech spy. Their jobs even with low pay and long hours are better than no job and poverty. Why put up with a snoop?

If the Foxconn security didn’t take the job seriously, Apple might take their business to another country. How many people would have lost their jobs if that happened?

holding a cup of hot coffee

Consider that China has one lawyer for every 13,000 people compared to the United States, The Litigation Nation, with more lawyers than any other country—one for every two-hundred and sixty-five people and spilling hot coffee on yourself is grounds for going to court.

See Doing Business in China

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too. 

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America’s Dual Dynasty

February 22, 2010

In America, the outcome for a Presidential Election is decided by the Electoral College, card-carrying members from the two major political parties. The popular vote does not elect the American president.

Today, the Communist Party acts similar to America’s Electoral College without the hypocrisy of a popular vote. Critics argue the American Electoral College is inherently undemocratic so China and America have more in common than anyone wants to admit.

Read Democracy and the threat of Authoritarianism, to see what I mean.

For this reason, President George W. Bush was elected America’s forty-third president while the popular vote went to Al Gore by more than a million. If American citizens really decided who leads America, Al Gore would have been America’s 43rd President.

Read China’s Modern Dynasty


Innocent Until Proven Guilty

February 21, 2010

An American friend who taught English and lived in China for several years once said that it was possible to get around the government censors and reach sites that have been blocked.  It just takes time.  With that in mind, pointing fingers, as Google and Secretary of State Clinton did over the Google hacking episode, was a blunder and an insult to the Chinese people and their government.

Catching clever, cyber criminals on the Internet is not easy—especially if those criminals are Geeks getting thrills hacking into protected Websites. From what I’ve learned, organized Internet criminals are worse and harder to catch.

Shadow Land, the post before this one, is a case in point.

To understand more, I suggest you read How Prisoners Are Using Facebook to Harass Their Victims , and remember, next time you decide to blame the Chinese government for everything that happens in China, hold your tongue with forceps until the evidence—not opinions—proves guilt.

Consider that China has 1.3 billion people and only seventy million belong to the Communist party that rules the country. And regardless of popular Western opinions, the Chinese government does not control everything the Chinese people do with their daily lives and they never will.