McCain for Boycott

John McCain calls (conditionally) for a boycott of the opening ceremonies. Key line: " I believe President Bush should evaluate his participation in the ceremonies surrounding the Olympics and, based on Chinese actions, decide whether it is appropriate to attend. If Chinese policies and practices do not change, I would not attend the opening ceremonies."

It's interesting that all the presidential candidates seem to believe this is good politics. Threatening to boycott the ceremonies per se seems unlikely to accomplish anything, but if the Chinese leadership sees that Western politicians come under intense pressure to have nothing to do with the PRC when the PRC cracks down, that should be food for thought in Beijing.

Comments

It's interesting that all the presidential candidates seem to believe this is good politics.

I think it's just a hedge against the strong likelihood of the Beijing Olympics (or events surrounding them) being a shitshow.

Posted by Jake | April 10, 2008 2:29 PM

Of course, presidents never attend the ceremonies anyway, unless the games are held in the States.

But let's not let that - or the silly idea of a ceremony boycott itself - get in the way of a self-righteous public stand.

Posted by Woody Bombay | April 10, 2008 2:35 PM

It seems to me that I see statements of this general kind---"seeing how they are mistrusted / disliked / resented should give so-and-so food for thought"---rather more often than I see said actors actually chowing down. Perhaps we should begin with the assumption that the rulers of countries are blinkered and pigheaded, and identify the exceptions, rather than the other way around.

Posted by Heathcliff | April 10, 2008 2:37 PM

Food for thought . . .

Chinese leader #1: Fucking Americans.

Chinese leader #2: Yeah, fuck those hypocritical assholes.

Chnese leader #3: Seriously. What are they going to about it?

Chinese leader #1: Nothing. They can go fuck themselves.

Posted by blah | April 10, 2008 2:40 PM

Probably he just wants to neutralize this as an issue by agreeing with his opponents. It reminds me of the last gubernatorial race we had in Michigan, when there was an ban on university affirmative action on the ballot. Both of the candidates came out against it, and I got the impression that DeVos (the Republican) just didn't feel like dealing with the issue.

Posted by Kraz | April 10, 2008 2:42 PM

There's also this:

http://www.theseminal.com/2008/04/10/john-mccain-digs-himself-deeper-insults-half-of-all-muslims/

"Sunni and Al-Qaeda are closely tied"??? Does he know that's like saying Protestants and the KKK are closely tied? The dude's an idiot; I'm absolutely convinced that he doesn't have nearly enough knowledge about the situation to be president.

Posted by ZednCu | April 10, 2008 2:45 PM

bold call from a bold man. sticking his toe in water that Bush has not blessed.

Posted by della Rovere | April 10, 2008 2:45 PM

I don't think Obama has called for a boycott yet. And good for him. Plus, he realizes that doing so would hurt Chicago's chances of winning the 2016 Games.

Posted by TH | April 10, 2008 3:01 PM

That McCain is advocating a boycott tells us a lot about the wisdom of the move. In the US, it's obviously a good political move. Nobody likes China. But it really doesn't make much sense when it comes to US-China relations. The Chinese people and their government will view such a move as a deliberate attempt to embarrass China, without having any real effect. To put it another way, the Chinese would rather be punched in the gut than slapped in the face. It's an issue of honor. And they will spin any boycott as a continuation of old colonial attitudes and policies. Their opinion of the West will only be diminished. If we want to change the policies of the Chinese government, the Chinese people need to be on our side. This won't help. We should understand that the Chinese people are already angry at their government for not cracking down hard enough on the Tibetans. The Chinese government may be willing to change some policies, but they will only do so in a back-room deal. They will not let themselves be embarrassed publicly. We need to find a face-saving solution, not bully them in public.

Posted by fostert | April 10, 2008 3:02 PM

I hereby call on George Bush to withdraw from the 200 meter freestyle competition, unless Chinese behavior changes.

Posted by Dan Kervick | April 10, 2008 3:02 PM

I don't think Obama has called for a boycott yet. And good for him. Plus, he realizes that doing so would hurt Chicago's chances of winning the 2016 Games.

Posted by TH | April 10, 2008 3:06 PM

The torturer-in-chief is going to lecture China about human rights? China has every right to call him and us hypocrites.

Posted by ChrisWWW | April 10, 2008 3:11 PM

But I thought we weren't supposed to anger our Chines overlords friends, because in 30 years when they're rich and rule the world, we don't want them to think we tried to keep them down...right?

Now I'm all confused...

Posted by Mr. Noah | April 10, 2008 3:16 PM

That McCain is advocating a boycott tells us a lot about the wisdom of the move. In the US, it's obviously a good political move. Nobody likes China. But it really doesn't make much sense when it comes to US-China relations. The Chinese people and their government will view such a move as a deliberate attempt to embarrass China, without having any real effect. To put it another way, the Chinese would rather be punched in the gut than slapped in the face. It's an issue of honor.

There's a lot of this sort of analysis of US-China relations and has been for 20 years. It looks to me like it is exactly what the Chinese government wants people to believe-- that they are oh-so-sensitive and that if anyone criticizes them, they will go and hide their heads in a hole somewhere. This deters criticism. They couch it in stereotypes about "Asian values", which are silly-- where's the evidence that, say, the Taiwanese government is overly concerned with face-saving and can't take any criticism.

The truth is that we never really tried playing hardball with the Chinese, because our policy was dictated by campaign contributions. That's not to say hardball will work now-- I doubt it will, because China is too powerful. But it probably could have worked in the past.

Posted by Dilan Esper | April 10, 2008 3:17 PM

But I thought we weren't supposed to anger our Chines overlords friends, because in 30 years when they're rich and rule the world, we don't want them to think we tried to keep them down...right?

Now I'm all confused...

Posted by Mr. Noah | April 10, 2008 3:19 PM

Plus, [Obama] realizes that doing so would hurt Chicago's chances of winning the 2016 Games.

Posted by TH | April 10, 2008 3:06 PM

If it were only that easy TH.

As a resident and more importantly a taxpayer of suburban Chicago, I'm praying to Almighty God that the Daleys do not succeed in bringing the 2016 Games to Chicago. It's going to be a fracking rat hole that will consume billion of tax dollars for no good reason whatsoever.

Please God please!! I would rather have a Dem elected President than having any portion of my tax dollars pay for the fracking Olympics anywhere near my fair city, county, state or country.

Posted by Chicounsel | April 10, 2008 3:54 PM

Well, based on Bush's recent comments, he's not going to boycott the ceremony...and why should he? He's lame duck as far as the rest of the world is concerned. And some country needs to fund this dumb-ass endless occupation of Iraq.
For McCain it's convenient to pretend to care about human rights, just as he did with the torture issue, since he's not actually president. But if he were president, I'm sure he'd be taking the same tack Bush is (ie. there are more effective ways of getting my point across, etc.).

Posted by kristi | April 10, 2008 4:30 PM

A 3 of the candidates are hinting around about a boycott and it's terrible. It's ineffective, showy, and a non-starter with the public.

Posted by Jeffrey Davis | April 10, 2008 4:31 PM

The truth is that we never really tried playing hardball with the Chinese

Um, for real?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opium_War

Failure to understand past grievances leads to future unrest, etc. Or, blame it on the inscrutable Orientals, whatever.

Posted by scythia | April 10, 2008 4:49 PM

I was in a internet cafe in Beijing when I read a story in the Guardian about the CIA kidnapping a suspected terrorist and taking him to Morocco where his jailors surgically mutilated his penis - cutting it with a scalpel and giving him an anti-biotic cream to rub on it to prevent infections between sessions.

Yes, lets make a bold moral stand for human rights in China.

Posted by justaguy | April 10, 2008 5:16 PM

The truth is that we never really tried playing hardball with the Chinese. Um, for real?

Now that's silly. I am talking about the current, semicapitalist, kleptocratic, authoritarian dictatorship currently in power. Even after Tiananmen Square, we sucked up to them. Now, we are probably forced to.

Posted by Dilan Esper | April 10, 2008 5:35 PM

The really funny thing is that the US itself is in the process of committing a far larger crime in Iraq, with methods far more brutal and bloody.

Apparently there is no hypocrisy so great that a big enough ego cannot render it invisible.

Posted by RLaing | April 10, 2008 5:53 PM

"Now that's silly. I am talking about the current, semicapitalist, kleptocratic, authoritarian dictatorship currently in power."

Dilan, you have raised some good points, but from reading your comments, I can only conclude that your travels to Asia have been very limited, or non-existent. While it is difficult to refute your descriptions of the Chinese government (the Chinese would say: "yeah, but so what?"), you seem to think that the Chinese government is unpopular with its people. It is not. While it is difficult for us in the West to understand, the Chinese are mostly comfortable with an authoritarian government. And for good reason, their government has provided them a level of economic growth that the rest of the world can only dream of. And every Chinese citizen I've ever met has always defended their government even when they disagreed with it. We have been raised to believe the authoritarianism is evil, but the Chinese weren't. They can understand that their masters are ultimately their slaves. As authoritarian as their government may be, it must still respond to the needs of the people. And it does, but not in the way we Westerners expect. To understand this better, I'd recommend reading the Tao Te Ching and concentrate on Lao Tsu's descriptions of the relationship between a king and his people. Asians really do have a different take on reality, and we would be wise to take that into account.

Posted by fostert | April 10, 2008 6:19 PM

@Dilan

True, I wasn't really being fair in posting a non-equivalent link.

But my point is, the whole "face-slapping," "national-honor-threatened-by-outside-forces" trope isn't some public-relations myth. It's an actual fact. A cursory glance of Chinese history shows it to be true.

And following the carving up of the country in the 19th and early 20th centuries, it's not a reach to say that the narrative has been reinforced, and much of Chinese policy from Mao onward has been conceived with the goal keeping foreign influence firmly in check.

What's more, look at the reaction of the Chinese people themselves, both in the home country and abroad. They're not excited that world community is finally standing up to their repressive gov't. They're not sympathetic to the plight of the Tibetans. They are angry and embarrassed, and see the protests as an insult to the country as a whole.

But, to address your other point: What exactly would playing hardball look like?

We could threaten them militarily, except that with the exception of Taiwan, China doesn't really project force outside their borders, so we'd have to drum up some weak excuse for a pre-emptive attack, which given the events of the last five years, doesn't seem like it was ever a wise choice.

We could threaten them economically...except that they're one of our largest trading partners, and any sanctions we imposed on them would hurt our country almost as much...to say nothing of the huge amount of debt they hold.

Or, we could threaten them symbolically...which is I guess what we're doing now. But if it doesn't have any tangible external effect, and if it doesn't push public opinion away from the government, what's the point? How does that effect meaningful change in any form?

There's this tendency of American thinkers, both on the left and the right, to look at foreign-policy totally ahistorically, as if we were just dropped out of the sky yesterday, saw some fucked up shit, and used our superior intellect to discern a solution.

But a lot of these conflicts have roots going back hundreds if not thousands of years, and a quick application of well-meaning neoliberal wallpaper isn't going to cover the underlying forces forever.

[Not that I'm accusing you specifically of having that world view, I'm just saying...]

Posted by scythia | April 10, 2008 6:39 PM

Dilan, you have raised some good points, but from reading your comments, I can only conclude that your travels to Asia have been very limited, or non-existent. While it is difficult to refute your descriptions of the Chinese government (the Chinese would say: "yeah, but so what?"), you seem to think that the Chinese government is unpopular with its people.

fostert, I made no claim about the Chinese dictatorship's popularity. It is true that lots of dictatorships are popular; it is also true that the fact that dictators refuse to stand in fair elections and suppress free expression suggests that one should not take claims of popularity at face value. But no, I don't claim to know if the dictators in Beijing are popular. I do know that some of their policies (including their policies in Tibet) are fairly popular; I suspect that Chinese censorship and propaganda succeeds in preventing the public from knowing about some of their actions that might be unpopular with the Chinese people.

In any event, you then jump off and say this:

Asians really do have a different take on reality, and we would be wise to take that into account.

Really? Tell that to the people in Taiwan. Heck, tell it to the people of Hong Kong (a place I have spent some time in), who are only thwarted in their attempts to have a democratic government by byzantine rules imposed by the dictatorship in Beijing.

The one absolute truth about China is that all claims about what "Asians" think and "Asian" values are nothing more than apologies for an evil dictatorship. People of the same culture and ethnicity live across the strait, and they reject all of the things that the dictators and their defenders claim are part of the "Asian" or "Chinese" cultural fabric.

We won't know what the Chinese people's values really are until China recognizes freedom of expression and holds democratic multiparty free and fair elections. If they repeatedly elect authoritarians, then we might be able to draw those sorts of conclusions.

Posted by Dilan Esper | April 10, 2008 6:46 PM

But my point is, the whole "face-slapping," "national-honor-threatened-by-outside-forces" trope isn't some public-relations myth. It's an actual fact. A cursory glance of Chinese history shows it to be true.

A few years after Tiananmen, we decided to go after the Chinese on record piracy. (I know, really big issue.) This time, the same folks in the business community who normally tell us that the Chinese can't be punished with sanctions and tough talk were all in favor, because IP rules are a big concern.

Well, guess what? After we threatened sanctions, China cracked down on record piracy. (Eventually, we backed off, of course, and now IP piracy in China is bigger than ever.)

China is just like any other country. Again, if there was evidence that sanctioning and berating China was counterproductive, you would see the same evidence in Taiwan. Yet nobody claims that you can't criticize Taiwan because they are so concerned about face-saving. This is an excuse that is only made for the purpose of insulating the dictators in criticism.

I do agree, though, that at this point we have very few points of leverage with China. But at one point, we did, and rather than doing anything, we let campaign contributions pay for the line that you could never criticize China because those poor vain little dictators were so concerned about keeping face. When we had trade levers (before MFN and the WTO), we should have used them, and they would have worked.

Posted by Dilan Esper | April 10, 2008 6:53 PM

Thank you for the intelligent response, Dilan.

But I think there's a crucial distinction between the current protests and the IP crackdown. Although I'm too young to remember, I imagine that latter was handled privately, through backdoor communications, with the intended effect of altering specific policy.

The current protests, on the other hand, are very large, vocal, and public, but unfocused: How can we expect China to respond to "Stop the Brutal Treatment" of Tibetans when it's right next to a "Free Tibet" sign.

It's not affecting the Chinese gov't, it's not affecting the Chinese people, it may be affecting foreign heads of state enough to pressure the Chinese gov't. Maybe.

But tactically speaking, it's not smart football. And the PRC's obsession with perception management is a big reason why.

Agree with you about MFN and WTO. But China isn't like any other country. It's like the biggest fucking country on Earth. You wanna taunt the tiger, go ahead, but expect there to be consequences.

Posted by scythia | April 10, 2008 7:14 PM

Nice double smack-down Dilan. But you should consider the fact that Taiwan and Hong Kong aren't the norm for Asia. They are unusually Western. Spend some time in Bangkok or Da Nang, and you'll you'll see what I mean.

Posted by fostert | April 10, 2008 7:48 PM

But I think there's a crucial distinction between the current protests and the IP crackdown. Although I'm too young to remember, I imagine that latter was handled privately, through backdoor communications, with the intended effect of altering specific policy.

Not really. We threatened a public sanction. And since it was IP, we didn't hear all the statements from the business community about how this stuff never works.

Agree with you about MFN and WTO. But China isn't like any other country. It's like the biggest [censored] country on Earth. You wanna taunt the tiger, go ahead, but expect there to be consequences.

Again, it isn't that I disagree about where we are now. But there was a time when China wasn't as strong as it is now, and attempts to do something about China's behavior were parried by (bought and paid for) "Asian values" arguments.

But you should consider the fact that Taiwan and Hong Kong aren't the norm for Asia. They are unusually Western.

Hong Kong is quite Western, being a British colony. But Taiwan is pretty much the same as China, except with western style freedoms. It's culture isn't particularly western in the sense that Hong Kong, with its horse racing and cricket and soccer and almost universal use of the English language, is.

Also, parts of China, such as Shanghai, are quite "Western" as well (probably more so than Taiwan), and yet we are given to believe that China, as a whole, is a product of anti-democratic "Asian" values while Taiwan is not.

Spend some time in Bangkok or Da Nang, and you'll you'll see what I mean.

Well, I used Taiwan because they are quite Chinese. But if you want to make it into a general "Asian" stereotype rather than specific to Chinese cultures, it seems to me Japan is a very big counterexample, a huge, vibrant, rich Asian society, with very different values and culture than the West, and yet with western style democracy and freedoms. And South Korea is another huge example.

Look, there's no reason that a regime that respected human rights couldn't function in China, just like in Hong Kong, Taiwan, South Korea, and Japan, except that the dictatorship doesn't want to give up power. THAT, and not "Asian values", is the cause of China's lousy political system.

Posted by Dilan Esper | April 10, 2008 8:08 PM

Dilan,

I think that you ought to recall a passage from The Best and the Brightest.

That passage talks about how some fellows at the State Dept write a speech apologizing for any US role in the exploitation of China during the 19th and 20th Centuries.

The big wig (pretty sure it wasn't Dean Rusk; maybe a Bundy) responds that this was the Communist line!

The speechwriters respond that it's also the official KMT(aka GMD) line.

This isn't just an "oriental" habit, this deep remembrance of painful history; just look at the Serbs who memorialize the Battle of Kosovo, or the Shia who still wail about the death of Ali. Basically the only place it's not present is in the cultural memories of non-black (exception: West Indians and Africans) and non-Amerindian Americans.

So to say that the Chinese won't tie this back to the past is extremely naive.

The People's Republic may have a different flag, but it's still the Middle Kingdom. Besides, at least the current (say, the Mao or CCP) dynasty is actually Chinese, as opposed the Qing dynasty, which was Manchu.

Posted by Greg | April 10, 2008 8:33 PM

Dilan,

Why exactly should China have free elections? Liberal democracy is a means, not an end. China is doing fairly well by most of its citizens right now, and there is a good chance that liberalizing its government would jeopardize that. India has, famously, not done too well by its poorest citizens, outside of a few states in the south and possibly West Bengal. A large part of that is I believe there was a poll about 10 years ago where about 2/3 of Indian people wanted the military to take over the government. Seriously, who would rather be a peasant in 'democratic' Bihar than in authoritarian Qinghai?

Yes, China ought to lift restrictions in a few area- improved religious freedom, more autonomy for Tibet, etc. But I am far from convinced, to say the least, that they should become a liberal democracy like India. India's liberal political system, in practice, meant empowering political and economic elites who repeatedly blocked needed social reforms. Land reform on a nationwide level was seriously hindered until the state of emergency in the late '70s.

And it is quite true that East Asian culture is not going to be favorable to liberal democracy. Hong Kong is a tiny city state and doesn't count; liberal democracy in Taiwan and South Korea is a very new thing and I doubt that it will last the next 50 years. Thailand was said to be a stable 'democracy' too, and then they had the coup of 2006 (which was a much needed thing in my opinion).

I think that we are going to enter a protracted economic crisis sometime in the next 50 years, because of declining natural resources. In that climate there will be a call for harsh authoritarian governments that can fairly ration scarce resources. I think that China represents the wave of the future, like it or not, though that may be a difficult future to perceive through the haze of today's temporrary prosperity.

Posted by Hector | April 10, 2008 10:09 PM

Dilan,

Oh and by the way tolerating a different culture means nothing if you don't tolerate them having different political, economic and social values than you. These are the things that define a culture as much as anything. If you want to impose liberal democracy on the world and make the entire world into little Jeffersons and Madisons then there are many words for that but 'tolerant' isn't one. If Venezuela tried to impose socialism on Colombia or Armenia tried to impose Christianity on Azerbaijian no doubt you would object. But it's all OK as long as it in the name of 'liberal democracy', which isn't even such a good thing in its own right.

The Chinese rulers don't simply want to hold on to their own power, they know that handing China over to Western liberal values would be a disaster for their people.

Posted by Hector | April 10, 2008 10:19 PM

This isn't just an "oriental" habit, this deep remembrance of painful history; just look at the Serbs who memorialize the Battle of Kosovo, or the Shia who still wail about the death of Ali. Basically the only place it's not present is in the cultural memories of non-black (exception: West Indians and Africans) and non-Amerindian Americans. So to say that the Chinese won't tie this back to the past is extremely naive. The People's Republic may have a different flag, but it's still the Middle Kingdom.

Greg:

Here's the problem I have. We have pretty solid evidence that leaders of nation-states are basically machiavellian actors who respond to inducements and want to stay in power. We also have pretty solid evidence that China's leaders fit right into this mold.

So, there's no reason to talk about "Asian values" here. No doubt if you were analyzing, say, WHY China thinks Tibet and Taiwan are so important, you can talk about historical slights. But that's not the point I am making. Rather, when someone says "we should give up and not try to pressure China's regime, because they are really popular and Asian values are anti-democratic and the only thing they care about is saving face", that person is basically being an apologist for the dictators, because this is EXACTLY the position that the dictatorship has encouraged its supporters and defenders to take over the past 30 years in order to avoid criticism.

In fact, as I noted above, China responds to pressure just like any other country. At this point, we have few levers, but in the past, we had more of them and didn't use them because of arguments about "Asian values" and saving face.

Meanwhile, Taiwan, across the strait, has exactly the same culture as China and yet nobody pulls the "Asian values" crap when it comes to Taiwan.

It's a smokescreen. In the end, at this point, I see no option but to deal with China the way they are. The ship has sailed. But the "saving face" / "Asian values" argument should still be rejected vehemently, because it is an excuse for supporting dictatorship.

As for Hector's admiration for Chinese caudillos, I think it speaks for itself.

Posted by Dilan Esper | April 11, 2008 12:59 AM

Oh and by the way tolerating a different culture means nothing if you don't tolerate them having different political, economic and social values than you.

Read some Rawls and get a clue Hector. There is a difference between differences that are tolerable and differences that are simply injustices. Should we tolerate the treatment of widows in India b/c they place negative social value on widows? No. Injustice should never be tolerated, and that includes a lack of political representation. You paint with far too broad a brush when you claim tolerance doesn't 'mean anything' unless it excuses any injustice a group practices. In fact, tolerance is only a meaningful term if it allows us to interact peaceably and productively with different peoples without compromising our understanding of basic human rights. Otherwise you should sound like a soft-headed relativist, which isn't so much as a liberal/left position as just a stupid one.

Posted by mpowell | April 11, 2008 1:03 AM

I only know the Vietnamese, who are somewhat more tractable on these kinds of issues than the Chinese are, but I am more optimistic than MY that a carefully phrased boycott announcement at this point could be useful in shifting the diplomatic landscape.

If, for example, the President were to announce that China's refusal to even sit down for discussions with the Dalai Lama made it extremely uncomfortably, politically difficult even, for him to go to Beijing -- say, that it would be a liability for his party in the US elections -- then it could be used as a lever to get China to tone down rhetoric on the Dalai Lama and perhaps broker at least a formal nonsubstantive dialogue with him before the Olympics. The way to do this would be to be somewhat noncommittal in public statements, and to communicate privately that a meeting with the DL would ease the situation greatly, and that otherwise there was a risk that some, uh, scheduling conflicts might prevent the President from coming to Beijing.

China may value the diplomatic propaganda of Olympic visits by Western heads of state highly enough that it would ease its way back down to some kind of meeting with the DL. And of course the US would have to make sure the DL reiterated his opposition to Tibetan independence, etc.

Posted by brooksfoe | April 11, 2008 2:21 AM

Dilan: "But the "saving face" / "Asian values" argument should still be rejected vehemently, because it is an excuse for supporting dictatorship."

I disagree. (Of course I've never been in China and have to base myself on what I read, and on 2 decades of life in other Asian countries.)

It seems to me that when dealing with China (as with most Asian countries, and indeed, with any country that can afford to bite the hand that hits it), you don't throw out insults the way McCain does. This is typical American feel-good posturing that does nothing for the Tibetans, indeed does not even ask anything from the Chinese, and can only make things worse.

China can be pressured, even blackmailed: when it intended to clear the forests of Borneo to have luxury wood for the Olympics, environmental organizations made it clear they would thoroughly spoil the Games. People from Hollywood have managed to impress on China the need to change its Sudan policy (how far they will go remains to be seen). But putting one's fists on one's hips and saying to China, in essence, "Get on your knees and say uncle before the eyes of the whole world, or else", is not the way to get things done.

Posted by Hans B | April 11, 2008 4:06 AM

The problem with Esper's notions is that it's more of the same as with Iraq and Kuwait back in 1991.

Everybody is SO upset about Tibet. Excuse me, but Tibet has been under Chinese rule for how long? Since 1951?

Why do we care this week? Because they're doing some more rioting and some more people got shot?

This is not our fucking problem, folks. And I'm not "apologizing" for dictators, Esper, so you can shove that argument. The bottom line is that Tibet is not the US's problem, not while it is engaged in killing Iraqis in big, bleeding batches. The Chinese have in Tibetan history killed, what, some thousands of Tibetans? The US in Iraq has killed at least 300,000 and is responsible for over a million.

140 people killed in Tibet in the last few weeks are compared to:

Nine Propositions on the U.S. Air War for Terror
http://www.antiwar.com/engelhardt/?articleid=12671

Six U.S.-allied Sunni fighters from the "Awakening" movement were reportedly killed in strikes by an AH-64 Apache helicopter on two checkpoints in the city of Samarra on March 22. ("The U.S. military denied the checkpoint it attacked was manned by friendly members of the so-called awakening councils and said those killed were behaving suspiciously in an area recently struck by a roadside bomb. It said the incident was under investigation. AP Television News footage of the aftermath showed awakening council members loading bodies into a pickup.")

Fifteen people in a single family were reportedly killed by U.S. helicopters in the city of Baquba in northern Iraq on March 23rd. ("The US military forces were not available to comment on the reports?")

In Tikrit, Saddam Hussein's hometown, five civilians, including a judge, Munaf Mehdi, were reportedly killed and ten wounded from strikes by "fixed-wing aircraft" in a "battle with suspected al-Qaeda Sunni Arab militants" on March 26. ("Preliminary assessment," according to the U.S. military, "indicates that despite coalition forces' efforts to protect them, several civilians were injured or killed during the ensuing gunbattle.")

According to the Iraqi police, a U.S. plane strafed a house in the southern city of Basra, killing eight civilians, including two women and a child on March 29th.

According to Iraqi police sources, five people, including four policemen were killed and three wounded when U.S. helicopters struck the city of Hilla in southern Iraq. According to another report, two police cars were also destroyed and an ambulance fired upon.

A U.S. F/A-18 carried out a "precision strike" against a house in Basra, reportedly killing at least three civilians, two men and an elderly woman, while burying a father, mother, and young boy in the rubble on April 3rd. ("'Coalition forces are unaware of any civilians killed in the strike but are currently looking into the matter,' the military said? Associated Press Television News showed cranes and rescue workers searching for survivors in the concrete rubble from the two-story house that was leveled in the Shiite militia stronghold of Qibla.")

Here, for instance, are a few lines from a recent Los Angeles Times piece by Tina Susman on escalating fighting in Baghdad: "American helicopters fired at least four Hellfire missiles and an Air Force jet dropped a bomb on a suspected militia target? A U.S. military spokesman in Baghdad, Lt. Col. Steven Stover, rejected Iraqi allegations that U.S. airstrikes and gunfire have killed mainly civilians. 'There might be some civilians that are getting caught, but for the most part, we're killing the bad guys.' 'We're very precise,' he said, adding that many airstrikes had been called off when it was not possible to get a 'clean hit' that would avoid hitting noncombatants." Or this from Sameer N. Yacoub of the Associated Press: "The U.S. military said one of its drones launched a Hellfire missile during the night at two gunmen shooting at government forces in a different part of Sadr City." Or this: "Three US airstrikes in northeastern Baghdad have killed 12 suspected gunmen and wounded 15 civilians, Iraqi police and US military say."

Each of these came out while this piece was being written, as did this: According to the AP, air strikes in a remote province of Afghanistan aimed at a warlord allied with the Taliban may have killed numerous civilians. ("Other provincial leaders said many civilians were killed in the hours-long clash, which included airstrikes in the remote villages of Shok and Kendal? U.S. officials and the Afghan Defense Ministry have denied that any civilians were killed.")

Nobody is saying that the Chinese government is particularly nice. If the US wants to distance itself from China in various ways, that's fine if it's done intelligently. It's also irrelevant. Suggesting that the US should start a spat over what is already a done deal - that the Olympics will be held in China - is simply petty bullshit that plays into the hands of war mongers like McCain and the neocons and gives the Chinese government an excuse to play tit-for-tat with the US dollar.

Posted by Richard Steven Hack | April 11, 2008 6:37 AM

Dilan,

I notice you choose not to respond to my substantive arguments.

Your insisting that there is some kind of 'natural right' to political representation is absurd. Liberal democracy is purely a means, not an end, and if you ask me it fails as a means pretty definitely.

China needs its 'caudillos', and my homeland, India, would be much better off if it had some 'caudillos' of its own. Ask a family in Beijing if they like having probably the lowest crime rate in the world.

Mpowell,

I have read Rawls thank you very much. Have you read any Augustine, or Sorel, or Rousseau, or Marx, or any of the many people who were even in the slightest way critical of liberal values?

Posted by Hector | April 11, 2008 8:21 AM

Dilan,

I do think, by the way, that China has a great deal of things wrong with it, and I don't think that its rulers at the current time are 'good people'. I wish that they would stop things like religious persecution, the occupation of Tibet, forced abortions, etc. If you were calling for political pressure for them to reform their system and end some of these abuses then I could support that. But I think that moving wholesale to a Western liberal society would not just be a betrayal of Asian values, it would be a disaster for China. They need a strong and authoritarian central government of one form or another.

Posted by Hector | April 11, 2008 8:31 AM

I think the main issue with a boycott of Beijing is that it's likely to be totally ineffective. It's incredibly difficult to embarass a government which excercises very tight control over virtually all media in-country. I think it's hard to overstate the persecution complex the Han have about the West, as well- any news about a boycott will be presented as an unfair, meanspirited attempt to ruin an international celebration by a group of Western nations trying to keep China down, and the people will accept that. They aren't unsophisticated- they know what goes on in Tibet. Equally they know what goes on in Iraq and Afghanistan and they're not likely to accept lectures from nations involved in putting down insurgencies elsewhere.

If you actually want to change the status quo in Tibet you first need a coherent policy about what you want to see happen. All the Chinese see is "FREE TIBET" banners and hemming and hawing from politicians (admitted human rights abusers, no less) about human rights. Neither Tibet nor Xinjiang are going to be independent any time soon so the best case scenario for either region is designation as a Special Administrative Region. The last decade has shown that the "one china, two policies" formula is workable in the HKSAR as well as the various SEZs. If credible govts approached the Chinese with a proposal to make Tibet an SAR with human rights protections equivalent to that of Hong Kong, tied to some kind of economic or aid incentive, or trade treaty, or what have you, you might get somewhere. Boycotting Beijing, while entertaining and viscerally satisfying, is not going to improve the conditions of the Tibetans (who, with the recently completed Lhasa rail link, are unlikely to remain a majority in Tibet for long anyway- a Tibetan democracy would probably not be very democratic for long).

Posted by Paper Mac | April 11, 2008 8:56 AM

Protesters attacked even a wheel chair bound torch bearer in Paris and of course was not report in the western media. So called Human right activities are real unhuman hooligans!

Posted by Yik Choo | April 11, 2008 10:11 AM

Protesters attacked even a wheel chair bound torch bearer in Paris and of course was not report in the western media. So called Human right activities are real unhuman hooligans!

Posted by Yik Choo | April 11, 2008 10:12 AM

Protesters attacked even a wheel chair bound torch bearer in Paris and of course was not report in the western media. So called Human right activities are real unhuman hooligans!

Posted by Yik Choo | April 11, 2008 10:12 AM