Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : War -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Rolla Coasta who wrote (577)	1/16/2001 12:40:39 AM
From: Hawkmoon	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 23908

It is not an overnight phenomenon that can guarantee every ignorant, uneducated, and directionless folks to vote for someone who cast their hypocritical imagines on TV or in person for political gain. Most certainly not... but doing something at a local level (like voting in their local mayor or village chieftain) would be a great start.. But of course, development of such a grass-roots political process is not what they have in mind. They have something along the lines of the Mexican PRI system in store for the Chinese people, I'd wager. (remember that Porfilio Diaz was revered by the Mexican people as a "paternal leader", and many consider Pinochet to be the same thing (despite the atrocities he was accused of). How can you trust people, who have so much absolute power over a billion chinese, to suddenly give it all up? Name for me ONE, only ONE mind you, communist state that has become democractic voluntarily. It just doesn't happen... So don't delude yourself. The Chinese people will have just as much "freedom" as the "paternalist elites" think they should have. And since ignorance is the sworn enemy of freedom (or at least free thought), what makes you believe it is in their interest to educate the ignorant peasants? Who else will they call upon to drive their tanks against young students asking only for political openess? (yes, according to reports the Chinese generals brought in peasant soldiers to put down the Tianamen demonstration). And this was because there existed considerable doubt about the willingness of troops from the coastal regions of China being willing to shoot their own countrymen. Obviously the ignorant peasants had no such qualms... and such a lack of conscience makes them invaluable, doesn't it? As for the British being totalitarian, I guess you could say that was the case several hundred years ago. And HK was a colony of Britain, not an independent state. But then again, you didn't see the kind of massive student demonstrations in HK either... probably because they had some of the most free capital markets on the planet. And you also didn't see people risking their lives to get out of HK and to cross into China (unless they were smugglers.. :0) How can someone trust them to lead their nation with so many threats from outside world Or better yet... why not generate threats that don't exist? Fear combined with ignorance is a beautiful recipe for continued oppression. Why is that Falun Gong is dangerous, but Tai-Chi isn't? And if people want to follow it, isn't that their right so long as they don't infringe on the rights of others? Again,... it's this "father knows best" mentality which the octegenarian leadership cynically claim is the justification for their repression of Falun Gong, as well as Christian churches (been burning quite a few of them lately, haven't they?) Of course, the only religion that TRULY matters is Maoist Communism. Riding the coattails of the capitalistis imperialists is only a temporary break from the ultimate goal of the egalitarian dictatorship of the proletariat (which is really a dictatorship of elites OVER the proletariat). It would seem that while all people are equal under communism, some are more equal than others. I don't know where you live Q (HK, China, or elsewhere), but don't fool yourself into buying into this fear mongering about people doing peaceful exercises. If they are following such a belief, it is because that the current system has nothing to offer them. They were disorganized and just fooling around themselves in party style with ego struggle. Which is why such a spontaneous uprising had to be met with Tanks and machine guns, right? How can someone trust them to lead their nation I don't think they were intending on seizing power, but were trying to get national leadership to open up the political system to more representation of the average individual (and not just to some communist party member). The Chinese paternal elders should know all the foreign threats well. One final point... most of these "paternal elders" have SPENT LIMITED TIME OUTSIDE OF CHINA. So the only concept they have of "foreign threats" are the ones they generate for themselves. After all, the US has long outnumbered both Russia and China in nuclear arms. And at the outset of the missile age, we held the distinct advantage that would have permitted us to utterly destroy the USSR and China combined without even a chance for retaliation. But we didn't exploit that advantage because we were a democracy and our people would not support such aggression. Can you say the same thing about the Chinese people with regard to the rest of the world? What would China have done had they had the upper hand? Regards, Ron