Peripatetic New York Times columnist Tom Friedman was in China for the closing ceremony of the Beijing Olympics, and his Wednesday column "A Biblical Seven Years" praised the host country for the Games' "magnificent $43 billion infrastructure," built over the past seven years while the U.S. has been stuck fighting Al Qaeda. Friedman also praised the Communist nation's "planning, concentrated state power" and "national mobilization." Don't those words have more than a little echo of Stalinism?
After attending the spectacular closing ceremony at the Beijing Olympics and feeling the vibrations from hundreds of Chinese drummers pulsating in my own chest, I was tempted to conclude two things: “Holy mackerel, the energy coming out of this country is unrivaled.” And, two: “We are so cooked. Start teaching your kids Mandarin.”
However, I’ve learned over the years not to over-interpret any two-week event. Olympics don’t change history. They are mere snapshots -- a country posing in its Sunday bests for all the world too see. But, as snapshots go, the one China presented through the Olympics was enormously powerful -- and it’s one that Americans need to reflect upon this election season.
China did not build the magnificent $43 billion infrastructure for these games, or put on the unparalleled opening and closing ceremonies, simply by the dumb luck of discovering oil. No, it was the culmination of seven years of national investment, planning, concentrated state power, national mobilization and hard work.
What Friedman apparently has not "learned over the years" is the phrase "Potemkin Village." And perhaps some reprioritizing of that $43 billion in infrastructure spending is in order, given the state of China's schools, hundreds of which collapsed during the recent earthquakes, resulting in grievous loss of young life.
And how did the Chinese government "mobilize" its country? Partly by bulldozing the homes of its citizens. The Times Olympic Blog reported earlier this month on the displacement of people to make room for the Olympics. The left-wing Guardian newspaper puts the number at around 1.5 million displaced Chinese. That figure makes Friedman's breezy celebration of "concentrated state power" and "national mobilization" more than a little sinister.
(h/t Dan Gainor of BMI)
—Clay Waters is the director of Times Watch, an MRC project tracking the New York Times.
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Mandarin Oranges
August 28, 2008 - 08:45 ET by Copperhead RidgeI remember in the 1980s when everybody said that we should start teaching our children Japanese.
I just don't see how the People's Republic of China can continue to be completely communist. They have to produce millions of new jobs each year. I think they're heading for an economic meltdown.
Liberals are so enamored by the infrastructure of the Olympic Village. They never look at the infrastructure of the entire nation. They also never examine how the handing over of Hong Kong infused billions of dollars of capital into a communist nation.
Someone replied to one of my messages some weeks ago that communism and socialism exist only because capitalism has allowed them to. I believe that. There's small examples of this within the United States. Thomas Hughes's socialist experiment at Rugby, Tennessee, is one. It was a failure until the colony embraced some capitalism. A tavern on the Cincinnati Southern kept capital coming into the colony. When it burned, the colony failed.
It's sort of a microcosm of Hong Kong and China.
Excellent point
August 28, 2008 - 10:02 ET by DarkCurrentI lived in Japan from the mid-80s to early 90s, when everyone said Japan would be ruling the world by now. I didn't buy it.
I live in China now and I doubt longer-term linear extrapolations regarding China's rise even more than I did those regarding Japan's back then.
While China today is mostly a capitalist economy at street level and will most likely continue to grow strongly in the mid-term, there are very serious long-term demographic, cultural and underlying developmental issues that I believe are mostly overlooked by casual observers today.
China and the Olympics and why I wasn't impressed
August 28, 2008 - 12:17 ET by UnsaneYou know this better than I because you live there, but my visit to Beijing was an eye-opener. I saw a city with amazing upside that undoubtedly has come a long way since the days of Mao, but I also saw very serious issues.
The pollution in Beijing was nightmarish. The government is doing all it can to stem a mass migration to the cities, but still my tour group and I were thronged by people selling us everything and anything.
And yeah, the Chinese blew $50 billion on the Olympics whereas London is only going through $22 billion. But the difference here is that China is not constrained by its people (i.e., no political pressure from voters). They could have blown $100 billion on the Olympics. The 80% of the population that is agrarian and living in extreme poverty were ignored in every way and the Chinese government could care less as they have better things to do as to impress the unknowing and uninitiated, like many in the NBC audience and apparently Mr. Friedman as well.
By contrast, London and UK voters are throwing a fit over cost overruns for the Games! Hell, in July 2005 The Economist was pleading, if I may paraphrase, for the IOC to "please, please, please give the 2012 games to Paris" due to concerns over costs!!! That is what happens in democratic nations where voters ultimately control the purse strings via representatives in legislatures.
Whoever casts a vote for Obama-Biden is nothing more than a common thief. Whoever fails to vote against them is nothing more than a moral coward.
Ditto
August 28, 2008 - 10:04 ET by Dr_LibertyYou beat me to the punch Copperhead Ridge (cool moniker by the way -- you gotta be a westerner too). Japan was THE new economic power in the '80s and now with a fertility rate below replacement level they are heading for oblivion.
China has a similar demographic problem in the works with its single child family policy. That may seem weird for the world's most populous country, but they have a highly skewed male/female ratio that will create problems by mid-century.
You can even go back to the 1960s and 1970s with numerous books that the Age of America is over. Every decade has its detractors that makes this type of prediction and 10 years later it is wrong.
<insert witty signature here>
Western...
August 28, 2008 - 10:17 ET by Copperhead Ridge...in a Kentucky sense. It's the name of the ridge on which my house stands. We've adopted the name. It keeps riff-raff off our property.
Copperheads? We've got 'em, believe me. I hate those things.
No word
August 28, 2008 - 08:52 ET by 10ksnookerAbout how Communist China's arsenal build up is coming ... Are these NYTimes writers ignorant, or do they just write like they are.
Democrat Response To Challenge
August 28, 2008 - 08:52 ET by ChasvsSurrender!
That's it! Just roll over and satrt learning Mandarin!
Certainly, they wouldn't think about something like unleashing the Private Sector to counter the efforts of a Centralized Planning effort by the Communists!
We ARE so cooked---but it's from our Marxist leaders in the Democrat Party and their cheering Moronic Media like Fineman!
Friedman is
August 28, 2008 - 09:05 ET by Delsaanything but "clueless".
He and those who will vote for SOBama are praying for the same "Concentrated State Power" China enjoys.
They start with their marxist choice and then take control of the Senate and house!
DONE! FINISHED!
Clueless? Not on YOUR or MY LIFE!
Why are most liberlas so clueless?
August 28, 2008 - 09:07 ET by c5thenDo they actually concentrate to take things out of context and perspective, thus showing heculean mental abilites, or are they just completely clueless and do not understand how to see beyond the pointing finger and have no understanding of a bigger picture? For most liberals that I know personally, it's the later.
The day that "politician" became a career choice is the day we started losing the Republic. Let's get it back! Alan Keyes '08.
damned if you do
August 28, 2008 - 09:08 ET by AgnosticThe Chinese build an Olympic Village, increase their ballistic missle capabilities, build a sub base (with help), and upgrade their military.
The US brings freedom to and rebuilds a nation while participating in a war that spans the entire globe. You would think that would be pretty impressive.
If the US was to accomplish what the Chinese did over the last seven years Friendman and friends would be telling us how we wasted money while the children starved, were being too agressive by sending the wrong message while increasing the size of our military and how it is America's fault that their is not peace in the world.
It baffles me
August 28, 2008 - 09:09 ET by Iowa BoyDo these elitest liberals who praise the strength of the central state not realize that when the central state takes over, they are the first ones who are stood up against the wall.
"Our liberties we prize and our rights we will maintain." Official Motto of the State of Iowa
Ready.. Aim... FIRE!
August 28, 2008 - 10:09 ET by Sergeant ROCKLiberals fancy themselves as being the ones doing the shooting!
LesserOf2evils '08
How can any reporter
August 28, 2008 - 09:38 ET by BruzillaHow can any reporter possibly overlook all the reporting that was done prior to the games that detailed how China was just papering over all the deplorable conditions in the country? As for enthusiasm and energy, it's easy to get your people to show lots of both when you have them under a threat of prison or death.
Information control and face value
August 28, 2008 - 12:23 ET by UnsaneEasy. The Chinese government ensured that people like the reporterette that went "traveling the Chinese countryside" went to the right places. It was amusing to see her and Costas gushing about China during those segments.
Also, you are forgetting that American reported take every single thing they see in countries outside the United States at face value. When the North Korean kids proclaimed that they were the hapiest in the world, Diane Sawyer dutifully reported this as gospel without any digging either within or without the DPRK. With this knowledge, how could anyone on earth expect anything different?
Whoever casts a vote for Obama-Biden is nothing more than a common thief. Whoever fails to vote against them is nothing more than a moral coward.
Can you say, "Potemkin
August 28, 2008 - 13:26 ET by Tim the EnchanterCan you say, "Potemkin Village?"
It is amazing how little it
August 28, 2008 - 10:06 ET by Chris NormanIt is amazing how little it takes from a communist dictatorship to get these pretentitiously intelligent journalists to fall all over themselves in praise of it. These centralized governments, who aren't answerable to anyone, can spend any amount of money they can get to build a showcase something or other. It's all built for national ego and to impress dupes like Friedman, who giddily fall for it every time - "This is where socialism works!"
McNotObama '08