Is China the next Enron?

[wapiti]

Big budget releases have to walk on eggshells for Chinese censors and now they can't handle an NBA GM's opinion regarding Hong Kong, essentially turning it into an international incident.

I'm not sure if it's possible, but I wonder if there's a way to encourage more manufacturing in other low cost labor countries to offset tariffs/change in trade relationship with China. Exerting pressure like this over such petty bullshit is not acceptable.

Re South Park -- have they not done anything with Fingerbang since 1999? What a great critique of what China has done to our movies/pop culture.

The difficulty in moving to other countries is the lack of infrastructure and easy access to raw materials. The Chinese have setup a manufacturing powerhouse that is difficult to compete with elsewhere.

The tariffs have moved the needle. Chinese factories are actually moving to Vietnam, even taking factory workers with them. But Vietnam is a fraction of the size of China and will only be able to absorb so much. Other countries (Phillipines, Malaysia, India, Mexico) are much further behind. It will take a long time to untangle.

[Moliere]

The statement from the state run broadcaster in China is

we believe that any remarks that challenge national sovereignty and social stability are not within the scope of freedom of speech

God bless the the first amendment!

[Jeff Lebowski]

"social stability"? bastards.

[Color Me Badd Fan]

This Hong Kong dude I think sums it up pretty well...

This would be a hilarious ring tone.

[YOhio]

Embedded Tweet

[Sleeping in EQ]

I'll put this here too, as it strongly condemns China:

https://www.thefire.org/coronavirus-...lace-of-ideas/

[Jeff Lebowski]

I hate China.

[YOhio]

I hate China.

I hate the Chinese government. Xi is Putin with a real economy, critical supply chain positioning in almost every industry, rare earth metals and so on. As hard as it will make things going forward, I think this administration has done some good work setting the stage for the necessary decoupling over the next decade.

[swampfrog]

I'll put this here too, as it strongly condemns China:

https://www.thefire.org/coronavirus-...lace-of-ideas/

Thanks, that goes into my bookmarks. It hits on the error of "seeing all sides" as if all sides had the same validity. The importance of seeing as much of the world as it really is can't be understated. Which is especially true during a crisis such as this where it means life or death.

[creekster]

I hate the Chinese government. Xi is Putin with a real economy, critical supply chain positioning in almost every industry, rare earth metals and so on. As hard as it will make things going forward, I think this administration has done some good work setting the stage for the necessary decoupling over the next decade.

A TRUMP LOVER??!!

[Donuthole]

[Color Me Badd Fan]

I hate the Chinese government. Xi is Putin with a real economy, critical supply chain positioning in almost every industry, rare earth metals and so on. As hard as it will make things going forward, I think this administration has done some good work setting the stage for the necessary decoupling over the next decade.

It's been a bad six months for China. Unfortunately, I don't think the US and the rest of the world has the wherewithal to properly put China in its place -- like have international accords that supply chains will not be compromised by this regime. Other regions of the world need to be able to pick up the slack in any given industry if China decides to go full asshole (which will mean they can't go full asshole).

I can't believe the pharmaceutical production has been outsourced to China -- hell that couldn't have continued to be made stateside or in Mexico? That doesn't seem particularly labor intensive to me.

[SeattleUte]

I posted this on Facebook. Interesting little video from Vox. The deep origin of this catastrophe is a legacy of Communism. Mao-policy caused famines were causing 36 million deaths by starvation. China encouraged wildlife farming and markets to prevent starvation. This created tastes and a market even as China turned capitalist and later became able to feed everyone. Today wildlife farms are industrial-sized and primarily cater to the elite, and this also stokes demand for poached wildlife. A toxic combination of communism's horrific failures and the dark side of capitalism.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=TPpoJGYlW54&feature=share

[YOhio]

What the U.S. officials learned during their visits concerned them so much that they dispatched two diplomatic cables categorized as Sensitive But Unclassified back to Washington. The cables warned about safety and management weaknesses at the WIV lab and proposed more attention and help. The first cable, which I obtained, also warns that the lab’s work on bat coronaviruses and their potential human transmission represented a risk of a new SARS-like pandemic.

“During interactions with scientists at the WIV laboratory, they noted the new lab has a serious shortage of appropriately trained technicians and investigators needed to safely operate this high-containment laboratory,” states the Jan. 19, 2018, cable, which was drafted by two officials from the embassy’s environment, science and health sections who met with the WIV scientists. (The State Department declined to comment on this and other details of the story.)

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opini...coronaviruses/

[Color Me Badd Fan]

Yet something else to convince you that China is asshoe.

https://www.npr.org/2020/04/14/82856...silence-his-wi