Mitt Romney steps in it again; Consideration of the dramatic escape of Chinese activist Chen Guangcheng to the US Embassy, his voluntary release to Chinese Government custody and new request to return to the US on Hillary Clinton's plane. Following the original Post, I include recent developments, critiques from commenters and credit where it is due.
Q; How many soldiers does it take to surround every US Embassy in China?
A: It depends on how long their legs are.
权力说真话 (Quánlì shuō zhēn huà) - Speaking Truth to Power -
Guards at the Gates of Freedom
Background;
Mr. Chen’s case is different. A self-taught lawyer, he has called attention to human rights abuses against the disabled and women who have been forcibly sterilized. In 2006 he was sentenced to 51 months in prison on charges of destroying property and assembling a crowd to disrupt traffic, charges his supporters say were trumped up.
The previous informative diary
here by
Rimjob documents Chen's recent, somewhat mysterious escape from in-house detention. Now an associate tells
CNN that
Chen had prepared for his escape for months .....by lying in bed for prolonged periods so that the guards wouldn’t be suspicious if they didn’t see any activity from him for a long time
If you can't see me doing nothing, you won't see when I stop. This from a blind man whose weakness, it would seem, is his strength.
Wu Wei; to do without doing, a fundamental principle of Taoist thought in yo face! "The sage seems to do little or naught, Yet he leaves nothing undone." An apperantly well organized, coordinated and prepared group of supporters managed to confound both China and the US with a neat little piece of misdirection that would make Sun Tzu proud.
Chen's family and associates have since been detained and questioned, Chinese officials are in frumious tizzy and commentators are puzzled by the haphazard nature of their response, both internally and externally. Chen's network of accomplices and the skill with which they evaded the blockades and surveillance surrounding him may be just the tip of the iceberg. How many other bright, tech-savvy young people are getting, or have already gotten to the point of frustration and sophistication that they too could, and would leverage their growing power to make their voices heard? How many of these people, seeing the actions of a blind man will be content to remain unseen and unheard themselves? Chen is blind but escapes the all seeing Party. How long can a Party remain in power if it continues to feign deafness to cries of Fǔbài!, Qúndài guānxì! (corruption and nepotism)? Where and how far might the blind lead the deaf? I certainly do not know and am perhaps overstating the case, but time will tell and when and if it does come, the next Tienanmen episode will end differently I think, I hope.
Shades of our own internal politics arise like hungry ghosts as well. Commentators on the linked stories exhibit a strong bi-polar divide between Party and Chen supporters with a great deal of animus and not much middle ground. Is this depth of feeling reflected in the Chinese population at large? I suspect it is, especially among the only child cohort. Be that as it may, as details emerge the story fairly begs for a movie treatment and, funnily enough, the movies are already playing a part in the unfolding drama................>>
Click the pic to watch the clip and you will see why 'Shawshank Redemption' is now a banned search term in the Middle Kingdom. Is the party very very nervous and unsettled? You decode it.
Yahoo News tells us that;
"There are many people now drinking toasts to him for the way he broke through his captivity, his difficulties, and pursued freedom," said Ai. "It's what we all want for ourselves in our hearts. Chen Guangcheng is an example to us. If a blind person can break out of the darkness to freedom, then everyone can."
China's state-controlled media have so far ignored the story despite its gripping narrative and the serious implications it could have on Sino-U.S. relations. Anything vaguely related to Chen has been blocked on Chinese social media sites, such as posts including or key word searches for Chen, Guangcheng, GC, or even the words "blind person."
and
I tell
you that the GGL XLate tells
me that when wishing this brave man and his friends, family and supporters well, as we raise our glass to them we should say
萬壽無疆 Wàn shòu wú jiāng, longevity and health to
you and all who put their bodies on the line for what they need and what they believe.
Much to the chagrin of our own venerable leaders, this has landed in their laps at a particularily inopportune time in the run up to high level diplomatic talks between Sec. of State Clinton and her Chinese counterpart. A senior american diplomat was secretly whisked off to Beijing to smooth things over in advance of Our Lady's visit, and, my (shhh) secret source at the State Department slipped me this photo, caught at the instat the news of The Unexpected Party in the US Embassy landed on her desk.
Oy, I think she just Plotzed! One wonders just how many more guests may show up at the door and how their plans may influence events.
As that other venerable Grey Lady further reveals;
In an audacious video released Friday, Mr. Chen did not call for a change of government, but rather appealed to Prime Minister Wen Jiabao to investigate and halt the abuse of his family. Other advocates who have spoken to him since he fled say he does not want asylum that would force him to leave China.
I hear what he IS saying, and I think I can hear what he's
NOT saying too. Open the link on a separate tab and listen to Demi Lovato sing about who's not saying what and why they're not saying it (or not) while you enliven and enlighten this diary with your erudite commentary, se non vi dispiace.
-End Original content-
I was pleased to recieve a couple comments from
koNko providing local perspective on the story;
...Obviously the turn of events since you posted this (and me my Chen diary) have reframed the picture.
My response to your ol question is that the Beijing Spring has been proceeding in slow motion for 30 years and is recently speeding up, and I would expect this to continue for several years or even decades. And the reason is that China is a big, complex nation, and reform is a process that happens on multiple social, economic and political levels in more small steps than big ones.
But I think Chen's case just pushed it a bit further. Let's see what happens.
And;
Actually a lot is changing. I would put the past 3 years of so in the positive column, with more focus progress on labor and fighting corruption. This year there is predictably more censorship because there is a changing of the guard and that is always a period of lock-down, but on the other hand a record number of non-party members are running for local offices.
Perhaps you have read about Mr. Bo's downfall; another positive are he was promoting regressive Maoist culture and accumulating too much power. Wen's strongly worded rebuke of him as he was demoted was pretty much welcomed by progressives here. From about mid 2013 things should relax again........
What about my Daughter's future?
Emphasis mine.
This is what I value most about DKos; the potential for a productive exchange of views and information from eyes on the scene and minds on the alert! koNko's views regarding the incremental and, I infer, generally positive course of developments in Chinese internal politics may not exactly stoke the fires of enthusiasm for seeing rapid change there, it does imply a certain confidence in the eventual outcome which I for one find encouraging.
As many will know, Mr. Chen's change of heart after finding himself back firmly in the grasp of the authorities has created a stir in the US media and blogosphere. Further muddling the issue, Mitt the foreign policy expert has felt the need to chime in.
Day of Shame for Obama....blah blah..troubled...dark day for freedom...(dog whistle) woof woof... etc.
Really Mitt? Like the
Romney-Ryan Budget from Mordor, he provides no specifics on how he would handle things differently. Let me show you my shocked face. Unlike Mitt, our correspondent here actually provides us with an increased understanding of the true consequential implications of these events; light rather than smoke. Let's have some more of that.
To give credit where credit is due, the good folks over at Zero Impact Posts provided some valuable technical and stylistic guidance that I've applied in this update and over at my most recent Diary, to good effect there, and we'll see how it goes here. I don't live for attention, but if no one reads what you write, why bother? I'm sure some Chinese Sage said this millenia ago and I've just absorbed it by spiritual osmosis; To know what you do not know is True Knowledge, to listen to those who do Know is True Power. Good advice for Mitt as well.