Patterico's Pontifications

1/25/2008

Interesting Instapundit Links: China & CNN

Filed under: 2008 Election — DRJ @ 9:34 am



[Guest post by DRJ]

What do these two Instapundit links about China and CNN have in common?

Item No. 1:

From StrategyPage – “At the current rate of progress, Chinese military technology will match that of the United States in a decade or so.”

Item No. 2:

From Cadillac Tight and Talking Points Memo – “CARVILLE AND BEGALA BOOTED FROM CNN due to complaints from Obama?

“One wonders as well what’s going to happen in the general election if Hillary Clinton is the nominee…will CNN continue to ban Carville, Begala, and Zimmerman so that they can’t play shenanigans against the Republican candidate?”

One concerns a foreign threat and the other a domestic threat.

[… and, Yes, I’m kidding about CNN.]

— DRJ

13 Responses to “Interesting Instapundit Links: China & CNN”

  1. The Chinese have had extremely poor technology for all three thousand years of their history. They just could not grasp quality of materials and craftsmanship, or quality control at all. If a Chinese soldier wanted a decent weapon, he bought it from Persia or India. If they do achieve technological parity with the United States, it will be only because we taught it to them. And I’m not so sure the lesson will take, anyway. If they could have been Americans, they would have been a long time ago.

    nk (eeb240)

  2. I agree there is a difference between inventing technology and implementing it, but I thought the conventional wisdom that Asians couldn’t effectively use American technology was disproved by the Japanese over the past 30-40 years.

    DRJ (517d26)

  3. No. The Japanese cannot be compared to the Chinese. The Japanese have always suffered from shortage of raw materials which they had to obtain from abroad. Including silk, of all things. But when it comes to innovation they are on a par with us, and when it comes to quality control they probably lead the world.

    Don’t forget that Japan came out of feudalism only about 150 years ago. It had been held in the 16th century by the Tokugawas for about three hundred years. Yet, only 80 years after that, it was a threat to all of Asia and the United States as well.

    nk (eeb240)

  4. If they [the Chinese] could have been Americans, they would have been a long time ago.

    Maybe I should have written

    If they [the Chinese] could have been Japanese, they would have been a long time ago.

    nk (eeb240)

  5. Heh. I like that.

    DRJ (517d26)

  6. The Chinese has jumped from one cultural handicap (pastorial fuedal Confucianism) to another (Maoist Communism), and I think nk is at least partly right about the cultural barriers to mass acceptance of the ideas of quality and innovation. There’s a lot of “it’ll do” and “easy way” thinking still going on, even in the “innovative” business regions.

    On the other hand, there was simply never enough done in the 90s to settle the Clinton-China connection, and probably won’t be now. Those who have followed the issue have little doubt that advanced American defense tech was traded for political help by Billy Jeff, and I’m still pissed that the investigations were so clumsily handled.

    The SOB should probably be in prison for that alone, and it really does harm my hope for the future of the American political system that it’s now all accusation and no backup, because the next truly evil SOB who gets into office has pretty much free reign.

    A compliant and stupid agenda-driven press corps doesn’t help.

    Gee whiz, I think I must be having a “grumpy day.”

    Merovign (4744a2)

  7. Kidding aside, I think it’s a mistake to underestimate the Chinese. Throughout history, the Chinese weren’t limited by their intellect, innovation, or even their people but rather by their choice to insulate themselves from the rest of the world. I think that is starting to change.

    DRJ (517d26)

  8. We forget that Chinese history goes back 4500 years at our own peril.
    The Japanese were driven into Modernity by one man: The Emperor Meiji.
    China’s history is one of expansion and consolidation, but always centered on the Middle Kingdom (they might be the original “navel gazers”).
    The Senate Investigation of WJC’s China Follies, was led by Fred Dalton Thompson. He could have ridden that to a Presidential Election.
    Looking back, it seems that comity was more important?

    Another Drew (f9dd2c)

  9. DRJ is correct.

    IMO the Chinese are content to play the slow strategy. In the 70’s they displaced Formosa/Taiwan and got a permanent seat on the UN
    Security council. In 1999 they picked Hong Kong back up when the treaty expired.
    Taiwan is their intermediate goal and if they gain Taiwan in another 50 years they would probably be content for awhile.

    Point is they have been around for 5000 years in some form or another as a country and see themselves as viable 5000 years from now. They’ve got all the time in the world so to speak.

    Voice of Reason (10af7e)

  10. Your comments about the nation of China are interesting, nk, compared with the reputation that Chinese expats have around the world for starting successful businesses in their adopted countries. The two stereotypes aren’t exactly contradictory, but they certainly do contrast.

    As to the length of Chinese history, the observation is made often and sounds superficially profound (which is no doubt the reason that it is made so often), but on analysis it seems to have no relevance. What difference does it make how old they are? Egyptian history goes back even further and no one is worried about them at the moment.

    Doc Rampage (47be8d)

  11. A primary difference Doc is that China has a continuing culture, you can trace a pretty straight line from antiquity to today, through all of her upheavals.
    Egypt today has very little relationship to the Egypt of the King Tut – too many armies have marched through, and civilizations have been discarded and lost.

    Another Drew (f9dd2c)

  12. Nothing stereotypical about what I said, Doc. The Chinese invented the blast furnace around 600 B.C. but they still have not produced a decent steel. No copy of any western product they have ever made has met the quality of the original. Right now, to quote my Senator Richard Durbin, “Made in China” is a warning.

    As far as their “history” goes, I know that it is no older than Western Europe’s.

    nk (eeb240)

  13. China’ problem is despite it’s history, it takes short cuts. It did so with Maoism,which claimed 65 million lives with the Great Leap Forward to
    the Cultural Revolution. Now even when they adopt
    capitalism or the semblance of same (much like with Russia) they follow the vulgar Marxist robber
    baron conception of same; what in Marxist terms is the period of ‘mass accumulation. In China’s case, their post Sun Yatsen to Chiang Kaishek period; which involves unfettered industrial capitalism along with cronyism and enviromental
    desolation. In this capacity it feeds its
    factories with Sudanese and Iranian as well as Venezuelan and Saudi crude. This will likely bring about a confrontation with the other major power competing for those resources; mainly the U.S. Nationalism will likely expand its grip, as the Shenzen bubble manifests itself.

    narciso (c36902)


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