On Mar 17, 6:29=A0pm, CharlesLiu <chliu...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> Call Obama and set the record straight on Tibet rioters and "Rodney
> King" style rock pelting vioence against innocent bystanders.
First, there were peaceful protests.
Then, the Chinese forces ran over the peaceful protestors with tanks.
Then the violence started. Yes, it is true that the Chinese moving
into Tibet are just poor people going where they can find work, and it
is sad they are getting hurt. But the rage that led to this is caused
by the Chinese government.
If they kept their hands off Tibet, the Tibetan people would be free
to practise their religion. They would not have suffered from the
Cultural Revolution.
The lucky people in Taiwan escaped the Cultural Revolution, so they
don't want to be under the government in the mainland that still
hasn't given up its ways of restricting the press, interfering in the
private matter of religion, imprisoning people for their political
statements.
Yes, it is true that China is a big and poor country, and it might be
hard to make Western-style democracy work there. But that is not an
excuse for any unnecessary brutality, any unnecessary limits on
individual freedom - or for any foreign policy actions that conflict
with the countries that have made democracy work.
Mao's China was one of the great evils of the world, alongside
Stalin's Russia and Hitler's Germany. Hitler's Germany was crushed and
defeated. Russia finally abandoned Communism, but the government now
still engages in dishonesty in how it runs its elections, and pursues
confrontation with the United States in its foreign policy.
China still maintains dictator****p, despite some partial reforms,
especially economic ones, and it threatens force against the part of
China which the Communist rebellion had not spread. Some time back, a
Chinese air force pilot irresponsibly flew his plane at an American
plane flying over international waters, causing damage that led to it
landing in China, and the plane was returned in pieces to the U.S.,
indicating that Chinese intelligence personnel had examined its
classified technology.
We wish to live in peace and freedom. The communists ruling China took
peace and freedom away from the Tibetan people when they assumed
control over Tibet. That is what matters - the happiness of individual
human beings. What treaties China and Tibet may have had five hundred
years ago, compared to the happiness of ordinary people, means
nothing. If China were a democratic country, and Tibetans were free to
read newspapers from anywhere in the world, free to practise their
religion, then it could be claimed that Tibetans who wanted to break
Tibet away from China were just unreasonable malcontents.
But that is not the case. So the Tibetan people want to put a big wall
between themselves and the evil monsters in Beijing. It would be nice
if some peaceful agreement could be negotiated where China could save
face by Tibet still being in China, but with personal freedom for
Tibetans (China, though, keeping the mineral wealth of Tibet for its
industrial and military uses, of course)... but a regime built on lies
and hate cannot afford to allow anyone under its sway a breath of
freedom.
(Well, that's not quite true; they have, surprisingly to me, largely
lived up to their one country, two systems commitment with respect to
Hong Kong. But letting the people of Tibet tell their stories of long
decades of repression to the world, they could not face that.)
Hillary Clinton has also made a statement about Tibet, but it seems
more measured and polite to China than Obama's statement. John McCain,
in Iraq, has not yet said anything I know of. I do not think I am yet
prepared to change my mind from John McCain to Obama, because the
United States is not likely to do much about Tibet, but it can do
things to protect the people of Iraq from the terrorists who don't
want them to be happy because the United States set them free from
Saddam Hussein. John McCain intends to keep up efforts to stop the
terrorists; hopefully, he will be clear about Tibet as well.
John Savard
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