Fool’s Mountain: Blogging for China

With Iceland close to bankruptcy and the world’s financial system going to hell, China stands somewhat apart in its relative isolation. Asia Times has an intriguing article on this:

“In the past, China has been blamed for the low-degree of internationalization of its financial industries. Now it seems we are profiting from this ‘fault’,” the commentary said.

Many Chinese economists share this view. “Our not-fully-open financial system and not-fully-convertible currency saved China from being rattled during the 1997 Asian Financial Crisis. And now again this seems to be a strong dam to protect us against the current financial tsunami,” an economics researcher with the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) said.

“It is evident that the financial industries cannot become entirely market oriented. The semi-market, semi-government-control system may prove a better [system]. The problem in China is that the part of government control is too big and thus reforms are needed to deregulate.”

In early September, Steven N S Cheung, a Hong Kong-born Chinese-American economist living in exile in China, being wanted by the US government for alleged tax evasion, claimed that China “has formed the best system in the history of human kind”.

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In a surprise move to some, the United States reactivated a $6.46 billion Taiwan arms sales proposal and sent it to Congress for approval yesterday. (As late as September 28, the proposal was said to be frozen by the White House even as Taiwan lobbied Congress.)

Some Chinese now believe China and Wen Jiabao were “played” by the US: “Premier Wen had just said to save the US markets, out came $6 billion of arms sales as a slap to the face,” reads a typical comment online.
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Our blog has been around for 5 months. Judging from our site traffic and the comments we get (over 12,600 and counting, plenty of them insightful), we are doing quite well.

However, some readers’ comments paint a very different picture. Continue reading »

Today, on National Day, some 190 thousand passers-by, strangers to each other, packed the festively decked-out Tian’anmen Square to watch the Flag Raising Ceremony.

Although 2008 doesn’t make a “round number” anniversary, so much has transpired in this troubled year to make it almost seem like one. On this day, we translate for you the following editorial published in the Beijing News (新京报), titled Today, let us remember the value of being a “Chinese”:
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Prologue: On my last trip back to China I brought back some reprints of Republican-era books. The following musings are based on my hasty reading notes.

Abstract: The Chinese society functions well when the stuff of its elite works. The American society functions well when the stuff of its elite works and is embraced by its masses (which is far from automatic). The challenge for the Chinese society is that historically the stuff of its elite (e.g., Confucianism, Legalism and revolutionary socialism) has often failed to work. The challenge for the American society is that the stuff of its elite (e.g., science, education and secular humanism) is often rejected by its masses. Continue reading »

Zhai Zhigang enters space

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The problem of Chinese powdered and liquid milk producers lacing their products with industrial chemicals has left the Chinese public (especially the parents) in panic. The facts of this crisis have been well-documented. I have a few thoughts about its implications. Continue reading »

This morning, the Shenzhou 7 spacecraft carrying Zhai Zhigang, Liu Boming, and Jing Haipeng successfully took off from Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center and entered orbit. This is a major event in China, as a space walk (the first for the Chinese space program) is planned on this 3-day mission (on the 27th).

Shenzhou 7 launched by a Long March 2F rocket

Here is a full version.
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