The Winter of Our Discontent - Session 2: Ultimate Goals | The New School

China: "Ninety percent of what you hear is lies."

China is clamping down on social media as it grapples with a crisis over the escape of a high-profile dissident, apparently to U.S. protection. The case presents new difficulties for a Chinese leadership already struggling to deal with the scandalous downfall of a powerful politician, and it complicates U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's visit to Beijing this week.
Yet China's use of social media in dealing with these two recent crises has been a study in contrasts.
There's a long list of forbidden terms on Chinese Twitter-like services, words for which searches are banned. In recent days, the list got longer still. Freshly banned words include "blind man," "U.S. Embassy" and "consulate," as well as "Chen Guangcheng," the name of the blind lawyer who escaped last week after 19 months under house arrest. Chen, who exposed forced abortions by local officials and subsequently served four years in prison, is believed to be under U.S. protection, though this is still unconfirmed.
Despite the ban, news of his escape was all over Weibo, China's biggest microblog service. Netizens were referring to him with code words such as "going into the light," which is a play on his name.
"Weibo now has become the public sphere of Chinese politics," says Michael Anti, a columnist who tracks Weibo closely. "It has become a market of rumors."
The Internet is making it harder for China to control messaging, he notes, but the government is becoming more sophisticated.
"Even rumors are not equal on Weibo," Anti says, adding that certain rumors are permitted, while others are deleted and their posters punished.
Such distinctions were clear recently, when powerful Chongqing politician Bo Xilai was sacked last month. Bo's name had been sacrosanct — no online criticism permitted — until a few months ago, when his former police chief tried to seek asylum in a U.S. consulate. Suddenly, unofficial accounts of the scandal were posted online, and not deleted. The saga took an even more dramatic turn when journalist Yang Haipeng announced on Weibo that the mysterious death of Englishman Neil Heywood was indirectly linked to Bo.
"I knew the news for about 10 days before releasing it," Yang says. "I didn't dare believe it. Then reliable sources told me about it again while we were drinking. They were from the legal world, and they didn't leak it on purpose."
Yang's post was not deleted, despite the sensitivity of the allegations. Days later, the government confirmed that Bo's wife, Gu Kailai, was a prime suspect in Heywood's death. Beijing seemed to be tacitly allowing the online demonization of Bo. Unconfirmed rumors swirled about his wiretapping of senior leaders, about massive corruption and that the motive for Heywood's murder might have been to stop him from exposing transfers of vast sums of money overseas.
Yang believes a disinformation campaign could have been under way. "At first, the government panicked because true news was coming out. Now they've calmed down," he says. "It's possible that they are releasing lots of false information on purpose to confuse people, so no one can tell what's real and what's false."
These rumors gave Beijing cover to move against Bo's followers inside the government.
"That's the typical Mao Zedong strategy: Mobilize the people against the local factions," says Anti, the columnist. "Weibo has already become a battlefield for public opinion. If it is a battlefield, they should occupy instead of destroy that."
But in the case of Chen, the escaped lawyer, the strategy has been completely different. The censorship machine has tried to deny his existence rather than allow his demonization. That could be because sensitive negotiations with the U.S. about his fate are ongoing.
Charlie Custer of the translation website ChinaGeeks.org says another factor could be that his case is more potent.
"The whole Bo Xilai thing is sort of like watching an opera or watching a movie. It's very entertaining and very interesting, but it doesn't cause the average person to think, 'Wow, that could happen to me,' " Custer says. "Chen Guangcheng comes from a rural, poor background, so he strikes a chord with a lot of people. Then seeing his family — these people who are completely innocent of anything — be arrested and held without trial or charges, that does resonate with a lot of people."
On the streets, many ordinary people are baffled by recent events.
"I don't believe anything," says a 50-something who gives his name as Mr. Sun. "Ninety percent of what you hear is lies. There's no truth anymore."
Such views highlight a real danger for Beijing. The government is trying its hardest to manipulate social media, but the truth is that the online world and official discourse have become parallel worlds, growing further apart day by day. And that widening gulf is undermining the government steadily every day.

Copyright 2012 National Public Radio. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.

Miss Teen USA 2007 - South Carolina answers a question

My belief system is this. The health care for anybody but especially for our nation. The highest quality and lowest cost can only be delivered without the government. What I believe is that all things we drive, we do, health care, anything, is a privilege to some extent. Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, those are inalienable rights endowed by your creator. If you’re claiming a right, if you’re going to say anything’s a right, if you’re going to say you have a right to a cell phone, then who has the responsibility to pay for it? That’s what I believe.

Miss South Carolina Teen USA, what do you think?

Nikki Haley Has Perfect Defense in Ethics Probe

by Kirsten Boyd Johnson

3:45 pm May 3, 2012

78 Comments 1995 Views

South Carolina’s dingbat governor Nikki Haley, famous chiefly for being the only human ever rumored to make hot forbidden love with a political blogger, has lately been in trouble for allegedly making hot forbidden legislative favors for her health company employer while she was still a state representative and doing “secret consulting work,” which sounds roughly as hot as secret blogger sex. Here is why Nikki Haley’s lawyer would like the House ethics panel to rule in her favor: “To find otherwise would not only impugn the integrity of many other members of the General Assembly, but also that of many of South Carolina’s best corporate partners: BlueCross BlueShield of South Carolina, Michelin, AT&T, Time Warner Cable, and several others.” We believe the usual lawyerly defense goes more along the lines of “no wrongdoing took place,” but sure, “everybody else does it, too” sounds great. So how does the panel rule?
From the Columbia Free Times:

Members of the committee voted 5-1 today to clear Haley of wrongdoing. The lone holdout was the only Democrat serving on the six-member panel.
…
[House Ethics Committee Chairman Ronald] Smith said the committee didn’t do much in the form of an independent investigation into the claims.
“Do we have an investigator on our staff who can go out there and do an investigation like the State Ethics [Commission]? No,” he said. “We have one full-time employee.”

You are wonderful, South Carolina. [Columbia Free Times]

Miss Teen USA 2007 - South Carolina answers a question

"I'm In With the Out Crowd" - Susan Branham

the cockeyed susan blog

Thursday, May 3, 2012

I'm In With the Out Crowd

It has finally dawned on me, after a half-century of being a Democrat, that WE are not the outsiders, we've just allowed ourselves to be labeled as such. If your party is the one advocating for the rights of all families to be equal, of all workers to be treated fairly, of all persons no matter their beliefs to be heard, of all gender identifications to serve, of a cleaner environment, and of the existence of a Middle Class, then you should be the ones demanding the return of your country.

But we're too nice. Oh, okay, W. Sure, you loosened the pickle jar for eight years. It's not like that President guy did anything but slip off the little Bin Laden lid. And yes, we aren't always as quick as a Rachel Maddow on a Sunday show to correct "inaccuracies" or, what lesser-evolved beings might refer to as M'Fing Lies: We don't say such things. We don't pull our National Convention out of a state where they are about to move BACKWARD on family rights, about to regress away the tiny gains that had been made. No, we just suggest that the hate-mongering preacher in NC might wanna have a look at "American Beauty" so he can see how the whole "beat the crap outta your gay kid" thing works out.

We are the donkeys, but we aren't the jackasses. Sorry elephants--see how I had to say "sorry"--but that would be you guys. Yes, there are some simple differences in opinion and in policy between reasonable people...thank goodness for that. But when killing Bin Laden is bad and beating kids is good--well, you lost me there.

I remember during the Decade of Bullying when I was young, that bullies are people who spread rumors and tell falsehoods, they push you around and call you names, they isolate you by your differences from them. Sound pachedermy yet? Rove, rove, rove your boat-load of lies: "Forward" means Marxist (except when both Bushes used it) and Healthcare For Most is evil (unless The Heritage Foundation is cool with it). And speaking of boats...we didn't stand up in 2004 and look what happened. This is THAT kind of election, I fear. Should President be up by 30 points? Of course. But these folks have a history of stealing elections; CLOSE ONES make their nefarious jobs easier. Then there's the suppression...and ALEC...and the poorly-named Citizens United.

I was loathe to call a lot of this racism four years ago. I knew some would be, some always is. And we sure saw a ton of that in the August 2009 town halls! But the more we Democrats are painted as the infidels, the more I wonder just where does the fear and anger come from? Changing demographics? Outmoded industries? The Occupy Movement?

Whether the Republicans are worried that they showed up at the wrong ballpark after the game had already been played or not, one thing is as clear as the glass keeping things briny in that pickle jar:
You gotta really hate a black man to knock the death of Bin Laden!

"If I Wanted America To Be A Dictatorship"