Townhalls & Firewalls

Analysis…

President Obama’s recent trip to China has sparked a wave of debate.  From economics to an uncensored Internet, numerous comments have conspired regarding the recent trip abroad.  Largely, the differences between the two nations, the United States and China, are what contribute to the conversation.

The Huffington Post |  In talking to a group of graduate students from the China University of Political Science and Law, one of Beijing’s most prestigious universities, President Obama’s rise to power has filled them with the hope that the impossible, or at least the improbable, is achievable.
For the students, many who have little recognition of a world before President George W. Bush, President Obama represents a new approach to the global order, an approach that they eagerly look to be a part of.

NPR |  President Obama visits China at a time when the world’s two most powerful economies face very different fortunes.
A humbled United States is slowly recovering after sparking the global financial crisis. China, on the other hand, has handled the downturn with ease and appears to be leading the world out of recession, while increasing its influence in Asia.

Time |  The official U.S. buzzword for President Obama’s visit to China this week is “pragmatic cooperation,” but behind the scenes, U.S. diplomats have been aiming for something a little closer to subversion — at least when it comes to getting around China’s “great firewall” of official censorship and information control.
There is a long history of Chinese officials censoring the comments of U.S. presidents. In 1984 when President Ronald Reagan gave a speech in Beijing, state-run China Central Television cut portions that referred to the Soviet Union, religion and democracy. During Obama’s inaugural speech in January, China’s state television cut away when the president referred to previous American generations that had faced down communism. The line that followed was also edited from television broadcasts and from transcripts on many Chinese news portals: “To those who cling to power through corruption and deceit and the silencing of dissent, know that you are on the wrong side of history; but that we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist.”
Online outreach by the Obama Administration is designed in part to bypass such censorship, and increase direct communications with the Chinese people. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, for one, has been particularly aggressive on the issue since taking office.

Personal Democracy Forum |  Obama made the argument that Internet freedoms are human freedoms, playing off China’s vibrant — if restricted — base of Internet users. His townhall with “future Chinese leaders” was broadcast online, and questions came, as they have with domestic townhalls, from the Internet, quote-unquote. Chinese young folks used their social networks Xinhuanet and Sohu, as well as from the website of the U.S. embassy in Beijing, to send in questions for Obama. And Obama — who hasn’t always done a great job in recognizing how participatory technologies change the nature of engagement with government — here pounced on the moment, telling his web-savvy Chinese audience, “I can tell you that in the United States, the fact that we have free Internet — or unrestricted Internet access is a source of strength, and I think should be encouraged.”

The Daily Dish |  Thirty years from now, the most important aspect of Barack Obama’s interaction with China will be whether the two countries, together, can do anything about environmental and climate issues. If they can, in 2039 we’ll look back on this as something like the Silent Spring/Clean Air Act moment in American history, which began a change toward broad environmental improvement. If they can’t….

News…

Are you an authentic American?  |  Racialicious

So how does one question who or who is not an American? Does it have to do with language, race, ethnicity, how long one has been in the United States – or is it about the more legal aspect of possessing citizenship.

Haunted by Gorbachev’s ghost  |  Truthdig

It has become a pub bore’s cliché to argue that we will never prevail in Afghanistan because no foreign power ever has: not even the Russians, whose nine-year occupation cost the lives of 14,000 of their soldiers and 35,500 wounded, and which ended in humiliating retreat in 1989. Those Cassandras irritate Western leaders, whose response is to insist that it is different this time. “We are not an occupying army,” Gordon Brown told the BBC on Friday. “It’s not like previous interventions. … We are actually creating the conditions by which the Afghans themselves, and not an occupying army, can run their own affairs.”

High court won’t hear Washington Redskins case  |  NPR

The Supreme Court on Monday decided not to weigh in on a 17-year legal challenge by a group of American Indians who contend the Washington Redskins football moniker does not deserve trademark protection because it is racially offensive.
In sidestepping the controversy, the justices did not comment on Harjo v. Pro Football, Inc. The court’s refusal to hear the case leaves in place an appeals court ruling that the plaintiffs waited too long to challenge the National Football League trademarks.

Why Americans hate to love the government  |  The New Republic

Anyone who has followed closely the debate over national health insurance has probably noticed some peculiar inconsistencies in Americans’ attitudes toward the legislation. A Pew Poll released on October 8 found “steady support” for specific elements of the health care plan, including the public alternative to private insurance, the employer mandate, and the requirement that everyone have insurance. Nonetheless, popular support for the plan itself was declining, with 34 percent “generally [in] favor” and 47 percent “generally opposed.”
What accounts for this disparity? Certainly, some people fear that Medicare will be cut, or that “death panels” will be set up, but one of the most persistent concerns is not about specific provisions; rather, it’s that the federal government will be taking over health care.