[selected translations]

... What happened?  At 8pm on September 21, I received information from another media worker that our reporter Zhou Yu was extorting a clinic which felt that the asking price was too high and therefore they were ready to call the police or the other media.  So I asked him to give us an opportunity to investigate ourselves.  He told me that I could come along to witness the transaction and I did.  I saw what happened and I was very shocked.  

... How do I look at this?  This is the shame of the Shenzhen station, this is my personal shame, this is the shame of Southern Metropolis Daily? Fortunately, the matter was handled in a timely manner.  If the principal did not come to us and went to the police and other media, what would have happened?  The two biggest news item of the year would have been the FoxConn case and our scandal ...

What do we do?  First of all, this is an individual case.  Overall, the station is in good shape.  I have made a detailed investigation and I believe that my judgment is accurate.  I have told the newspaper committee that this was the act of one individual. 

... Zhou Yu explained that Nanfang Daily wanted to run an undercover story and got one of our reporters to do the story.  Afterwards, the clinic wanted Zhou Yu to mediate.  When the asking price was too high, the complaint came to us.  Of course, Zhou Yu said that he was innocent and I am sure that this is a reasonable position from his perspective.  But I think that Zhou made two fatal mistakes.  First, he was pimping for others.  Even though this was not as bad as trading his own article in for money, he was trying to get another reporter to do just that.  Secondly, he failed to consider that this was detrimental to the image of Southern Metropolis Daily.  So I told Zhou that this affair has not been unfair to him.

... Afterwards, I went down to the advertising sales department and I used a pleading/warning tone to ask them not to drag our reporters into these kinds of things.  ... In Zhou's case, someone in the ad sales department was involved.  Had Zhou refused, the ad sales person would have tried it.  ... it was important that the editorial and business departments be separated.  The authority to publish any article should rest solely with the managing editorial committee.

... The people who face the most temptation are not the frontline reporters; it is the managers such as myself.  If I wanted to get rich that way, I wouldn't still be here.

[in translation]

According to information, after the media "exposed" how the school deceived the students, someone deliberately incited a riot and thereby created the excuse to suppress the students.  Some students are complained that the school campus had been vandalized and torched by "unknown persons."  Meanwhile, more armed police officers have been sent there.

Yesterday, a student said that there more than 2,000 anti-riot and armed police officers are on campus.  The entire school has been sealed.  The students faced off against the police and have been gassed.  Another said that the riots at the school have gone on for several days, but there is no reporting in the local media.  The private entrepreneurs must therefore colluding with the local government officials to pressure the media.

According to overseas website reports, the campus riots were deliberately incdited.  Some students said that CCTV reported on Monday that the school was deceiving its students.  On the same night, someone vandalized the campus, breaking the windows, looting the computers and setting fire to the offices.  The more than 10,000 students were terrorized.  On Tuesday morning, large numbers of armed policemen entered the campus.  But on the evening, there were still peasants and hooligans looting in the school and molesting female students.

Students from ten Jiangxi vocational schools plan to demonstrate on Sunday at the 81 Plaza in Nancheng city.

P.S. Never mind that I have not even touched on this piece from Taipei Times; "The paramilitary People's Armed Police was deployed to contain the protests and at least five people were detained, the report said. It said the protesters were from ethnic minorities, including some 2,000 Uighurs from China's Muslim northwest."  Isn't that another mystery?  Why are there 2,000 Uighurs at the Jiangxi Clothing Vocational School out of a student body of 18,000?

General attitude towards United States
Favorable: 45% (this is a historical low compared to 68% when US invaded Iraq in March 2003; 48% in September 2004)
Unfavorable: 25%
 
Do you think Taiwan should procure those arms from the United States? 
Yes: 30%
No: 41%
[generally, pan-blues oppose purchase while pan-greens support it; among those with university education, 57% oppose and 30% support]

American officials have demanded the Legislature to pass the arms procurement bill quickly.  Do you agree?
Yes: 25%
No: 46%
 
The strongly worded statements from American officials such as AIT director Stephen Young on arms procurement were ...
Inappropriate: 66%
Appropriate: 12%
 
Will United States abandon Taiwan (i.e. place Taiwan outside its protective umbrella) if arms procurement failed to pass?
Yes: 22%
No: 68%
 
Will United States come to Taiwan's aid if Chinese Communists invades?
Yes: 40%
No: 44%

Related Link:  Fringe v. mainstream views  Glenn Greenwald, Unclaimed Territory

M: Why does so much of the American public often seem wilfully ignorant? Much of the populace seems intent on not knowing what is going on in terms of political and foreign affairs.

SH: This is the strangest interview I’ve ever had.

M: Why?

SH: Because you’re so fucking opinionated. I don’t disagree with you, but we’re just rolling through your thoughts on things. It is sort of silly. No, it’s not silly, but we’re just rolling from whatever obsession you have to the next. You’re pretty obsessional.

M: Isn’t that a fair question?

SH: The ignorance may not be wilful. The problem with this is, in order to answer your questions, I have to buy into what it is you’re saying. I have no fucking way of knowing whether they’re ignorant. I mean, Americans are pretty fucking ignorant. What we don’t know is pretty huge. You could never accuse Americans of learning from history or learning from past mistakes. You’re talking about a country that went to war in Vietnam with the theory that we had to bomb North Vietnam in order to keep the hordes of Red China from coming, right? Not knowing that Vietnam and China had fought wars for 2,000 years and would fight one four years after the war was over, in ’79. What we don’t know is just breathtaking in my country. To call this ignorance wilful as opposed to general ignorance, I don’t know. On any issue, Americans can display an incredible lack of information. I doubt if there’s a society which has paid less attention to the facts than any else.

[in translation]

I went to shoot the breeze in a small discussion group that provided cakes, beverages and even a fee.  We discussed the Hong Kong SAR Chief Executive election involving Donald Tsang and Alan Leong.  As ordinary citizens who attended this discussion group, it seemed that even though we read the newspapers and we have opinions about the celebrity politicans, we seem to be influenced by the media and our opinions are incomplete and partial.  In the end, it seemed as if we had not been reading the news at all.

For example, what about Donald Tsang?  Donald Tsang is an ill-tempered and lousy-looking Catholic chief executive who has many years of government administrative experience, knows how to whistle and can handle public relations.  Alan Leong is a dandy-looking, principled but extremist barrister who is anti-government, carries a pocket handkerchief and sings English-language songs.  These are impressions derived from certain news reports, even if they are not connected to each other.

The moderator asked everybody whom they want elected as Chief Executive.  Everybody assumed that the undeclared Donald Tsang would win with certainty.  The majority even believed that Alan Leong would not be a better CE than Donald Tsang, because he has not been involved in politics long enough and he has no experience in government administration.  With respect to any hopes from the entry of Alan Leong in this "election," the ordinary citizens only mentioned the policy platforms and Donald Tsang's debating points in the sense that Donald Tsang will have to offer new ideas and promises to let the citizens understand his viewpoints.  Actually, we didn't have any fresh ideas.

The discussion was actually very partial.  This was obviously deeply connected to the purpose of obtaining "your impressions about Tsang/Leong/the next Hong Kong Chief Executive" (I am just guessing, since I don't know what the ultimate purpose of this meeting was.  I was just asked to attend by a friend at the last minute).

From the ordinary citizens' idea that the anti-smoking regulations came from the policy report and that the anti-smoking was related to the blue-sky movement, that their descriptions of Tsang/Leong were very "impressionistic," and then the moderator eventually asking about opinions of the styles of Tsang/Leong, I felt that the policies or even details of the events ultimately do not matter to ordinary citizens.  When a politician steps up to say something -- as long as it is not shocking -- the content is unimportant.  To become famous, you have to make frequent appearances to create the appropriate impression by saying the appropriate things.  You will then be able to leave an impression in the citizens' minds.

Why do the ordinary citizens feel that it is important for a candidate to have been in the government and worked as the Chief Executive previously?  Why was Alan Leong typed as an extreme oppositionist by the ordinary citizens?  How should we usually read the news reports?  How to manufacture the image?  Where does public opinion spin stop?  The attendance fee for this day was worth my while.

1. South China Morning Post (7.36)
2. Ming Pao (7.24)
3. Hong Kong Economic Journal (7.09)
4. Hong Kong Economic Times (7.08)
5. The Standard (6.97)
6. Sing Tao (6.84)
7. SIng Pao (6.43)
8. Metro Daily (6.15)
9. Orient Daily (6.12)
10. Hong Kong Daily news (6.09)
11. Headline Daily (5.99)
12. AM730 (5.88)
13. Hong Kong Commercial Daily (5.78)
14. Apple Daily (5.51)
15. The Sun (5.42)
16. Wen Wei Po (5.26)
17. Ta Kung Pao (5.25)

Technical Note:  Although the newspaper article does not indicate, the base of each rating is not the total adult population of Hong Kong.  For example, not every adult knows South China Morning Post (i.e. they don't read English); as another example, a non-Chinese-reading adult doesn't know the Chinese-language newspapers.  One option is to allow a "Don't Know/No opinion" response and then compute the average rating solely from those who provided a rating.  Another option is to ask a screen question ("Have you read or look into any issue of South China Morning Post in the past 3 months (or 6 months)?") and then getting a rating only from those who answer affirmatively.  In any case, the respondent bases of the average ratings will differ across newspapers.  South China Morning Post (100,000 circulation) will have a smaller and different base than Oriental Daily (400,000 circulation).  But if the base is self-selected (that is, those people who read the newspaper), then the results may be biased.
 
The best illustration of self-selection bias that I can remember is for mainframe computers.  At the time, the market was dominated by IBM with some clones (such as Amdahl).  However, an end-user survey showed that the highest satisfaction score was for Xerox, which was no longer even in the business.  Why?  There were just two Xerox users left.  Their needs were very simple, they did not require any state-of-the-art technology and as long as Xerox continued to satisfy their minimalist needs, they could not be happier.  By contrast, the people who are using the latest state-of-the-art IBM computers are always wishing for even more functionalities.

[in translation]

It is said that on the Chinese Internet, the ratio of current affairs among all topics is among the world leaders.  Every Chinese person is a political commentator.  And the degree of volatility of their speeches (and the number of times that every netizen's ancestors have been cursed) is also among the world leaders.  The Internet watchdogs conclude that it was the anonymity of the Internet which caused this explosion of evil human nature.  Aided by a bunch of VIP's who were abused on the Internet, the real-name registration in every Internet area is gaining ground.

The current proposal for real-name blogger registration is one part of the process.  Actually, Internet mob violence is something that the watchdogs ought to consider for another reason.  On the mainland Internet many inappropriate websites have already been shut down, leaving only innocence and harmony behind.  So why is our Internet still more barbaric than elsewhere?  That is because this virtual world is the only place to speak out for many people whose rage have no other venue for release.

The emotions of people need to be released somehow, especially anger.  If we see so much rage on the Internet, it means that the rage have been brewing inside the speakers.  They throw curses on the Internet and they leave their words behind, and then they become more relaxed in real life.  Which system is more efficient?  more effective?  Many people like to invoke the case of the schizophrenic person.  They say that this gentle and well-mannered person in real life becomes foul-mouthed on the Internet.  If real-name registration is implemented, then he will be a gentleman all the time.  But what about another possibility?  The only reason that he could maintain his "civility" in real life was because of his "vulgarity" on the Internet.  If this final exit is closed, then he could become a foul-mouthed person all the time.  The smart watchdog should be grateful towards the rage on the Internet.  People who hit others with 'bricks' from a keyboard will not hit people with bricks in real life.

People often need to learn how to express their opinions.  The Internet serves the function of self-determined progress.  Although rough language can express one's position, it usually cannot persuade others.  When someone becomes aware that this mode of expression is ineffective, he will gradually abandon it and seek more logical methods of persuasion.   A child begins by using crying to express his viewpoints.  If he wants milk, he cries; if he wants to defecate, he cries; it is hard to communicate with him and you cannot just shut him up by telling him: "You are illiterate.  You don't now how to talk.  What is the point of crying?"  But after crying a lot, he eventually learns to talk clearly to articulate his needs.

... The anonymous nature of the Internet is not only beneficial towards social harmony, it is also a university for civic speech.  This is the free lunch offered by the Internet.  If we get rid of it, then we are too ignorant.  It is so hard to gauge public opinion when speech is slanted, but anonymous Internet speech serves the irreplaceable function of polling that will help people to understand this society better.

Three young girls widely reported to have threatened two teenage boys with "triad language" before calling in 10 other boys to beat up the pair have no known links with any triad society and are in fact witnesses in the case, police said yesterday.  Kwai Tsing assistant district commander Leung Chin-wah said media reporting of the assault in a Kwai Shing East Estate shopping mall on Sunday was not accurate, according to investigations.  

Some Chinese-language newspapers reported that the three girls, aged eight to 10, calling themselves "kid triads", had asked the two teenagers for cigarettes then called in the others when they refused.  But police said the assault was caused by unfriendly eye contact between the two groups of boys. The girls witnessed the melee when they were in the shopping centre.  "The three girls are only our witnesses," Mr Leung said. "There has been no any evidence suggesting that they asked for cigarettes, or that they have any connections with the 10 young boys assaulting the victims." 

So how did the various Chinese-language media get the story 'wrong'?  This was not just one or two newspapers, but they all got it 'wrong.'  They only spoke to the two assault victims as well as eyewitnesses.  Sorry about that.  They should have checked with the police and report whatever the police fed them.  You know, it's that thing about social stability and harmony.
 
Meanwhile, Apple Daily had some background on the three girls.  Two of the girls attend a local school where a classmate told reporters that the two girls are used to saying things like: "My dad and mom were triad members.  My dad was chopped to death!"  A neighbor said: "The mom was married twice, and one husband died in a gang fight.  She takes care of seven children, some of whom are children of her ex-husband.  She has an office job during the day, and she works as a security guard at nights.  Therefore, she is never home to take care of the children."

 
(Apple Daily)  When the reporter went to the girls' home yesterday, the door was padlocked and nobody answered to door knocks.  However, the reporter could hear the sound of girls talking inside as well as heavy objects hitting the wall.  If there should be a fire inside the apartment, the children will be unable to exit.

 
In the hallway, a cleaning woman was scrubbing graffiti off the wall.

What was written on the wall?  "爸 爸 你 快 些 回 來" (in translation: "Daddy, come back soon").

[in translation]

At the rally, the tour guides criticzed the "zero charge" tours but they also pointed to the Hong Kong media for exposing the tour guides.  One tour guide said: "I hope the reporters would have mercy and not pick at the scabs of the travel industry."

Yesterday, the Hong Kong Journalists Association chairperson Serenade Woo said that tour guides forcing tourists to purchase merchandise involves overriding public interest.  As such, the media should investigate and expose these improper acts.  She said: "While the tour guide involved in the incident is understandably unhappy, the blame cannot be shifted onto the media."  

... At the rally, a tour guide named Yeung blamed the recent problems on the media.  She picked up the microphone and told the 500 or so attendees: "The Hong Kong Tourism Board spends tens of millions a year to promote Hong Kong, but the media ruined everything with one or two negative reports.  The central government is asking for harmony.  So why do the media want to smear Hong Kong's name?  The media exaggerated thing by saying that we are profiteering.  I say -- a bottle of water goes for 16 dollars in Ocean Park but Park n Shop sells three bottles for 10 dollars.  Did you call Ocean Park for profiteering?"  After a round of applause, Yeung said that this incident had been blown up by the media.  "The commission system for tour guides is not unique to Hong Kong.  Hong Kong is the shoppers' paradise.  To shop here and make money off it is the natural law of Heaven and Earth."

Generation #1: The first people who knew how to blog and maximize the technical capabilities were people involved in Information Technology (IT).  Thus, the first generation of bloggers were those who tried to preach the technology of blogging.
 
Generation #2: Once the gospel of blogging technology becomes simplified and widespread, the next issue is content.  What good is a technology if there is no content?  So the second generation of mainland Chinese bloggers turned out to be media workers.  Why?  Because these are the people who knew their topics (both the backgrounds as well as the latest developments) and the writing techniques.  For the same story, they can say and argue it better than most others.
 
Generation #3: Once blogging achieved a certain momentum threshold, the major portals (such as Sina.com and Sohu.com) decided that they can be blog service providers too and invited a number of celebrities to become their bloggers.  This initiated the age of celebrity bloggers, and Xu Jinglei and others would top the Technorait popularity list for the entire planet.

What is Generation #4 in China?  I wouldn't know (or else I would be a prophet).  Instead, I am interested here in the construction of a history of blogging in Hong Kong based upon the experience in mainland China.

Who is in Generation #1 in Hong Kong?  According to mainstream media, it seems that the first generation of Hong Kong bloggers were mostly the Xanga-like teenage online diarists.  Compared to China, the IT people were not major players in Hong Kong.

Who is in Generation #2 in Hong Kong?  Out of the the Xanga-like cacophony, there emerged a small group of clear influential voices (to me personally) which are difficult to classifly -- they are definitely not from the IT sector, they do not appear to be media workers and they are definitely not celebrities.  Will this illuminate on Generation #4 in China?

Imagine my surprise (well, this is actually a confirmation of my suspicions all along) when I was invited to attend an informal self-organized dinner with some of my respected Hong Kong bloggers!  Whereas they cannot disclose their identities on their blogs, they could do so freely in a social context (with the implicit understanding that their identities shall not be disclosed by the attendees).  Guess what?  They all work in media/PR-related industrial sectors.  From the ensuing gossip exchange, many more absentn well-known bloggers work at media organizations.  It was like: What about blogger X?  Oh, she works at newspaper Y, and so on.  After a while, I lost track of who's who.

What gives?  This is about media corporate codes of conduct.  In Hong Kong, many media workers have been told in clear and certain terms that maintaining a personal blog about their job situations would be cause for immediate dismissal.  I have posed the blogging question directly to media workers ("Why don't you have a blog?") in front of their bosses ("Why won't you let your reporters keep blogs?), and they replied that legal liability was a major concern -- if the published newspaper report was at variance with the blog post, that would constitute evidence of biased/unbalanced reporting in a court of law.  So it is that the Hong Kong media workers go through a great deal of contortions to conceal their identities on their personal blogs.  And that was why I could not figure who did what until I met them personally in private.  To me (and to them), this does not matter as long as they continue to blog .  So, keep blogging!

Going back to the issue of mainland China, I hope that you understand why I spend so much time translating the blog posts such as Fu Jianfeng's An Investigative Reporter's Year-End Review and many others.  The openness of their boldness is what moves me to write about them.  A media worker does not have to self-immolate to prove his/her worth as a martyr.  I am saying that the Internet has the capability of delivering a message to the public without official retaliation against oneself (note: please take all the appropriate cautionary measures, in terms of technology as well as the contents!).  In either mainland China or Hong Kong, media workers do not have an easy time, but the space is still open.  In each case, the media workers' blogs are influential (minimally, they influence me!)!

[translated in summary]

In the matter of the Shanghai corruption scandal, the Central Disciplinary Committee interrogated tycoon Zhang Rongkun.  In order to save himself, Zhang provided the list of Shanghai officials with whom he had dealings.  Furthermore,  he provided the investigators with a set of videotapes about those officials starring in 'blue' (in English, but 'yellow' in Chinese) movies.

When Zhang Rongkun first arrived in Shanghai, he was a nobody.  But through charity work, he met many family members of senior officials and then he built relationships with former Shanghai Baoshan district leader Qin Yu and former Shanghai Social Security Bureau chief Zhu Junyi.  When Qin and Zhu were interrogated by the Central Disciplinary Committee about their involvement in the case,, they intended to refuse to cooperate.  But then they had to confess after the investigators showed them those 'blue' (or 'yellow') movies.

One of the contemporary challenges for the PAP in the control of political expression has been the Internet. The essence of the government’s response has been to superimpose the spirit of the Societies Act on cyberspace. This includes the requirement for registration with the Singapore Broadcasting Authority of political Web sites and the barring of nonparty political associations from political promotion, advertising or campaigning during elections. As Senior Minister of State Balaji Sadasivan explained: “In a free-for-all Internet environment, where there are no rules, political debate could easily degenerate into an unhealthy, unreliable and dangerous discourse, flush with rumors and distortions to mislead and confuse the public.”

These controls have proved remarkably effective. However, during the May election, individuals defied the government edict barring political blogging and podcasting. There were around 50 Web sites and blogs producing political or semipolitical content during the election, according to the Institute of Policy Studies in Singapore. Among other things, this provided venues for critical analysis and views to be aired by individuals and it enabled videos of sizeable opposition rallies, blanketed in the state-controlled media, to be made available. This is an important development, since it challenges the PAP preference for all forms of political expression to be channeled through state-controlled institutions and the idea that the alternative is dangerous. A more serious challenge, though, would involve the technology’s facilitation of collective political action or mobilization. The PAP’s priority will be to prevent this.

More important for my China-themed readers is the essay China's Online Mobs by Anne Stephenson-Yang.  This is available only to FEER subscribers.  But I will give you a couple of paragraphs just to get you interested.  Here is the sections on Internet posses:

In the absence of a segmented Internet offering authoritative content to specialized user groups, China has developed an online mob dynamic in which a blog can fuel a sudden social fire, which then becomes subject to the autocatalytic effect of mass copying by sites who want to participate in the traffic surge.  The irony is that the perculiarly Chinese "Internet posse" -- people who try to identify, pursue and seek justice against those of whose postings they disapprove -- would seem to be a byproduct of the government's effort to control precisely the distributed aspect of Internet communications that is viewed as so threatening to the Communist Party's rule.

... Chinese netizens act essentially like bees, swarming to whichever bulletin board system (BBS) or chat room has the most people and the most intriguing conversation.  BBS traffic is fickle and is happy to follow scandal to the next site, as long as others are there as well ... hot chat rooms could easily jump off the screen to become real-life conflagrations.

And here is the paragraph on trust:

There is no published information on how many government-sponsored agents post information on China's Internet, but the government publicly promotes a program of chat room propaganda in localities nationwide and estimates several tens of thousands of agents taking part.  Certainly, the average Chinese citizen thinks that political dissent will be noted promptly by ubiquitous authorities and many people fear government entrapment online in conversations about democracy, Japan, religion and other sensitive topics.

This regulation creates an environment in which everyone is role-playing.  Companies pretend to be your friendly online advisor.  Media operators pretend to be objective presenters of the news.  True reformists or dissidents might use discussion of a film as a surrogate for political debate.  Government agents pretend to be dissidents.  Journalists pretend they are independent.  In the end, everyone suspects everyone, and even sincere motives are questioned.  Try this next time you are in China: ask a Chinese acquaintence whether he or she believes the weather report.  Many Chinese believe that the government lies about temperatures that are too high or too low, because some state-owned companies are supposed to pay subsidies to workers on very hot days.

Oh,  yes!  I've tried asking that exact question this past summer.  My informants (of mainland Chinese working-class backgrounds) all assure me that the temperature figures are 'cooked.'  For example, they assure me that since state-owned company workers are allowed to go home once the temperature gets past 40 degrees centrigrade, the weather bureau will only report figures like 39.5 degrees centrigrade no matter what your own thermometer says.  This is for the sake of the gross domestic product, of course.  But this summer, I got the opportunity to counterpose: "But they reported that the temperature reached 45 degrees centigrade in Chongqin this summer!"  The counterpoint was, "Well, it must have shot past 50 degrees centrigrade and they could not hide it!"

[in translation]

Yesterday both Southern Weekend and Southern Metropolis Daily reported on a the poem case in Pengshui (Chongqing).  Because of a sarcastic SMS, citizen Qin Zhongfei is facing trouble.  Several dozens of others were interrogated by the public security bureau because they had received the SMS.  Regardless of what the motives were, the Pengshui public security bureau has terrorized some meek people into shutting up about politics.  But the silence does not seem to satisfy them, because they also found photographs of national leaders in the chat session records of Qin Zhongfei -- in their eyes, this is an even bigger crime.

This case angers and shocks people, but then it is actually commonplace. 

Firstly, this is commonplace because when people talk about poltiics, they habitually and sub-consciously use metaphors and allusions. The readers have the corresponding habit to be hyperalert about the unwritten messages behind the words.  This phenomenon did not emerge because of any self-absorption with flower linguistic constructions, nor the secret delight in solving a puzzle.  This phenomnon was created by the tradition of restricting speech by the rulers of China, and therefore people learn that bad things occur as a result of what ones says.

Qin Zhongfei used a obliquely worded SMS to satirize current affairs, instead of making an open criticism in the civic spirit.  This is depressing enough.  Behind this twisted thinking is an instinctive fear: When interrogated by the police, his immediate reaction was to deny everything because he seemed to think that writing poetry was a crime.  The issue is: As a citizen protected under the constitution, what he was afraid of?  He did not scare himself; he was scared of something that really exists. 

Secondly, this is commonplace because at the grassroots level, especially within the society of acquaintences in counties and towns, there is a force that creates fear.  In the case of the Pengshui poem, we read the media reports and we clearly see that the public security bureau and the procuratorate were serving the leaders.  The machinery of violence and the local government are joined as one like the local "rulers" in ancient times -- they are not there to uphold the law, they are not serving the people and they only want to consolidate their control of society.  These local powers are enough to make people afraid, and make people like Qin Zhongfei become the "royal subjects" of the past.

Looking next at how the public security bureau handled the case, they obviously wanted to use an suppressive method to obtain a superficial tranquillity: "This poem nearly negated all of the accomplishments in Pengshui," "if a SMS such as this one is disseminated broadly in society, it will impact the Pengshui economy a lot" and "it will definitely affect social stability and political stability."  With these righteous sounding accusations, the local officials may not realize that while they seem to have borrowed the latest political terminlogy, they were actually still relying on the tradition of suppressing speech in the despotic systems.  In either the speeches of these leaders or the actions of the local public security bureau and procuratorate, we cannot see any evidence to show that their thinking is aligned with the new Chinese civic concepts.

From the political storm in a small county, one can observe the classical double suppression: on one hand, the citizens use indirect means of expression to suppress themselves; on the other hand, the local authorities use the marchinery of violence to suppress speech.  The former type of suppression is the result of the latter type, and therefore those suppress speech are fully responsible.  As long as the relationship between the suppressors and suppressed continue to have a stable existence, absurd cases such as this one will naturally occur.  Interpreting this case in the legal spirit, the people in charge of the Pengshui case must answer these simple questions: What are the bad consequences of a SMS that was sent among several dozen people?  What right does the public security bureau have to monitor and control the SMS from ordinary citizens, and how can they read the chat records of an innocent person without cause?  Does Qin Zhongfei have any civil rights?  Do the citizens of Pengshui have any legal rights?  Is Pengshu ignoring the overall situation in China and stuck in the despotic past?

Related Link: As Grip of Censors Endures in China, A Satirical Poem Leads to Jail Time  Edward Cody, Washington Post

Those who support the real name registration system said that Internet anonymity allowed a small number of netizens to spread malicious speeches, violate others' rights and libel others.  The expression of viewpoints should be based upon responsibility, and a real name registration system will allow accountability on people who make malicious speeches.

Apart from the abstract ideas about free speech on the Internet, the industry experts who oppose the real name registration system believe that there are three practical issues that may abort the registration system:

1.  A good technical identification system will be required.  Most rights violators will show up anonymously with no other information besides the temporary IP address.

2. There is the legal issue of protection of personal information.  There are presently no mainland laws with respect to the protection of privacy and personal information.  In the absence of such laws, there is no guarantee that the private information collected for the blogger real name registration will not be misused.

3. The practical effectiveness of the implementation is in doubt.  Based upon the experience with the real name registration with Internet cafes and mobile telephone, the blog service providers will not seriously implement the work of registration because this will be against their commercial interests.  If registration is to be based upon the national identification system, then the blog service providers must access that database which charges 5 RMB per query.  This means that full implementation will be costly.  Besides, there is no effective method to deal with false information (such as someone registering under someone else's name and identification number). 

More generally, a China Youth Daily commentator said that the correct approach to the problem is through the private and not the public sector.  Instead of setting up more laws for the government to intervene in such matters (which treat private disputes as national crimes), it is better to have civil laws and processes that allow citizens to seek legal remedy on their own in order to defend their rights.
 
 Related Link: Anonymity Ending in China Blogs?  Kaiser Kuo, Red Herring

Over the past two weekends, there were two television programs about monopolies.  At a time when the government is about to consult the public about the "fair competition law," it is suspicious that the television stations should be leading the cheering now.

The television programs mentioned the frequently cited case of supermarkets.  This example is easy to understand because citizens visit supermarkets very often and therefore the example gets their interest.  No wonder that when the legislators talk of monopoly, they use Park n Shop and Wellcome as example.  But let us make it clear that when we discuss monopoly, the focus should be the interests of the consumers, just as the government document stated clearly.  The question is whether the interests of the supermarket customers have been damaged by Park n Shop and Wellcome?

There is no doubt that these two supermarkets are the leaders in the industry.  They also want to increase their business and nobody will believe that they have no expansion plans.  But is it possible for them to completely prevent new competitiors?  Yu Kee ( 裕 記) built a business from the back of an old truck and now has more than 60 store locations with plans for a stock offering.  CitySuper is doing great too.  If Park n Shop and Wellcome really have monopolistic power, Yu Kee and CitySuper could not be suceeding!

What about the consumers?  The supermarkets are forced to improve their services in order to attract the customers.  Their stores must be bright, clean and spacious and they must stock a large variety of goods.  The customers are smart and they shop daily, so they are impossible to fool.  To increase sales, prices cuts are used.  When the prices go down, the consumers benefit.  Yet some legislators complain about the excessively cut-throat prices.  Isn't that strange?  This is underestimating the wisdom of the consumers.

The more customers a supermarket has, the more merchandise it has to order, the greater its ability to negotiate with suppliers and the lower the prices it has to pay.  To compete in the market, the supermarket shares the price savings from the suppliers with its consumers.  It can be said that the role of the supermarkes is to aggregate the power of the consumers in order to negotiate with the supplier.  While customers are glad to see the supermarkets negotiating prices with the suppliers, the people who don't want to see the supermarkets get bigger must be those suppliers.  Where anti-monopolistic laws exist, who do  you think complains against the supermarkets -- the customers or the suppliers?

James Soong (PFP): Why isn't he in jail for life for grand-scale corruption given the expansive evidence?
Hau Lung-kin (KMT):  Smaller-scale corruption compared to his dad, who is smaller-scale compared to James Soong.
Frank Hsieh (DPP): A thorough political hack in his current position as DPP chairman and a proven failure in his prior position as Premier.  Also implicated in corruption scandals.
Li Ao (IND): A big mouth without any substance and an unmitigated disaster as administrator if ever elected as mayor
Clara Chou (TSU): Who?

But I am not a resident of Taipei and I have no right to vote.  So why should you care about my whining about the lack of choice?  I am just a naive outsider who wonders why the citizens of Taipei City cannot just have the best administrator possible without worrying about his/her political party color (blue/green/red/orange/whatever).

The personal reality is that I live in Hong Kong, where there will be an election for a Chief Executive in 2007.  Here are my personal impressions of the known candidates expressed under freedom of speech as guaranteed in Hong Kong SAR/USA and therefore this does not constitute libel (because I am not making up anything -- these are just my opinoins):

Sir Donald Tsang: How can I possibly vote for an insurance salesman (because that is what he is to me)?  The point is that he treats his customers with contempt as passive objects of his grand messages.
Alan Leong: In what way is he qualified to be Chief Executive of Hong Kong SAR?  In my opinon, he is unqualified and would be an unmitigated disaster in that posiition since he knows zilch about government adminstratiion.  He is there only because of the credential: "I am NOT DONALD TSANG."
Bus Uncle: This is the clown show.  No further comment necessary ...

In all of the preceding, I am either ineligible or the election is a long time away.  But here is a very immediate event.  I am looking at the absentee ballot from the New York City Board of Elections which I have to return immediately.  I am going to vote for my representatives in the US Senate and Congress.

For the US Senate, here are my personal impressions expressed under freedom of speech as guaranteed in Hong Kong SAR/USA:

Hillary Rodham Clinton (DEM): This is Ms. Triangulator herself.  I have no idea what she stands for, except whatever positions that maximize the number of votes.  If Iraq is the biggest issue of the moment, then I have no idea what her position is.  She will say what pleases the audience of the moment accprding to the focus group results.  If the preferences are uncertain, she will waffle in her choice of language.
John Spencer (REP): Here is a real clown who completely destroyed himself. (Wikipedia): On August 18th, 2005, Spencer gave a radio interview where he attacked District Attorney Jeanine Pirro, another candidate for the Republican nomination, calling her chances of winning the Conservative Party nomination "a Chinaman's chance."  Spencer was asked to apologize for the comment after an outcry from the Asian community that the statement was derogatory.

For the US Congress, here are my personal impressions expressed under freedom of speech as guaranteed in Hong Kong SAR/USA:

Carolyn B. Maloney (DEM): The only thing that I know about her is that an insane gunman named Colin Ferguson went on a shooting rampage on the Long Island Railroad, killing her husband and others.  But she does not have any negatives that I know about.
Danniel  Maio (REP): Who?  How am I supposed to vote for this person with zero information?

In any case, the New York races are pointless because the Democratic Party candidates are overwhelming favorites.  My only issue is: Should I save the postage stamps?  The conventional wisdom is that I must vote to register my personal voice.  Eh ... I am uncertain because I do not enjoy the idea that my vote will be taken as an