With Chinese leader Hu Jintao in Washington, you got some of what you might expect inright wing media outlets–Rush Limbaugh doing a fake Chinese accent, and Bill O’Reilly opening his Fox show last night with crack about a Chinese dinner that wasn’t take out.
Meanwhile, on public television’s Charlie Rose Show, the hour was spent with… Henry Kissinger. I had to go back to the Extra! archives to remember the Kissinger/China connection, which includes most notably his defense of the Chinese crackdown on Tienanmen Square. From Extra!, 10-11/89:
In recent months, Kissinger has used his high media profile in a spirited defense of China. In a Washington Post/L.A. Times column (“The Caricature of Deng as a Tyrant Is Unfair,” 8/1/89), Kissinger argued against sanctions: “China remains too important for America’s national security to risk the relationship on the emotions of the moment.” He asserted: “No government in the world would have tolerated having the main square of its capital occupied for eight weeks by tens of thousands of demonstrators.”
Kissinger’s defense of China and other repressive governments has sometimes raised eyebrows. What it has not raised is tough questions from TV interviewers about Kissinger’s business ties to these same governments. In a column alluding to FAIR’s study that found Kissinger to be Nightline‘s most frequent guest, the Washington Post‘s Richard Cohen (8/29/89) sounded an urgent appeal: “Will someone please ask Henry Kissinger the ‘C’ question?” The “C” stands for conflict of interest.
When he’s not pontificating in the media about foreign affairs, he’s engaging in foreign financial affairs through his secretive consulting firm Kissinger & Associates. The firm, representing some 30 multinational companies–including American Express, H.J. Heinz, ITT and Lockheed–earns profits by “opening doors” for investors in China, Latin America and elsewhere (New York Times, 4/30/89).
A Wall Street Journal article by John Fialka (“Mr. Kissinger Has Opinions on China–and Business Ties,” 9/15/89) reported that Kissinger also heads China Ventures, a company engaged in joint ventures with China’s state bank. As its brochure explains, China Ventures invests only in projects that “enjoy the unquestioned support of the People’s Republic of China.” The Journal article was unusual in exploring the private business interests behind U.S. foreign policy, not the media’s strong suit–even when, as in Kissinger’s case, they are rolled into one person.
DidCharlie Rose want to interview someone on China with skin in the game? That would be a strange standard for public television.
http://www.zpub.com/un/wanted-hkiss.html
Henry Kissinger: War Criminal or Old-Fashioned Murderer? – Welcome to the “Henry Kissinger: Unindicted Terrorist” file! …
Incredibly, Henry Kissingerâ┚¬”Âthe man who rivals Pol Pot for the dubious honor of being the person responsible for the death of the largest number of innocent people in South East Asia (and far surpasses Pol Pot in criminality when one factors in Kissinger’s various levels of responsibility for wholesale slaughter and repression in other parts of the world)â┚¬”Âstill wields significant power in the United States; but his role as eager facilitator of mass murder, totalitarian repression and other atrocities is never discussed in polite society.
After years of fruitless research, I have finally discovered a common link with Henry Kissinger in our first names. While it is too late for me to either correct that misfortune or to criticize my parents for it, the least that I can do is to use every opportunity when he is cited to (1) differentiate my views from his and (2) to hail the introduction of the internet as a means of identifying myself without drawing attention to our nominal similarities. An ironic toast, then, to Henry Kissinger, who will go to his grave with the lives of more innocent people on his conscience than almost anyone I can think of named “Henry.”
Henry Foner
I gasped when I saw the old man beaming on the stage with the Chairman. He’s still alive? His sordid connections notwithstanding, you have to almost swoon at his staying power. A first-rate super-criminal who makes “Big” Dick Cheney look like a petty check-kiter, Kissinger certainly has some kind of powerful, almost super-human need to stay in the Game. I believe that’s what keeps him going. He should play some variation of himself in the next Batman movie, a malevolent, superannuated, super-freak who easily kicks Batman’s ass and then takes over Gotham and then becomes mayor when everyone comes to undertsand how nice and funny he actually is, apart from the mass-murder and profiteering and general mayhem that is his undying ethic. Sure to be a big hit, and God knows that the old brute will be alive and very well when they finally make the movie.
Actually, Henry, I don’t think Kissinger has any lives on his conscience–I don’t think he cares, or really looks at it that way. He’s always thought that what he did was right. He no more thinks about the innocents he ravaged than does George Bush, or Dick (“Big Dick”) Cheney. It’s difficult for mere mortals like myself or you to consider this kind of super-immorality, this sick and awful disregard for one’s actions and constant underlying need to make huge amounts of money at the expense of many other people.
TimN…. sweet dancing Jesus but our minds for once thought alike.How is this guy still pumping?What is he like 110 years old?He is one of those guys who looked old in the 1960s.Like a bad penny he just keeps turning up.They always say he is this massive intellect .But doddering age aside ,i have never seen it.He has been dead wrong about a long list of things going back 5o plus years.As far as is he a nice guy?Never heard that said.He is just the wise(sic) old sage turtle with dead eyes, and a cold heart chewing the day away who will probably outlive us all.
Old war criminals never die ; some don’t even seem to fade away. For Heinz Alfred Kissinger (which is what his parents named him), morality is hardly an issue. But, it must be admitted, he is certainly right in the the United States government is hardly in a position to criticise its Chinese counterpart on the issue of «human rights» ; after all, no human activity is so destructive of the most basic human rights as war, and given the fact that the US government has been engaged in foreign wars of aggression more or less continually since the end of WW II, it ill behooves that government to lecture anybody on human rights. (The last time the Chinese engaged in military adventures abroad was Deng Xiaoping’s attempt to «teach Vietnam a lesson» in 1979 ; things didn’t go so well and the Chinese wound the whole thing up in less then a month, which compares well with the US adventure in, e g, Afghanistan, which has been going on for over 9 years.)….
Henri
Forget that creep Kissinger.
What I want to know is why is that suck-up Charlie Rose still on PBS, paid for with my tax dollars?
By God, mhenriday, I’d completely forgotten about Xiaoping’s Vietnam mis-adventure. You’re right, though: When the USA goes in, it goes all in, and never pulls out until maximum damage has been inflicted, no matter what. We’re number one!
China’s Innovative Way of Skinning the United States!
Mark Twain is credited with an early use of the cliché “more than one way to skin a cat” in A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court, as follows: â┚¬Ã…“she was wise, subtle, and knew more than one way to skin a cat, that is, more than one way to get what she wantedâ┚¬Ã‚Â. Thefreedictionary.com defines beggar-thy-neighbor as: an international trade policy of competitive devaluations and increased protective barriers that one country institutes to gain at the expense of its trading partners. Under the guise of fostering â┚¬Ã‹Å“indigenous innovation’, the Chinese government has creatively used a non-conventional, subtle version of beggar-thy-neighbor. Its version doesn’t entail the competitive devaluation of its own currency, which would enhance China’s exports and inhibits its trading partners’ exports. China’s version perpetrates an over-valuation of the currencies of one or more of its trading partners. This negatively affects all the trade of the pegged trading partner(s), not just trade with China. During the recent period China pegged its currency to the U.S. Dollar, its version of beggar-thy-neighbor was 8 times as damaging to the U.S. economy as what the media refers to as â┚¬Ã…“China keeping it currency undervaluedâ┚¬Ã‚Â.
In November 2003, Warren Buffett in his Fortune, Squanderville versus Thriftville article recommended that America adopt a balanced trade model. The fact that advice advocating balance and sustainability, from a sage the caliber of Warren Buffett, could be virtually ignored for over seven years is unfathomable. Until action is taken on Buffett’s or a similar balanced trade model, America will continue to squander time, treasure and talent in pursuit of an illusionary recovery.
Deep Blue,
CPB’s appropriation of funds for PBS alone totals approximately $250 million per year; state governments allocate $300 million; and federal grants and contracts contribute another $70 million.
CPB is the Corporation of Public Broadcasting. It looks like this source shows only $70 million from the federal government, which if looking at it from the combination of all the sources above and assuming you paid equally for a share to PBS, it would be only $4.00 for your share. And that is per year.
From one source that is from a list of cuts of $2.5 trillion that the Republicans want to do:
The amount that the federal government supplies to PBS is $455 million; if 150 million tax payers pay taxes, then that amounts to $3.03 per person. I doubt that you would go broke paying for Public TV.
Raymond…Im a bit queasy at government subsidizing any broadcasting in any amount.I have heard Natonal Geo shows that all of a sudden spout Global warming beliefs.Hey if they pay for it fine.If Government has a hand ,or appears to hold a hand in a political edge no matter how weak…………Like I say it makes me queasy.