PUCKER UP GRASSHOPPER

People disappear and they die. Speech is proscribed. Yet, America and her President stand ready to kiss the ass of any Chinese official that can be found to make certain the flow of credit and cheap TV's continue.

Is there anything that we are wiling to sacrifice for? Is there no discomfort we will tolerate to do the right thing and support freedom for the people of the world? We have lost our way and very likely our soul. We are no longer the country that I was born into; a country willing to confront and defeat evil, regardless of the cost.

I take that back. After all, we did just put a tariff on cheap imported tires from China. That'll teach 'em!

"POSTERS went up on lampposts and walls all around drab neighbourhoods in the northwestern area of China last week, announcing a series of executions.

They proclaimed the deaths of nine men convicted of murdering people during the racial violence that convulsed the remote city of Urumqi in July. No details were released of the condemned men’s last moments and few dared to mourn them.

The executions marked the culmination of the Chinese authorities’ response to a revolt by native Uighur Muslims in the city on July 5.

The revolt triggered violent clashes with Han Chinese settlers before being put down by security forces that night. Chinese civilians later turned on the Uighurs.

Since the clashes ended on July 7, the Chinese and the Uighurs have traded acrimonious claims about what happened and how many died.

The government said that of the 197 people killed, only 46 were Uighurs. A local official put the number of rioters shot dead by the security forces at just 12.

Exiles, however, alleged that hundreds of Uighur men had died and thousands had disappeared after a police and army sweep through the rough district of Sai Ma Chang."

Times Online

"At the Museum of Science and Technology Monday afternoon, President Obama took questions from a docile audience of more than 400 Chinese university students handpicked by officials of eight different Chinese universities.

The town hall meeting was one of the few unscripted moments on the president's trip. It was supposed to be carried live on Chinese state television but at the last moment, the Chinese government changed its mind and only local stations in Shanghai, and the White House Web site, carried it live."

ABC News