April 21, 2008 5:23 AM

The Olympic spirit. Catch it. Or die trying.

Nepal has given its security personnel permission to shoot pro-Tibet demonstrators during China's Olympic flame climb to Mount Everest's summit early next month.... "About 25 soldiers and policemen have established camps on the mountain and they have been ordered to use force if necessary to stop any anti-Chinese activities," Mod Raj Dotel, spokesman for the home ministry, said Sunday. "This could mean shooting if necessary."

Is it just me...or is there something horribly wrong when you can use the words "shooting" and "Olympic flame" in the same sentence? Rather than just expecting their Nepali neighbors to ape their standard reaction to dissent, perhaps the Chinese government could engage in a wee bit of introspection. After all, there are reasons why so many people around the world have turned the Olympic Torch relay into a farce.

This is not just about a collection of anti-China rowdies trying to rain on the Chinese government's parade, y'all. This really is about China's miserable human rights record, it's appalling sales of arms to Sudan, and it's brutally repressive occupation of Tibet. It defies explanation to believe that the Chinese government seriously expected that their little round-the-world propaganda parade would go undisturbed. While some afflicted with tunnel vision (and a pronounced lack of humanity) blithely refer to the worldwide protests as "anti-Chinese activity", most of us have a simpler and more accurate description. These protests are merely a long-overdue reaction to the reality that China is a lousy international citizen. If China wants to be respected and treated as a full member of the international community, all the government has to do is to learn how to play well with others, respect human rights, and stop the oppression of Tibet. Oh, and they might also give some consideration to stopping the practice of using their prison population as a cheap labor source. It might also help their cause if they stopped selling arms to the government of Sudan- arms that all too often end up being used to kill innocent, defenseless civilians in Darfur.

Pretty simple, don't you think? Nonetheless, I don't imagine anyone reasonably expects that China will become a shining example of openness and enlightened democracy any time soon. Not when they can blame CNN, or Jack Cafferty, or those who would interfere in Chinese "internal matters", or...anyone but themselves. Hey, why do the right thing and change your autocratic, brutal ways when you can blame others? It's not as if introspection has been a quality cherished by the Chinese government over the years- because they really are the same goons and thugs that have run the country for the past 60 years.

Same as it ever was.

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This page contains a single entry by Jack Cluth published on April 21, 2008 5:23 AM.

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