Obama supports democracy in China—but not here in US

As the “democracy” protests go on in Hong Kong the United States under the Barack Obama regime has released a statement in support of the demonstrators.

“The United States supports universal suffrage in Hong Kong in accordance with the Basic Law,” a statement said, which was carried in Time magazine. It continued that Hong Kong residents should have “a genuine choice of candidates representative of the voters’ will.”……

……“We believe that an open society, with the highest possible degree of autonomy and governed by the rule of law, is essential for Hong Kong’s stability and prosperity,” read the response.

But one big question should be raised—if those values are so important now in China why were they not respected during the Occupy movement? Obama and his government seem to like all those values…open society…a genuine choice of candidates representative of the voter’s will…but they like it in someone else’s country.

US officials plan to meet with Chinese officials. They may press for more bourgeois democracy, or they could just give Chinese officials advice from when they crushed the Occupy movement.

For example—They could explain to Chinese officials how they had the mainstream press portray the protesters as dirty, lazy hippie wanna-bees who just wanted to relive the Woodstock days. They ignored all the complaints that our politicians are only interested in serving moneyed interests and never listen to their constituents…or that the economy is leaving people without homes, medical needs unmet or without jobs. They Ignored the fact that the two-party system (that’s twice as democratic as a one party system as in China) prevents any real choices during our elections.

Of the dos and don’ts for successfully beating down protesters: beat protesters with sticks; shoot tear gas canisters directly at protesters; arrest and handcuff protesters; mace them in their face once they are arrested; and just ignore those who shout-“the whole world is watching!”

Yes- the whole world was watching—and US politicians just didn’t care. Their attitude seemed to be “no one in the world can do ANYTHING about the way we treat protesters—and no one in the world will do or say anything. After all—being the world’s greatest supper power means never having to care what anyone else thinks.

The protesters in Hong Kong probably fall into various factions from simple reformers to those who actually want to see the entire system taken down. As far as restoring capitalism goes China’s leaders have already made huge strides in returning the economic system to capitalism. The government is mostly communist in name only. The Communist Party of China uses the concepts of communism mostly as an excuse to curb the nation’s dissent.

If US leaders really believe in all those lofty democratic principles and liberties they should lighten up on their own dissidents. They should also get rid of a two-party system that mostly exists to prevent any real change.

-សតិវ​ អតុ

Pix from america.aljazeera.com.