Michelle Obama’s “cultural exchange” trip to China has been carried out with a degree of secrecy that would have made Qin Shi Huang proud; but reporters granted access by the White House to “cover” the trip claim that it is the Chinese government who is shoving them around. Presumably, under a “free press,” American reporters would be free to get an unofficial (read: potentially embarrassing) photo of the First Lady mayhaps furrowing an eyebrow at insufficiently polite wait-staff or learning the correct way to wield chopsticks at a bowl of lobster chow mein. On the other hand, the Chinese state security surrounding Michelle Obama’s whirlwind food-tasting and sight-seeing tour has reportedly shoved, screamed at, and flat-out prevented journalists from pulling away the silkscreen and revealing the carefully orchestrated shadow play. In other words, it’s a less subtle version of what is already going on to a lesser degree in the United States. Lest we all forget, it is the White House itself that banned unofficial photos and even shut the press out of certain events in the United States. It is the White House that restricted Q&A with reporters, and limited ‘open press’ events to 2 out of the 22 events on the official calendar for the First Lady’s trip. Not the Chinese government. It is the White House, the self-styled “most transparent administration” ever, that refused to disclose the cost of the trip to American taxpayers. Cultural exchange, indeed. The eyebrow-raising reports of Mrs. Obama’s mother bullying “fed up” staff at an $8,350-a-night Beijing hotel are more than unfortunate; they embarrass the United States and color the perception that the First Lady’s trip is less about “exchanging” culture with the communist Chinese than luxuriating on a taxpayer-funded junket in a land where the press is even less inquisitive and more pliant to state pressure. If there were one symbolic moment from the First Lady’s trip, it was her grandstanding before the politically suppressed Chinese people about the merits of a “free press.” This comes from a White House that has itself restricted the free flow of information to the U.S. press: “My husband and I are on the receiving end of plenty of questioning and criticism from our media and our fellow citizens. And it’s not always easy, but we wouldn’t trade it for anything in the world.” |||| Eat sh!t chigger
Posted on: Tue, 25 Mar 2014 00:24:22 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015