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Hong Kong

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Samson said:
Russia never scared me but China is terrifying in the Pacific.
Russian culture closely matches European, and will default to libertarian values.

He hopes.
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Russia's record says otherwise. Twice they had a chance to become a democracy, and twice they chose to return to authoritarianism.
ANd Putin scares the hell out of me, with his attempts to undermine democracy in the West. Time to take the rose collored glasses off.
 
dudalb said:
Russia's record says otherwise. Twice they had a chance to become a democracy, and twice they chose to return to authoritarianism.
ANd Putin scares the hell out of me, with his attempts to undermine democracy in the West. Time to take the rose collored glasses off.
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But Russia fits well with american conservative values. Employers can force employees to pray, they outlawed talking about homosexuality and so on. It really is the Republican ideal, and it seems like they are finally realizing that.
 
dudalb said:
Russia's record says otherwise. Twice they had a chance to become a democracy, and twice they chose to return to authoritarianism.
ANd Putin scares the hell out of me, with his attempts to undermine democracy in the West. Time to take the rose collored glasses off.
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Putin is certainly a threat, but the threat is constrained by a couple of factors which Putin can do little or nothing about. The biggest one is simply demographics: Russia is a country without a future. Its shrinking population guarantees that in the long run, no matter what Putin does, its influence will decline. The shorter term problem for Russia is that they simply don't have enough money. Their economy is crap, they depend too heavily on oil, and oil prices have declined. Putin simply can't fund all his ambitions. He can still cause a lot of problems, but he will never recapture the old Soviet prominence.

China has demographic problems as well, but their sheer size means that even with a declining population they will still be a power to reckon with. And they've got economic muscle that Russia can only dream of, although they've got some real economic vulnerabilities as well.
 
dudalb said:
Russia's record says otherwise. Twice they had a chance to become a democracy, and twice they chose to return to authoritarianism.

ANd Putin scares the hell out of me, with his attempts to undermine democracy in the West. Time to take the rose collored glasses off.
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The contemporary Russians didn't choose authoritarianism. It was forced on them. Putin was able to nudge things just enough to make sure he won and that he can't be challenged.
 
a_unique_person said:
Looks like China is signalling quite clearly "Tiananmin Square II" the sequal is about to happen.
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And you will have a number of people in the West who will justify it, of course.
IMHO it way past time for the Mandate Of Heaven to be withdrawn from the current regime.
 
dudalb said:
And you will have a number of people in the West who will justify it, of course.
IMHO it way past time for the Mandate Of Heaven to be withdrawn from the current regime.
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China has probably learnt from the fall of the USSR (and perhaps Egypt & Libya compared to Syria)... if an authoritarian government wants to hang on to power, don’t be weak - be ruthless.

I feel desperately sorry for the people of Hong Kong... but I don’t know how much anyone can/will do to help them.
 
dudalb said:
And you will have a number of people in the West who will justify it, of course.
IMHO it way past time for the Mandate Of Heaven to be withdrawn from the current regime.
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Sure, but how do you do it? Do we launch a nuclear war? That doesn't seem like it's worth it.

The best way to weaken the Chinese communist party short of a shooting war is to engage in a trade war. Their economy is very vulnerable to that.
 
Giz said:
China has probably learnt from the fall of the USSR (and perhaps Egypt & Libya compared to Syria)... if an authoritarian government wants to hang on to power, don’t be weak - be ruthless.

I feel desperately sorry for the people of Hong Kong... but I don’t know how much anyone can/will do to help them.
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Not much, sadly.
Boycotttng Chinese goods is a non starter,so much stuff is imported from CHina.
And the Chinese Gvernment does not care much about its image.
 
Samson said:
Russia never scared me but China is terrifying in the Pacific.
Russian culture closely matches European, and will default to libertarian values.

He hopes.
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While modern Russia certainly tries to loosely imitate Europe, China doesn't even pretend to try. Very non politically correct and blunt with their iron fist.
 
A lot of posts in other forums pretty much echoing the Beijing propaganda line. Looks as if the Chinese are taking a page from Putin's internet tactics and has hired a bunch of shills.
 
dudalb said:
A lot of posts in other forums pretty much echoing the Beijing propaganda line. Looks as if the Chinese are taking a page from Putin's internet tactics and has hired a bunch of shills.
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The 50 cent army has been around for a while now, although I'm told they're now down to 30 cents ;)
 
The unprecedented cancellation of all flights on Monday coincided with the latest in an increasingly threatening series of statements by Beijing. A Chinese official said “terrorism” was emerging in the city, while in Hong Kong authorities demonstrated water cannon for use in crowd control.

Late on Monday, two Chinese state media outlets ran videos showing armoured personnel carriers purportedly driving to Shenzhen, which borders Hong Kong.

On Tuesday, the territory’s chief executive, Carrie Lam, said violence was pushing Hong Kong “down a path of no return”. .

Lam, who at one point appeared to be near tears, appealed for calm but again refused any concessions to protesters.

“Take a minute to think, look at our city, our home, do you all really want to see it pushed into an abyss?” she asked.
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https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...udeau-urges-china-to-address-serious-concerns

The way things are going it's only a matter of time before the Chinese government orders the military to seize control of Hong Kong. As i said before, the Communist party was never ever going to allow any genuinely democratic form of government in Hong Kong and it has in fact systematically chipping away at the institutional and political autonomy Hong Kong notionally should enjoy.

The fact that Carrie Lam refuses to respond to the question of whether she has the autonomy to dismiss the extradition bill is illustrative of not just the Chinese governments control, but also how they refuse to give any kind of concessions or engage in any dialogue, instead they only aggravate the situation by provoking the pro-democracy activists with their stubborn behavior, such as by not explicitly withdrawing the extradition bill.
 
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KDLarsen said:
The 50 cent army has been around for a while now, although I'm told they're now down to 30 cents ;)
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And not worth that much, really. Pretty inept,make little effort to hide where they are coming from. The Russian shills are also pretty bad at this, but the Chinese shills are even worse.
The use of the term "New China" is sort of a giveaway.
What is sad is that some people who should really know better are supporting China simply because Trump does not like them. The enemy of my enemy is my friend routine is really stupid.
 
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