You know, one thing I cannot get over is how so many on the Left seem to admire the "China model" of economy. You read talk about China's "benevolent dictatorship" and how it is headed by a group of "enlightened" people (Thomas Friedman there). But I mean, seriously? Many of these people are the same kinds who RAILED against the policies of the Bush administration as being too oppressive. Well the Bush administration, love it or hate it, was no equivalent of the Chinese Communist Party. If anyone questions that, try criticizing the Chinese Communist Party from within China the way people criticized the Bush administration.
These people remind me of the types who would sit from the comfort and freedom of a Western democratic country and romanticize about the (supposed) greatness of the Soviet Union or Castro's Cuba or even Mao's China. But yet, few of these types would ever go and actually live in such a country. Now we see the same with these admirers (almost all on the left-wing end of the political spectrum) of the so-called China model. Oh, they will sing the praises of authoritarian government so long as it is doing the things they like and want to be done, and usually so long as it is in a different country.
But it probably isn't very difficult to describe how these same China-model admiring elites would respond if say a Republican administration took control of the government and decided to implement its own brand of authoritarian rule. As I've pointed out, it's generally thought that economic freedom cannot exist without political freedom, although this isn't known for sure (and transitioning from an authoritarian government to a liberal democracy can take some time). For example, if China's economy is allowed to become freer (which the government isn't allowing at the moment), will it eventually lead to China becoming a liberal democracy? There's a joke that in the late 19th century, Germany began adopting the principles of liberal democracy and market capitalism, and within only sixty years, West Germany was a vibrant market capitalist economic system and liberal democracy. Of course, as everyone knows, there was a whole bunch of other very bad stuff that happened in between! Similarly, with China, it could take a few decades to get to liberal democracy, and in the intervening space, some nasty things could occur. So anyways, what if some form of "right-wing" authoritarian govenrment decided to take over in America, where it would seek to maintain an authoritarian government while at the same time maintaining a strong market economy. I'd be willing to bet that these same elites would blow a fuse.
Many people would rightly blow a fuse over something like that (myself included), BUT, I can never get over how so many who railed against the Bush administration and would rail against any kind of right-wing authoritarian government in the United States, actually show admiration for the actual authoritarian government of China, all because that government is able to do the things by force that the Left want to do to America. Many among the so-called Progressives it seems only admire liberal democracy when it counters right-wing ideas. However, whenever liberal democracy prevents them from being able to push through a whole bunch of big government schemes and proposals they have, well then you get people like Thomas Friedman saying, "Why can't we be China for a day?" And the real kicker here is that a lot of the things that he thinks would be great for America if only we could force them through, would actually be terrible for America at the moment (i.e. high-speed rail, alternative energy, etc...) (in which I say thank goodness we are a democratic system).
One final thing, but in pointing out that so many of the China admirers are on the political left, I am not saying that all people on the Left admire China's system (many disdain their lack of democracy), but just that of those that do, they all seem to be on the Left. I don't know of any limited-government right-wing free-market oriented people who admire the Chinese system.
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