Poll and Glass of Water Show it is the Chinese Who Live in the Land of the Free, Not Americans

in china the government runs the big banks that run the economy, in america the big banks that run the economy run the government. both systems have converged at the ‘merger of the corporation and state': Mussolini’s original definition of Fascism.

The american system is rotten to the core and run by frauds and crooks who use our government as a money making racket. That’s obvious to anyone with eyes, just as the reality of climate change is obvious to anyone who’s seen the photos of the arctic ice and the glaciers receding. And the author is right, our infrastructure is falling apart at the seams, thanks in no small part to the car companies well funded opposition to public transit investment and the massive corporate welfare that went into the national highway system.

But acknowledging those points does not justify the author’s absolutely disgusting assertion that since china is investing in mass transit and alternative energy their well-documented human rights abuses don’t matter. China is not free. It is nothing even remotely near free. To say that it’s mass murder of political dissidents doesn’t matter is to endorse that murder and be complicit in it. Such as stand is morally bankrupt and utterly indefensible. Just as the american companies that have laid off americans and outsourced their jobs into chinese prison camps are morally bankrupt.

If Clean Technica makes a habit of running articles this mind-shatteringly stupid you can expect to lose readers. I know I won’t be coming back.

every crime china is guilty of, we as americans are guilty of as well. we do not censor religious images but we do censor war imagery.

when was the last time you saw a video or photo of and afgan child with her arm blown off by american soldiers/weapons? i can guarantee u that it has happened and continues to happen. every week we read about another scandal some political leader is involved with in america, from one angle we are as free as can be, take a look at another angle and we’re despots.

the point is all governments are as guilty as the next, but progress can be made, and we should look to each other and progress meaningfully.

if the chinese are becoming more eco-friendly only good can come of it. there are over a billion of them and if they can live in an ecologically sustainable manner we all would benefit from it, now, and the generations to come.

Yan and Mrdil, Actually by “the land of the free” I was comparing the areas of free information. Over there, mere religions are censored: but here: the climate scientists are, who warn of impending catastrophe.

In this country, Exxon writes the science curriculum for our schools and publishes its propaganda freely, (now, even on PBS NOVA, as I covered here). In China, by contrast – 82% of the educated know the facts about climate change.

We are no longer free, because corporations with an interest in hiding the truth tell us what to think about climate science.

Hats off to China and thanks for their efforts to save the environment which benefits the whole world .

Here’s an example of the old saying “Show me a survey that says one thing and I’ll show you one that says something different”

A recent US survey by Capital One says “nearly 80 percent (78%) believes EVs are are here to stay and are not just a passing fad while over half (54%) think they will own an alternative motor vehicle in their lifetimes”

http://electric-vehicles-cars-bikes.blogspot.com/2010/04/nearly-80-believe-electric-and-hybrid.html

Susan:

China has our money to invest in just about anything they want so they can pursue both non traditional and traditional power sources way beyond the resources we have and they are doing so in a way we cannot even fathom. We on the other hand are thinking about implementing what might be good green policies in a way that punishes our economy in both the short term and long term hence the arguments that occur. If you look behind what China says and does, they don’t really believe its man that is causing Global warming they just jump on the band wagon cause they need all the power sources they can muster, green or non green. They still are building more coal plants each year than all other countries combined along with nuclear, solar and wind. In regards to your freedom issues, in some ways China may be freer than us since this administration is working hard to limit and remove liberties we have held dear for a long time. John Kerry should look at himself and the Democrats as roadblocks to progress. Building of infrastructure improvements over the years always seems to get stopped or delayed by Environmentalists and others usually associated with the Democrats. Infrastructure improvements in China seldom ever get stopped by anything so in that way China is freer, if only it was so here.

Maybe that is where Swiftboat John should concentrate his efforts in making us more like China.

Funny, I think there’s thousands of Chinese political prisoners who might disagree with your statement that what the Chinese government censors doesn’t matter.

It’s easy to build a massive infrastructure project when there is no opposition, because you’re a one party nation still on the edge of totalitarianism. It’s also easy to shape public opinion when you control the news.

And where do you think all the electricity is going to come from to power those cars? Last time I checked, China was still building coal fired power plants at an astonishing rate.

Let’s temper our enthusiasm for a government that still routinely imprisons its citizens for speaking their mind, and oppresses the occupants of seized territories, eh?

Last time I checked, being free meant not having to worry about being locked up for disagreeing with the government, not being able to drink a glass of water on a high speed train.