A Good President and a Filial Son
By Chip Tsao | published Jan 22, 2009
It’s curtains for George W. Bush, allegedly one of the worst presidents in the history of the United States. Should we on this side of the earth join the global Bush-bashing spree led by the editorials of the New York Times and the Guardian?
George W. Bush was actually a good president, judged by every Chinese moral and cultural standard. The invasion of Iraq not only liberated the Iraqi people, but it also liberated their productivity—they’ve achieved a remarkable 30 percent GDP growth rate compared with before the war. Yes, there was a high toll to pay: about half a million Iraqi civilians perished during the war. But did we Chinese not happily pay a similar but much greater price, with Chairman Mao’s execution of 8 million “counter-revolutionaries,” mostly landlords, scholars and local government officials of the previous Nationalist government (of course, this is not counting tens of millions of deaths of innocent people during the Cultural Revolution)? It’s all about liberation. As the rural Chinese celebrated Chairman Mao’s birthday last month, why shouldn’t George W. Bush rank in the same league as Che Guevara, Ho Chi Minh and Mao? Especially by the standards of those Western liberals with their rose-tinted glasses? Strange.
Then comes the “it’s all about oil” charge. Of course it’s all about oil—we have to make it cheap enough for someone like Noam Chomsky to drive to Wal-Mart every weekend. There’s no oil in Afghanistan, so Obama’s commitment to send more US troops there sounds a bit like an expensive free lunch. If the American people are fed up with their government acting as the World Cop, then we Chinese are ready to take up the role. We’re sending our warships to Somalia, for one thing. And that’s not considering the exodus of millions of Chinese legal and illegal immigrants ready to take over San Francisco, New York, Paris and Rome. We define the ingredients of milk and decide that melamine is good for the health of all children in the world, as much as the Americans define the recipe of Coca-Cola. Oh yes, we’re more than ready to fill the gap, and will eventually be more than happy to make the Little Red Book together with the Koran a compulsory text in all American secondary schools, if you so wish.
You call Bush daft? We call him a good son of filial piety. One of the reasons why George W. Bush invaded Iraq was revenge for Saddam’s assassination plan against his father. That’s Confucian values in modern practice. The 43rd president of the United States was more Chinese than any of his predecessors, so with some firecrackers to see him off, Bush will be missed. This is a multicultural and alternative verdict on a man of faith and integrity.
It’s curtains for George W. Bush, allegedly one of the worst presidents in the history of the United States. Should we on this side of the earth join the global Bush-bashing spree led by the editorials of the New York Times and the Guardian?
George W. Bush was actually a good president, judged by every Chinese moral and cultural standard. The invasion of Iraq not only liberated the Iraqi people, but it also liberated their productivity—they’ve achieved a remarkable 30 percent GDP growth rate compared with before the war. Yes, there was a high toll to pay: about half a million Iraqi civilians perished during the war. But did we Chinese not happily pay a similar but much greater price, with Chairman Mao’s execution of 8 million “counter-revolutionaries,” mostly landlords, scholars and local government officials of the previous Nationalist government (of course, this is not counting tens of millions of deaths of innocent people during the Cultural Revolution)? It’s all about liberation. As the rural Chinese celebrated Chairman Mao’s birthday last month, why shouldn’t George W. Bush rank in the same league as Che Guevara, Ho Chi Minh and Mao? Especially by the standards of those Western liberals with their rose-tinted glasses? Strange.
Then comes the “it’s all about oil” charge. Of course it’s all about oil—we have to make it cheap enough for someone like Noam Chomsky to drive to Wal-Mart every weekend. There’s no oil in Afghanistan, so Obama’s commitment to send more US troops there sounds a bit like an expensive free lunch. If the American people are fed up with their government acting as the World Cop, then we Chinese are ready to take up the role. We’re sending our warships to Somalia, for one thing. And that’s not considering the exodus of millions of Chinese legal and illegal immigrants ready to take over San Francisco, New York, Paris and Rome. We define the ingredients of milk and decide that melamine is good for the health of all children in the world, as much as the Americans define the recipe of Coca-Cola. Oh yes, we’re more than ready to fill the gap, and will eventually be more than happy to make the Little Red Book together with the Koran a compulsory text in all American secondary schools, if you so wish.
You call Bush daft? We call him a good son of filial piety. One of the reasons why George W. Bush invaded Iraq was revenge for Saddam’s assassination plan against his father. That’s Confucian values in modern practice. The 43rd president of the United States was more Chinese than any of his predecessors, so with some firecrackers to see him off, Bush will be missed. This is a multicultural and alternative verdict on a man of faith and integrity.
Labels: Politically Incorrect, 陶傑
posted by Gemini Saga at 12:00 AM
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