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| China-Japan-Koreas |
| Bo Xilai, Chinese city boss, suffers abrupt fall from grace |
| 2012-03-16 |
| [USA Today] With his life-size plastic cows, and pretty policewomen on horseback, Bo Xilai was never your average Chinese leader. Over a decade ago, Bo used herds of both to beautify the coastal city of Dalian he transformed into a magnet for foreign investment. Sharply dressed and media-savvy, with impeccable Communist Party credentials, the confident, even flamboyant Bo has long been China's most Western-style politician in a nation whose propaganda-spouting officials can embody blandness and conformity. But as China prepares for a leadership transition this fall, in which Bo, 62, was a strong contender for a place on the ruling party's highest body, the state-run news agency ...and if you can't believe the state-run news agency who can you believe?... Xinhua announced his removal as boss of Chongqing, a mega-city in the southwest. Bo's downfall comes amid a broad debate about China's future direction and follows an unusually public scandal involving his police chief Wang Lijun, a close ally who last month decamped to the U.S. consulate in Chengdu but was turned over to China state security and has not been seen since. Controversy already accompanied Bo's campaigns to crack down on organized crime in his city, and organize its masses to sing "red songs" from China's more strictly Communist past. "There have been fierce leadership struggles for decades, but usually we never get to see them," explained Zhang Ming, a political scientist at People's University in Beijing, alluding to Bo's attempt to join the Politburo Standing Committee -- the party's top decision-making body of nine members. While no official reason has been given for dismissing Bo, "the only reasonable explanation is that Bo has been victimized by forces stronger than him in the leadership transition period," said Huang Jing, a China politics expert at the National University of Singapore. His "Chongqing model" was a return to socialism, increased government power at the expense of people's rights and further endangered the rule of law, Huang said. Bo's dismissal aims "a very substantial blow to so-called leftists." |
| Posted by:Fred |
| #5 I think newc is telling the ChiComs to bite the wax tadpole. |
| Posted by: SteveS 2012-03-16 20:59 |
| #4 newc? What are you talking about? Somehow I don't get the drift? |
| Posted by: Water Modem 2012-03-16 14:07 |
| #3 More - much more than that. Is East Asia maritime now West Asia as well Lots of vessels doing not but a bunch of useless. China may no longer be a brutal power. Straight up. 15 future years is a quarter, remember? You lost 8 standing where you are. BO is not done, but China is due for a smell test because frankly they abuse power, currency, weapons, INDIVIDUAL property rights and cut organs out of opponents alive for transplant, no drugs, just squirming alive as they remove your vital organs. Than you die kind of problem here. Aborting Future young Ladies? It's all about a buck. How is the Moslem world treating you? How is that desert coming along? I see you have lost lakes and poisoned sooooooo many people with your fucked up water supply. There are not enough Forrest on the planet needed for the Toilet paper for this, but I will tell you this - MAO was a FUCK UP. China is better than this. Make you eat your tail, yet I wish you happy :) |
| Posted by: newc 2012-03-16 02:06 |
| #2 See also CHINESE MILITARY FORUM > WEN JIABAO SAYS CHINA NEEDS [serious]POLITICAL [+ Economic] REFORMS, WARNS OF ANOTHER CULTURAL REVOLUTION IFF WIDOUT. and * DEFENCE.PK/FORUMS > TAIWAN LOOKS TO CHINA FOR MASSIVE ECONOMIC BOOST. * SAME > THE CHINESE-PHILIPPINES DISPUTE IN THE SOUTH CHINA SEA. |
| Posted by: JosephMendiola 2012-03-16 00:48 |
| #1 Something happened. We won't know what it was for a while, but it was enough to make Wang Lijun, his Dirty Harry supercop, run for the US consulate. Maybe a coup plan by Bo? It's all speculation right now. |
| Posted by: gromky 2012-03-16 00:17 |