Live Free Or Die

From freep.com

BY TOM WATKINS • September 24, 2008

Many have predicted that the 21st Century will be the Century of China. It seems that the jokers in charge of Wall Street and our federal regulators assigned to watch over “The Street” are attempting to speed up this prediction.

The Chinese government holds in excess of $1 trillion in U.S. securities. The Chinese fear the global economic slowdown being led by this country will stifle the jobs boom that has moved hundreds of millions of people out of abject poverty and created the Chinese equivalent of the American dream.

If the Chinese government, along with the U.S. taxpayers, were not left holding a bag of debt, they would be laughing at the mess our banking and financial systems are in today.

U.S. taxpayers have taken over the country’s two biggest mortgage companies, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and its biggest insurance company, AIG. Our government took no action as the nation’s fourth-largest investment bank, Lehman Brothers, tumbled into bankruptcy and another investment icon, Merrill Lynch, was forced to sell itself to Bank of America. And there is fear from Main Street to Wall Street that more dominoes are likely to fall.

The old socialists and communists — Marx, Engels, Lenin and Mao — must be chuckling in their graves.

Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and many members of Congress have called on China to address its currency manipulation and develop more transparency in its banking and legal systems. We must admit that this lacks credibility and is a bit ironic when our nation has failed to get its own fiscal house in order.

America is hugely in hock to China and Japan, borrowing money from those countries to underwrite the escalating debt brought about by the Iraq war, cutting taxes while going on a spending spree, and being mired in the mortgage crisis. While the United States borrows and consumes, the Chinese are saving, building up their infrastructure and lending us money to continue our self-destructive behavior.

Earlier this year, I traveled 48 hours by rail from Beijing, the capital of China, to Lasha, Tibet. What did I see? Not just the $40 billion of Olympic infrastructure investment in Beijing, but bridges, roads, rail, hospitals and schools being built in the interior of the country (some with inferior construction, as we saw in the collapse of thousands of schools in the May earthquake in Sichuan that killed 70,000, including 10,000 schoolage children).

I spent days traveling along the old “silk route” in Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, where, in the middle of the desert, thousands of windmills and solar panels provide renewable energy to the people of Turpan and Urumchi. Yes, I know, you have never heard of these places, yet they are more advanced than we are when it comes to finding alternatives to fossil fuels.

The Chinese are investing in progress while we disinvest in America and the American people.

Our behavior and poor choices on foreign and domestic policy are making us a laughingstock on the world stage. We preach to the world about capitalism and free markets while we nationalize our largest insurance company and money lenders. China, sitting on a big stash of cash, will be looking at what American banks and other companies they can pick up on a fire sale.

In China they call their economic system “capitalism with Chinese characteristics.” That means the state owns a big part of the economy while, at the same time, individuals are allowed to participate within a market economy. Today in America, it would seem we have socialism with slivers of free market characteristics. The world is being turned upside down.

As this financial crisis plays out, the questions remain. Will people on Main Street be viewed as worthy of a bailout or investment as Wall Street? Will Treasury Secretary Paulson, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, Congress or the presidential candidates ensure that working men and women get relief? Or will it be, to paraphrase an old country song, Wall Street gets the gold mine and the rest of us get the shaft.

If this is the case, our national leaders may want to keep in mind what Mao Tse-tung said: “In waking a tiger, use a long stick.”

It is about time that our national leaders recall and act on the fact that this great country was built on the backs of working men and women and that ordinary Americans deserve better than seeing our American dream evaporate.

TOM WATKINS is a business and education consultant working in the United States and China. He served as Michigan’s state superintendent of schools, 2001-2005. He can be reached at tdwatkins@aol.com.

华尔街多米诺骨牌一一倒下：马恩列在坟墓里开心而笑

信源：青年参考-

美国《底特律自由新闻报》：“马克思一定在坟墓里开心而笑” 作者　［美］　Ｔｏｍ　Ｗａｔｋｉｎｓ　译者　小河

许多人都预测２１世纪将是中国世纪。如今看来，似乎掌管华尔街的讨厌家伙以及奉命看管华尔街的联邦监管者，试图在加速这个预言的实现。

中国政府持有数千亿美元的美国国债。中国人担心，美国牵头的全球经济下滑将抑制就业繁荣，而正是它使得数亿中国人摆脱赤贫，以及创造跟美国梦相当的中国梦。

美国纳税人接管了两大抵押贷款公司房利美和房地美，以及最大保险公司美国国际集团（ＡＩＧ）。但从街头巷尾到华尔街，人们担心会有更多的多米诺骨牌倒下。老社会主义者和共产主义者—-马克思、恩格斯、列宁，一定在坟墓里开心而笑。

美国财政部长保尔森和许多国会议员曾呼吁中国解决货币操纵问题，以及增加其银行和法律系统的透明度。我们必须承认他们没有资格这样指责，甚至具有一些讽刺意味，特别是当我们的国家未能管理好自己的金融秩序时。

美国欠下了中国和日本的大笔债务。我们从那些国家借钱供我们补上由伊拉克战争、减税导致的债务，与此同时，我们又大肆挥霍，深陷抵押贷款的危机当中。当美国在借钱消费时，中国人却在存钱、建设他们的基础设施。而我们借钱使得我们的自我毁灭行为继续下去。

今年年初，我从中国首都北京坐火车４８小时到西藏首府拉萨。你猜我看到了什么？不仅有４００亿美元的奥运基础设施投资，还有内陆地区的桥梁、道路、铁路、医院和学校建设。

我花了几天工夫在位于新疆维吾尔自治区的古“丝绸之路”旅行，我在那里的沙漠中看到了数以千计的风力发电机和太阳能板，它们向当地人提供了可再生能源。没错，我知道你们从未听说过这些地方，但说到寻找化石燃料的替代物时，这些地方比我们更先进。

中国人正投资于发展，而我们正在缩减投资。我们的行为和在外交及国内政策上的拙劣选择，正使我们成为国际社会的笑柄。我们向世界鼓吹资本主义和自由市场，却将我们最大的保险公司和贷款公司国有化。资金充裕的中国，将注视着美国银行和其他公司的大贱卖。

在中国，他们称自己的经济为“有中国特色的社会主义”。这意味着国家拥有经济的很大部分，而个人被允许参与市场经济。在今天的美国，我们似乎是有自由市场特色的社会主义。世界整个儿被颠倒过来了。

Related posts:

1. Buying Into China’s Land Rush Buying Into China's Land Rush Americans, Others Acquire Luxury Homes...
2. China Announces Major Stimulus Plan 586 Billion BEIJING -- China announced a stimulus program that could exceed...
3. NBA Uses Local Allure to Push Planned League in China NBA Uses Local Allure to Push Planned League in China...
4. China to Allow Short Selling on Trial Basis Quoted from WSJ China's securities regulator said Sunday it would...
5. Tips for travelling to China （1）Conversation during a meal should focus heavily on giving compliments...

Tags: China, economics, US
Filed under 商业财经::Business, 游目骋怀::Thinking | Trackback | Comments RSS | Add Comment

Previous: 这些习惯也让人迅速变老
Next: Google rolls out Mail Goggles