Re: Soft anti-Americanism

Michael Coburn wrote:
On Sun, 28 Dec 2008 14:36:40 -0500, Les Cargill wrote:

http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200812/fallows-chinese-banker

This is an article by James Fallows, an interview with Gao Xiqing.
Gao Xiqing is one of the giants of Chinese finance.

It makes some great points - we have too much emphasis on abstract
financial manipulation at the expense of manipulation of actual goods
and services. Compensation is very different, expectations are vastly
different.

But what shines through to me is what I call "soft anti-Americanism".
It's a less warlike Qutbism, and it's very striking. The title says
it all - "Be Nice to the Countries that Lend You Money."

There's a vague reference to pulling out of Iraq. But it's mostly
surprising to me how scattershot the thing is, how little coherence
his criticism bears. Not all - but there are tow modes - one is more
technical, and the other is attitudinal.

I say "mild Qutbism", and I mean it. The resonances are somewhat
striking. "Finally, after months and months of struggling with your
own ideology, with your own pride, your self-right-eousness .
finally [the U.S. applied] one of the great gifts of Americans,
which is that you're pragmatic." That's very similar to what a
Qutbist would say, albeit with a dollop of sugar at the end. And of
course funneling billions into failed organizations is, I suppose,
obvious to a person who was alive in China when he was.

I don't disapprove of this sort of anti-Ameericanism, but it seems a
displacement in this case - his fortune is completely due to the very
things he decries. He also misidentifies the role of savings and
such in this. We could, if we wanted, call the experiment in
industrialism in China a form of immigration with out having to
leave the mother country. We moved 1900s New York *to China*,
because that's cheaper now. This is to me analogous to Britain
moving its low-end industrial revolution to America because *it* was
cheaper. Both statements leave out enough detail to be wrong on my
part, but it's *like* that.

Sure, there was ideology, but it was complex mixes of ideologies,
forged on the anvil of politics. Pride? Self-righteousness? Erm...
maybe, in cases, but the underlying structure is a perception of
dishumility. I dunno - what do you call the hubris of a Countrywide?

Stupid. That's what you call it.

I can't deny him his observations - but the word that doesn't appear
is "stupid". These things are stupid. I've been playing defense
myself against various bubbles since the mid 90s.

But it's ultimately kind of surprising how strongly the phrase "you
think you're better than us" shines through all that. "I won't say
kowtow [with a laugh], but at least, be nice to the countries that
lend you money."

Very strange. I'm not 100% sure what to make of that. Cynically, if
we sent flatterers with nice gifts over, he'd be happy? America is
brusque, no doubt. But would it have made a difference?

What he is identifying in my mind is the Neocon Thing - let the
intellectuals write the book/plan, and the foot soldiers ( Bush being
the top foot soldier ) simply don't apologize or explain.

I appreciate how all this must look to a factory girl in Bejing, but
there's really not that much to be done about it. If America crashes,
SFAIK it all goes with it.

I read this and I read your critique and I see the same fundamental
error all the time. It really does get down to "borrowing $700B a
year from China and sending it to Saudi Arabia". And all the hoopla
over global warming is, to me, just a way to enlist the greens in the
real fight to save the nation (and even the world) from the "yellow
peril" (and all the other "perils" that besiege us). It will ever
get back to this each and every time: We do not need to borrow from
anyone because the one thing that we do manufacture in great
abundance is money. It is somewhat like an ocean borrowing water.
The reality is that we must pay for all the gasoline that we waste
and that trumps the money.

The way to free ourselves from the clutches of
the foreigners is to stop sucking on the oil teat.

Not even possible without destroying the economy.

It hasn't changed simply because oil has gotten cheaper
though this decline may buy is some breathing room.

Yes it has, you watch.

All that crap about being nice to people that loan you money is
top sided. The SUV gas hogs and the high rollers want to be
nice to the foreigners down to the last working stiff in this country.

Mindlessly silly.

We do not need the long term cooperation of the Chinese or any of
the rest of the Asians or even the Europeans. That does not mean
that cooperation isn't good. It means that we need to deal from the
proper position of economic strength which is our reality to make.

Not your way it aint.

As a nation we are far richer than they and it is primarily
natural resource per capita that gives us that wealth.

Nope, its actually a mindset.

We simply must use our own resources (or at least the resources of
this hemisphere) to become energy independent within this hemisphere.

Not viable. It makes absolutely no sense whatever to be doing things much
more expensively to achieve that end. That just makes you uncompetitive.

You're already uncompetitive on labor costs and doing that would *** your prospects completely.

Why we insist on being nice to China while pissing all over Chavez and Latin
and South America has got to be one of the big mysteries of the universe.

Nope. Anyone with a clue can see that Latin and South America
havent even got a clue about what makes sense population wise.

I would much rather send money to Central and South
America than to send it to the middle east or the far east.

Thanks for that completely superfluous proof that you have never ever had a fucking clue about anything at all, ever.

And if that means we will be using a lot more biofuels and paying more at the pump then so be it.

Fortunately those who decide stuff like that arent that stupid.

It is the oil dependence every single time.

Nope.


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