As China’s market is anticipated to see a slight dip in the post-Olympic economy, it has been reported recently that the Chinese Communist Party is considering a 370 billion yuan (approximately US$54.03 billion) economic stimulus package.
Economic stimulus package? This is the economy that boasts growth rates of 10% annually. It is supposedly drowning in foreign investment, even more so with the great success of the Olympics. What happened?
Well, for starters, as the worldwide economy takes a breather (to put it mildly), the export-dependent economy is feeling the pinch (Asia News). More to the point, however, many of us wondered about the validity of those statistics, which are in fact aggregated totals from local cadres across the land desperate to make their little fiefdoms look good.
It's part of the larger problem in dealing with the Communist-imprisoned country: what you see is not always (and in fact hardly ever) what you get. The Olympics themselves were a prime example. It was a wonderful show (Washington Times) that nevertheless disguised a bloodthirsty regime (Between Heaven and Earth, Boycott 2008 Communist Olympics, and Epoch Times), and didn't hide it particularly well (National Review Online - Media Blog).
As the Games fade into memory, the truth has once again come to the fore, whether it's treatment of dissidents (BH&E), corruption (BBC), its Korean colony (BBC, Newsmax, and One Free Korea), or its weakening economy.
Of course, there will be many still dazzled by Beijing's smoke-and-mirrors, from new American allies (BBC) to would-be Vice Presidents (The View From Taiwan via the Weekly Standard), but today we saw one important pillar of falsehood collapse: the myth of the great Communist Chinese economy.
After all, if the economy were in such terrific shape, why would it need a stimulus package?
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