#rsrh This carp-jumping-in-boat video has international implications.

Specifically, implications re: the Chinese.

Apparently, it all has to do with the fact that those are wild carp jumping into the boat, there.  Wild carp – which in America are imported pests that the federal government is trying to get rid off (with good reason*) – is a delicacy in the People’s Republic of China.  An expensive delicacy, given that the PRC has precisely the sort of endemic pollution that one should expect from Commie regimes.  40% of their waterways don’t meet the Chi-Com’s own standards; by ours the Chinese local environment is something out of a cyberpunk novel.  How bad is it, in fact?  Well, let me put it this way: it’s roughly ten times or so worse than the agitprop released about the USA to drum up donations for Big Green.  Hence the wistful looks abroad at all those tasty, tasty fish, just jumping into the boat…

That’s mostly it – except that there’s a variety of Chinese bloggers and writers who would like us to know that if we aren’t planning to eat that carp they’d be happy to take ’em off of our hands.  Personally, I’d be happy to have somebody sell them; unfortunately, we’re not exactly in a great entrepreneurial place right now in this country.  Frankly, this administration would rather kill the fish themselves than make it easier for people to sell them abroad**…

(H/T Instapundit)

Moe Lane

*Although God help us if California decides that the stupid things are at risk, or something.

**Don’t believe me?  Take a wild carp at random from our waterways.  Guess what?  It probably has some garbage in its system (so would farm-raised carp, but it’s easier to keep them at an acceptable level of cleanliness).  Your average Chinese consumer might not care, given that it’s going to be less garbage than what they’ve got in their domestic carp… but the FDA most certainly will.  And they have a veto.

No, I didn’t elect them, either.

5 thoughts on “#rsrh This carp-jumping-in-boat video has international implications.”

  1. BG5, I just learned the back-story today. They were first imported in the 70’s to keep the bottoms of fish farms clean, and it worked very well. Then a few of the fish farms got flooded out and the carp made it into the Mississippi river, where the population has since exploded. The federal government is trying to keep them from getting into the great lakes, which they are closing in on, because they will take over the entire place. Apparently they breed incredibly fast and wipe out all native species.

  2. I’m just wondering how that dinky little stream could support such a crapload (or should that be carpload?) of five-pound carp…

  3. IIRC, there’s already an underground market funneling wild-caught carp to Chicago’s Chinatown…

    Wouldn’t surprise me if there’s a small pipeline to mainland China in there as well. After all, a filleted and flash-frozen carp looks a lot like any other frozen fish fillet…

    Mew

Comments are closed.