Hong Kong learns that you can’t trust Commies.

Hot Air has the summary:

Before 1997, the city of Hong Kong had been a British colony for 156 years. The reintroduction of that bustling capitalist city into communist China was always thought to be a risky proposition. It was China’s Deng Xiaoping who crafted a policy known as “One Country, Two Systems” in the 1980s, which was aimed at assuaging concerns in Hong Kong that their way of life would persist even after the Union Jack was lowered and the flag of the People’s Republic was raised in its place.

Well, the reintegration process has finally begun and Beijing has determined that the semi-autonomous province will no longer have its own politics as well as its own economic system. The Chinese government rejected calls from democracy activists aimed at allowing Hong Kong residents to directly elect their own leadership. Beijing would be vetting any prospective candidate to first determine their suitability for office.

Translation: the PRC will pick Hong Kong’s rulers for it.  It always stuck in my craw that we just handed a economic powerhouse over to the Commies; it annoyed me worse that we didn’t hand out green cards and travel visas to anybody who wanted one, either.  Because God forbid that we take the position that it’s better to be free than to live under Communism – even the mutant version that the Chinese have developed for themselves.

Ah, for a time machine.

Moe Lane

8 thoughts on “Hong Kong learns that you can’t trust Commies.”

  1. So in five years when Hong Kong is a third world hellhole, will the Chinese blame Capitalists or America?
    .
    I’m betting on both.

  2. It’s amazing that even a dimbulb like Prince Charles foresaw this happening. According to excerpts from his (leaked) diary:

    The Prince described the Chinese president and “his cronies” at a handover dinner that followed.

    The president “gave a kind of propaganda speech which was loudly cheered by the bussed-in party faithful at the suitable moment in the text,” Charles wrote.

    “At the end of this awful Soviet-style display we had to watch the Chinese soldiers goose-step on to the stage and haul down the Union Jack and raise the ultimate flag.”

    The journal continued: “Thus we left Hong Kong to her fate and the hope that Martin Lee, the leader of the Democrats, would not be arrested…”

    He said everyone at another reception was “thoroughly optimistic” about Hong Kong’s future.

    “But in the background was the sneaking worry about creeping corruption and the gradual undermining of Hong Kong’s greatest asset — the rule of law.”

    He said the Chinese army was also a concern because soldiers’ low pay meant there may be “irresistible temptations to intimidate or threaten local people”.

  3. There is another factor. The Chinese economy is on the edge of a crash. Just as happened here in 2007-2008, banks are finding that what they thought was collateral in many cases does not exist. There have been a couple of cases that have become public about ingots in bullion reserves turning out to be merely gold plated. The real estate market is …. shaky. And guanxi [bribery] at all levels and at every encounter with the government is rampant.

    Squashing Hong Kong has the effect of showing the rest of the country what happens when they get out of line. And any economic problems can be blamed on the evil Hong Kong version of the “two systems”. The Party is desperate to maintain control by any means. Including war, foreign or domestic.

    1. Seeing as how Hong Kong has to import drinking water, they’re especially vulnerable to coercion.
      .
      I’m surprised it’s taken this long.
      I still can’t believe that the media chose to cover the hand-over as a celebration. I can’t tell you how many times I turned off the television in disgust that week.

  4. Hong Kong never had a choice in the matter to begin with, it was the British that handed Hong Kong off to China…

  5. Oh, good Heavens.

    The Chinese have patience.

    It’s been clear since 1997 that Hong Kong would eventually be reintegrated into the Kleptocratic Republic.

    In many ways, it already has been.

    1. I would say it is more likely took this long for that massive government bureaucracy to notice Hong Kong. After all, there are committee meeting to be call, investigation to be held, torture rooms to be reserve, figuring out who gets what bribes. Big government aren’t what you call quick on the draw.

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