Human Rights

We Can’t Let Genocide Get in the Way of a Good Investment Opportunity, Right?

December 2, 2021 by Jim Geraghty Leave a Comment

Ray Dalio speaks during the Skybridge Capital SALT New York 2021 conference in New York City, September 15, 2021. (Brendan McDermid/Reuters)

There is nothing in Ray Dalio’s defense of investing in China that would not also apply to U.S. investments in Nazi Germany in the 1930s.

Then, as now, not every U.S. investor can “be an expert in those types of things.”

Then, as now, the United States had its own controversies and flaws and failures to live up to its own professed values; Dalio asked, “should I not invest in the United States because our own human rights issues and other things?”

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a92dbc0a818 .inline-newsletter-subscribe__cta label {
font-size: 1.2rem;

line-height: 1.5rem;

color: #000000;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a92dbc0a818 .inline-newsletter-subscribe__cta p {
font-size: 1.05rem;

line-height: 1.45rem;

color: #000000;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a92dbc0a818 {
background-color: #ffffff;

border-width: 1px;

border-color: #cccccc;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a92dbc0a818 .inline-newsletter-subscribe__email-submit {
border-color: #e92131;
background-color: #e92131;

color: #ffffff;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a92dbc0a99b .inline-newsletter-subscribe__cta label {
font-size: 1.5rem;

line-height: 1.7rem;

color: #000000;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a92dbc0a99b .inline-newsletter-subscribe__cta p {
font-size: 1.05rem;

line-height: 1.45rem;

color: #000000;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a92dbc0a99b {
background-color: #ffffff;

border-width: 1px;

}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a92dbc0a99b .inline-newsletter-subscribe__email-submit {
border-color: #eba605;
background-color: #eba605;

color: #ffffff;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a92dbc0aa53 .inline-newsletter-subscribe__cta label {
font-size: 1.3rem;

line-height: 1.5rem;

color: #dd9933;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a92dbc0aa53 .inline-newsletter-subscribe__cta p {
font-size: 1.05rem;

line-height: 1.5rem;

color: #2d2d2d;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a92dbc0aa53 {
background-color: #ffffff;

border-width: 1px;

border-color: #999999;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a92dbc0aa53 .inline-newsletter-subscribe__email-submit {
border-color: #dd9933;
background-color: #dd9933;

color: #ffffff;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a92dbc0ab03 .inline-newsletter-subscribe__cta label {
font-size: 1.5rem;

line-height: 1.7rem;

color: #0f733c;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a92dbc0ab03 .inline-newsletter-subscribe__cta p {
font-size: 1.05rem;

line-height: 1.45rem;

color: #2d2d2d;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a92dbc0ab03 {
background-color: #ffffff;

border-width: 1px;

border-color: #cccccc;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a92dbc0ab03 .inline-newsletter-subscribe__email-submit {
border-color: #0f733c;
background-color: #0f733c;

color: #ffffff;
}

Then, as now, it was legal for Americans to invest in Nazi Germany — until 1941, in fact — and so businessmen could “leave it to the government to make those decisions.”

No doubt the Nazis also saw the state as “an extension of the family” and “as a top-down country, what they are doing is they behave like a strict parent.” Indeed, a strict abusive parent.

I realize comparisons to Nazi Germany can often be overwrought and inappropriate, but it does seem to fit, since that was the last time a genocide-minded government hosted the Olympics.

China: Boycotting Olympics over Genocide Is ‘Selfish’

December 2, 2021 by John Hayward Leave a Comment

China’s state-run Global Times on Wednesday railed against the worldwide movement to boycott the upcoming Beijing Winter Olympics over China’s human rights abuses, denouncing the effort as “selfish” and “ultimately harmful.”

The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) paper never really got around to explaining how a boycott that would cost athletes, corporate sponsors, and media companies billions of dollars could be “selfish.” Instead, the editorial zeroed in on the “diplomatic boycott” concept, which is actually a watered-down compromise measure that would have high-level officials from free nations refuse to attend the Beijing Games in person.

This wouldn’t really be a “boycott” at all, since the Olympics would proceed on schedule and huge sums of money would change hands as planned. It is more like a way for politicians to get on the record as expressing their disapproval for China’s dismal human rights record without actually doing anything that counts – the mildest of geopolitical slaps on the wrist.

The Global Times nevertheless went berserk on Wednesday and accused diplomatic boycott proponents of using the Olympics to score cheap political points. The editorial disingenuously mixed in quotes from people objecting to real boycotts that would cancel the Olympics entirely, such as International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach.

Activists including members of the local Hong Kong, Tibetan and Uyghur communities hold up banners and placards in Melbourne on June 23, 2021, calling on the Australian government to boycott the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics over China’s human rights record. (WILLIAM WEST/AFP via Getty)

“Anybody who is thinking about a boycott should learn this lesson from history. A sports boycott serves nothing. It’s only hurting the athletes, and it’s hurting the population of the country because they are losing the joy to share, the pride, the success with their Olympic team,” Bach said in a July 2020 interview approvingly quoted by the Global Times.

Bach was referring to the U.S.-led 1980 boycott of the Moscow Olympics and Russia’s retaliatory boycott of the 1984 Los Angeles Games, which involved nations refusing to participate in the Olympics and keeping their athletes home.

Bach, a fencing gold medalist in the 1976 Montreal Games, mourned the lost opportunities for athletes resulting from these actions and expressed his deep belief that the Olympics should “unify the entire world in a peaceful competition, without any discrimination, be it racial, be it social, be it cultural, be it political.”

The “diplomatic boycott” contemplated by the Biden administration, on the other hand, would not cancel the Games or prevent any athletes from participating – by its express design, the measure would only require top U.S. government officials to avoid attending the Games in person.

Critics in the Western world dislike the diplomatic boycott concept precisely because it would be “meaningless” and “hollow,” as World Athletics President Sebastian Coe said last week of similar proposals floated by the British government.

A Tibetan activist holds a placard and a Tibetan flag during a protest against Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics in front of the Olympics Museum in Lausanne on June 23, 2021 as some 200 participants took part to the protest. (FABRICE COFFRINI/AFP via Getty Images)

Contrary to IOC President Bach’s optimistic belief in the humanizing and liberalizing power of the Games, there is absolutely zero evidence from the past half-century that any sort of cultural or economic “engagement” has liberalized the Chinese regime in the slightest. On the contrary, the regime has only grown more brutal and oppressive as it got rich from globalism and gained economic leverage over the Western world.

Case in point: on Thursday, the Washington Post reported China is pressuring American companies to push back against the boycott movement – and demanding those companies openly embrace key elements of the Communist geopolitical agenda, such as endorsing China’s claims to Taiwan, accepting its crackdown on democracy in Hong Kong, and giving the Communist Party free rein to oppress the Uyghur Muslims of Xinjiang province in the name of “national security.”

The Power of One

December 2, 2021 by Jay Nordlinger Leave a Comment

Peng Shuai plays in the Australian Open on January 21, 2021. (Kim Hong-Ji / Reuters)

In Impromptus today, I lead with jury duty, which leads to Balkanization in our country — have you filled out your “juror information” form? — which leads to politics, which leads to . . . you know how it goes. Personalities in my column include Thomas Jefferson, Jim Harbaugh, and Mark Roth. (The last of those was a bowler.) (The second is a former quarterback and current coach.) (The first is a statue, removed.) Among the countries I discuss are Taiwan — it’s still a country, for now — Ukraine, Hungary, and India. Here on the Corner, I’d like to say something about China — great, vast China — and one Chinese citizen, in particular: Peng Shuai.

She is a tennis player, who was raped by a government official and said so. As a consequence, she was banished from view. A lot of people want to know where she is. Her case has galvanized the tennis community and segments of the general public, in various countries.

A reader of mine writes something like this: “Wouldn’t it be neat if some athlete, in some democratic country, said, ‘I’m not going to the Olympics while Peng Shuai is missing’? Wouldn’t it be even more neat if an entire team said, ‘We aren’t going, as long as she is missing’?”

That would indeed be amazing.

The Chinese state pulverizes people every day — people who are anonymous, except to their loved ones, and themselves. The state brutalizes the Tibetans, brutalizes the Uyghurs. Brutalizes ordinary Han Chinese. That’s what a dictatorship does: brutalize. And yet, the case of this one young woman has caught the attention of many people. People can understand it, wrap their minds around it: tennis player has been raped by a government official and has been disappeared. I know what she looks like. There’s her picture.

You recall the statement attributed to Stalin: “One death is a tragedy; a million deaths are a statistic.”

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a8d8812e5ea .inline-newsletter-subscribe__cta label {
font-size: 1.2rem;

line-height: 1.5rem;

color: #000000;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a8d8812e5ea .inline-newsletter-subscribe__cta p {
font-size: 1.05rem;

line-height: 1.45rem;

color: #000000;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a8d8812e5ea {
background-color: #ffffff;

border-width: 1px;

border-color: #cccccc;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a8d8812e5ea .inline-newsletter-subscribe__email-submit {
border-color: #e92131;
background-color: #e92131;

color: #ffffff;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a8d8812e872 .inline-newsletter-subscribe__cta label {
font-size: 1.5rem;

line-height: 1.7rem;

color: #000000;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a8d8812e872 .inline-newsletter-subscribe__cta p {
font-size: 1.05rem;

line-height: 1.45rem;

color: #000000;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a8d8812e872 {
background-color: #ffffff;

border-width: 1px;

}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a8d8812e872 .inline-newsletter-subscribe__email-submit {
border-color: #eba605;
background-color: #eba605;

color: #ffffff;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a8d8812e924 .inline-newsletter-subscribe__cta label {
font-size: 1.3rem;

line-height: 1.5rem;

color: #dd9933;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a8d8812e924 .inline-newsletter-subscribe__cta p {
font-size: 1.05rem;

line-height: 1.5rem;

color: #2d2d2d;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a8d8812e924 {
background-color: #ffffff;

border-width: 1px;

border-color: #999999;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a8d8812e924 .inline-newsletter-subscribe__email-submit {
border-color: #dd9933;
background-color: #dd9933;

color: #ffffff;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a8d8812e9c6 .inline-newsletter-subscribe__cta label {
font-size: 1.5rem;

line-height: 1.7rem;

color: #0f733c;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a8d8812e9c6 .inline-newsletter-subscribe__cta p {
font-size: 1.05rem;

line-height: 1.45rem;

color: #2d2d2d;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a8d8812e9c6 {
background-color: #ffffff;

border-width: 1px;

border-color: #cccccc;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-61a8d8812e9c6 .inline-newsletter-subscribe__email-submit {
border-color: #0f733c;
background-color: #0f733c;

color: #ffffff;
}

Yelena Bonner, the wife of Andrei Sakharov, the great physicist and dissident, told me that her husband disliked talking about human rights in general. He preferred to talk about individual cases — especially cases he was involved in personally. People could relate to that. Not “human rights.”

Over 25 years or so, I have written a lot about human rights in China — human rights in general, in that country. (By the way, there is an organization, founded in the 1980s, called, simply, Human Rights in China.) But I have also written about, say, Grace Gao. Hers is a story that people can relate to, I would think. I have written about the Uyghurs. Generally. But I have also written about Gulchehra Hoja and her family — personally.

Hong Kong is interesting. Interesting and important. So are Tanya Chan and Nathan Law, individually.

I have written a lot about Russia — and about Ildar Dadin, say, or Oyub Titiev, personally.

In Saudi Arabia: Raif Badawi and Ensaf Haidar, and Loujain al-Hathloul. In Venezuela: Antonio Ledezma and Leopoldo López. In Nicaragua: Félix Maradiaga and Edipcia Dubón. In Iran: Manouchehr Honarmand and Masih Alinejad. In Cuba: Juan Carlos González Leiva and Danilo Maldonado.

And so on.

Syria is a place so dark and terrifying and murderous, it can scarcely be imagined. But one can narrow in on the life of, for example, Waad al-Kateab.

There are a billion and a half people in China. You can’t know them all. But Peng Shuai — “You know that tennis player?” I hope she does a lot of damage to that nasty, foul, life-opposing regime. It is an enemy of all mankind.

Kasparov’s Crusade

November 9, 2021 by Jay Nordlinger Leave a Comment

Garry Kasparov in October 2021 (Oslo Freedom Forum)

I would like to link to a couple of podcasts. Here is the latest episode of my Music for a While; and here is my latest Q&A, which is with Garry Kasparov.

The text accompanying the music podcast is as follows:

A piece he was writing about soccer, believe it or not, put Jay in mind of a song. So did the title of the latest Bond movie. There have been some passings in music recently: of Carlisle Floyd, Edita Gruberová, and Bernard Haitink. Jay pays tribute to these musicians, and, as usual, to music itself.

Garry Kasparov, as you know, is a chess champion and a democracy champion. He was the first-ever guest on Q&A, back in 2015. The second was John McCain.

For a total of 255 months, Kasparov was the No. 1 chess player in the world. By way of comparison, I looked up Tiger Woods: who, in his career, has been the No. 1 golfer for 158 months. No one else is close to Tiger; no one else is close to Garry.

Garry has authored many books, the latest of which are Deep Thinking, which is about machine intelligence and human creativity, and Winter Is Coming, which is about the challenge posed by authoritarianism to democracy.

Kasparov is the chairman of two organizations: the Human Rights Foundation, which hosts the Oslo Freedom Forum, and the Renew Democracy Initiative. RDI has a new project, Frontlines of Freedom. I will quote the relevant webpage:

The Renew Democracy Initiative is proud to present Frontlines of Freedom, a groundbreaking project bringing together 52 dissidents from 28 oppressive countries. As RDI Freedom Fellows, these activists have signed onto an open letter highlighting their hopes and fears for American democracy and reminding Americans of the US’s potential to serve as a global democratic inspiration.

In my podcast with Kasparov, I tell him that he reminds me of Peter Schramm, the late Hungarian-born American political scientist. Peter always said that his mission in life was to teach native-born Americans about their democracy and the blessings it brings — whether they know it or not. And the importance of American democracy to the entire world.

Garry is against radicalism on left or right. He is for “evolution, not revolution,” as he tells me. “Just don’t get crazy,” he wants to tell Americans. “Don’t turn self-criticism into self-flagellation.” “Take a deep breath and appreciate the greatness of your democracy.”

There is no perfection on earth, says Garry. What do we ask of intelligent machines? That they make fewer mistakes. They cannot be perfect. Neither can any country, composed as it is of human beings. But the United States has set a pretty good example for the world (and more than pretty good).

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-618a833a3cf84 .inline-newsletter-subscribe__cta label {
font-size: 1.2rem;

line-height: 1.5rem;

color: #000000;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-618a833a3cf84 .inline-newsletter-subscribe__cta p {
font-size: 1.05rem;

line-height: 1.45rem;

color: #000000;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-618a833a3cf84 {
background-color: #ffffff;

border-width: 1px;

border-color: #cccccc;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-618a833a3cf84 .inline-newsletter-subscribe__email-submit {
border-color: #e92131;
background-color: #e92131;

color: #ffffff;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-618a833a3d1a9 .inline-newsletter-subscribe__cta label {
font-size: 1.5rem;

line-height: 1.7rem;

color: #000000;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-618a833a3d1a9 .inline-newsletter-subscribe__cta p {
font-size: 1.05rem;

line-height: 1.45rem;

color: #000000;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-618a833a3d1a9 {
background-color: #ffffff;

border-width: 1px;

}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-618a833a3d1a9 .inline-newsletter-subscribe__email-submit {
border-color: #eba605;
background-color: #eba605;

color: #ffffff;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-618a833a3d25c .inline-newsletter-subscribe__cta label {
font-size: 1.3rem;

line-height: 1.5rem;

color: #dd9933;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-618a833a3d25c .inline-newsletter-subscribe__cta p {
font-size: 1.05rem;

line-height: 1.5rem;

color: #2d2d2d;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-618a833a3d25c {
background-color: #ffffff;

border-width: 1px;

border-color: #999999;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-618a833a3d25c .inline-newsletter-subscribe__email-submit {
border-color: #dd9933;
background-color: #dd9933;

color: #ffffff;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-618a833a3d2fa .inline-newsletter-subscribe__cta label {
font-size: 1.5rem;

line-height: 1.7rem;

color: #0f733c;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-618a833a3d2fa .inline-newsletter-subscribe__cta p {
font-size: 1.05rem;

line-height: 1.45rem;

color: #2d2d2d;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-618a833a3d2fa {
background-color: #ffffff;

border-width: 1px;

border-color: #cccccc;
}

#inline-newsletter-nloptin-618a833a3d2fa .inline-newsletter-subscribe__email-submit {
border-color: #0f733c;
background-color: #0f733c;

color: #ffffff;
}

One thing Garry raises in our conversation is this business of “equality” versus “equity.” Garry is, of course, for equality under the law and equality of opportunity. Equity is something else entirely. “As someone raised in the Soviet Union,” he says, “I know what that means. It means a miserable outcome for everybody.”

He is very much for strong U.S. leadership in the world. He thinks it is good for the United States and the world — both. From World War II to the late 2000s, he says, every U.S. president assumed responsibility for world leadership, to one degree or another. The last three presidents, however, have not, as Garry sees it — and this has been good for no one.

With one exception: dictators.

For the last several years, Kasparov has said something that I have quoted a lot: “Dictators don’t ask ‘Why?,’ they ask, ‘Why not?’” When they see that no one will resist some misdeed — why not go ahead and do it? What’s stopping them?

The world abhors a vacuum, Kasparov notes: and when the United States walks away, bad actors walk in. Like who? Like Communist China, like ISIS, like malevolent, destructive others.

Another point, from Kasparov: The United States could use better propaganda — good propaganda, meaning, truthful propaganda. Why should it not be said, throughout the world, “China gave the world the pandemic, and the United States saved the world, with its vaccines”? Why are Americans so shy in this regard?

There is a lot more to our podcast, of course. At the end, I ask Garry about chess.

In the past, I have hailed him for getting his hands dirty, with politics and the fight for freedom against dictatorship. He could have lived out his life as the chess hero, with his feet up in some dacha, perhaps. He could have accepted accolades and signed autographs without breaking a sweat. Instead, he is in constant motion, working in behalf of freedom, democracy, and human rights.

He once replied to me as follows: “I never wanted to be a statue. That would be boring. Plus, you know what pigeons do to statues.”

Again, my latest Q&A with Garry Kasparov is here.