Clinton avoids China disputes, hands out teddy bears. Avoiding disputes and handing out teddy bears is the appropriate behavior of a First lady, not a Secretary of State of a major power. Reuters reports that “She avoided any public discussion of the issues that will occupy her in Beijing, including North Korea’s suspected sinking of a South Korean warship, Iran’s nuclear program, and U.S. calls for China to allow its currency to appreciate.”
Just as disturbing is the puny content of the American pavilion which provides and apt visualizations of The Fruits of American Weakness.
Clinton began her day at the U.S. pavilion, which was a bare patch of ground less than a year ago with the United States short of money to build it and at risk of missing an event at the top of China’s business and political agenda.Thanks partly to her intervention, major U.S. companies stepped up to the plate to fund the pavilion, whose attractions include three films highlighting the American way of life.
In one, Americans including basketball stars Kobe Bryant and Magic Johnson offered greetings in Chinese.
A second verged on corporate advertising, with an executive discussing the potential of wind to meet China’s burgeoning energy needs with pictures of U.S.-made windmills in the background.
A third was an allegory of what a single person — in this case a young girl who plants a flower in an abandoned city lot — can do to improve the environment.
After the film, Clinton handed out teddy bears to children in the audience.
The films made no explicit reference to democracy, human rights, freedom of religion or other political issues where the United States has long criticized China’s record.
The U.S. exhibit ends with a gift shop where a great many products — from teddy bears and stuffed bison to silver lapel pins and pink cowboy hats — were all marked “Made in China.”
Compare Hillary Clinton’s submissiveness to Mexican president Calderon’s assertiveness and you realize just how successful the Obama/Clinton administration’s smart diplomacy of engagement has been in weakening American in a year and a half. We have at least two and a half years to go.
