China Emerges as a Scapegoat in Campaign Advertisements

[pampango]

Source: New York Times

With many Americans seized by anxiety about the country’s economic decline, candidates from both political parties have suddenly found a new villain to run against: China. In the past week or so, at least 29 candidates have unveiled advertisements suggesting that their opponents have been too sympathetic to China and, as a result, Americans have suffered. The ads are striking not only in their volume but also in their pointed language.

It is no accident that Democrats, in particular, have been eying China as a line of attack. This spring, national Democrats, including the House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, began to encourage candidates to highlight the issue after reviewing internal polling that suggested voters strongly favored eliminating tax breaks for companies that do business in China.

Still, some Republicans clearly see the issue as potent, and they are counterattacking with ads stating that the Obama administration’s stimulus package helped to create $2 billion in wind-turbine technology jobs in China, a claim the Treasury Department and the American Wind Energy Association say is dubious.

Evan B. Tracey, president of the Campaign Media Analysis Group, which tracks political advertising, said that “China has sort of become a straw-man villain in this election” in a way that elicits comparisons to the sentiments toward Japan in the 1980s over car manufacturing and Mexico in the 1990s over the North American Free Trade Agreement.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/10/us/politics/10outsource.html?_r=1&hp

[Cirque du So-What]

1. 'Strawman?'

Was the Japanese government pouring millions into the coffers of the US Chamber of Commerce back in the '70s & '80s? Were repugs openly collaborating with corporations in finding ways to eliminate American jobs back then? Fuck this RW apologist writer and the screed he rode in on!

[txlibdem]

4. Newt is actively seeking those foreign funding sources to corrupt our elections

Is it yet another facet of "If you believe government can never do anything right, elect a Republican and they'll prove it."? Except now it's "If you think that our elections are corrupt, just watch the actions of the Republicans and they'll prove it."

It should be illegal for any foreign entity, person, or organization to directly or indirectly affect the outcome of our elections. Yet our Democratic President is doing NOTHING to stop the flood of foreign cash and corporate cash that is poisoning our political process. Our Democratic majorities in both the House and the Senate are similarly doing NOTHING to stop it or slow it down. Nobody is challenging the "Citizens United" supreme court ruling or making new laws that just might survive a supreme court challenge. But they are doing none of that.

I just can't find it in my heart to blame the foreign companies for playing by OUR rules, especially when the Republicans are ACTIVELY seeking their cash. I choose to focus my anger on the Mob Boss, not on the delivery boy.

[fasttense]

2. So filled with lies, so filled with BS.

"Candidates from both political parties have suddenly found a new villain to run against."

Oh really?

With the RepubliCON party accepting bribes, err illegal campaign donations, from Communist China through the US Chamber of Horrors, I see only that the Democratic Party has a villain to run against.

RepubliCONS are now the party of Communist China. Can they thank the US Chamber of Horrors?

[txlibdem]

3. Don't blame China, blame the Corporatistas that have killed 20 million American jobs?

If that's the meme then I'm all for it. The idea that big business bears no responsibility for closing down tens of thousands of factories here, and killing between 20 million and 40 million American jobs by doing so, is pure idiocy.

Who should we be pissed off at?

Corporations who closed factories
Companies who outsourced jobs
Companies that buy stuff NOT made in America
Republicans who wrote the laws that gave tax write-offs to those same companies for shipping jobs overseas

If I was China, and thousands of rich but stupid American companies wanted to build factories and create jobs in my country I would never turn them down. I'd help them get the ball rolling!

Jobs have been taken away from Americans -by the Corporatistas- and have been moved to China, India, Indonesia, Vietnam, South America, Mexico, Canada in some cases. Basically wherever the government is corrupt or too stupid to have laws that keep businesses from being destructive to their environment, economy, human rights, etc.

[fasttense]

5. I really don't blame Communist China.

They are doing the smart thing. They are merely accepting the gift given to them by our corrupt Supreme Court. The mess made out of our American economy is the real enemy, and our corporate CEOs with the backing of our politicians made it. It started with Ronnie Raygun and has gotten worse even under President Clinton.

But, the RepubliCONS are dead set in keeping the status quo, no matter how they try to hide it. That's why they so willingly take illegal campaign contributions from Communist China. While a larger percentage of Democratic leaders want that change President Obama talked about.

[txlibdem]

6. Thanks

I just felt it was important to keep the truth out in front and now allow them to deflect our attention.

It all ties into my view that Capitalism rewards only the most psychotic, the best and most accomplished pathological liars.

[Populist_Prole]

7. This was so predictable

Apologists for "free trade" write garbage like this every time populist sentiment against it bubbles to the top amidst the korporate ( sic ) media. The names may change, but the 1000 Lb elephant in the room is to be ignored always.

[David__77]

8. I oppose this in principle, but support anything to win.

China is not an enemy of the US and the McCarthyite and racist anti-China sentiment is wrong. That said, I support anything to win.