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| 7/9 |
| 2004/4/23 [Politics/Foreign/Asia/China] UID:13342 Activity:high |
4/23 Read "In Beijing's Crushing Grip" at http://washingtonpost.com to see how fucked up China is. Oh wait, they changed the title to "China Tightens Its Grip" this morning. No password needed. Oh wait, the title is now "A Study Group Crushed in China's Grip". http://tinyurl.com/2tmzu [URL added, yr welcome] \- You are being monitored: http://tinyurl.com/2h2xg --psb \_ I knew it, Partha, you treacherous bastard! --erikred \_ One thing such stories make me curious about is why do people in the grip of a judicial system that is simply acting as a part of the authoritarian state imagine that defending their innocence - or others' innocence is going to do anything but expand the umbrella of suspicion? I ran across numerous such examples while studying recent history in the PRC as an undergrad. Sure Li comes off pretty badly in this article but without connections to local friends to visit in jail, it sounds like the only sensible thing. Defending them would only have landed his own ass in jail as well. -- ulysses \_ SHADES OF GRAY! NO ABSOLUTE EVIL! \_ You want a war worth fighting? Deposing the government of the PRC is that war. \_ obviously you still don't get it. deposing is easy, finding something to replace it is the tough part. also, it's a job for the PRCers, not for you. if you try, they will get confused, and all 1.3 billion of them will fight you, thinking you are the enemy, even though you are just trying to help. \_ Sigh. You're right, and yet, of all the regimes I most want to see toppled, this is the crown jewel. I wouldn't even care if they chopped it up into fifty tiny ethnic fiefs. \_ Okay. I'll bite. Since there are much much more brutal regimes and kleptocracies out there, most of them in Africa, why is the PRC your crown jewel? I'm no fan but they pale by comparison with many others in terms of their unsavoriness as a regime. Why them? -- ulysses \_ give us soda's login please \_ csuamotd@csua.berkeley.edu, pwd=csuamotd \_ "Chinese Communist Party is engaged in the largest and perhaps most successful experiment in authoritarianism in the world." Largest maybe, but most successful? Come on! Don't forget how much more effective NK is! \_ I am from Taiwan, and my first impression of the mainland is that I am impressed with the Communist's control structure. \_ Last time I check, USA wasn't able to rule Iraq too well. and Iraq is about 1/100 in size and only got 20 million people. \_ Well, yeah. But what does that have to do with anything? NK = North Korea \_ large land mass, huge population, and different cultural and ethnic mix make a land difficult to rule. For example, Singapore's government structure seems to work well with Chinese, but it can not scale up thus can't apply to the mainland. \_ Yeah, whatever you North Korean playa hater. \_ "I am a liberal," he wrote, "and what I care about are human rights, freedom and democracy." Funny how in the US "liberal" means you're pro-communist! \_ In Communist China, School studies YOU. \_ Check out the picture. Lu Kun has this big opportunity to show the western world her struggle... and what does she do? Talks on her cell phone during the picture session. Niiiiceee.. \_ Hey, she told her computer geek husband she wanted a quiet life and that he should get rich like his buddies and settle into the middle class -- not start up a web site called "Yangzi's Home of Ideas" and join a pro-democracy group. \_ Huh, well I can't argue with that. |
| 7/9 |
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| tinyurl.com/2tmzu -> www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A34768-2004Apr22.html He described their views on political change, asserting that some favored violent methods. And then he delivered the report to the Ministry of State Security. Three and a half years later, four members of the study group are in prison, serving sentences of eight or 10 years on subversion charges. Two are free but living with the shame of implicating the others when interrogated by police. And Li has fled to Thailand, where one recent afternoon he leafed through some of his reports and struggled to explain why he became an informer and betrayed his friends. Nearly 15 years after the Tiananmen Square massacre and 13 since the fall of the Soviet Union, the Chinese Communist Party is engaged in the largest and perhaps most successful experiment in authoritarianism in the world. What happened to the New Youth Study Group offers a glimpse into the methods the party uses to maintain its monopoly on power and the difficult moral choices faced by those caught in its grip. The fate of the study group also illustrates the thoroughness with which the party applies one of its most basic rules of survival: Consider any independent organization a potential threat and crush it. The eight members of the New Youth Study Group never agreed on a political platform and had no real source of funds. They never set up branches in other cities or recruited any other members. They never even managed to hold another meeting with full attendance; And yet they attracted the attention of Chinas two main security ministries. Reports about their activities reached officials at the highest levels of the party, including Luo Gan, the Politburo member responsible for internal security. Even the president then, Jiang Zemin, referred to the investigation as one of the most important in the nation, according to people who have seen an internal memo summarizing the comments of senior officials about the case. The leaderships interest in such a ragtag group reflects a deep insecurity about its grip on power. The party has delivered two decades of rapid growth, defying those who believe economic reform must lead to political liberalization. But it is struggling to manage rising social tension and popular discontent and remains especially wary of student activism, which sparked the 1989 pro-democracy demonstrations in Tiananmen Square. So the party moved quickly to eliminate the New Youth Study Group. In doing so, it forced eight young people to consider how much they were willing to sacrifice for their beliefs - and for their friends. This account is based on interviews with the four members of the study group who escaped arrest, relatives and friends of those imprisoned, and others who attended the groups meetings, as well as documents presented in court in the case. A Forum Is Born Lu Kun remembers standing over a stove in the alley outside her one-room house, making dinner as she lectured her husband, Yang Zili. He was inside, sitting in front of the computer they had purchased as a wedding present for themselves, tinkering with an essay on democracy he planned to post on the Internet. You dont have to do all this, she recalled admonishing him, her voice carrying through the open doorway. You should think of your parents, your family, our economic situation. He told me that someone had to stand up and work for social progress, and he had decided to stand up, Lu said. A slim, outgoing computer whiz with a youthful, angular face, Yang developed his political views at Beijing University, where he earned a masters degree in mechanics but was inspired by reading Vaclav Havel, Friedrich Hayek and Samuel P Huntington. As the eldest son of farmers so poor they gave his brothers up for adoption, he was especially interested in rural poverty and often traveled to the countryside to investigate the abuse of power by local officials. After graduating in 1998, Yang found work as a programmer and set up a popular Web site, Yangzis Home of Ideas, where he posted forceful essays condemning communism and arguing for democratic reform. I am a liberal, he wrote, and what I care about are human rights, freedom and democracy. Lu, a magazine editor with long, straight hair and sad eyes, never read her husbands essays and poems. She wanted a quiet life and urged him to be more like classmates who were chasing riches and settling into Chinas new middle class. Instead, he found a circle of friends who shared his concern about those left behind by the booming economy. They were college kids and recent graduates, people like himself who had come to Beijing from the provinces for an education and who enjoyed arguing about what could be done to change China and help its less fortunate. Yang signed up immediately when a few of his friends proposed setting up a club to provide structure to their discussions. They named it the New Youth Study Group after an influential journal published during Chinas celebrated May 4th Movement, when students and intellectuals passionately debated the countrys future after the fall of the last emperor in 1911. We wanted to do something for society, recalled Zhang Yanhua, a soft-spoken graduate who took a civil service job in the nearby city of Tianjin but made the two-hour trip back to Beijing for the groups meetings. They met on different college campuses, in dorm rooms, classrooms or just outside, and they welcomed friends and classmates to join them. Sometimes, they had tea or shared a meal, but usually they would just sit and talk, for hours at a time, about government corruption, the plight of laid-off factory workers or the tax burden on peasant families. |
| tinyurl.com/2h2xg -> www.chinaonline.com/refer/ministry_profiles/c01050865.asp There are also units for railways, traffic, civil aviation and forestry that are responsible to both the PSB and the related government department. The PSB requires intermediary border-control agencies that provide services for overseas studies, employment and travel to register, obtain licenses and permits, and meet quality standards. The ministry has been implementing State Council directives to authorize more foreign travel for Chinese citizens and allow foreigners to visit more Chinese cities without needing a travel permit. Patrol police handle minor offenses, safeguard major events and render first aid during emergencies. In their neighborhoods, officers promote social order, mediate squabbles and counsel people. The ministry also targets official corruption, software pirating, smuggling, black markets and pornography. The ministry registers theaters and cinemas to better supervise public gatherings, and registers communication equipment such as printing presses to facilitate censorship. It banned government agencies and state enterprises from accepting interview requests from overseas media to minimize leaks of secrets. It is regulating the development, manufacturing, sale and usage of network security products and commercial encryption products. The ministry forbade Internet service providers from allowing the online distribution of information that harms public security, and cyberpolice monitor the online activity of those suspected of violating content regulations. |
| washingtonpost.com -> www.washingtonpost.com/ Numbers, History Cast Shadow on Bush Hopes Despite close horse race with Kerry, president's approval ratings trail those of predecessors who won reelection. Soldier Details Iraq Abuse Defendant in prison scandal gives account of detainee treatment, offers to plead guilty. IN MOVIES New releases: "Troy," "Breakin' All the Rules," "Young Adam," "Godzilla: Uncut," "Word Wars," "With All Deliberate Speed." IN STYLE Fox issued a stunning news release for a reality special called "Seriously, Dude, I'm Gay" in which, two heterosexual men will try to convince people that they are gay. |
| csua.berkeley.edu Science Undergraduate Association The Computer Science Undergraduate Association is dedicated to representing the undergraduate Computer Science student body and associates to the University of California at Berkeley, its representatives, and other related organizations; Our office is located in 343 Soda Hall, located at the corner of Hearst & LeRoy. May___| |May, 2004 | |_S___M___T___W___T___F___S_| | |1 | ||___| |2 |3 |4 |5 |6 |7 |8 | |___|___|___|___|___|___|___| |9 |10 |11 |12 |13 |14 |15 | |___|___|___|___|___|___|___| |16 |17 |18 |19 |20 |21 |22 | |___|___|___|___|___|___|___| |23 |24 |25 |26 |27 |28 |29 | |___|___|___|___|___|___|___| |30 |31 | | |___|___|| Calendar of Events Mon, May 3rd, (6:00 PM) General Meeting/Officer Elections Announcements: * CSUA t-shirts are now available in the office (343 Soda) for $12 each. Baby-doll cuts also available. View the design on front and back. The CSUA Mentoring Program is calling for new students to sign up to be mentored. Register to find out more information about this free program at the mentoring website. Members interested in mentoring should contact jhs as soon as possible. CSUA Officer Meetings: Politburo meetings for Spring 2004 are scheduled for every Monday at 6pm in 337 Soda Hall. New members always welcome. Help Sessions are being offered, open especially to new students. The topics, times, and locations are listed here. We just made a Costco run. If you don't know what this means, stop by 343 Soda to find out. The Constitution has been amended. Many thanks to AMD and the TDA Project. Secure remote logins require either SSH ( Java Client) or S/KEY ( Java Client). User Policy - The Rules * Frequently Asked Questions about the CSUA and Soda * CSUA Constitution * Message of the Day - Including downtime announcements * CSUA Library * CSUA Encyclopedia * Membership application form, in PDF, TeX, DVI, and Postscript. The Mentoring Program * Prospective LSCS Mailing List. |