It appears that the Communist censors of China are concerned about more than just discussion of the absence of civil liberties. It appears that one of the greatest concerns for Communist censors is any proof that its Communist leaders are capitalists. Networks like Sina Weibo and Wechat have deleted all discussion of the Panama Papers leak which names several members of China’s elite, including President Xi Jinping’s brother-in-law, as hiding huge amounts of money in foreign accounts. Mao warned that “There is a serious tendency towards capitalism among the well-to-do peasants.” It appears that the well-to-do peasants have discovered foreign bank accounts.
The leaked papers from Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca, mention Deng Jiagui, who is married to Mr Xi’s older sister. Dang and his wife reportedly are sheltering hundreds of millions of dollars in real estate, share holdings and other assets.
Deng appears to have soared in profits and investments just as Xi was rising in politics, including the purchase of two companies.
The result is that Mao’s successors have discarded his economic precepts while hanging on to the authoritarian powers.
This could be a US Intelligence operation as suggested by some Russians. The US is the only country I know that puts a tax obligation on it citizens living and working overseas. The nationals of other nations can work overseas tax free from their home nation. IRS agents, at great taxpayer expense, are flown and lodged around the world to sit in every American Embassy to urge and assist Americans to file and pay income tax. Even children of missionaries, who have income must pay US tax. Doctors Without Borders. A proprietor of a tourist retreat, a cafe or an American Bar in Casablanca, has the competitive disadvantage of a tax obligation at home unlike any non-American person. This is patently unjust and has pushed Treasury to draconian bullying of foreign financial institutions and regulators; destroyed Antigua’s economic development plan using online gaming; and required foreign entities to “turn in” the names and account details of every American customer with a credit card or account anywhere in the world.
There are no US people revealed so far in this “leak” because the IRS has likely sifted through the data dump first and made provision for their own measures and sanctions over people that they can reach. They’ve thrown the rest–in China, Russia, Ukraine, Iceland, Dubai, Saudi, Brazil, everywhere to the wolves. Why is the leaking organization based in Washington? So they can obtain US intelligence community protection and cooperation. That’s my theory today.
Roe v. Wade was the last assertion of any privacy right or penumbra in this sorry state of American decline.
It’s fun to pick on China but the papers have resulted in the Prime Minister of Iceland resigning. Those who received the papers haven’t get gotten to the US folks stashing their gains threw this “law” firm. There are other shoes waiting to drop.
A Norwegian Conservative politician stated that Bernie Sanders would fit right in his party.
The PRC is neofascist. The communism is just a name.
Then there are those who emigrated from the USSR then after a few years went back because they couldn’t handle the overwhelming abundance of choice found in places like the common supermarket. I recently spoke, thanks to a translater app,, with a couple of recent Chinese green carded people who are amazed, not overwhelmed–amazed, at the options.
Even with China’s restriction, that information is getting in and spreading. Reminds me of John Paul II and flooding Poland with fax machines, well before Gdansk.
Aren’t Communism and Socialism just grand?
Inevitably, it creates a government ruling class that live like sultans, while the rest of the population lives in equal misery. They must control the press and speech to prevent the population from becoming educated on how their government mistreats them.
My dad was talking about how the Communists were a minor percent of the population of the USSR. They had a secret communications system with which they could order anything they wanted. The rest of the population stood for hours in line to get into stores with meagre supplies on the shelves. “Evil” capitalism was abolished, with the entirely predictable result that there was no point in working hard. Government controlled industry, and the location of regional production. People were all equal, but equally poor.
The same thing happens in China.
And when the Chinese recently began using capitalism because they discovered the same shortages with communism as the USSR, they did so over the underlying structure of communism, with little to no individual rights. So of course it created the same abuses as its controlling communist government did.
Please, don’t become suicidal and vote for avowed socialist Bernie Sanders. I do not know if the US could ever recover, and I don’t want stale government bread. Even Sweden discovered the error of their uber socialist ways.
Xi should just follow the Clinton model: start a “global foundation” to hide your graft in plain view … and get congratulated for it!
Xi has been putting people like this in jail regularly, so this is a problem for him. He cannot get rid of all corruption in China since that is how business is done, but Xi has been able to slow it down. If Xi follows his normal pattern, he will jail his brother-in-law. If not, he is playing favorites.
Apparently Pres. Obama has taken a page from the Chinese censors’ book – witness Pres. Hollande’s statement about “Islamic Terrorism” being censored before “technical difficulties” were corrected under pressure.
I have read the reports posted by ICIJ and this sounds awfully circumstantial. Most everything they did was a valid business practice, excepting only that the IRS demands banks investigate their clients to “make certain” that they have done nothing illegal. That is preposterous. This is ALL about TAXES.
Taxation is theft.
https://youtu.be/lA_Yl_JCdFg
https://youtu.be/MGWNg-pCiSE
https://youtu.be/BKZtHvwzEfw
https://youtu.be/JEagFTVzIBs
https://youtu.be/0ne16Le-hq4
Listing clients with possible unsavory practices of a huge business in Panama (which has its own regulations and law) is like listing all the mob-connected customers of the Cross Bay Diner in Queens! That doesn’t mean the Cross Bay Diner is doing anything RICO. Come on.
A chink is a chink. Is a chink all the way. From his first drink of coke to his last dying day….
….and to add to your comments, I review “China Daily” as part of the Daily Outsider #China Project–and they are silent as they can be–it should not surprise anyone as Xi is featured prominently in addition to Li Peng who was the key architect of Tiananmen