The New York Times on Thursday published an opinion column by Regina Ip, the Hong Kong official widely denounced as “Beijing’s enforcer.” Ip declared “Hong Kong is part of China” and dismissed the protesters fighting for freedom in their city. I have no objection to the publishing of the column. Ip is a major figure in Hong Kong and, despite her support for authoritarian rule and crushing dissent, there is a value to having such views as part of the public debate. Rather, my concern is that the New York Times was denounced by many of us for its cringing apology after publishing a column by Sen. Tom Cotton (R, Ark.). and promising not to publish future such columns. So it will not publish a column from a Republican senator on protests in the United States but it will publish columns from one of the Chinese leaders crushing protests for freedom in Hong Kong.
Ip told Americans not to be sympathetic with the protesters being beaten and arrested as they fight for the most basic freedoms and human rights. She insists these inspiring protests as meaningless because it is the “destiny” of the protesters (and the city) to accept Communist Chinese rule. It is like publishing Emperor Palpatine’s op-ed declaring “Your feeble skills are no match for the power of the dark side.”
Ip declared. “No amount of outcry, condemnation or sanctions over the Chinese government’s purported encroachment in Hong Kong’s affairs will alter the fact that Hong Kong is part of China and that its destiny is intertwined with the mainland’s.”
Now compare that to the Cotton column that led to a mass protest from reporters and led to the forced resignation of the opinion editor.
The column by Cotton was discussing a statutory option used by presidents in the past in times of riot. He was arguing that troops could be used support insufficient law enforcement numbers. He stressed that his column concerns the violence not the protests. While I disagreed with the column, Cotton did not denounce the protests or the protesters. Rather than he objected to “a revolting moral equivalence of rioters and looters to peaceful, law-abiding protesters. A majority who seek to protest peacefully shouldn’t be confused with bands of miscreants.” In doing so, he not only cited the history of such use but cautioned that it should only be used temporarily to get hold of the situation:
“This venerable law, nearly as old as our republic itself, doesn’t amount to ‘martial law’ or the end of democracy, as some excitable critics, ignorant of both the law and our history, have comically suggested. In fact, the federal government has a constitutional duty to the states to ‘protect each of them from domestic violence.’ Throughout our history, presidents have exercised this authority on dozens of occasions to protect law-abiding citizens from disorder.”
I have repeatedly opposed such a move as unnecessary and inimical to the exercise of free speech. However, the column correctly recounted how the military has been used repeatedly by presidents to quell rioting and stabilize cities. However, the New York Times then bowed to the pressure of advocates and abandoned both its principles and the proud legacy of the paper. In a statement that will go done in journalistic infamy, the newspaper announced:
“We’ve examined the piece and the process leading up to its publication. This review made clear that a rushed editorial process led to the publication of an Op-Ed that did not meet our standards. As a result, we’re planning to examine both short term and long term changes, to include expanding our fact-checking operation and reduction the number of op-eds we publish.”
All of that because the newspaper published a historically correct account of a Republican senator on the use of military personnel to put down rioting. At the time New York Times reporter Jenna Wortham denounced publishing Cotton’s view because it put “Black @nytimes staffers in danger.” Instead, it is publishing a Chinese authoritarian leader dismissing protesters being crushed by her regime and proclaiming “Like it or not, Hong Kong is part of China.” Reporters are simply arrested by China and disappear into its extensive prison camp system.
The New York Times has succeeded in reducing its legendary opinion page to a mockery of hypocrisy. That is what happens when proving that you are woke is more important to being right. The right answer is to publish both columns as a newspaper committed to diversity of thought and expression.
The “jounralists” at the New York Times aren’t called presstitutes for nothing.
James Feldman — The reporters at TNYT are among the best there is. Consider the Pulitzer prizes over the years.
Yes, the Pulitzer Prize for Walter Duranty’s reporting on the splendors of the Soviet Union is a sentinel example of the worth of the prize.
Young, the countries that made up the former Soviet Union have many splendors. Such as Lake Baikal and for the intrepid, the delta of the Lena.
Yes, Lake Baikal has the largest body of freshwater in the world and was polluted under the Soviet regime. Perhaps the Gulags were less scenic, not to mention the fields of corpses of the Holdomor that Duranty and the NYT and the Pulitzer committee chose to pretend did not exist.
If I were editor of a major newspaper I might choose millions of people being deliberately starved to death by a tyrannical government as being more newsworthy than that Lake Baikal is pretty. Perhaps that is why I am unsuited to be an editor of the NYT. I don’t have the right priorities.
Today – not 20 years ago.
This isn’t the only way that the CCP violates the constitution of the PRC.
Autonomous provinces aren’t, being run by CCP Han sent from the Forbidden Palace;
9 dash line violating UNCLOS that the PRC signed;
Boundaries with India…
Who at the moment is standing up to the CCP? And who is in bed with them ?
Ip is correct that the destiny of Hong Kong and that of China are entwined.
What she fails to grasp is that destiny is likely the political freedom those in HK are protesting for, not the totalitarianism she is apologizing for.
The Chinese aren’t concerned with the history of the area they occupy. Other groups settled before them and yet the Chinese are exterinating them.
https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/07/15/uighur-genocide-xinjiang-china-surveillance-sterilization/
The World’s Most Technologically Sophisticated Genocide Is Happening in Xinjiang
Two recent disturbing events may finally awaken the world to the scale and horror of the atrocities being committed against the Uighurs, a mostly secular Muslim ethnic minority, in Xinjiang, China. One is an authoritative report documenting the systematic sterilization of Uighur women. The other was the seizure by U.S. Customs and Border Protection of 13 tons of products made from human hair suspected of being forcibly removed from Uighurs imprisoned in concentration camps. Both events evoke chilling parallels to past atrocities elsewhere, forced sterilization of minorities, disabled, and Indigenous people, and the image of the glass display of mountains of hair preserved at Auschwitz.
Wait.
The world’s sovereign nations and people need an arbitrary UNCLOS, with no legal basis, weight or force, to issue a statement of the obvious, that China doesn’t own the world beyond a small, “grace,” fringe area adjacent to its accepted, historic, traditional and customary borders?
In addition, the PRC coal burners are wrecking the world. More are being built. Still more in planning.
Ha Ha benson here is a new funny level for you. CCP violating the PRC constitution?
You don’t get to decide that– CCP does. And they say, no problem! Mei wenti
And now, the Communist People’s Republic of China has attempted the assassination of the President of the United States;
an act in support of and in complicity with the communists (liberals, progressives, socialists, democrats, RINOs) in America;
as a consequence of their joint development and deliberate, targeted release, from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, of “The China Flu, 2020”
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________
October 2, 2020
“Eight months and twelve days ago, January 20, 2020 – a date which will live in infamy – the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by the Communist People’s Republic of China.
“The United States was at peace with that nation and, wittingly or unwittingly, through criminal dereliction and negligence and attempting to obtain the cloak of plausible deniability, the People’s Republic of China released on the world the COVID-19 biological weapon.
“China has, therefore, undertaken a surprise offensive extending throughout the World. The Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy has directed his entire Cabinet that all measures be taken for the defense of the United States.
“With confidence in the United States Center For Disease Control and with the unbounding determination of the American people, the Untied States will gain the inevitable triumph so help us God.
“Congress must declare that since the unprovoked and dastardly attack by China on January 20, 2020, a state of war has existed between the United States and China.”
– President Donald J. Trump
David B. Benson. Aghast exclamation but no real counter argument.
Once again the subject is about an opinion peace in The New York Times concerning the fate of Hong Kong. Somehow, the comments become about President Trumps contracting the corona virus. Not one word about the struggle for freedom by the people of Hong Kong. Just smelling another chance to attack The President. They can’t collect their check unless they can show proof that they have been getting the word out. Winning at any cost is here so exemplified.
I agree with Dr. Turley concerning the allowing of the opinion of a Chinese government official by The New York Times. It makes the contrast with the treatment of a United States Senator and a Chinese spokes person so apparent. Will their employees soon be vehemently protesting this Chinese opinion peace. I am awaitng their calls for the dismissal of their new editor with great anticipation. The New York Times has been choosing what form of government they would prefer for some time now.
Balderdash, Thinkitthrough, balderdash.
“Balderdash, Thinkitthrough, balderdash.”
How so ?
Make an argument.
Lobbing insults is not very persuasive.
Use your words.
When logic, reason, rational discourse are not available, insults are their only tools.
Tell your friend Allan that lobbing insults is not very persuasive.
Beijing’s Enforcer advocates and promotes violation of the Hong Kong handover agreement between the UK and the PRC.
“Free speech”, I suppose Jonathan Turley will shout as the freedom lovers are dragged into the PRC donjons, “free speech!”
Yes, actual liberals will shout Free Speech.
Violations of the right to free speech are justification for actions. Such as sanctions or ultimately the dissolution of the government violating ones free speech.