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Two Monsters behind American Democracy

2/26/2022

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Dr. Wordman

The U.S. is the superpower in the world. She has only a short history of 246 years since her independence breaking away from Great Britain her master colonizer. The U.S. rose rapidly as a modern country with territorial expansion, industrialization and trade. The forefathers of the U.S. wisely adopted the three principles, capitalism, freedom and democracy as the foundations for nation building even though the principles were new ideas subject to development and refinement as her government system was being constructed. The U.S. is a great nation blessed with huge land and natural resources, protected by the Pacific Ocean on her west and Atlantic Ocean on her east. Luckily, the U.S. experienced WW I and WW II without any battle on her home turf and emerged as a victor. After WW I, the U.S. had become a significant world power among the European states. After WW II, the U.S. became a superpower after the European nations, including UK and Russia were all devastated by the war and Germany and Japan were crushed and defeated by the Allies. The U.S. rightfully emerged as the world’s superpower after WW II and took on the leadership role on world stage with her Marshall Plan to rebuild Europe and took advantage of her occupation of Japan to lead Asia to recovery from ruins caused by the Japanese Imperial army.
 
There was another political philosophy, communism, rooted in Ancient Greek and Rome philosophers and later elucidated by Thomas More’s book, Utopia, and echoed by Christian Universalist teaching that humankind is one and God does not discriminate among people. Thus, communism thought can be traced back to 16-18th century, such as the idea of abolition of private ownership of land which was evidenced in Edward Bernstein’s book (1895), Cromwell and Communism. In the early 19th century, various social reformers founded communities based on common ownership. Unlike many previous communist communities, they replaced the religious emphasis with a rational and philanthropic basis. During the industrial revolution, many social problems occurred, such as workers' working conditions etc. Karl Marx and his associate Friedrich Engels, in 1848, offered a new definition of communism and popularized the term in their famous pamphlet, The Communist Manifesto. Communism started its revolution in Russia, In 1917, the October Revolution in Russia brought Vladimir Lenin's Bolsheviks (communist party with the Bolsheviks having the majority) to state power. The event generated a great deal of practical and theoretical debate within the Marxist movement. Marx’s socialism and communism to be built upon foundations laid by the most advanced capitalist development was not workable in poor Russia with an enormous illiterate peasantry and just a minority of industrial workers. The peasants demanded for land reform and popular support for the Soviets. Hence, the development of Soviet Union dictated the evolution of communism and triggered the U.S. anti-communism and anti-Russia ideologies.
 
Now that the Soviet Union had collapsed after the end of Cold War, the U.S. should be the only superpower commanding the world leadership. But the rise of China has challenged the U.S. position not because of communism but her diligence in finding a workable system for nation development. China’s success may be correlated with Marx’s vision that communism works better with capitalism foundation, but that would be an oversimplification of China’s success. This author believes that it is the political system not ideology that has made China efficient and focused in delivering benefits to her people. In contrast, the U.S. has been on a decline with her own deeds. The author believes that there are two monsters in American Democracy which are crippling her political system and society. These two monsters are, one, discrimination (obvious but denied), which is dealt with by laws on the surface but in reality, systemically persistent in the American society. The second monster is money, the U.S. dollars protected under the American capitalism (not obvious but admitted), which means the U.S. dollars, backed by military power, has a monstrous strength to do business in the world. The U.S. dollars can never fail regardless of American productivity and have unlimited supply by printing spoiling the American governments in their monetary policies and behaviors. If there is no other nation rising in economy and military strength to challenge her, the U.S. would only have one monster and not two to worry about. With China’s rise, the U.S. must face the two monsters in order to save her from decline.
 
Let’s first examine how discrimination is a monster destroying the future of the U.S. First, we have to admit that discrimination exists in American democracy. The U.S. is an immigrant nation with white immigrants dominating the country since her colonial days. The history showed us native American were discriminated (literally eliminated in the U.S.), then the Blacks were discriminated and still persistent today. The Asian Americans were discriminated throughout the past two centuries since they arrived. Today, the discrimination monster raised its head again against Asians, Chinese especially. The Mexicans are discriminated despite of the laws making Spanish language printed on all documents. These discrimination have monstrous effects while the white population is shrinking relative to the other races. The U.S. advocate, defend and export democracy but the on-going discrimination domestically is the monster revealing hypocrisy and double standards in American democracy. If Martin Luther King was not assassinated and got elected as a U.S. President that would be evidence for democracy. Obama, son of a Kenyan, educated through a discriminating system by privileges and got elected as the President is hardly democracy at work but a discriminatory and controlled system at work. Discrimination was so entrenched that it became open practice when China was perceived as a threat; the American government openly discriminate against Chinese Americans (treating every Chinese Americans as a spy) never mind Chinese people (stopping them coming to our universities). The value and contributions of immigrants to the U.S. do not need citation; the Chinese Americans shine in all disciplines. These monstrous discrimination actions will produce monstrous effects accelerating the U.S. decline.
 
The second monster is hard to describe its cause and effect. We practice capitalism and so are many other countries including China who is gingerly embracing capitalism. It is not capitalism being the monster in American democracy. It is the enormous amount of U.S. dollars controlled by a few that is the evil. First, our elections are controlled by money, the U.S. dollars. A presidential election requires a billion dollars or more. Whoever has the money will control the election. Whoever has the money can lobby the Congress to pass their preferred laws. Just look at the anti-China bills, the sponsors and supporters get money from anti-China organizations even foreign entities while the U.S. recognizes only one China and try to resolve differences with China. Why do we allow money monsters rather than our citizens to guide our policies? Many of our foreign wars can be traced to interests of the money monster rather than our citizens' wishes. Must we let the military-industry complex or giant oil companies decide our national policies such as Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya wars or Iran relation? Is China’s rise as a manufacturing giant supplying goods to American citizens at lower prices a threat to our citizens’ lives or money men's wealth? Or can waging a war benefit our citizens or our military weapon manufacturers? We have to recognize and reveal the hidden money monsters who are controlling our democracy and leading us to decline. Our scholars have long recognized that waging war is not a solution. We must deal with the root of our problems, that is the two monsters in American Democracy!




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To the Future Together - Beijing Winter Olympic

2/19/2022

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Dr. Wordman

The Olympic Games has roots in ancient time 776 B.C. The international Olympic Committee(IOC) was founded in 1894 with first Summer Olympics started in 1896. Figure skating was added in 1908 Summer Olympics and Ice Hockey were further added in 1920. The first Winter Olympics was held in 1924 with Summer Olympics in the same year continued every four years till 1992. Starting 1994, the Winter Olympics became two years apart from Summer Olympic also held every four years. Paralympic Games were added in 1948 Summer Olympics with first Summer Paralympics in 2008. and Winter Paralympics in 2010 Winter Olympics. From 2012 onward Paralympics were combined with Summer and Winter Olympics. Therefore, the 2022 Beijing Olympic is the Winter Olympics and Paralympics.
 
The world can recall that the Beijing 2008 Summer Olympics and Paralympics was an extravaganza event. It created not only many sports records but also many advances in its operation from organization, technology, entertainment to culture, despite of the world was in financial crisis. Hence, this year while the coronavirus still rampant, the world is looking forward to another success of the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics. Beijing is the only city with a record of holding both Summer and Winter Olympics with Paralympics. The world is under siege by the pandemic with quarantines, social distancing and travel bans for over two years, the Beijing Olympic is the only large world event of positive energy to lift the human spirit. (the world has seen a number of negative events including the storming of the American Capital Building of Congress) We are looking forward to seeing the positive energy from the Beijing Winter Olympics.
 
China, with her track record of a successful 2008 Summer Olympics, is setting herself up to challenge the nation to bring the world a successful Winter Olympics in 2022. However, not like northern American and northern European, China is not known for Winter sports which are generally luxurious sports for middle and upper-class citizens. From what the author has observed so far, it appears that the Chinese government has designed to use the Olympic opportunity not only just a prestige lifting world event but also an economy uplifting event with long term planning, meticulous execution and far reaching post-Olympic impact to China and the world. First, China seems destined to promote winter sports nationwide by investing many winter sports facilities throughout the nation (mountains and resorts for winter sports) and educating the coming generations (winter sports academies throughout the country). The author can picture that China will become the principal winter sports equipment and faculty manufacturer making winter sports affordable to ordinary citizens. This will create a tremendous economic opportunity for China spilling over to tourism and service industry. This plan is obviously in line with China’s goal of lifting her citizens to middle class and increasing service oriented domestic economy.
 
There are a number of promotional videos about the Beijing 2022 Olympic. First, a 350km per hour high speed rail was built from Beijing to the mountains that can transport athletes within 46 minutes. The AI train used is equipped not only with advanced 5G communication technology but also with on-board studio and news broadcasting facilities beaming sceneries and athletes interviews to the world about the Olympic from Feb 4 - 20. The author anticipates that this technology not only will raise the quality of Olympic reporting to the world in nearly real time but with rich information and entertainment value. No doubt, this technology can easily propagate to China’s tens of thousands of miles high speed trains promoting traveling, tourism and commerce. For readers’ info, there is a 24 hour TV daily coverage about the Beijing Winter Olympics available on YouTube, named To the Future Tohether (一起向未來). You sure will enjoy that news coverage since the U.S. journalism is biased against China.
 
Speaking about journalistic bias, one cannot help but notice that the U.S. has adopted an anti-China policy driven not by rational competitive analysis but by jealousy and desperation. Announcing diplomatic boycotting the Beijing 2022 Olympics is a shameful U.S. foreign policy. The U.S. is urging its Five Eye Alliance and other allies to practice diplomatic boycott against China, but the following was minimal and certainly not endorsing Pompeo’s Xinjiang genocide claim. So far, it appears that many world leaders including Russia, South Korea, Saudi Arabia, … and UN officials are attending the Beijing 2022 Olympics. Despite of the pandemic scare, as of a week ago the 2022 Winter Olympics has 91 countries and 2861 athletes participating compared to 92 nations and 2922 athletes in 2018 Winter Olympic. This record speaks volume about the world’s trust in China’s efficacy in managing pandemic and her ability in organizing world events. The pandemic prevented audience participation which is regrettable, but thank goodness, China is putting quite a bit of investment in media communication. Do watch the above YouTube links and China’s CGTN global tv.
 
“To the Future Together” is a very positive and timely slogan for the world. The Olympic spirit is much needed in our artificially competitive world. The U.S. certainly has the right to compete on the world stage and try to maintain her leadership, however, she must recognize Olympic Spirit both in Olympic Games and international relations. As a citizen, we must speak out openly when the government does something wrong. Politicizing Olympic Games is certainly a bad policy, it not only diminishes sportsmanship we used to teach our kids in school, but also hurts our athletes’ reputation in the international arena. Please do tell our politicians, congressman and government officials, the above message when we welcome our gold medal winning athletes back from Beijing.
 



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American Alliance Against Dishonest Journalism (AAADJ)

2/12/2022

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Dr. Wordman
 
The U.S. media industry has changed. It has grown with technology advances and has become dominating the world media. Under liberal capitalism, the U.S. media industry has transformed into a few conglomerates. The giant corporations have big clout over the media workers, the journalists and media creators. In the process of transformation, the U.S. media industry gained monopoly but lost independence. Before the conglomeration, the U.S. media used to have more confidence in reporting the truth, good or bad, more daring to report bad or inferior things in the world including that of the U.S. After the conglomeration, the media industry became consolidated and polarized, defensive about turfs geographically and politically. The monopolizing power of the media made tight linkage with financial and political powers. We see media divided in polarized camps losing objectivity. This is especially apparent in campaign and election reporting or election politics. This trend or transformation has degraded the U.S. media industry. Recently, it became more obvious as fake news reporting surfaced more often and became rampant and dishonest journalism sprouted and became troublesome, not only seen in elections but also in other areas such as the Corona virus reporting and foreign affairs news.
 
The citizens are aware of this media transformation, but beyond feeling disgusting we seem to have no way to influence the media to return to honest journalism. Since the media is highly tied to advertising and marketing business sectors, the forces pulling the media to honest journalism are so weak against the money driven media. That is why, campaign news and election reporting are dominated by paid media. Corona various and vaccine news are funded by pharmaceutical companies. We do have small forces such as Fact Check websites to expose fake news, but it is an unbalanced fight. The fake news simply overwhelms the checkers. To correct this phenomenon, we need to organize masses to police the media. We need a large number of people involved; the collective effort must be significant enough to impact media producers’ revenue source, that is, advertising, marketing merchandise and media products and revenue generating media events. The question confronting us is how citizens can be organized to accomplish the goal - Keep Journalism and media honest. In this article, we try to propose a method to do so.
 
Since the fake news problem has broadened from election politics to US-China relations today, as we have seen in the press media nearly daily. So many fake news reports about corona-virus and China, the biased reporting of Hong Kong unrest (in contrast to the Capitol Building Assault in Washington DC on January 6, 2021) and the fabricated stories about concentration camp, genocide and forced labor in Xinjiang have angered Chinese Americans because these dishonest journalism have created racial discrimination problems in our societies. This author will use the Chinese American population as an example to illustrate a methodology to fight against dishonest journalism. The method is simply to organize our citizens (Chinese Americans are used here as an example) to form a group to police the media. The group collectively will monitor the media, evaluate the fake news and dishonest journalism and publish the verdict to deter the journalists and media outlets from repeating fake news and dishonest journalism again.
 
We propose to organize a group, to be named, American Alliance Against Dishonest Journalism (AAADJ). The group will solicit members by collecting their emails for receiving potential fake news or dishonest reporting, casting their evaluation in terms of a vote (yes, no and abstain) and supporting a public announcement and distribution to expose the dishonest journalism so to deter its reccurrence and to discredit its reputation. The group (AAADJ) is potentially a large group of millions of people, but they are organized by a simple email List. Such a List will be used to communicate and conduct the evaluation, voting and public announcement functions. The List is described below and the author would like to receive applications for joining the List either as an individual or as an organization with multiple members, simply by providing a valid email and a pledge of $5 member fee which will be collected later after the AAADJ is officially organized and functional. The collected $5 membership fee will be principally used to pay for cost for placing announcements on paid media, if necessary, to expose dishonest journalism.
 
The List is An Email List
AAADJ (Drwordman@gmail.com) can be any elected or hired individual.
ADJ000000 (ifaywanli@gmail.com) the author applies to be the first member.
ADJ000001 individual email
ADJ000002 individual email
ADJ000003N (Group 3N, 1 to N members with organization name, US-China Forum, N=13+) Assuming some of the Forum members will join.
ADJ000004 individual email
..
ADJ000008 Individual email
ADJ000009P (Group 9P, 1 to P members with organization name, Prof. Wong Zoom, P=18)
ADJ000010 individual email
ADJ000011M (Group 11M, 1 to M members with organization name, CCC, Committee for Chinese Concerns, M=100+) hypothetical group for illustration purpose.
ADJ000012 individual email
.
ADJ000018L (Group 18L, 1 to L members with organization name, CAI, Chinese American Institute, L= 500+) hypothetical group for illustration purpose.
ADJ000019 Individual
ADJ000020 individual
ADJ000021K (Group 21K, 1 to K members with organization name, CGOP, Chinese GOP, K=8800+) hypothetical group for illustration purpose.
ADJ000022 individual email
..
ADJ000099J (Group 99J, 1 to J members with organization name, 1999 League, J=999+)
ADJ000100 individual email
.
ADJ001000H (Group 1000H, 1 to H members with organization name, QRC, QianRenCommittee, H=1000-) hypothetical group for illustration purpose.
.
ADJ999998G (Group 999998G, 1 to G members with Organization name, CDNC, Chinese Democratic National Consortium, G=28000+) hypothetical group for illustration purpose.
 
From the above List example, we can envision the AAADJ group may grow to millions of members. The List members can submit news or media item to the List for evaluation. The reply result is automatically tabulated. When the yes vote is greater than the no vote and the abstain vote, the item is considered dishonest journalism to be publicly announced. In the public announcement, three messages are always included: 1. Anyone can join as an AAADJ Member by sending a valid email to AAADJ (DrWordman@gmail.com). 2. Anyone can send in a media piece for AAADJ to evaluate. 3. AAADJ urges the U.N. to form a World Media Organization (WMO) to formerly deal with the fake news and dishonest journalism problems worldwide.
 
The author sincerely wishes to receive your support (your email) for joining this endeavor.
​
Ifay Chang. Ph.D., Inventor, Author, TV Game Show Host and Columnist (www.us-chinaforum.org) as well as serving as Trustee, Somers Central School District.
 

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