The Chinese Internet Imbroglio

Well it looks like China has relented and is now providing the Western media more or less unfettered access to the Internet during the run-up to the Beijing Olympics. As if it matters. I never had any problem accessing whatever I wanted to when I recently visited China, accept for CNN. The Chinese were pissed with CNN for the inane remarks of Jack Cafferty calling out China's leaders as thugs and hooligans, as if the renegades in Washington D.C. were any better. In fact our misbegotten "leaders" are light years ahead of the relatively benign leaders of the PRC in thugishness. Never mind the pernicious censorship that our authorities try to implement whenever they have the opportunity at military bases and other federal institutions. In point of fact, I don't think the Western media would be impeded by the Chinese limiting access to sites put up by Falun Gong or Tibetan dissidents. Chinese restrictions on Internet access are basically fits of pique and nothing more. As was mentioned on, of all places, CNN last night any technologically savvy Chinese denizen of the Web can easily make an end-run around whatever firewalls the authorities impose. The whole issue is just a smokescreen by the media to allow them to cast aspersions on what China has accomplished over the last 60 years, which will be on display for all to see beginning next week.