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19 February 2010



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Obama Meets Dalai Lama, Miffs China

Yesterday, President Obama had an hour-long meeting with the Dalai Lama, exiled leader of Chinese-occupied Tibet. The Chinese Communist Party's response was one of open anger, with unspecified sanctions threatened. The timing of the meeting was handled rather well by the State Department, held after Mr. Obama's visit to Beijing. Nevertheless, the meeting served no real purpose, the Dalai Lama is no real leader, and the Americans and Chinese have a relationship that is complicated enough without tertiary issues such as this.

White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said, "the president stated his strong support for the preservation of Tibet's unique religious, cultural and linguistic identity and the protection of human rights for Tibetans [in China]." Quite how the existence or non-existence of these unique identities affects America's national interests is elusive at best. Yes, human rights are important. And yes, the Chinese government is actively engaged in wiping that out because multi-culturalism isn't part of the racist government's worldview. The question is what can America do about it that is feasible given America's already stretched resources.

Had the Tibetan people a real political leader rather than a monk who has been ineffective in getting any sort of resistance going in Tibet, it might be worth America's while. The fact is the Dalai Lama is not a political-military-resistance leader. One is in no position to question his spiritual value to Tibet, nor the fact that he has come to embody Tibetan culture to many in the West. He is not, however, another Gandhi, let alone another Mandela, or Ho Chi Minh. When he departs this mortal coil, there will be very little left of a resistance movement.

The US-Chinese relationship has entered a very difficult stage. America is in a financial, economic and cultural mess. The economic restructuring ahead is going to hurt, and it will change the way the US operates permanently. At the same time, China is seriously overplaying its hand. It is a regional power still, not a global one. It is beginning to make that shift, but it will take a couple of decades yet. Meanwhile, its impoverished west has seen little of the wealth from the east. Moreover, its cultural preference for sons combined with a one-child policy resulted in decades of abortions of female fetuses and infanticide committed against baby girls. The result is a shortage of potential brides. Millions of young men with no hope of a family is a demographic time bomb that undermines the fabric of Chinese society.

This is a lot to digest, and it will require that each have a much better understanding of the other's interests if the two countries are to successfully resolve their interlocking problems. Tibet is not very high up on the list. One is quite sure that the Chinese have compassionate feelings for the "unique religious, cultural and linguistic identity" of the Apache in Arizona. They just don't choose to make an issue out of it.

© Copyright 2010 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Ubuntu Linux.

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