Archive for February, 2009

Letters From Home: Update

Saturday, February 28th, 2009

Couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy:

The mayor of a small Southern California city says he will resign after being criticized for sharing an e-mail picture depicting the White House lawn planted with watermelons under the title "No Easter egg hunt this year."

Los Alamitos Mayor Dean Grose issued a statement Thursday saying he is sorry and will step down as mayor at Monday’s City Council meeting.

Grose came under fire for sending the picture to what he called "a small group of friends." One of the recipients, a local businesswoman and city volunteer, publicly scolded the mayor for his actions.

If you have no idea why I am writing this post, see my previous diatribe here.

Critics Go After Another Old China Hand

Friday, February 27th, 2009

One of the perennial issues that gets thrown around in the U.S. foreign policy community regards ambassadorial posts and the value of "career" State Department folks. I have to admit that I’m on the side of the career guys, particularly after the debacle that was the Bush foreign policy and its complete disregard/respect for actual experience in the field.

More than most, long-time expats know what it’s worth to be in country for a long time or to have regular exposure to certain issues. Political guys, whose value rests with the ability to raise cash and stick to a certain ideology, well — that don’t cut it when foreign crises erupt. The best example of this was Iraq and the 20-something conservative intern-ish appointees that the Bush administration put in charge of the occupation in 2003/4. Absolutely horrendous.

The post of head of the National Intelligence Council is a case in point. The name of Chas Freeman has been floated out there as a possible pick, and the idea immediately drew fire from folks who think that he is too close to the Saudis and too sympathetic to Bejiing. Knowing that these criticisms come from the Neocons and the pro-Israel lobby, my natural inclination is to go in the opposite direction.

So I checked out Freeman’s bio to see where he comes from. Here’s a sample:

  • Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs from 1993-94
  • U. S. Ambassador to Saudi Arabia (during operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm)
  • Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs during the historic U.S. mediation of Namibian independence from South Africa and Cuban troop withdrawal from Angola
  • Deputy Chief of Mission and Chargé d’Affaires in the American embassies at both Bangkok (1984-1986) and Beijing (1981-1984)
  • Director for Chinese Affairs at the U.S. Department of State from 1979-1981
  • Principal American interpreter during the late President Nixon’s path-breaking visit to China in 1972

Here are his academic credentials:

Ambassador Freeman earned a certificate in Latin American studies from the National Autonomous University of Mexico, certificates in both the national and Taiwan dialects of Chinese from the former Foreign Service Institute field school in Taiwan, a BA from Yale University and a JD from the Harvard Law School.

Look, I’m not trying to be a cheerleader for this guy. But come on, I don’t see how you can go after someone with these credentials, particularly when we’ve had such losers in the U.S. government for the past eight years. I think we’ve been fortunate here in China to have a very qualified ambassador, who actually knows the country and speaks the language (yes, and I admit, a foreign lawyer), but there are a lot of horror stories around the globe about other Bush appointees that have not made the US of A so proud.

This guy has a very solid record. The critics have been hitting his ties to the Saudis. Fair enough, but the guy was ambassador there; I kind of expect he would have those ties and even benefit from them at some point. Sure, it looks bad that the outfit he was working for back in 2001 was consulting on Middle East deals that include the Bin Laden family, but unless you are looking to score cheap political points, you gotta admit that everyone was doing business with the Bin Laden family in that part of the world, the black sheep of the family notwithstanding.

Freeman’s stance on Israel has also been brought up. This quote from a 2005 speech is held out as controversial:

As long as the United States continues unconditionally to provide the subsidies and political protection that make the Israeli occupation and the high-handed and self-defeating policies it engenders possible, there is little, if any, reason to hope that anything resembling the former peace process can be resurrected. Israeli occupation and settlement of Arab lands is inherently violent.

You know, only AIPAC would consider that controversial. I would call it common sense, if not plain fact.

Finally, Freeman did make some fairly outspoken comments about China’s policy decisions in 1989:

"The truly unforgivable mistake of the Chinese authorities," he wrote in 2006, "was the failure to intervene on a timely basis to nip the demonstrations in the bud."

Indeed, continued Mr. Freeman, "I do not believe it is acceptable for any country to allow the heart of its national capital to be occupied by dissidents intent on disrupting the normal functions of government, however appealing to foreigners their propaganda may be."

Apparently this was in a moderated chat room or something, so this was not some formal policy pronouncement or anything. I know people have strong opinions about this topic, and Freeman’s comments do come across in the worst cold-hearted realist way imaginable. On the other hand, I can’t completely disagree with what he said either, and I would definitely not cross him off the list of appointees just because of that statement (although I might want to know a bit more about what he meant).

I’m getting more than a little tired at the potshots being taken at well-qualified professionals these days. If you’ve had a long career, and particularly if you are a consultant or a lawyer, there is always going to be some client or some deal you worked on that can be dredged up (I’m thinking as much of Gary Locke here as I am of Freeman). As for controversial statements, keep in mind that these are being pushed by very opinionated folks with very narrow policy axes to grind.

No Job? Stay in School

Friday, February 27th, 2009

Not a new concept. I believe that the poor job market in the early 90s spurred me on to law school, in fact.

Lots of unemployed kids here in China. The government knows this is a problem, understands that this is a very vocal group of people, and seems to be aware of the need for action.

In addition to "normal" policies designed to push economic growth, Beijing is working on ways to keep the kids busy:

The government has taken notice. It has offered seed money for recent graduates to start their own businesses, arranged government funded internships, and expanded educational loans for further study. But this will not be enough. Education officials have convened emergency meetings just last week with university leaders, telling them in no indirect terms that they are to expand enrollment immediately. The government is trying to temporarily expand the universities across the country so that they can a) absorb more high school students that might otherwise search for nonexistent work and b) keep more college graduates in universities for graduate study and thus off the job market.

The first rationale stems from the government’s decision to enlarge the size of the high schools feeding into colleges but not the spots awaiting high school graduates in universities. As a result, college admissions remains a serious bottleneck in educational advancement. Not wanting potential drop-outs and college rejects to add pressure to the already dreary job market, the Education Bureau has pushed for a temporary "surge" of enrollment to soak up this group.

The second rationale results from the simple fact that with the unemployment rate rising and 20 million migrants out of work, the government can’t afford to have recent college graduates crowding the labor market. As a result, the leadership is requiring national universities to dramatically expand their graduate school enrollment.

All in all, the government plans to expand college admissions by 50,000 across the country.

Seems like 50,000 in a country like China is quite a small number, but I suppose it is significant. From the flood of emails I’ve been getting these days from hopeful kids looking for an internship (at the law firm, not China Hearsay), the numbers are scary.

As with every other recession, we are going to see a significant number of folks (here and globally) that have gone back to school for that additional degree. Good for the grad schools, I guess. It also means that as the job market improves (in 2010?), there will be some very well-qualified, and now well educated, grads on the market. Tough competition.