China has changed so much in 31 years, Pelosi’s view not one iota
- From her 1991 protest stunt in Tiananmen Square to her latest trip to Taiwan, the US House speaker has maintained the same moralistic stance
- Either she has been right about China from day one or it’s self-serving, wilful blindness that is highly useful in politics
By any measure, 31 years is a long time. In politics, that’s longer than eternity. If your view of something or someone hasn’t changed for so long, either you are infallible or you are just wilfully blind.
In business, you would have lost so much money you would have been out of a job a long time ago.
In politics, though, if you had latched onto the right target, you might be admired for being “principled” and even “courageous” - well, at least in America.
And that’s Nancy Pelosi, the United States Speaker of the House of Representatives. Those 31 years have seen her eternally unchanging view of China.
If goading Beijing with Taiwan drama is the US’ goal, leave Asean out of it
During that time, China has of course changed in the most awesome and unprecedented way in the annals of human history.
But to Pelosi, China has stayed the same, at its core, in all the most crucial fundamentals. You have to ask, though: if she is right, why bother? China clearly can’t change.
I apologise for coming back to Nancy repeatedly in this space. But her morally vacuous and politically dangerous trip to Taiwan is just too much to bear.
What’s worse is the sanctimony and halo that her supporters and propagandists put up for their heroine back home.
With Pelosi’s Taiwan trip, the US betrays the one-China principle
In 1991, as she has tirelessly reminded us, Pelosi and two other junior House members unfurled a banner in Tiananmen Square to protest against the crackdown.
That year, China’s GDP per capita or output per person was US$333, according to the World Bank. Today, it’s around US$12,500.
Between 1990 and 2015, 746 million Chinese citizens were lifted out of poverty, according to Unicef. Few young Chinese went to university back in 1991. Today, the country has the world’s largest higher education system with 240 million college graduates.
To be sure, those universities and colleges are not Harvard or Oxbridge, but still. Chinese today enjoy much personal freedom at home and to travel, study and live abroad, unlike the situation in 1991.
For one thing, the average family in a big city has money to spend on holidays, while it didn’t three decades ago. OK, Covid restrictions! You got me there.
However, it’s still true ordinary Chinese would get into trouble if they shout “down with the Communist Party” in Tiananmen Square today as they would have back in 1991 or 1949.
In that respect, Pelosi is right. Keep it up, ol’ girl!
