posted
I wasn't saying they should learn before, I was just mentioning my own chronology, and the fact that if it weren't for outside sources, I would have learned a "Rah-rah!" version of World War II that glossed over or omitted certain events of that war.
And I went to High School in a prep school in bleeding heart MA.
posted
Unforunate is all I have to say I was mistaken. However I still say things were better under Mao then under Chiang Kai Shek that I will hold onto.
Posts: 1567 | Registered: Oct 2004
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posted
Sid, I agree with Kwea, you're clueless when it comes to Mao. Things were bad under Chiang and the Nationalists, that's why the revolution had popular support. But Mao didn't improve things. Don't even mention The Great Leap Forward as a plus, without research.
quote:The death toll of Mao’s visionary land reforms, leaps forward, political purges, re-education programs and wayward cultural revolutions has “been exceeded only once,” says Mao biographer Philip Short, and that was “by all the dead in the Second World War.” Though the actual number of Mao's victims remains incalculable, the tally may exceed 60 million.
from Kwea's 3rd link.
Also, the Chinese girl who you know was likely indoctrinated in Maoist propaganda her whole life.
posted
And as for comparisons between Mao and Chiang...look at the standards of living, the freedoms, of Taiwanese, and Chinese people (though they both consider themselves Chinese), and ask yourself who was the better leader.
'Unfortunate'? Sixty million people died as a direct result of Mao's stupidity. I realize China is the land of epic population statistics in all areas, but that is a catastrophic, reprehensible fact.
Posts: 17164 | Registered: Jun 2001
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posted
Actually, I'd have to say that Mao was good for China at least in the sense that he banned the practice of foot-binding, which had effectively made chinese women physically inferior to men. On the other hand, he made all those women who had foot-bindings romove them, which was very cruel on his part.
The fact of the matter is, so-called "communist" nations have always arisen to power with empty promises on the part of would be totalitarians.
Furthermore, as was said before, it is easy to judge the past by the present's standards. The people in China honestly did think that they'd be better off under Mao Zedong. Mao Zedong was able to do what he did by transforming communism into a "truth" or religious fervor.
Was China better off post 49 under Mao? Well the fact of the matter is there was no one else ruling China during that time and under those circumstances, so any speculation as to which was better, more humane, or otherwise is a totally fruitless endeavor. What happened, happened and China is now under an Totalitarian regime (by my estimation).
Lastly, nobody here is clueless (or maybe everyone is) and Mao was not stupid, it takes a smart man to con an entire people (much less the entire world: Tianamen Square is currently our word against the Chinese, despite the documentation of the event.)
Posts: 681 | Registered: Feb 2004
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quote:The comparison to activist judges is silly. There are hundreds of examples of judges who rule based on their own opinion rather than constitutionality. I'm still waiting for somebody to point out where California's proposition 187 violatd the constitution, yet it was overturned by ONE 9th circuit extremely liberal activist judge, and the people of California have no recourse.
NO recourse? Really? Seems odd given that there's both a State Supreme Court, a Federal Supreme Court, and a legislature (which could choose, of course, to redraft the bill to meet whatever Constitutional test it fails should the attempt to reverse the Circuit Judge's opinion fail.)
Posts: 22497 | Registered: Sep 2000
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posted
1) The Kuomintang was politically-structured based on their admiration for Stalinist cadres. 2) The Kuomintang made second-class citizens of Taiwanese on their own island, confiscating land and other assets to award to the thieves who followed the Nationalists from the mainland. 3) Taiwan was heavily subsidized by the US government -- both directly through the US "military umbrella", grants, and inexpensive loans; and indirectly through most favored nation status in trade and technology transfer -- as an irritant to the Mainland even after Nixon announced the US committment to the OneChinaPolicy. 4) Most of the true improvements in Taiwan governance and economics occurred after the OneChinaPolicy stripped the Kuomintang/Nationalists of their seat on the UN Security Council and awarded it to China, and otherwise increasingly deprived Taiwan of its status as an equal among nations.
Pure speculation of course, but based on the level of preWWII and WWII corruption as well as the Kuomintang's handling of Taiwan until the "One China Policy", presentday China would be far behind India both economicly and socially if the Kuomintang had been allowed to remain in power. Certainly far far less of a global power than India; with a virtual certainty that India would have seized the Tibetan Plateau.
Not saying that Maoism -- the personality cult which launched the GreatLeapForward and the CulturalRevolution -- wasn't a disaster. Am saying that the Kuomintang would have been worse.
quote:I'm still waiting for somebody to point out where California's proposition 187 violatd the constitution, yet it was overturned by ONE 9th circuit extremely liberal activist judge, and the people of California have no recourse.
No one will accuse me of supporting judicial overreach, but this statement is just flat out wrong. First of all, Gov. Davis decided not to appeal the lower court decision. Had he done so, at least 12, and probably 20-something, judges would have reviewed it at some point.
Second, the decision itself provides reasons why the law was unconstitutional. "Field preemption" has a long-standing judicial history, and is necessary in a federal system. Congress could have passed a law stating, "Nothing in the act known as the PRA shall preempt the states from making more stringent restrictions on benefits to illegal aliens." Had the President signed it, the Prop would have passed the preemption test.
The remainder of the Constitutional issues were not ruled on, because this issue was decisive.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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posted
Yay! I'm not alone. I'm pretty sure that was my original point, correct me if I'm wrong was that Mao was better for China then Chiang Kai Shek. Not nessasarily that China is a perfect workers utopia under Mao which I'm certain I did not say.
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posted
You can't help to feel stong for Mao if you start reading in into the history of the Chinese civil war. It's a side effect of mine of when reading something I imagine what it would be like to be near these figures in histery... erm.., hard to explain.
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posted
Like umm... I not nessasasrily Pro Mao, I just think he did many good things for China and also many mistakes, but one has to consider everything including the motivations before making a judgement argh! I can't explain it.
Posts: 1567 | Registered: Oct 2004
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posted
>> Also, I find it interestng how no one seems to be refuting my points of the things that happened post 1949.
There is no point in disputing something that is indisputable. In fact, I was not commenting at all on the Shek vs. Mao debate. My point, following the reasonable train of logic of how well is China doing today, with full advantage of hindsight. My points were on what China evolved into. I believe that today the Chinese have a strange, paradoxical, unstable, and extremely dangerous Communist-Capitalist hybrid. They would have been far better off had the Tiananmen Square events succeeded in overthrowing the government. I watched those events unfold daily while I was a grad student--sitting in the student union with between one and three Beijing citizens who happened to be my fellow students. My opinion echoes what theirs were.
Even on your point, I'm more inclined to listen to the well educated 40-year old Chinese engineer with whom I work than an 18-year old. I'll ask him about this next time I have the chance. He was, however, very clear about how today, even speaking negatively about the government can cause people to disappear for a very long time.
Between the choices of Mao and Shek, the better choice might well have been Mao. (The point that Japan would have given back the coast as part of unconditional surrender not withstanding.) However, we have no idea whether a China under Shek might have taken the path of post-war Japan, becoming a world superpower (and not only militarily) far earlier than under Mao, or if they would have devolved into further chaos, civil war, or some kind of fascist dictatorship.
posted
Why would Gray Davis appeal a decision against prop 187? He was against prop 187. In any case, I wouldn't put an ounce of trust in anything off the ACLU web site. These are the guys who support NAMBLA, remember.
Posts: 90 | Registered: May 2005
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quote: In any case, I wouldn't put an ounce of trust in anything off the ACLU web site. These are the guys who support NAMBLA, remember.
Hiroshima, go find the opinion and refute it then. This is a very basic concept of constitutional law: the Supremacy clause gives federal statutes made pursuant to the constitution precedence over state statutes, constitutions, or referenda. The federal government has explicit power to regulate immigration. The federal government passed a law intended to occupy the field. States lack the power to enact laws contrary to the federal law.
At least pretend to understand the argument before declaring there's no basis for it. If I have to choose between the ACLU saying X with a series of legal reasoning and you sayin not X with no backup whatsoever, why on earth would I pick you?
quote:Why would Gray Davis appeal a decision against prop 187? He was against prop 187.
The people of CA elected Gray Davis. The decision to appeal was in his power. He chose not to. Further, this decision could be changed by act of Congress, although we don't know if the due process and equal protection arguments would succeed or not.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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posted
*rolls eyes* The ACLU has rabidly defended people on all sorts of issues, including the KKK and NAMBLA, yes, but also thousands of other groups and individuals, and always because their organization sees a serious rights violation issue. To steal from a particularly disgusting man who soundly protected his own rights to be disgusting, if the worst among us have their rights protected, the rest of us do.
You could look at the decision itself, which does a very nice job of pointing out how blatantly unconstitutional the prop was, and I'd have thought you'd have looked at it before denouncing how it was impossible to see a way it could be unconstitutional.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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quote: In any case, I wouldn't put an ounce of trust in anything off the ACLU web site. These are the guys who support NAMBLA, remember.
Hiroshima, go find the opinion and refute it then. This is a very basic concept of constitutional law: the Supremacy clause gives federal statutes made pursuant to the constitution precedence over state statutes, constitutions, or referenda. The federal government has explicit power to regulate immigration. The federal government passed a law intended to occupy the field. States lack the power to enact laws contrary to the federal law.
At least pretend to understand the argument before declaring there's no basis for it. If I have to choose between the ACLU saying X with a series of legal reasoning and you sayin not X with no backup whatsoever, why on earth would I pick you?
quote:Why would Gray Davis appeal a decision against prop 187? He was against prop 187.
The people of CA elected Gray Davis. The decision to appeal was in his power. He chose not to. Further, this decision could be changed by act of Congress, although we don't know if the due process and equal protection arguments would succeed or not.
They also booted him.
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posted
So you have no reason why the Supremacy Clause doesn't apply to this law?
You said you were waiting for someone to point out where it violated the Constitution. Several people did.
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posted
Look, I happen to disagree with the entire premise that the states cannot enforce what the federal government refuses to enforce. Nowhere in the constitution does it say that a state law cannot be more strict than federal law.
There are many other instances where state law is more strict than federal law (highway speeds, for instance). Why haven't those laws been struck down as unconstitutional? Where in that link is the actual TEXT of the proposition?
I lived in California in 1994. The anti-187 people were extremely desperate. I received phone calls telling me that passing 187 would endanger the lives of police officers by publishing their home addresses. There is no such text in the proposition. The 9th circuit is very creative in interpreting the constitution. I recall some politicians at the time publicly declaring that the proposition would overturned by whatever means necessary. Teh 9th circuit divines its own agenda into "the spirit of the letter," rather than the words on the paper. I give this ruling zero credence. This ruling was based on a law NOT in the U.S. constitution, and supported by one in the California constitution--which I'm sure they looked very very hard to find. This underscores my point, the judges are activists.
Feel free to post any rebuttals, but I will no longer participate in this sidebar.
Federal laws regarding highway speed limits specifically allow the states to set stricter standards. Furthermore, states aren't even actually *required* to follow the federal speed limit laws, they just have to if they want the highway *dollars*.
And you have read this part of the Constitution, I'd hope:
quote:This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.
If Congress makes a law in an area they constitutionally can saying "this is the way things are", that's the way things are. That is what "the supreme law of the land" and "any Thing in the . . . Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding" means.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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posted
"American textbooks discuss World War II as if a Patton, Le May, or Nimitz did not exist, as if the war was essentially the Japanese internment and Hiroshima"
That is for the most part true...All we learned about the Japanese in our coverage of WWII was that we wrongly imprisoned them in internment camps and later dropped 2 atomic bombs on their country, we didn't really even learn that Japan was one of the most rutheless, bloodthirsty countries of WWII.
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I know I said I wouldn't respond...but I am not a lawyer, and many people will be able to out-lawyer me, just like most lawyers can't do math.
>>If Congress makes a law in an area they constitutionally can saying "this is the way things are", that's the way things are...
Herein lies the problem. I am looking at this from a founding fathers point of view. A sad side-effect from the Civil War was the complete destruction of the concept of the intended United States, with states rights being the main victim.
Over and out.
Posts: 90 | Registered: May 2005
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posted
Did you even read the clause quite clearly stated in the Constitution? Its not equivocating. The Constitution is the law of the land. The statement of mine you quote is not some modern thing, its been in there from the beginning, I merely restated an exceptionally clear section of the Constitution. Try reading the original document.
As for the whole "founding fathers point of view" shtick, the founding fathers themselves debated the whole voluntary union vs leaving only with consent of the whole (or violent revolution) thing. This wasn't something that all the founding fathers thought one way on which then got usurped. While at the Constitutional convention an explicit decision was put off, the people in favor of it being a leaving only with consent of the whole (or violent revolution) thing won out.
Even a government founded on the ideal of revolution against injustice (not that the British were actually all that harsh, we'd condemn people rebelling for the same reasons as terrorists most likely nowadays) must assert its own sovereignty or it fails to be a government.
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posted
Mao is responsible for some 50M deaths, mostly from a planned famine but also from mass executions. It's hard to see how he could have been worse.
Posts: 1877 | Registered: Apr 2005
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posted
Last I checked, there is no national speed limit. When there was one (instituted during the Energy Crisis of the 1970's) it was a MAXIMUM. That's how it was written.
Bad example if you're looking for states being more restrictive than Federal law. The law didn't set a minimum at the Federal level, so there's really no comparison.
I suppose if a state had tried to set a speed limit of zero on an interstate road (effectively closing a Federal Highway) there would've been a firestorm of protest and some kind of official reaction from Washington.
It is also worth pointing out that most state law has provisions for assigning the responsibility to determine speed limits to an entity like "the Department of Transportation" or the secretary thereof and the legislature usually only sets the maximum speed limit.
Posts: 22497 | Registered: Sep 2000
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posted
The famines weren't "planned" to happen. It's sad but you have to understand that Mao believed that the popular masses are the only true revolutionary tool and that it was up to them to bring about socialism. The main problems with the GLF and the TGPCR was that they were so disorganized and badly planned that bad harvests and skewed educational and industrial plannign resulted.
However, TGLF massivly improved China's heavy industry and pretty much laid the gorund work for rational industrial and agricultural planning.
As for Tienamen Square sad that it failed since quite possibly it would've set the stage for a more democratic socialist government that could've quite well made Socialism work past the dictatorship stage and I doubt it would've broken up as Russia did since I doubt anyone in China would see it as acceptable for Tibet and Siking to break away. Though in way I feel more secure since it means there's a super power that can keep things balanced with America.
Posts: 1567 | Registered: Oct 2004
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posted
Just so everyone knows, I changed my username to Spaceman because it occured to me that some people might be offended by the name Hiroshima (even though it was from the band, not the city).
I'm not trying to duck my incorrect, lame and stupid opinions, by which I still stand.
posted
All good man, thanks for letting us know...not because I thought your opinions were (or weren't) stupid, but because it was the cool thing to do, letting us know.
As far as out-lawyering you, well, you were stating a definite opinion about the legality and constitutionality of a proposition, so to be honest you kinda asked for that.
The ruling was NOT based on "legal activism" whatever that means....it was based on a well defined legal principle that is stated clearly (with tons of presidents) in the very Constitution. You can agree or disagree with the decision, or course, but when you claimed it was based on anything BUT legal jurisprudence you made a claim that was easy to refute.
posted
My junior high and high school history classes taught me very little about WWII because it's always toward the end of the book and we never get there before the school year ends.
posted
Also, Hiro/Spaceman, I just thought I'd point out that your referring to Chiang Kai Shek as "Shek" is incorrect. In Chinese names, the family name comes first, so Chiang would be the correct way to refer to the surname, just as Mao is the correct way to refer to the surname of Mao Tse Tung.
quote:Originally posted by Kwea: (with tons of presidents) Kwea
My turn...I think you want precedents. Let's drop this legality thing and get back to the topic. We've strayed way too far.
Posts: 115 | Registered: May 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Annie: Also, Hiro/Spaceman, I just thought I'd point out that your referring to Chiang Kai Shek as "Shek" is incorrect. In Chinese names, the family name comes first, so Chiang would be the correct way to refer to the surname, just as Mao is the correct way to refer to the surname of Mao Tse Tung.
How do you know I wasn't close buddies with him? Actually, I know that and I just screwed up because I was in a hurry.
By the way, I spoke with my engineer friend today, he quite disagrees with Sid.
Posts: 115 | Registered: May 2005
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Praising Communist China as being "better" than any other brutal regime that it replaced can only come from ignoring a major portion of that regime's own brutality. If you can explain Tiananmen Square to me as anything but an act of the utmost stupidity and brutality, I'd like to hear it.
Posts: 22497 | Registered: Sep 2000
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posted
There was a short blurb in the paper about a middle school history textbook jointly written by scholars, teachers and historians of China, Japan and South Korea published this month.news link I couldn't find a more recent link.
I wonder, will a history book written by a huge commitee work? This short essay "The Problem with History" by Donald Granberry claims multiple authors from different countries is the only way overcome subjectivity and nationalism problems in history, but I wonder.
You might think modern media would overcome some of these problems of subjectivity, with video clips, live TV etc...but it doesn't. Two of the most massively covered events in the past 50 years, 9/11 and the Kennedy assasination, have only led to countless conspiracy theories about what REALLY happened.
Video has to be put in context, and whoever does the analysis has lots of power to manipulate.
Posts: 6316 | Registered: Jun 2003
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posted
editing helps too. The Terry Schiavo case was plagued with experts rendering opinions based on edited videos given to them by one side or the other.
Posts: 22497 | Registered: Sep 2000
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posted
Editing has even more power than analysis. I took that for granted but should have stated it, Bob. Posts: 6316 | Registered: Jun 2003
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That FDR video and book are exactly the kind of thing people are going nuts about when they talk about revisionist history in the US. That some people might watch/read that before understanding the "canon" of WWII.
And it proves my point, I think, about how information becoming declassified in recent years has fueled not revisionist history, but an explosion of both interest and fleshing out of details.
I think people owe it to themselves to study everything, not just the newly uncovered declassified stuff.
If anything begs for a context in which to place it and define it, it is war.
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posted
No victor in any war is ever as innocent and benevolent as they wish to be portrayed.
That being said, I think what is being called revisionist is not the facts that have come to light but thier portrayal, and the selectivity of facts used. There is a pervasive attitude by a defined group to vilify the US in all that they do and they will find the facts to prove it.
I am not defending the fire bombing of Dresden, or the JapaneseAmerican internment and other atrocites committed in a spirit of what might have been revenge and often profiteering. However I believe the necessity of US involvement in the war is a given.
The very threat of US invasion diverted the troops that allowed the USSR to begin thier invasion of what became thier sattelite states. They kept as thier own every inch of land they occupied. If we were not involved, with both industrial bombing, and in the North of Africa Hitler may have been able to crack the defences of Russia the next summer and obtain every supply they needed to become unstoppable. If by what I would consider a miracle, Russia prevailed, Does anyone believe that when they reached Berlin they would have stopped there? I don't believe that the war after Russian occupation of all of Europe would have been cold and I also don't believe we would have been the victors.
Yes many US military and political leaders did things that in retrospect seem atrocious and although I do not excuse it, I believe that they often made the best dicision they could make based upon who they were and what thier world view was.
It is important to remember that as flawed as thier actions and decisions were, they are what has sustained the freedom we have to be debating thier actions. Because under Der Dritte Riech or the USSR we wouldn not have these freedoms, and I don't think it is propoganda or exaggeration to say that those were potential outcomes of the Second World War.
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