"It's a good example of how people on the left view China and its associated issues through 40 year old Cold War glasses that cast the US as the root of all evil of the world..."Michael Turton said that - in a blog post critical of one "Conn Hallinan" whose blatant PRC propaganda piece was published at the commie newsletter, Counterpunch. I like the tone Turton takes here, since it speaks to a central cleft in the heart of the Left; principled opposition to "capitalism" (i.e. the principle of free-exchange between individuals) on the one hand, and a less strident, pragmatic opposition to "capitalism" on the other (i.e. free exchange is acceptable under certain conditions derived from a collectivist calculus). In either position however, the State is the operant presupposition which
There are many choice quotes to be lopped off Hallinan's article, but the one Turton chooses is this:
"China is prickly about its home waters... but there is no evidence that it is expansionist."That is only true if one accepts the premise, lying between Hallinan's lines, that the waters of the South China Sea are not international waters, but are, as their name suggests, a territory of China. The most obvious problem with that is that the waters of the so-called South China Sea also wash up against the coastlines of other territories such as Vietnam, the Phillipines and Malaysia - not to mention of course, Taiwan.
Generally speaking, I largely agree with Turton's reading of the China-Taiwan geopolitical situation, but that isn't so much a compliment to him as the PRC's expansionist ambitions ought to be obvious to anybody who pays attention to events.
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