Press Releases With Chinese Characteristics

The Wall Street Journal takes note of goings-on in China:

President Obama’s climate leadership sure gets results fast. The very next day after the Environmental Protection Agency’s anticarbon broadside, China suddenly concluded it is on the wrong side of history and decided to limit its emissions too. Or so many liberal Americans are choosing to believe.

He Jiankun, a senior scientific adviser to the Chinese regime, told an academic conference in Beijing this week that China would adopt “an absolute cap” on carbon in its forthcoming five-year plan, the 13th since 1953. Reuters reported the comments as a political breakthrough ahead of the U.N. treaty gabfest later this year in Lima, Peru, and the report got America’s anticarbon Rockettes kicking.

Too bad Mr. He later advised Reuters that he was merely tendering “my personal view” and that “what I said does not represent the Chinese government.” He added to the New York Times that the cap is only under study and “I’m not a government official.” If Mr. He isn’t careful, he’ll wind up like the health, food and railway ministers executed for various Chinese scandals.

That’s just the latest in a series of official and semi-official pronouncements by the Chinese authorities on the subject of reducing emissions, none of which have been acted on to any great degree. Chinese investments in alternative energy are largely devoted to subsidies for export. There’s a laowei sucker born every minute. The Chinese also recently announced that they were de-emphasizing solar and wind in favor of hydroelectric and natural gas. That I believe.

Pay attention to what the Chinese do rather than what they say. The target audience for most statements is the gullible.

1 comment… add one
  • Guarneri Link

    Pretty cynical, Dave. Although, since Susan Rice didn’t make the assertion there is a chance it could be false. Me, I choose to believe. Now if you will excuse me I’m off to the new show that has hit town – Unicorn-palooza.

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