Is China really the country we wish to sell our land to?
China dissident wins Nobel Peace prize
China has condemned the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to a jailed dissident as obscene, saying that it went against the aims of the award and would harm the country's relations with Norway.
Pro-democracy activist Liu Xiaobo won the Nobel Peace Prize for decades of non-violent struggle for human rights, an award that Beijing had anticipated and bitterly criticised.
Is this really the country we want to sell our land to? A country that fights Nobel peace awards from being handed out to peaceful dissidents against their totalitarian regime? A country that empowers their companies with 0% interest loans? A country that won't allow foreigners purchase land in their country?
One of the arguments thrown up by liars like Cathy Odgers is that criticism of China purchasing our farm land is racist. Billshit, I am as against selling our land to any overseas owners. I say we allow overseas powers to lease land in NZ, but not buy it out right.
Writing legitimate concerns about foreign ownership off as racist by liars like Cathy Odgers is simply lazy, and as the save our farms people point out...
Land-sale lobbyist rejects racism tag
Remuera property developer John McKearney - the man behind the Save Our Farms group opposing land sales to foreigners - says he is no racist and welcomes overseas buyers prepared to move here and become New Zealanders.
...beyond wider issues of foreign ownership I come back to my original point, do we really want to sell our land to a country that denies our ability to buy their land, artificially props up their companies with 0% finance and rages against Nobel peace price winners?
posted by Bomber @ 9:22 am
15 comments
15 Comments:
Hi Bomber
I blogged on this (and the Paul Henry debacle) yesterday at Red Alert.
http://blog.labour.org.nz/index.php/2010/10/09/kiwiblog-machinations/
where I said there’s a clear difference between racist, offensive remarks and attitudes expressed by errant TV presenters which make many people feel uncomfortable and sickened, and deeply held views by many NZers that it is important to have economic sovereignty over their own land and strategic assets.
It seems to me that John Key is (as usual) trying to have a bob each way. Using the racist card to argue for more investment by foreign interests in our land and strategic assets, while refusing to condemn outwardly racist remarks by Henry because he might alienate redneck NZ.
"A country that won't allow foreigners purchase land in their country?"
This is not a fact. Foreigners are indeed limited - they can only purchase one property per person - but they can buy land in China.
Obviously this doesn't make your argument much weaker but it's best to keep one's assertions factual, innit?
Nobody can buy land in China -they lease it. I think that China has got a way to go before it overtakes US human rights abuses. Mind you the US has had a a couple of hundred years head start.
China's preference is in leasing land for production overseas. It is not interested in rent farming but producing food. The outfit that wants to buy Crafar farms is a private company owned by Chinese capitalists operating out of Hong Kong.
Bernard Hicky wrote a good piece on foreign ownership.
Foreign ownership is really irrelevant when farmland has been mortgaged to the hilt with FOREIGN money - they own it anyway. They have the right to accelerate the debt and demand immediate repayment if they want.
I suppose the nuance that escapes Bomber and Tim after insulting and denigating Hubbard and SCF was that it was one of the only NZ financial institutions that was backing NZ farmers by loaning them money.
Happy now?
My problem is with absentee landlords of any persuasion. Not being part of the community and out of touch with our norms, standards and aspirations. Yes I know that there are a few NZ farmers that are not in touch with these things but we can be socil presure to bear on them. It is difficult to do with a international company HQ in HK or NY.
From my faint memories of 5th form history wasn't one of the big issues in 19th C NZ the ownership of larges parts of NZ by absentee Brit landlords. Didn't Sir J Vogel pass legislation to break them up for small(er) lots for local farmers.
cheers Doug
Tell me Hungry Bear, how many so called political prisoners are there in China today? The actual amount is a tiny tiny tiny tiny proportion of the population as a whole.
On a another note, one has far more chance of being locked up in the USA for a misdemenour than China -the US incarceration rate is about 6 times that of China’s!
Back to the first point. Did you know there are academics in Europe now -locked up in prison for several years, just because they question the veracity of just a little part of the official Holocaust account?
To outsiders that know nothing of European history that would be considered completely outrageous (perhaps many Europeans also consider it outrageous – but nevertheless they have those laws and most Europeans care little about it). But if one understood the historical context and the current circumstances of those laws, then there is justification for them (these are offense caused to the survivors, and the use of revisionist beliefs to promote fascism and neo-naziism).
In Germany one is not even allowed the raised arm salute without risking imprisonment.
In Thailand you insult the king, you go to jail (that is after you have already had the shit beaten out of you).
In the UK, Australia, Canada, and New Zealand one can risk imprisonment for defacing the image of the Queen on a banknote (although never enforced).
Liu Xiaobo, for one suggests that China should roll over and accept imperialist rule.
Given China’s suffering under Western and Japanese imperialists for up to a century, the Chinese are completely within their rights to regard this as completely offensive to national dignity and an insult to the nation. Liu Xiaobo deserves his sentence, in the same way that Holocaust deniers in Europe deserve theirs.
One of the arguments thrown up by liars like Cathy Odgers is that criticism of China purchasing our farm land is racist.
I don't think she quite said that.
Opposing foreign land sales in itself is not racist.
But many who do oppose foreign land sales - especially to the Chinese are racist.
By the way - where is the outrage over the sale last week of a dairy farm to Harvard University?
Honestly speaking NZrs really would not give a shit about selling to America. They would to China, or any other non-white country.
In any case the Nobel peace prize is a complete and utter joke. FFS they gave it to that windbag, Obama, last year, and now to this self serving attention seeker Liu Xiaobo.
Neither of these two jackasses have done anything to further peace - either domestic or world.
In fact if China swallowed the presecriptions of Liu Xiaobo, the place would become decidedly unpeaceful, with likely chaos, disruption, ---in short a place like those third world 'democratic' paradises of India, South Africa, and the Phillipines.
You're right Wayne, these people who disagree with the ruling party/class of the day should keep their mouths shut lest they disturb the peace. We can't have these peasants voicing their opinions now can we?
And Wayne comes in, right on cue. Espousing how great life in NZ is in China would land you a nice cell next to Liu Xiaobao.
Oh Freedom!
I must say that although 99.99% of what comes out of Wayne is absolute rubbish, he's right about the Harvard University thing.
I remember thinking myself that it seemed a bit "off" that it was perfectly fine for Americans to purchase the dairy farm for millions, but if it was the Chinese a huge stink would have been kicked up in the media.
We can't have these peasants voicing their opinions now can we?
The fact is the government is bringing hundreds and millions of peasants out of poverty and wants to urbanise more and more of them.
It is this very poverty reduction which would be put at risk if there was so called 'democracy.'
Liu Xiaobo is one of these Chinese 'intellectuals' who are typically privilged and up themselves. He is not a peasant. He cares not for the millions of people still under the poverty line - but is interested only in his own selfish right to subvert the system.
"It is this very poverty reduction which would be put at risk if there was so called 'democracy.'"
Like I said, 99.99% of what comes out of Wayne is utter rubbish; which he has just proved.
Cue Wayne spouting loads of bullshit about imperialism and how Europe and USA are far worse, so the Chinese should be happy with what they have.
And I should point out Wayne, that your outbursts have become quite a source of humour for me, so thanks for that at least!
Tell me Hungry Bear, how many so called political prisoners are there in China today? Cue Wayne spouting loads of bullshit about imperialism and how Europe and USA are far worse, 7000 of Britain's 85,000 prison population are veterans, from the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts.All this comes as the monarch will oversee a twenty percent cut in the defence budget and say nothing as is their wont.About 20,000 former servicemen suffering from combat stress are doing community service or on probation as a result of crimes related to drink, drugs and domestic violence...and problems facing veterans with budget cuts includes housing, family support, medical care, counselling and financial advice?
Go figure!
China’s system is good at saving lives. India’s ‘full democracy’ is not. China consistently outperforms fully ‘democratic’ India on life expectancy:
http://tinyurl.com/2evkmz6
China’s system is good at reducing poverty. India’s ‘full democracy’ is not:
“China is also praised for cutting the number of hungry by 58 million in 10 years through strong state support for smallholder farmers.
But the report criticises economically liberal India where, it says, 30 million people have been added to the ranks of the hungry since the mid-1990s and 46% of children are underweight.
It says hunger exists in India not because there is insufficient food, but because people cannot access it, and that the exploitation of natural resources has led to ‘horrific displacements’ of people, pushing many into poverty.
When people are already on the brink of starvation this is simply unacceptable”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8309979.stm
Liu Xiaobo is a privileged and selfish. He only cares, as a so called ‘intellectual’, about his own ‘right’ to say what he wants – he cares nothing for the poor people in China.
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