They’re crying on the inside.

The murder of Wei Wenhua by the extended arm of China’s dictatorial regime ought to do at least two things here in the US. First, it should renew (or amplify) calls to boycott the 2008 Beijing Olympics. Second, it should remind us about the complete irrationality and unprincipled thinking (like we could forget) of our President, who recently accepted an invitation from Hu Jintao, China’s “president” to attend the Olympics.

“Aides said the president [Bush] would attend as a sports fan, and not to make any political statement.”

I call bullshit on that. The Olympic events are the embodiment individual human achievement –and the ability of men to accomplish almost superhuman feats when they put their minds to it. Bullshit Bush can watch that in a country with no concept of the individual human. Bullshit that he (and anyone else lending their support to that regime) isn’t making a political statement. He is sanctioning the behavior of China and giving them future ammunition which they will use to continue oppressing human life.

Comparisons to the 1936 games abound and I wonder, if Hitler had invited Bush to the Berlin Olympics would he have attended as a sports fan? It sure worked out well for F.D.R.

Wei’s murder should remind us that whatever China appears to be at its core is a culture of corruption, oppression, and death. And that fact doesn’t stop being true on the day of the Olympic games.

Filed under: Politics is Personal, Pop! Goes the Culture, Profiles in Governance