China's CCP warns Elon Musk against sharing Wuhan lab leak report

[Grand Mal]

No, that's Herefordshire, way down south in the West Midlands

Hereford cattle - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Fine then! Have it your way! But it's still where the buffalo roam, and the deer and the antelope play.
Uh, there's still a buffalo in Texas, isn't there?

 

[ClaraD]

...as well as just about every other electronic appliance in the home. Buy American? Sure, if you can both afford it-and find it!

and even then a lot of the components or tech parts are either Taiwan or Chinese made...my HP is an example....it has a processor that is Chinese. My Macbook....chinese parts. My Samsung tv and cellphone...both South Korea and China, my Samsung washer and dryer, the same.

 

[Ahlevah]

nope, you really cannot. You cannot across the board ban a media company, because you don't like the country they are based in.

Wanna bet? When it comes to national security, the sky’s the limit.

 

[ClaraD]

Maybe I should have been less specific and just said “land of lots of big cows,” like Texas Longhorns. Do they have those in Scotland? How about a Gigafactory? Space City?

View attachment 67439227

They have cows in Scotland....in fact, their beef is better than the longhorn. Their cows have long hair.....a lot of people have them in Colorado.

 

[Ahlevah]

...as well as just about every other electronic appliance in the home. Buy American? Sure, if you can both afford it-and find it!

It doesn’t have to be American. Just not Chinese.

 

[ClaraD]

It doesn’t have to be American. Just not Chinese.

Almost all electronics...even American companies have 50% or more Chinese made parts. Samsung across the board is about 50% Chinese manufactured. HP, the same. Dell....mostly Chinese....Mac yep, China.

 

[slavablueberryjam]

This is why it's wrong to have a 'free' market operate in a 'dictatorship' like China. China, clearly, doesn't value sovereignty and they will force all those entities weak to do its bidding if they want money. Because it is just a business, businesses will do what China wants. This is bad. There clearly isn't checks-and-balances in most societies, not even in America. At least in America, we have the greatest state for the state. China wants that and is implementing it in its own way.

 

[snakestretcher]

Fine then! Have it your way! But it's still where the buffalo roam, and the deer and the antelope play.
Uh, there's still a buffalo in Texas, isn't there?

Haha! You'd be surprised by what we have:

First wild European bison born in the UK for thousands of years

A herd of bison released into woodland near Canterbury, Kent, have surprised conservationists by giving birth to a calf.

www.nhm.ac.uk

Then there's the capybara, wallabies, parakeets, scorpions-all either escapees or smuggled in.

10 Animals You Won't Believe Are Seen In Britain And Could Be Living Near You!

I have been interested in mystery wild cats in Britain since I was a young Boy. When I was 11 my father saw a black leopard in the garden of our North London home. As years went by obtaining the...

bigcatsofthechilterns.weebly.com

Wallabies are on the loose in Britain – and we’ve mapped 95 sightings

First imported by zoos, wallabies proved to be adept escape artists that can survive in the British countryside.

theconversation.com

 

[ClaraD]

Wanna bet? When it comes to national security, the sky’s the limit.

There is no national security risk with someone uploading their home videos to an app. Good grief. The only phones this is a risk with is government owned phones..and they better hope they are 100% American made...which would be extraordinarily rare.

 

[ClaraD]

This is why it's wrong to have a 'free' market operate in a 'dictatorship' like China. China, clearly, doesn't value sovereignty and they will force all those entities weak to do its bidding if they want money. Because it is just a business, businesses will do what China wants. This is bad. There clearly isn't checks-and-balances in most societies, not even in America. At least in America, we have the greatest state for the state. China wants that and is implementing it in its own way.

So, is Ivanka and Trump going to be forced to close down business in Russia and China?

 

[slavablueberryjam]

So, is Ivanka and Trump going to be forced to close down business in Russia and China?

Babe, they're very pro-CCP.

 

[Metric Mouse]

No, they didn't. I still have tik tok on my phone and can still watch it and/or upload videos to it.

Ok, to be pedantic, it is ok to have tik tok for another 27 days.

Then it is banned on government devices.

 

[Metric Mouse]

Busted.
You lied, in writing, twice, and got caught.
Again.
You seem very discombobulated.
Again.
And you still don’t understand how tariffs work and who actually pays for them.

Biden is paying for them? Or are Americans? Trump promised that these tariffs were good and Biden agrees.

Biden loves tariffs that hurt Americans, and thinks trade wars are good and easy to win...

Thank you for correcting me. I meant to say increased economic pressure, and not tariffs, and was unclear to the point of being incorrect. I appreciate the correction.

 

[SMTA]

Biden is paying for them? Or are Americans?

Biden loves tariffs that hurt Americans, and thinks trade wars are good and easy to win...

A) you have no idea how tariffs work
B) you lied twice and got caught
C) your posts are always worthless bullshit
should be your avatar

 

[Metric Mouse]

A) you have no idea how tariffs work
B) you lied twice and got caught
C) your posts are always worthless bullshit
should be your avatar

I already thanked you for correcting me.

Don't worry, Biden will win this trade war. He is following the super successful Trump model.

Cuz he's a dumb dumb.

 

[Metric Mouse]

I don't think government employees should have any non-pertinent apps on their government-issued phones. Mouse knows damn well I am referring to their intentions to ban it for all Americans.

Thats funny because I clearly stated otherwise, and you damn well know it.

 

[Ahlevah]

Almost all electronics...even American companies have 50% or more Chinese made parts. Samsung across the board is about 50% Chinese manufactured. HP, the same. Dell....mostly Chinese....Mac yep, China.

It’s not about where we are now. It’s about where we are headed. We should decouple our economy from China’s. I’m not saying this can or should be done overnight. It will be a process, and will take years. But it needs to happen. It took a crisis to wake up us and the E.U. about Russia. Let’s prepare and not let that happen with China, which it likely will with Xi Jinping behind the wheel. Invest in China at your peril.

 

[Visbek]

Even if they’re not state-owned, Chinese corporations are obligated by law to give access to their data to the Chinese government. The government doesn’t need to produce a warrant to access it.

Indeed, and I'm sure that is more wide-spread. However, getting a warrant for data in the US is easy, and many companies are willing to cooperate without one. Did you already forget about AT&T in SF?

Nor is it justifiable on this basis to treat every single business in China as a wholly controlled arm of the Chinese government.

Do you not understand the difference between data collected by a social media company... etc

Do you not understand that the NSA is gathering massive amounts of public data anyway? That the NSA spies on US citizens within the US? Or that social media companies are doing more than just using your data to sell ads?

You know, for someone who claims not to be making comparisons, you do a lot of comparing.

Uh, hello? Obviously I'm making comparisons, nor am I defending China's wrongdoing in any way. What I've said is that I am not saying they are equivalent.

But while these two nations are not equally bad, that certainly doesn't mean that the US is as pure as the driven snow, or that a major cessation of trade is warranted -- or beneficial to either party.

E.g. the US exported $153 billion of goods to China, meaning they're the 3rd largest buyer of US goods and services. Both Obama's and Trump's tariffs, intended to reform China's behavior, backfired. China also holds $1 trillion in US government debt. So yeah, it sure seems like the US needs China.

I don’t trust any of those ****ers... etc

Yeah, that attitude needs adjustment. Would you respond positively to a Chinese citizen saying "I don't trust any of those f*****g Americans"?

And again, it sure looks like one US political party wants to weaken, if not eliminate, a number of those countervailing institutions. We absolutely cannot equate Republican dreams with Chinese reality, again it sure seems like we ought to be a little more circumspect when suggesting that the US is fantabulous.

Do you think Edward Snowden would have been as successful getting the word out if he’d turned Chinese state secrets over to Chinese state media instead of Julian Assange?

Snowden knew that the instant the documents he released were published, he was going straight to jail for the rest of his life. He made sure to be outside the US on release for that very reason. If you read up on how badly Chelsea Manning was treated, that's what Snowden reasonably expected. Snowden would likely get a fair trial, but he'd be in a supermax for life.

China does have whistleblowers, by the way. E.g. One exposed torture of Uyghurs.

I have no problems whatsoever saying that the US is in many substantial ways a better nation than China or Russia. If I was in China, I'd have to be extremely careful or refrain from publishing a post as critical as this one. That still doesn't justify a raging hatred towards a nation of 1 billion people, or a bone-headed idea like "cutting most or all trade between the US and China."

I’m not excusing any governmental malfeasance, but do you think Muslims are less free here than they are in the Middle East?

I think that such a simplistic statement is difficult to take seriously.

Are governments in Syria, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq and Jordan identical? No. Are they brutal totalitarian states? Some yes, others no.

Muslims are surely more free in the US, but that doesn't mean they are treated justly in the US. Aside from centuries of prejudice and discrimination, they were heavily targeted for surveillance after 9/11, and an unlucky few were tortured. Those "countervailing powers" didn't help people who were tortured at Gitmo (even though torture is illegal and doesn't actually work) or sent to Syria to be tortured.

Again, the US isn't equivalent to China, but it isn't anywhere near as pure as you seem to suggest. And if features like moral purity, widespread government surveillance, and expanding hegemony are reasons to stop trade, then it kinda seems like no one should trade with the US. Or almost any other nation, actually.

 

[SMTA]

I already thanked you for correcting me.

Don't worry, Biden will win this trade war. He is following the super successful Trump model.

Cuz he's a dumb dumb.

I stand corrected - you did thank me.
Sorry about that.
Nobody wins a trade war, and US consumers get screwed.
Trumps stupid trade bullshit with China caused US grain to not be purchased by China, and Trump then threw $12 billion US taxpayers dollars to US farmers.
US solar Chinese component prices also went through the roof, again screwing US consumers, due to the import tariffs that Trump enacted.
Trump was and is a ****ing moron.
That is exactly why he’ll never hold the POTUS office ever again.

 

[SMTA]

It’s not about where we are now. It’s about where we are headed. We should decouple our economy from China’s. I’m not saying this can or should be done overnight. It will be a process, and will take years. But it needs to happen. It took a crisis to wake up us and the E.U. about Russia. Let’s prepare and not let that happen with China, which it likely will with Xi Jinping behind the wheel. Invest in China at your peril.

Never happen.
US consumers are hooked on cheap Chinese goods and that will never stop.
Never.

 

[Fishking]

MSN

www.msn.com

Up to this point, without China Tesla isn’t Tesla. Moral of the story: As we’ve seen with other businesses that operate in China, such as Disney and the NBA, be prepared to surrender your constitutional rights and accept the growing geopolitical risk of doing business there, or pay the consequences.

Agree with the overall sentiment but it's not a loss of constitutional rights. It's a loss of personal autonomy without suffering possible catastrophic business losses. This is just another example of why we need to be divesting from China, for important things, at least. They can still be used for cheap plastic nick-nacks.

 

[Metric Mouse]

I stand corrected - you did thank me.
Sorry about that.
Nobody wins a trade war, and US consumers get screwed.
Trumps stupid trade bullshit with China caused US grain to not be purchased by China, and Trump then threw $12 billion US taxpayers dollars to US farmers.
US solar Chinese component prices also went through the roof, again screwing US consumers, due to the import tariffs that Trump enacted.
Trump was and is a ****ing moron.
That is exactly why he’ll never hold the POTUS office ever again.

Biden disagrees. He thinks Trump's policies are genius, he supports the trade tarrifs and can't think of any better way to screw Americans. That's why he keeps them. The cruelty is the point.

Trumpers didn't need to re elect Trump; they voted for Biden and got the same policies. They won twice, and will probably do so at least one more time before the rest of America can out vote them.

 

[Ahlevah]

Agree with the overall sentiment but it's not a loss of constitutional rights. It's a loss of personal autonomy without suffering possible catastrophic business losses. This is just another example of why we need to be divesting from China, for important things, at least. They can still be used for cheap plastic nick-nacks.

Yes, understand that, and I agree. I should have been better in my phrasing. What I was attempting to convey was the idea that if you’re not free to voice an otherwise legal opinion in your own country without facing some sort of restriction or sanction, then you’re not really enjoying the full benefit of the right of free speech. How to remedy that? Remove the ability of the foreign government to sanction you by not doing business there.

 

[Visbek]

Unprovoked and tangential whataboutism, deflection and false equivalences are basically the calling card of CCP apologists and shills, both on this forum and elsewhere.

Yes, I've spent years posting on DP, not writing much about China, because I'm a secret Chinese paid troll.

Again, I am not in any way shape or form saying this to excuse any immoral behavior by China's government. My point is that xenophobic attacks are not justified, more than a smidge hypocritical, and won't work anyway.

First of all, the concern, which is evidently valid given the repeated conclusions of federal investigations (and not just those limited to the US govt), is that there is a direct pipeline from Tiktok to the Chinese state security apparatus as a matter of course.

Sort of like that direct pipeline from AT&T to the NSA?

Are you a fan of gag orders on subpoenas served to tech companies, including for data on journalists? Sure, American companies can publicly complain about it and Chinese can't -- but many quietly cooperate.

How about the NYPD -- a single city police department -- requesting 20,000 administrative secret subpoenas per year to ISPs and other tech companies?

Seems more like a difference of degree rather than of kind.

It is the height of absurdity to tar and feather the US as a whole because of the bad behaviour of a lunatic fringe...

But it's OK to tar and feather 1 billion Chinese people because of their government. Got it.

I certainly agree we can't treat a desire for autocracy as equivalent to an actual autocracy. However, your point would be stronger if it was only a tiny lunatic fringe pushing for Autocracy Lite™. Sadly, that's not the case. Do I really need to go into detail?

As recently as 2022, state hackers stole trillions worth from 30 multinationals.

How did we get from $600 billion to trillions?

Anyway. Let's grant that it's massive. Let's even grant that the US has a moral obligation to do more than bother to defend itself from foreign hackers. How will cutting trade with China stop this? Will the average Chinese citizen appreciate the US targeting its economy and causing a massive recession? What happens to the $1 trillion in US debt held by China? Or private investments?

How would it even work? Mere targeted tariffs levied by Obama, the EU and Trump all failed to curb bad behavior, and China retaliated. Russia hasn't stopped its invasion of Ukraine despite massive sanctions. Economic isolation has only made North Korea more oppressive and belligerent. It seems likely China would increase theft in retaliation, or at least increase trade with other nations anyway.

It doesn't matter because the state can compel or even seize them unilaterally and abruptly at any time; this is moreover coded into Chinese law, which is why every Chinese company has to be treated for security purposes as a de facto extension of the state.

Yes, we can certainly say that Chinese companies are much more subservient to the government than the US. In fact, in many ways, the US government is subservient to US and foreign or multinational corporations -- which is its own problem, of course. They're also more widely using this to oppress dissent.

However, by your logic, every tech company in the US should be seen as an extension of the federal government, because most of them have cooperated with information requests, including warantless wiretapping. I have a really hard time seeing this specific element as all that different.

Moreover, China is in no position to aggress against the West and its allies at present...

So it's a threat, but not a threat?

Let's say China has a long-term plan to invade Taiwan in 2025. If the US stops trading with China, would anything change? Both the US and China will be hit by recessions. Both will be reluctant to change military spending (i.e. US will still vastly outspend China). Both know that numerous nations would provide military aid or otherwise react - surely Japan would build a huge military in response. And China isn't going to stop stealing military secrets just because the US stopped buying socks made in Datang.

Whatever action the world takes, it doesn't seem likely that cutting trade is on the table, or likely to work anyway. What else ya got?

 

[Ahlevah]

Indeed, and I'm sure that is more wide-spread. However, getting a warrant for data in the US is easy, and many companies are willing to cooperate without one. Did you already forget about AT&T in SF?

Our government still operates under a system of laws, or at least it’s supposed to. That’s where these countervailing institutions, such as a free press and congressional and judicial oversight, are supposed to enter the picture. While it may be “easy” or routine to get a warrant, you still need a legal justification for it. Not true in China.

Nor is it justifiable on this basis to treat every single business in China as a wholly controlled arm of the Chinese government.

Actually, you just reminded me of something on the issue of diversifying supply chains and decoupling from China which is cropping up more and more frequently in the financial press. Apparently, some Chinese companies that sell into the Chinese market are moving their supply chains out of China, too. I guess their capitalists don’t like authoritarians and their Covid lockdowns any more than ours do.

Do you not understand that the NSA is gathering massive amounts of public data anyway? That the NSA spies on US citizens within the US? Or that social media companies are doing more than just using your data to sell ads?

Yeah, and if you want to start a thread on that we can discuss it. Otherwise, it’s just more whataboutism.

Uh, hello? Obviously I'm making comparisons, nor am I defending China's wrongdoing in any way. What I've said is that I am not saying they are equivalent.

Okay, you seem to have latched onto my use of the phrase “false equivalencies” to mean that I claimed you were “equating” China’s communist dictatorship to our democracy in every literal sense of the word. That wasn’t my intent. If you prefer, how about we just call it “whataboutism”?

E.g. the US exported $153 billion of goods to China, meaning they're the 3rd largest buyer of US goods and services. Both Obama's and Trump's tariffs, intended to reform China's behavior, backfired. China also holds $1 trillion in US government debt. So yeah, it sure seems like the US needs China.

Well, considering that our total debt now stands at about $31 trillion and counting, China’s share is shrinking by the second. Remember, our central bank opened up the dollar spigot to the BoJ and the ECB a few years ago. Just have the Fed buy those Treasuries from China and trade them for some spare yen or Euro swaps, or sell them in Open Market Operations and we’ll be fine. U.S. Treasures are the most liquid government debt on the planet. Otherwise, they can eat them, use them for toilet paper or blow their noses with them—whatever if they want. We don’t need China.