Cablegate: Media Reaction: U.S. Policy, China Policy

VZCZCXRO6963
RR RUEHCN RUEHGH RUEHVC
DE RUEHBJ #3487 3630901
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
R 290901Z DEC 09
FM AMEMBASSY BEIJING
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 7455
INFO RUEHOO/CHINA POSTS COLLECTIVE
RHMFIUU/CDR USPACOM HONOLULU HI

UNCLAS BEIJING 003487

DEPARTMENT FOR INR/R/MR, EAP/CM, EAP/PA, EAP/PD, C
HQ PACOM FOR PUBLIC DIPLOMACY ADVISOR (J007)
SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: PREL ECON SENV KGHG KMDR OPRC CH

SUBJECT: MEDIA REACTION: U.S. POLICY, CHINA POLICY

--------------------
Editorial Quotes
--------------------

1. U.S. POLICY

A. "New breakthroughs in U.S. healthcare reform: towards a managed
competition"

Guangdong 21st Century Publishing Company Ltd.'s business newspaper
21st Century Business Herald (21Shiji Jingji Baodao)(12/29)(pg 2):
"Because the Democratic Party is the majority party in both the U.S.
Senate and House, the U.S. Democratic Party's half-century-long
effort to promote health care for all hopefully will pay off soon.
There is something that we should learn from the United States'
public policy decision-making mechanism. In the United States, the
President does not have the final say in public policy. He can
merely advocate for or reject the bill. U.S. public policy bills
are composed of specific rules rather than vague statements of
principles, which are often seen in China's regulations and
promulgations. All new bills are drafted based on the original
bill, article by article. The U.S. public policy decision-making
process is intensive, systematic and targeted. The process of
debating and consensus cohesion is also relatively clear and
transparent."

B. "The future of Israeli-Palestinian peace talks is still bleak"

The official Communist Party People's Daily (Renmin Ribao)(12/29)(pg
3):" 2009 is almost gone and the resumption of the
Palestinian-Israeli peace talks still takes time. No progress will
be seen on the horizon for a considerable time. The United States
is the most important mediator for Palestinian-Israeli negotiations.
The main characteristics of the Obama administration's stance on
the Palestinian-Israeli peace talks are: first, the Unite States'
position is very precarious. Second, the Obama administration lacks
the means to promote peace in this process. Third, the Obama
administration has more will than strength to achieve its goals.
These are also the main reasons the peace talks have not been
resumed. Since President Obama took office, the Secretary of State
and U.S. Special Envoy have been sent to the Middle East many times
but very few accomplishments have been made."

2. CHINA POLICY

"Is the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences' yellow book providing
ammunition for the 'China threat ' theory? "

The China Radio International sponsored newspaper World News Journal
(Shijie Xinwenbao)(12/29)(pg 9): "Neither Chinese netizens nor
military experts think much of this CASS yellow book, which ranks
China 7th in the world in overall strength and 2nd after the United
States in military strength. Chinese netizens found it ridiculous
because they believe that China's overall strength should be ranked
higher and China's military strength, the sophistication of China's
conventional weapons in particular, has lagged far behind the West
especially the United States. Military expert Dai Xu said that the
author, the CASS World Economics and International Politics
Institute, is not an authoritative institute on Chinese military
affairs. Some researchers say that they lack military common sense.
Yu Wanli, an expert in international relations at the Peking
University said that CASS is just an official think tank and it
cannot represent the views of the Chinese government. According to
Yu, Russia at least has more military strength than China and this
yellow book is nothing but reference material. One of the editors
of the yellow book, Li Shaojun, admitted that the United States'
military strength scored 90.08 and China only scored 33.3 out of
100."

GOLDBERG

© Scoop Media