Dianne Feinstein regained top honors in our Appease China Sweepstakes last week and put in a bid for the Moral-Equivalence Lifetime Achievement Award as well. At a Senate hearing, California's senior senator noted that some 300 million Chinese have taken part in villagelevel elections, in which there are no opposition parties and the overwhelming percentage of available candidates are selected by the ruling Communist oligarchy. Why, she exclaimed, "More people vote in China today than do in the United States!"
But wait, there's more. Feinstein also expressed her view that Beijing would not take steps toward democracy when "they're preached to by others [i. e. Americans] who don't always practice it themselves." This is reminiscent of her ludicrous comparison of the Tiananmen square massacre to Kent State -- the display of moral equivalency, readers will recall, that inaugurated THE SCRAPBOOK'S Appease-China Sweepstakes earlier this year.
And finally, in an exchange with assistant secretary of state Stanley Roth, Feinstein again managed to out-appease the State Department by suggesting that China's brutal crackdown on dissent -- or as she put it, their "human rights posture" -- might be necessary for maintaining stability during economic reform. As China throws millions into unemployment, in other words, who can blame its dictators for wanting to make sure these poor souls keep their mouths shut and their fannies out of Tiananmen Square? To his great credit, Roth replied that even if Chinese leaders were thinking this way, " It's not an argument that I think we should be particularly receptive to."
Well, not most of us, anyway. Feinstein, on the other hand, is a special case. So special that THE SCRAPBOOK herewith renames our ongoing sweepstakes the Dianne Feinstein Appease-China Award. Congratulations, Senator!