OUR VIEWS

A paralyzed China

The result had been paralysis in Beijing. The civilian half of the government could not overrule the military half, and Chinese President Jiang Zemin, traveling in South America, was unable to lay down the law from overseas.

How the apparent impasse between hard-line nationalists and more internationally minded reformers was broken may not be known for some time. If it hadn't been, the internal dispute could have had the same practical effect as a deliberate policy of antagonizing the United States. It already has to some degree.

The Bush administration has handled the incident carefully, with an emphasis on low-key diplomacy and an absence of threats. To say, as Secretary of State Colin Powell and presidential spokesman Ari Fleischer often did, that delay risked damaging the U.S.-China relationship is only to state the self-evident.

The first evidence that relations were souring was the cancellation of a number of planned congressional visits to China over the Easter recess, even though President Bush urged the lawmakers to go.

The conventional wisdom — and it seems correct — is that the Chinese leadership, with no elections or ideology to legitimize it, holds power in an unspoken economic bargain with the people: The people tolerate the government as long as the government raises living standards.

The threat to China's leadership from its inability to resolve this incident was economic. If China is not in the World Trade Organization by June, Congress must extend normal trade relations with China. Failure to do would be a huge setback to China's trade hopes, indefinitely postponing WTO membership.

Certainly its hopes of hosting the 2008 Olympics would have been over, and Bush would likely have canceled a planned visit to China this fall, a diplomatic snub that make any "apology" look trivial. Congress would have insisted on lavishing high-grade weapons on Taiwan, forcing China to spend even more money on its own military.

Most important, continued intransigence would have hamstring the bipartisan bloc of U.S. lawmakers, policy makers, business leaders, lobbyists and academics who have pushed, with growing influence, for closer economic, political and diplomatic ties with China.

China's insistence on complete apology — and claiming that's what we gave — indicates a telling lack of self-confidence, as if somehow humbling the United States might make it truly a first-class power.

A golden moment

His Masters victory was a golden moment in sports history. Only once, in 1930, has a player won four majors in a season. The kid with the infectious grin and ferocious concentration is the first to win four straight in the modern era, though not all in the same season. Even greater records are not out of the question; this season, like Woods, is still young.

Unlike so many Generation X athletes, who believe the history of their sports began with their appearance, Woods has an easy reverence for the players who have gone before, especially his idol, Jack Nicklaus, whose record of 18 career majors now not only seems achievable but breakable.

And, knowing his sport, Woods had to realize that he beat an exceptional field. Once a sport confined to the relative handful of the population with access to country clubs, golf now benefits from a vastly greater talent pool, thanks to its popularity and general accessibility. Over the weekend, Woods beat the best golfers in the world, not just those from the small and better-privileged parts of it. His victory may have looked like a stroll in Augusta's glorious surroundings, but the tears he shed at the end showed how mentally demanding and emotionally draining golf is at its highest level.

Woods' feat may be a golden moment in sports history in another sense: Between winnings, endorsements and promotions, he may become the first athlete to make a billion dollars out of his sport.

YOUR VIEWS

All death sentences must be opposed

Two years ago the abolitionist movement (in particular Amnesty International) "observed a respectful silence" when, in Jasper County, three white racist assassins were condemned (two to death) for the brutal killing of the black man James Byrd. They did not make protests or send letters or telegrams. They did nothing of the "normal routine" we do for any death penalty trial. It was like they had fear of their own ideas.

I think I was one of the few, if not the lone, who wrote in defence of those three criminals' lives.

Now something similar is happening to Timothy McVeigh, the Oklahoma City terrorist. His "date" with the hangman is known for a long time; newspapers wrote on his decision to stop the appeals and about his request for a televised execution, but in the abolitionist movement (in particular Amnesty International) nobody seems to notice him. Nevertheless it will be the very first federal execution since the Kennedy administration. There were a lot of letters, petitions, urgent actions and the likes when there was the possibility that Juan Raul Garza would be the first federally condemned man to be killed in 40 years.

Nothing of this has happened to McVeigh, yet. I think it is because McVeigh is not a "normal" death penalty inmate. He is not a possible innocent, he is not a mad man or a child, he is not a victim of the racist, political, class-related American justice. For him the normal humanitarian rationale against the death penalty does not work. Timothy McVeigh is one of the worst, if not the worst, of the murderers in the American death row.

But he is also the touchstone of the solidity of our ideals. If we do not fight for him, we will not be able to fight for anyone else.

Dott. Claudio Giusti
Committee 3rd July 1849
Via Nullo Baldini 14
47100 Forli, Italy

Limited choice

Admittedly, President (Impeached) Clinton would have occupied a better position from which to negotiate since he could have simply imposed sanctions barring any future shipments of our top secret, U.S. strategic defense plans to Communist China.

Armond "Si" Simmons
104 Wadsworth Lane
Pell City

Can't be worse

As Dr. Wayne Flynt of Auburn University opinined recently in Elaine Witt's column in this newspaper, any new constitution will be better than the present one.

George L. Singleton
2509 Matzek Road

Want power

The governor has stated that a new constitution would do away with the proration problem. Sure it will, just as the Amendment 1 issue was supposed to fix all the bridges in Alabama and now we are told they don't have enough money for all the bridges.

Alabama needs tax reform and the elimination of pork barrel projects such as the $200 million in the educational trust fund spending that has nothing to do with classrooms.

Of all the needs in Alabama, we don't need this bunch in Montgomery messing with the state Constitution. They can't be trusted.

Donald Dunlap
1335 Montevallo Road
Irondale

LOOK BACK

50 years ago, April 11, 1951

Gov. Gordon Persons promises wholesale shake-up of Capitol guards following night-time burglery of state auditor's office. It is second Capitol break-in in 10 days.

25 years ago, April 11, 1976

Democratic presidential race expected to get nastier in coming weeks with target being front-runner Jimmy Carter.

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