(Nothing Is Ever As It Seems In China) Brother Wristwatch and Grandpa Wen: Chinese Kleptocracy

Posted by Evan Osnos

Two days after Americans go to the polls, China will embark with great fanfare on its own leadership transition, anointing a new generation of men—and they almost certainly will all be men—to run the country for the next ten years. A team of seven, the Standing Committee of the Politburo of the Chinese Communist Party, will intone their official priorities for the new term: economic rebalancing, technological innovation, and territorial integrity, among other things. There is one issue that they will not emphasize, but it is more essential to their Party’s survival than any other: combating corruption…..But when Wedeman looked at the data, he concluded, to his surprise, that “corruption in China more closely resembled corruption in Zaire than it did corruption in Japan.” In short, he found, “the evidence suggests that corruption in contemporary China is essentially anarchy.” ….. (Official records indicate that eighteen thousand corrupt officials have fled the country since 1990, taking with them a hundred and twenty billion dollars.) …….The Party is running out of time not because corruption is a drag on the economy—it can outrun that effect—but because the public is losing confidence…… anonymous message that read, in part: “When a country is so corrupt that one lightning strike can cause a train crash … none of us are exempt. China today is a train rushing through a lightning storm…. We are all passengers.”   To Read More....