2y ago

Biden says he still believes Xi Jinping is a dictator

www.cnn.com

Biden says he still believes Xi Jinping is a dictator | CNN Politics

US President Joe Biden said Wednesday he still believes Chinese President Xi Jinping is a dictator, even as the two leaders made progress in their relationship during a meeting outside San Francisco.

“Well, look, he’s a dictator in the sense that he is a guy who runs a country that is a communist country that’s based on a form of government totally different than ours,” Biden told CNN’s MJ Lee. “Anyway, we made progress.”

When asked about Biden’s latest comment at a Chinese Foreign Ministry briefing on Thursday, a spokesperson called it “extremely erroneous” and an “irresponsible political maneuver, which China firmly opposes.”

77 comments

What a weird way to define a dictator.
Not "he has been in power for an extended period of time in a country with a single ruling party."
But "he runs a communist country that has a different government than ours"?
- I'm not a big fan of President Biden after some consideration I've decided I do like his answer. It's nuanced, which means the Internet won't understand it, but it answered the question correctly (Yes he is) while making it clear that other countries have different styles of Government that we may not like but must accept if we want to have relations with them.
  Countries with Liberal Democracies, like the United States, have no responsibility to lie about another countries style of Government to spare their feelings but we also don't need to let our distaste preclude us from talking to them.
  
  But that's just not what Biden said, at all. Here's what Biden actually said: "he’s a dictator in the sense that he is a guy who runs a country that is a communist country that’s based on a form of government totally different than ours."
  This isn't nuanced, it's an ignorant and belligerent hot-take. He clearly indicated that either having a different form of government from ours, or being communist, or perhaps the combination of those two things (which is redundant), makes a country a dictatorship. That's not a straw man reading, it's what he said, in pretty clear terms. He didn't say, or even approach saying, any of the things you suggested, except the "yes he is" bit.
  Biden spews toxic nonsense almost as badly as Trump, sometimes. Thankfully, not as constantly.
  
  What a weird take.
- Probably aiming for the elderly votes or something. Then again, the guy is old himself so I don’t know.
  
  Then again, the guy is old himself so I don’t know.
  The core problem, sadly. Millennials and younger can't relate to his worldview without doing a generational-history deep dive.
  I'll still vote for him if he's the frontrunner, because I don't enjoy the thought of the fascist alternative, and he's done a better job than I expected in a lot of areas, but he won't get my vote in the primaries.
- In what sense is modern China a communist country?
  
  They insist very much that they’re communist. Like, a lot. It’s even on their letterhead and business cards and website!
  
  They think that they are. Part of marxist theory, at least traditional 'orthodox' marxist theory is that the development of a capitalist mode of production is essential to development of revolutionary consciousness in the proletariat. The CCP keeps its oligarchs on a leash. They have been allowed to prosper only as part of the rapid modernization of the Chinese economy over the last 30-40 years.
- Why is that weird? Seems fairly commonplace to me. Like, not that it's necessarily correct, just not weird at all.
  
  Because it is fundamentally wrong.
I mean he literally abolished the term limits which were put in place to prevent another dictator from taking power in China.
- He also has complete control over the party that controls the chinese equivalent of a congress, who then votes him into power. He won the last election with 100% of the vote, 2,952 For and 25 Absent.
Well. He is.
- And I'm pretty sure Xi wouldn't deny it in private.
  
  In private, whoever said it would be killed summarily.
Gee, I hope the Chinese dictator isn't offended.
You realize if Biden had failed to call Xi a dictator, they'd be squawking about how he was weak.
"And if there's one thing we love, it's dictators. Just ask our biggest ally, Saudi Arabia."
- Biggest ally isn't the descriptor I'd use for the Saudis...
  
  I think its a Trump quote?
- Xan you be a dictator if you are a king with a kingdom?
Did anyone else see that camera on Blinken wincing when he said it?
It's gold.
- I wanna see this!!
  
  https://youtu.be/yTys4B9qBW8?t=10s
Do we really need a news article for every sentence uttered?
- This headline, while accurate, puts Biden's statement in a way most likely to undermine current cooperations with China. The goal is to offend Xi and scuttle any deals reached, and if that doesn't work, at least it paints Biden as a hypocrite for working with a dictator.
  It's scortched earth politics. It's not meant to be news.
  
  at least it paints Biden as a hypocrite for working with a dictator.
  The United States has generally had no problem working with anyone, including Dictators. We've only every refused to do so when their crimes grow so obscenely large that they literally cannot be overlooked.
I mean he is right
- He is correct in the label and completely wrong with the explanation.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
When asked about Biden’s latest comment at a Chinese Foreign Ministry briefing on Thursday, a spokesperson called it “extremely erroneous” and an “irresponsible political maneuver, which China firmly opposes.”
Beijing responded furiously over the summer when the president made a similar comment and compared his Chinese counterpart to “dictators” in June.
The president made that comment during an off-camera campaign reception in California, hitting Xi for being caught by surprise after the US had shot down a Chinese spy balloon that had veered off course over the United States.
“The remarks seriously contradict basic facts, seriously violate diplomatic etiquette, and seriously infringe on China’s political dignity,” the spokesperson for the foreign ministry said.
Wednesday’s comment could threaten to derail the positive energy coming out of the meeting, which Biden described earlier in the news conference as “some of the most constructive and productive discussions we’ve had.”
“Both sides should understand each other’s principles and bottom lines, not make or stir up trouble or cross boundaries, (but instead) communicate more, have more dialogue and more discussions, and handle differences and accidents calmly,” Xi said.
The original article contains 533 words, the summary contains 183 words. Saved 66%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!
I mean Biden casually bribed the Pakistan army to remove the previous government and yet he calls Pakistan a totally legit democracy even though elections still haven't happened.
And water is wet. What else?
Let me guess, Xi think the same thing about Biden.. 🤣🤣
Stuff like this is a waste of time.
But does he still believe fire is hot?
Leader of a country that has a different form of governance than America? Must be a dictator.
Only America can be good.
While Xi's move to remove term limits and humiliate his predecessor is worrying and very much dictator moves, china is still more democratic than most people realize. It's just another model of democracy. Democracy happens within the Chinese Communist party, which anyone can join and participate in to elect local officials, which elect regional officials and so on.
Obviously not perfect, but not completely dictatorial eitherr.
- within the Chinese Communist party, which anyone can join and participate in to elect local officials
  This is definitely not the case anymore. Realistically speaking, it was never as simple as "anyone can join." Today, most people will go through a lengthy process to just be denied membership.
  Guess who you can thank for this...
- If I go in a public square and liken Xi to Winnie the Pooh for several hours, will I be returning home untouched by the government and continue to live without government reprisal?
  I think we could learn a lot from their more restrained capitalism system. But that doesn't mean I can't recognize the authoritarian dictatorship.
  There's an old Soviet Russia joke that applies here. They had freedom of speech too -- in the US you can rant about Reagan all day and the government won't do any reprisal, and in the USSR you can also rant about Reagan without any reprisal!
  
  I get where you're coming from but that's not an argument about the defining characteristics of dictatorships, that's an argument about the existence or lack thereof of free speech.
  In my opinion a better argument would be that China has 1 leader at the top of the ladder with near unquestionable power over government precedings who will remain in that position until he either dies or chooses to step down. That already would make him something analogous to a monarch, but add the regular use of military strength in forcing compliance from the masses and now we have a dictator.
  
  Recently in the UK, we had a lot of "not my king" protests where people were arrested for blank signs after people had signs mentioning Prince Andrew's misdeeds.
  
  Try saying From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free! In Berlin. Or the many US states were boycotting Israel is illegal.

77 comments