A month ago I addressed the Human Rights Torch Relay in Santa Monica along with members of Congress Dana Rohrabacher and Maxine Waters.  The Human Rights Torch Relay’s purpose was to draw attention to the widespread human rights abuses visited upon the people of China by the unelected communist regime in Beijing – while the Olympic torch was nearby. 

About the same time, Assemblyman Sam Blakeslee (R-San Luis Obispo) introduced Assembly Concurrent Resolution 119 on Tibet Day (http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/07-08/bill/asm/ab_0101-0150/acr_119_bill_20080325_introduced.html).  This resolution specifically called out human rights abuses in both Tibet and China, so it was shelved by the Democrats in charge in Sacramento as being too controversial.  Last Thursday, May 15, however, a compromise Tibet Day resolution was allowed onto the floor of the Assembly.  Authored by Assemblyman Gene Mullin (D-San Mateo), House Resolution 20 was a mainly positive mention of Tibet and the Dalai Lama (http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/07-08/bill/asm/ab_0001-0050/hr_20_bill_20080501_amended_asm_v98.html).

I received a letter from the Chinese Communist government a day after voting in favor of the Tibet Day resolution (one can argue the merits of even discussing such things while we have a $17 billion deficit, but, when comparing a resolution supporting human rights to some of the other bills we vote out, at least you can say it was neither harmful nor frivolous).  The letter, dated May 1, was quite remarkable for both its blatant lies and its tone to an American elected official. 

The first Big Lie occurs in the letter’s second paragraph, “Like the US, China attaches great importance to protect the human rights of our citizens.”  Really?  Tell that to the millions of women forced to have abortions in service of China’s one-child policy, not to mention widespread forced infanticide.  Tell that to the hundreds of thousands of people brutally imprisoned in the Laogai gulag system (http://www.laogai.org/news/index.php), including Catholic and Protestant house church members, Falun Gong practitioners, and political prisoners.  Tell that to the families of those executed by the government without due process so as to harvest their valuable organs for profit in People’s Liberation Army hospitals. 

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