This footage of the rioting in Tibet is raw and harrowing. It's also, for the most part, not being seen in China where authorities have blocked access to YouTube.com, which has many videos on Tibet.
The Internet as a liberating force? Not always. [..]
The whole thing is a bloody mess as the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing draws near. I think a vast majority of people have no stomach for another boycott -- most Americans would rather defeat evil on the athletic field, as Jesse Owens did in Berlin in 1936, than take our ball and go home, as Jimmy Carter did in 1980. That said, I'd like to see freedom-loving people, from the U.S. and elsewhere, figure out how to make some kind of statement this August.
PARIS (AP) - Moves to punish China over its handling of violence in Tibet gained momentum Tuesday, with a novel suggestion for a mini-boycott of the Beijing Olympics by VIPs at the opening ceremony.
Such a protest by world leaders would be a huge slap in the face for China's Communist leadership.
France's outspoken foreign minister, former humanitarian campaigner Bernard Kouchner, said the idea "is interesting."
Sadly, I can't see anyone in the Bush administration going along with that idea...especially when we owe China so much. I guess that oppressing their citizens, violence and actual weapons of mass destruction, that's not so important, when they underwrite your loans.
