Not to be outdone by the Beijing-friendly Clinton State Department, Democratic senator Dianne Feinstein of California now weighs in with a true masterpiece of China-related moral equivalence. According to a short item in the February 5 Los Angeles Times, Sen. Feinstein recently gave a speech at the Asia Society on the question of human rights in Sino-U.S. diplomacy. It is a difficult issue, Feinstein believes. It requires study.
She proposes that our two nations study together. President Clinton and his Beijing counterparts, Sen. Feinstein told the Asia Society, should appoint a bilateral commission to chart “the evolution of human rights in both countries over the last 20 to 30 years.” Perhaps you thought this comparison had long since been resolved — by free elections and that sort of thing — in America’s favor. You thought wrong. The commission she proposes, the senator said, “would point out the successes and failures” of both sides: ” both Tiananmen Square and” — are you ready? — “Kent State.”
So Ohio national guardsmen, operating on the spur of the moment and without authority, open fire on Vietnam-era protesters in 1970, killing four of them. Chinese Red Army officers, in battle tanks, slaughter several hundred democracy advocates, on politburo instructions, in 1989. And a United States senator from California talks as if there’s no difference — between those specific events, or between the national political systems in which they took place.
Dianne Feinstein wins top honors in our 1997 Appease China Sweepstakes. She will retain her prize until some other fool (inevitably) says something even dumber.
