China has announced it is revoking the press credentials of three Wall Street Journal staff personnel from Beijing and these people have been ordered to leave the country within 5 days. They are deputy bureau chief Josh Chin, reporter Chao Deng, both from the US, and reporter Philip Wen, from Australia.
This expulsion, is among its harshest moves against foreign media in recent memory, and it stems from a WSJ editorial that China regards as racist, and discriminatory. Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Geng Shuang complained that the article has a “racially discriminatory” and “sensational” headline.
The article he is referring to is from the WSJ Opinion column By Walter Russell Mead Feb. 3, 2020 6:47 pm ET “China Is the Real Sick Man of Asia” which amounts to not much more than curmudgeonly spewed vitriol with a western skewed view of reality. It is a nothing piece that was hardly noticed, to date it has some 300 comments, most were probably published after China drew attention to the article. The point is nobody cared or really even noticed until China made an issue of it.
You can see for yourself here China Is the Real Sick Man of Asia it is a nasty piece. However, one must keep in mind that Chinese state controlled media has published far more and much worse in the way of vitriolic pieces against, as they would call the decadent US.
True the Wuhan government acted slowly, and was not prepared for such a crisis as this, but the national government stepped in and has done a great job of containing the spread of this new novel coronavirus.
The overreaction to this nothing article is more newsworthy than the actual 800 plus word piece of shit column that was written by the Bard College Professor. In fact, I’d have never even bothered to read it, especially with its crappy headline until Beijing steps in and makes a big deal out of this by expelling WSJ staff in retaliation. That’s right, the three being ordered to leave/deported work in The Wall Street Journal's news section, which is not linked to the editorial and opinion section at all. The newspaper's publisher, William Lewis, said "This opinion piece was published independently from the WSJ newsroom and none of the journalists being expelled had any involvement with it."
Here on the home front our US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo condemned the expulsions and expressed hope that China would one day allow its citizens "the same access to accurate information" that Americans enjoy.
"Mature, responsible countries understand that a free press report facts and expresses opinions" and "The correct response is to present counter arguments, not restrict speech" US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo
To date the new coronavirus epidemic has killed more than 2,000 people, infected more than 74,000 others, and has spread to at least two dozen countries.
The Chinese Government could have quietly complained to the WSJ and asked for an apology, keeping foot on as I would call the high ground. Instead they swing wildly and whiffed it here.
