U.S. Senate passed the “China currency manipulation bill” around October. http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/10/11/senate-passes-china-currency-manipulation-bill/
You can find the text here. http://www.opencongress.org/bill/112-s1619/text
The action hints at Racism at its core, buried under layers of political procedural jargons. A few points for thoughts.
UPDATE: 2 graphs, Gold-Dollar price history vs. Gold-RMB price history:
Gold-USD: 1982: ~$400/ounce, 2012: ~$1700/ounce. (4.25 times increase)
Gold-RMB: 1982: ~25Yuan/g, 2012: ~380Yuan/g. (12.34 times increase)
Which makes RMB having depreciated about 3X against the USD since 1982. Which if you look at http://www.businessinsider.com/yuan-dollar-conflict-2010-4, is close to what the RMB have depreciated in exchange rate against the USD.
(1) Technically the bill isn’t even called “China currency manipulation bill”. It has a long benign sounding title, “S.1619 – Currency Exchange Rate Oversight Reform Act of 2011″. Note: No mention of China anywhere in the bill.
But, even more oddly enough, the bill only generally and vaguely describes its purpose as “To provide for identification of misaligned currency, require action to correct the misalignment, and for other purposes.” YES, for “other purposes” as in including every thing, thus the purpose is unstated. “Misaligned currency”?? My dollar is cheaper than it was 5 years ago. It doesn’t mean that the US government intends to compensate me for the loss of value.
What’s odd about it is, generally, all US laws contain the “intent”/problem statements, which describe the problem that the law is designed to fix, as specifically as possible, to allow proper interpretation of law later on.
But this bill only has 1 little sentence of the “other purposes” that it does not mention. And it uses the label “fundamentally misaligned”, to the same vague effect. Which country is really “fundamentally misaligned”?
Why is it being so vague, because wink/wink, it is really targeting China, and so, you don’t need a definition, a problem statement, or any objective standards, when you already know who is the intended target. (Oh yes, the bill also contains no details of any kind about what the effect was or going to be before and after the correction).
So to describe what the Bill says, it directs Political appointee A to issue a report, Congress edits, issues to White House, force it and the Commerce department to impose duties, ON CHINA. AKA, let’s tar and feather China Bill.
(2) The history of “Currency Manipulation”, as I have already commented, traces back to the label of “money manipulator”, a racist label used by Europeans against the Jewish People, as payment for lending money to European Kings/Queens, such as Edward I, (Edward Longshank), in the use of conquering other people, such as the Welsh (Edward I killed off Welsh royalties) and the Scottish (yes, Braveheart).
Similar to the current day, when European Kings/queens found themselves unable to repay their debts to the Jewish people, they called them “money manipulators” (but on top, then kicked them out of their countries.)
Shakespeare wrote in Merchant of Venice, a stereotypical devious money manipulator, Shylock, as wanting to extract the “pound of flesh” from decent Christians who only wanted to find true love and get married, (and of course, lawyers saved the day in the end).
Even in American history, anti-Semites attributed the American Independence War as due in part to the Rothchild’s bank in England for “money manipulation”.
Far fetched connection perhaps? Read on.
(3) the China currency manipulation Bill itself gives a clue to its true origin. At its end, it reads,
SEC. 15. REPEAL OF THE EXCHANGE RATES AND ECONOMIC POLICY COORDINATION ACT OF 1988.
The Exchange Rates and International Economic Policy Coordination Act of 1988 (22 U.S.C. 5301 et seq.) is repealed.
What it this other law of 1988, which is now apparently being repealed, or replaced by the “China currency manipulation bill”, you might ask?
Well, You can call it the “Anti-Japan Trade law” of 1988. http://uscode.house.gov/download/pls/22C62.txt
This law, actually named Japan, as an unfair trade manipulator.
Now, you see the pattern of racism and sore loser-ship, in 2nd act.
But why wasn’t that 1988 law good enough to be applied to China, as well? Because it actually contained a problem statement, that stated, “currency volatility” was a problem in 1988, and US wanted more stable currency.
Hint, hint: by having the 1988, US is actually admitting that itself was engaging in “currency manipulation” from 1988, at least against Japan.
(4) Here is the kicker: Who is the “currency manipulator”? Not China.
By definition, China’s currency “PEG” is a “currency stabilizer”, not a manipulator. China rarely changed its currency peg, and in the last few changes, it was nearly always moving toward in favor of other nations. It was also widely acknowledged that China’s stable currency prevented wider damages during the Asian currency crisis.
No, the true “currency manipulators” are in the banks, they want to “buy low”, “sell high” with the Chinese currency. China is actually preventing them from “manipulating” RMB to make money, so China’s peg is the “Anti-Manipulation law”.
In truth, “free market” that US touts, is the true “manipulator”. Ask Americans, most would say that their own banks are profiting by manipulating the market. So how “free” is this market? Not very. US government itself imposes all kinds of restrictions in “manipulation” by the banks, and European nations even investigate credit rating companies for unfavorable reports. If that’s not “thumbs” on the scale in their own favor of stability, I don’t know what is.
(5) The bottom line is, this Bill, like most acts of racism, is rooted in irrationality, disguised as rational action, buried under layers of political vagueness (disguised political correctness).
It would be obvious to any one that it would be racist, if the Bill had actually mentioned China by name.
but it didn’t. Yet, the US government doesn’t even have to wink, they openly call it “China currency manipulation bill” to the media.
Why? It’s basically akin to burning a cross, and everyone knows who is supposed to get the message.
Yes, calling China the “currency manipulator”, well rich with the historical context of that label, should be also clear, despite the vagueness of the Bill itself, what is to be done to “China”.
(the Bill, in that spirit, has provisions to stop all banks, public or private, within reach of US, including IMF, from lending money to any projects in China. NOT just companies that supposedly might be profiting from “manipulation”, but EVERY THING, including aid projects.)
Call it what you will, it is NOT some proportional rational response to specific definable problems or policies, but simply collective punishment on all of China, tar and feathering, and racist.
Charles Liu says
If you think about it, what is QE1, QE2, and the pending QE3? I think it’s hypocrisy for us to change the law, after the current law fails to qualify China with political label year after year.
While the real problem is with our own laders and policy makers.
zack says
see, this is why i believe the West, led by the US is determined to prevent China from ever becoming a peer power as the US; in fact, you can even make a case that the whole ‘copenhagen/carbon scare tactics/climate politics’ is aimed at preventing developing countries from being able to develop to the same status as the First World/West (since the traditional carbon energy commodity, coal and hydrocarbons are fairly efficient in terms of the amount of energy given off per kilogram of fuel) . Having said that though, i’m not a climate change sceptic, but i am very much in favour of China’s green policies and steering to dominate the green industry.
Which of course brings us to the newest broadside attack from the White Boys Club otherwise known as the US Congress + Friends; US business groups pressuring Congress to slap China with tariffs on green tech such as solar panels can only hurt US citizens who would benefit hugely from the green technology China is installing in the US; not to mention, China’s retaliation will cripple the US solar industry. See, Obama’s embarassed and pissed ever since his darling golden boy champion Solyndra done went belly up, unable to compete in the highly competitive environment of green tech.
am i seeing a recurring theme here? every time US companies fold in the face of superior competition, the President and other politicians bitch and moan about China ‘not playing fair’ or as obama said it ‘gaming the system’l what the fuck sort of accusation is that? how the heck has China ‘gamed the system’? if anything, it’s the US via currency manipulation such as QE1,2, 3(?) that’s been gaming the system especially as they’ve been hoodwinking the world with their priviliged role as the world’s reserve currency. Anyway, as Peter Lee from ATimes has pointed out, China assiduously follows the letter of the law in the WTO-so effectively that obama has to accuse them of ‘gaming the system’.
charles, you want to know what’s wrong with America’s leaders and policy makers, which is the same problem any Western country appears to have?
they simply don’t want to live in a world where the dominant ethnicity in the world is anything other than caucasian; even Russia is considered preferable by some since russians are caucasian. Now we can only hope that future generations let go of such ethnocentric and racist viewpoints but i won’t hold my breath. Perhaps giving the West their version of the ‘Century of Humiliation’ might force them to be a little more accepting. Might*.
TonyP4 says
US is currency manipulator by printing money recklessly. It helps US reducing its debt burden. However, USD is weakened and its status of reserve currency is numbered.
http://tonyp4idea.blogspot.com/2010/03/appreciating-yuan.html
pug_ster says
China is part of the problem in the US currency issue. Considering the amount of money that China invest in US’ useless treasuries, China is feeding into a losing investment. China should instead invest in itself by setting up several industries. They should be pumping at least 5 times of amount of money in its R&D and universities. They should be attracting more overseas professors and give them money for research in China’s universities. So many Chinese are buying LV bags and Buicks when China should be investing on building luxury brands or even middle tier brands.
FOARP says
@Raventhorn – There is no record that any-one ever used the term “money manipulator” as a slur against the Jewish people during the medieval and renaissance periods. In fact the term did not even appear in print until the late 19th century (see Google Ngrams). Looking at the etymology, the word “manipulator” was not even used in the sense of skilfully handling objects and people until the 1820’s – hundreds of years after the time of the Jewish expulsions. Instead the anti-Semitic epithet of choice during medieval and renaissance times was not “money manipulator” but “usurer” – meaning someone lending money at an excessive rate of interest.
Reading The Merchant of Venice as an anti-Semitic play is also debatable. Certainly many Shakespeare scholars (such as Israel Gollancz, for example) can and have read the play as sympathetic towards the character of Shylock.
Basically, I think you need to improve your fact checking, otherwise you are very likely to sound like you do not know what you are talking about.
The rest of this piece is mere opinion without supporting facts, and I doubt anyone but the already-converted is likely to be swayed by it, even if, like me, they believe this bill to be bad policy.
raventhorn says
@FOARP
I didn’t say the label was used during the Medieval and Renaissance periods, I said it traces back to that period, based upon the racist stereotypes from those periods in Europe, (as you wrote, “usurer”).
And I have no doubt that Shakespeare did have some sympathies toward Shylock, but also NO DOUBT that the character of Shylock play up to the anti-Semitic stereotypes of the time. As I said, IT PORTRAYED the Stereotype which the word “money manipulator” traced back to!!
Basically, I don’t know what “fact checking” you are complaining about, if you are going to write a bunch of assumptions of your own that don’t match what I wrote.
“The rest of this piece is mere opinion without supporting facts, and I doubt anyone but the already-converted is likely to be swayed by it, even if, like me, they believe this bill to be bad policy.”
Well, that’s up to you. I have supporting facts from the Bill itself, its own vagueness, its own origin from an “Anti-Japan trade law”.
If that’s not enough for you, I’m not here to please your standards. It’s all my opinions any ways, it’s not meant to be gospel for anyone. Reasonable people can disagree, (unless you just want to disagree for no particular reason, based upon your own personal assumptions).
I just find it funny (and illustrative) that the word “manipulation” is NOT even in the Bill, but that’s what they are calling it in the government and in the media.
It makes me wonder why a “democracy” would do such a “untransparent” thing.
But hey, perhaps, let’s just call this policy, “stereotype manipulation”, instead of “racism”, but we all know what that means, right?!
🙂
LOLZ says
There is definitely racism in the US, especially against people of Chinese descent. A more recent example of this is Danny Chan. China is also unfairly being singled out as the main culprit of US’ economic decline. However, labeling China as a “currency manipulator” is hardly racist. Hypocrisy maybe, but not racist. Given the fact that China will continue to adjust its currency much like every other country does, calling China a “currency manipulator” won’t even change the way china behaves. This whole thing have more to do with domestic US politics in a very partisan atmosphere. US politicians want all to appear like they have this magical silver bullet which will solve US’ economic woes without any party sacrificing or taking risks. The American people are continued to be told of a partial story by a rather lazy media who clearly doesn’t want people to understand in fearing of losing customers.
silentvoice says
I’m with LOLZ in thinking the bill is not an example of racism. However, I do believe the current environment will increase anti-Chinese feelings and contribute to racism.
While I was in the States, most of the racism I’ve encountered (as an ethnic Chinese) were from African Americans and Hispanics, not Caucasians. I have no idea why.
LOLZ says
Most of the caucasians in the US have learned to be politically correct. Getting caught with a racial slur in public may be career ending. That is not to say that they are not prejudiced, but most are taught to keep prejudices to themselves. Asian Americans are the least politically correct IMO but at the same time the least racial conscious. Blacks and Hispanics tend to be racially sensitive when it comes to others talking about their race, but are less so when they are talking about other races.
pug_ster says
Personally, I think many Americans in general don’t think there’s is racism towards asians in general therefore not racial conscious towards them. One of my Jewish co-workers makes fun of my Chinese name all the time. A few years back I worked in a place where there’s not alot of Chinese living there and there’s these 2 women co-workers consistently made fun of my Chinese heritage. I finally got fed up and told my boss about it, and these 2 co-workers had to take some kind of ‘racial sensitivity’ course. But they didn’t apologize to me about it, instead thought it was my fault for them taking the class. In any case, I quit this job a few months later and moved out of that city altogether.
raventhorn says
@LOLZ
Hypocrisy, definitely, but I still think there is something more to it.
perhaps we can at least agree it is some “xenophobic desire to scapegoat foreign conspiracy”, ie. targeting non-Western “alien” nations/cultures for blame, ie. targeting Japan in 1980’s, and now China.
At the very least, this Bill is playing up to the public xenophobia of China (which is similar to the 1988 law playing up to the xenophobia of Japan at the time).
If one is to carry that logic to the logic of the Western Expats (Duck, Geek, “Fear of A Red Planet”, etc.), that’s just Nationalism based in Racism, sponsored by the US government.
And Pug is right, they don’t even see it as racism, (but they look for it in other nations).
pug_ster says
Also, the only reason why the death of Danny Chan got that kind of publicity was the way the guy died while serving the country. And initially they didn’t get that much attention initially until the appeal from their parents and from an Chinese association. What is kind of sad is that there is little if any attention from the politicians of racial problems from local and state officials. Racially motivated killings and beatings of Chinese are commonplace and they are reported in the Chinese newspapers in the US while ignored by the Western Propaganda in general.
Ray says
I still remember when the Euro first came out it is designed to be 1 to 1 to the US$. Today it is 1.3, does it mean US export has jumped by 30% to Europe? So in reality the labelling of China as a currency manipulator to aid export is the biggest propaganda ever. Yen also rise from Y120 to Y80 today. Again, it did not help US export. The US public refuse to see that the real manufacturing competitor to them is the European and Japanese which actually have similar pay level to them. The fact that the US$ has lost around 30%-40% of its value to the Yen, Euro and RMB over the last ten years is lost on them as well.
zack says
the sad fact is thatr it’s not going to matter if a handful of intelligent americans try to explain the US China trading relationship and how intertwined both economines are; the financial/media elite in the US have designated China as public enemy no. 1 , so that’s how it’s going to stay until the media/propaganda assault ends
colin says
“they simply don’t want to live in a world where the dominant ethnicity in the world is anything other than caucasian”
Yep, that’s the underlying factor to everything. Though I don’t really blame them. Anyone would probably do the same thing in their position, though I wish there was more of an effort to actually live to enlightened ideals they preach so loudly, but ends up so lacking in reality.
As the US once said, to paraphrase, “The is our (Chinese) currency, and your (American) problem”. Every currency is manipulated by the originating country. The fact the this issue is still as popular as it is speaks to the utter failure of our government to even admit the problems, let alone try to solve them. While we’re casting hooks in all the wrong directions, China is quietly and determinedly going about their business trying to overcome their problems and indeed catch and even surpass the developed world in many areas.
“While I was in the States, most of the racism I’ve encountered (as an ethnic Chinese) were from African Americans and Hispanics, not Caucasians. I have no idea why.”
African’s and hispanics generally will display racism more crudely and overtly, the only way they can. Caucasians display racism more subtly in the corporate offices, boardrooms and other venues. That glass ceiling? While I admit some of it for asians (and other minorities) are legitimately due to cultural differences and background, a large part is simply due to racism.
LOLZ says
raventhorn says
@LOLZ
on 1 point of defining “Currency stabilization” vs. “currency manipulation”:
I do believe the whole article was about what currency manipulation is and isn’t!! Thus, I did define it.
and I also defined currency stabilization as a prevention of currency rate fluctuation by a PEG. If that’s not good enough for “Jimmy”, that’s his problem.
On that note: Did Congress bother to define “currency manipulation” in a bill it calls “currency manipulation”? NOPE! There is no criteria in the bill to determine what “currency manipulation” is.
For a Bill that itself fails to define a problem that it purports to solve, shows everything about the flimsiness of its purpose, and by consequence, suggest ulterior motives.
Logically, if one can’t even define a problem that one is “trying to solve”, one is acting for some other reason than solving the “problem”.
But I guess some people are happy with Congress going on xenophobic witchhunts for the “witches” who are causing the bad harvest in “currency”.
Gives new meaning to “voodoo economics”, eh? 🙂
raventhorn says
Oh, also to JIM/JIMMY:
We have our definition of “harmony”, for examples, see policy https://hiddenharmonies.org/faq/.
Perhaps you missed it.
We are not here to please your personal definition of “harmony”, which you have not defined.
dan says
@LOLZ#16
‘…You get dozens of blogs where people are screaming at China, arguing posts after posts why it should change to better suit Western interests/perspectives already. ..’
Not only blogs but main stream media. Now they are trying to redefine ‘What is Chinese Language’ and some western linguists even propose that Chinese writing should be Romanized for others to learn since Chinese characters are so difficult for non-Chinese to remember.
One wonders what is next on these people agenda about China.
raventhorn says
@colin
“As the US once said, to paraphrase, “The is our (Chinese) currency, and your (American) problem”. Every currency is manipulated by the originating country.”
in the 1988 law mentioned above, US government authorized Federal Reserves and US banks to “stabilize currency volatility”. With Reserve currency manipulation.
*
But if you want to compare real currency value, compare Gold-Dollar vs. Gold-RMB exchange prices history. I will put up the graphs above.
silentchinese says
I am really surprised that people actually try to make a rational argument against this congressional bill.
this is a congressional bill.
what is the last time U.S. Congress did any thing rational?
raventhorn says
@silentchinese
🙂 Quite right.
It’s like arguing with a block of moldy cheese.
However, as I said, this Bill was particularly badly written, so bad, that it doesn’t even contain or define the words that it’s being called in public.
Or as the Chinese saying going, “Hang Goat’s Head, Sell Dog’s Meat”.
silentchinese says
If China really wants to solve the problem…
a better option for china’s reserve is to spend some of that reserve hiring some top notch K street lobbying firm to bribe a dozen senators. 10 million$ each would only cost about 1 billion total to buy the entire US senate. and 10 million is more than any big corporation would spend on a single senator.
couple of key donations to all the house represenatives (let’s say a 2 million each) would would also garantee their support on issues.
that’s 2 billion,
2 billon $ a year garantee US congress doesn’t do anything stupid? that is nothing. money well spent.
silentchinese says
and then 1 billion every 4 years (split amongst the two party candidate, 500 million is big number for a presidential campaign) to prevent the presidential candidate doing anything stupid.
that’s 2.25 billion dollars a year for the entire American Federal Government. cheap.
silentchinese says
Above is the carrot part.
As the Stick part.
US Supreme Court garantees 1st amendment rights to corporation, so Just register CIC as a corporation in Delaware,
then make it clear to any law makers in congress that any of these stupidity would result an unlimited war chest paying for their opponent’s attack ads in their district. all year along.
silentchinese says
Your approach is wrong.
these people has no shame, so shame them with facts and rational argument would not work.
see my suggestion above.
Carrot and Sticks.
raventhorn says
@silentchinese
Doubly ironic, Silentchinese,
I think my approach is the carrot, and your approach is the stick! 🙂 I consider lobbying as dirty politics, a form of stick.
silentchinese says
Your goal is trying to make irrational people rational.
“My Goal” is to stop stupidity on particular issues.
I do not hold hope that these people can be made sensible, as the system stand.
actually William Cooper’s execellent if bit dense critique on destructive nature of individualism and how that is now underpinning the entire western social-economic-political system would be a good thing to read at this point. as it points to the question “why”.
raventhorn says
@silentchinese
“I do not hold hope that these people can be made sensible, as the system stand.”
Well, that’s why we have my “carrot”, and your “stick”. Obviously, they are going to have different methods, whether to convince them or force them.
But I wouldn’t call these “goals”.
And you might be right, my method might be futile. (but I would hesitate to brush “these people” as all insensible).
zack says
you guys are assuming American democracy functions the way it’s supposed to function on paper; in reality it’s nothing more than a plutarchy where power and money are concentrated amongst a caste of WASP (White Anglo Saxon Protestant) Americans. Don’t believe me? why would any impartial democracy have powerful political families like the Bushes, Kennedys, Clintons, Shrivers, etc and why would they have such deep connections to major investment firms and Steel and oil companies?
Wayne says
@zack
An interesting point I heard the other day. In the US the corporations and banks control the government. In China at least the Government owns and controls the banks and big corporations, and can order them to act in the interests of the country.
In the US, the government acts in the interests of the big corporations and banks – afterall who were both Obama’s biggest campaign donor was Goldmann Sachs, who also contributed to McCain.
Many American people generally hate the idea of their lives being controlled by these Wall Street Banksters. But they are as powerless to change this as they claim Chinese are powerless to change their leaders. But at least China’s leaders act mainly in the interests of the country. America’s leaders act and even go to war for the benefit of the big corporates.
So really who is more ‘democratic’?
raventhorn says
@zack
Even a plutacracy can be swayed by opinions. And Rich powerful families are not stupid enough to ignore sense. Stupidity is not how they maintain their wealth and power.
We don’t need to sway the reason of the mindless droning masses of “democracy”, who are slaves to the system.
raventhorn says
@Wayne
The logic of “trickle down economy” Capitalism is no different in principle than basic Feudalism, where the rich owns the resources and trickle the wealth down to the poor by patronage.
This kind of system has been around since the earliest of human civilizations.
Modern Capitalism thinks of itself as a new invention, but it is not. It perhaps mixed in some principles of Colonialism, where one can seek out “new territory” and acquire new monopolies of resources, thus becoming new Feudal lords, (For example, internet commerce, where Google and Facebook have become the new Feudal lords in a new economic territory).
People don’t really have private property rights in any case. (It is a legal fiction).
The US Constitution 5th Amendment “Public Taking”/Eminent Domain, is acknowledged by US Supreme Court as defining the “PUBLIC”/Sovereign/King/etc. as the final holder of property rights for all properties.
In that, if you don’t pay property taxes, (or rent), they can take it away.
If you don’t obey the zoning laws, they can condemn your house, and then take it away.
And sometimes for no good reasons, they can take it away, (and build a shopping mall on it).
That’s no different than how the Kings of Europe used to treat the Property in their Kingdom.
Charles Liu says
@Wayne
There’s a documentary by Michael Moore, “Capitalism, A Love Story”. See for yourself much influce Goldman Sachs had in financial regulation in the last 20 years:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4BhQtsnc0zM
Wayne says
@Charles Liu
Thanks for the heads up Charles. Will definitely check out the video.