IOC Admits Internet Censorship Deal With China

Dave writes "BEIJING (Reuters) — Some International Olympic Committee officials cut a deal to let China block sensitive websites despite promises of unrestricted access, a senior IOC official admitted on Wednesday. Persistent pollution fears and China's concerns about security in Tibet also remained problems for organizers nine days before the Games begin. China had committed to providing media with the same freedom to report on the Games as they enjoyed at previous Olympics, but journalists have this week complained of finding access to sites deemed sensitive to its communist leadership blocked. 'I regret that it now appears BOCOG has announced that there will be limitations on website access during Games time,' IOC press chief Kevan Gosper said, referring to Beijing's Olympic organizers. 'I also now understand that some IOC officials negotiated with the Chinese that some sensitive sites would be blocked on the basis they were not considered Games related,' he said." But yet somehow the mainstream media will ignore this because the Olympics are patriotic or something.

Comments

Re:Obama's shady dealings?

[Moryath]

For starters, his corrupt close relationship with a slumlord who's now in prison for bribery of Illinois officials, who just "happened" to then give Obama a $300,000 "deal" on a house and later another $600,000 "deal" on a plot of land next door to expand Obama's yard space.

And then there's the borderline illegal tactics Obama used to get into political office in the first place by preventing his opponents' names from being on the ballot, while Rezko was bankrolling his first campaign...

I've lived an hour from Obama's house. Trust me when I say I know him from the days before he went on this big campaign: the man is dirtier than a Lousiana mayor.

Re:No problem

[Neodudeman]

Actually, VPNs aren't banned. VPN's are really important for companies situated in China to reach out to the rest of the world. The government knows this, and willingly lets any packets tagged VPN through. If they didn't, many vendors would complain, and quite possibly leave China; and the Chinese government doesn't want that

Well Said!

[Moryath]

And to answer the PP:

So, he knew a guy who had a company that had one big financial issue, and did 5 hours of work for him in the 6 years he was in office. And this suddenly makes him a huge criminal?

No, he:
-actually refuses to release the records showing how much work he actually did.
-is on record as naming the guy as one of his "best friends."
-Got nearly a million dollars' "discount" from the guy on his house in two deals, in addition to extremely sizable donations to every one of his campaigns.

So he went out there and checked to make sure that their signitures on the ballots were taken in a legal method?

No, he tied up the petitions to get on the ballot in legal maneuvering till the due-date expired. Plus, keeping people off the ballot is what they do in socialist/communist countries like China and Cuba and Venezuela, not civilized countries.

I have no problem with a potential president who wants rule by law.

I'd love to have one. Too bad neither the Democrats nor Republicans are running one.

How does that make him dirtier than a guy who takes openhanded bribes and hides them in his freezer?

It makes him just as dirty. And you should, as the above responder mentions, instead be asking the question: why are the democrats running a guy this dirty?

Re:Well Said!

[demachina]

My God, media bias isn't something you can quantify in a study, its in the eyes of the beholder. You also have to decide where the middle is. The middle in the U.S. has moved dramatically to the right in recent years, since Reagan and especially since 9/11. The middle in most of Europe would be considered very liberal in the U.S. I think most of the world thinks the middle in the U.S. is now hovering dangerously close to right wing nut job.

The accuracy of the study was shredded when they said Fox wasn't biased. I'm sure when Fox is reporting generic wire news they don't have much bias, no one does, but everyone of their stars and commentators drips right wing bias, every time they cover politics they drip bias. Bill Kristol and Karl Rove are two of their star contributors, say no more. Rupert Murdock and Roger Ailes politics are well known and they created Fox News to carry news from their political perspective. They are constantly cheerleading the Bush administration and the Republicans. The night of the 2006 elections their entire election team was crushed because the Republicans got clocked and their run was over.

CNN was blatantly liberal biased when Ted Turned ran it, it was no secret. Since Turner was replaced by Time Warner and CNN was getting clocked by Fox their liberal bias completely evaporated, at least at CNN US. CNN International is still pretty liberal but its based in Europe, and Europe is extremely liberal compared to the U.S. I can barely tell CNN America from Fox any more, and the quality of their reporting has completely cratered. The New York Time is indisputably liberal, its one of the last liberal bastions, lucky for the right, newspapers are dieing. CBS and Katie I can't detect political bias because she is so fixated on human interest stories most of the time. Gibson and Williams again I can't see the bias, but maybe I'm biased, and there is so little editorial left on the network news anyway since Rather was beheaded.

"He ran with a bad story, and rather than admit that he'd been snookered, he kept screaming about how obvious forgeries were "genuine" till CBS had no choice but to axe him."

It wasn't a bad story, it was an accurate story which is how Rather tripped himself up. He knew it was true, he was desperate to influence the election and stop another four years of madness and stuck his neck out too far. The problem was all the original documents were destroyed by the Bushistas. They certainly were by the time Bush was governor of Texas since he controlled all his records as Governor of Texas. The forgery was described by the secretary for the Guard commander as being about right, it just wasn't the original unfortunately. The original was probably burned long ago.

"Bob Barr would make a decent candidate"

Excepting even the Republican party wouldn't nominate him because he is a Libertarian and a real conservative and the Republican party doesn't remember what real conservatism is any more, they've fallen so far. No telling what skeletons he has in his closet if he gets put under the microscope.

"You mean like Jimmy Carter? Obama is dangerously close to him both in policies and experience level. And you remember the damage Carter did to us in just four years."

Well, then like now the Republicans elected him by being so corrupt and morally bankrupt the voters were going to throw them out no matter who was running against them.

I don't remember Carter well enough to remember exactly how good or bad he was, and the post mortem on him is completely biased against him now. I remember the whole of the establishment, Wall Street, the military, Republicans hated him and worked to make him fail. They did the same thing to Kennedy, Clinton and Truman. Johnson destroyed himself with Vietnam. Unfortunately most of the people with the real power and money in the U.S. are conservatives and Republican's and they routinely do everything in their power to destroy liberal Presidents and they generally succeed because they h

Re:Obama's shady dealings?

[Reality Master 201]

Mmm. Well, first, the bit about "borderline illegal" tactics by Obama is just kinda bullshit. From the linked article:

Obama's challenge was perfectly legal, said Jay Stewart of the Chicago's Better Government Association. Although records of the challenges are no longer on file for review with the election board, Stewart said Obama is not the only politician to resort to petition challenges to eliminate the competition.

"He came from Chicago politics," Stewart said. "Politics ain't beanbag, as they say in Chicago. You play with your elbows up, and you're pretty tough and ruthless when you have to be. Sen. Obama felt that's what was necessary at the time, that's what he did. Does it fit in with the rhetoric now? Perhaps not."

So, by "borderline illegal," you mean, "a completely legal application of the electoral rules of Chicago that sounds fairly well in keeping with the political climate in the city?"

As for the Rezko thing, here's a better article (same author, more recent):
http://www.suntimes.com/news/watchdogs/757340,CST-NWS-watchdog24.article

A few months after Obama became a U.S. senator, he and Rezko's wife, Rita, bought adjacent pieces of property from a doctor in Chicago's Kenwood neighborhood -- a deal that has dogged Obama the last two years. The doctor sold the mansion to Obama for $1.65 million -- $300,000 below the asking price. Rezko's wife paid full price -- $625,000 -- for the adjacent vacant lot. The deals closed in June 2005. Six months later, Obama paid Rezko's wife $104,500 for a strip of her land, so he could have a bigger yard. At the time, it had been widely reported that Tony Rezko was under federal investigation. Questioned later about the timing of the Rezko deal, Obama called it "boneheaded" because people might think the Rezkos had done him a favor.

So, there's the $300k under asking price sale from a doctor in Kenwood, not Rezko. The next door purchase of the vacant lot seems odd, but then of course, Obama did buy a bit of land for $104,500.

So your assertion that they gave Obama a deal on the house is merely untrue. That the gave him another deal on the plot of land next door is inaccurate - they bought it for ~600k, but he only bought a chunk of it. The most you could say is that the Rezkos somehow bought the land at full price to buy off the doctor to get him to sell Obama the house more cheaply, but that's at best a circumstantial argument.

Further, one thing I didn't see is any allegation of quid pro quo for the supposed payoff.

I've lived an hour from Obama's house. Trust me when I say I know him from the days before he went on this big campaign: the man is dirtier than a Lousiana mayor.

I fail to see why I or anyone else should take you at your word about Obama's supposed dirtiness. I see one bullshitty allegation, and one allegation that may be shady or may just be a stupid move that's relatively innocent.