CCTV FOLLIES 11.27 A SPECTRAL PRESENCE
Xi is not seen but he's never not there -Li Qiang learns invisibility of #2 -Trains, trains, trains -Gaza ceasefire -Syria hit by Zionist aggressor -Greece wants its marbles back! -US is a mess!
“The Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China Central Committee held a meeting to review guidelines on policies and measures for further promoting the high-quality development of the Yangtze River Economic Belt.”
“The meeting also deliberated a set of regulations on party leadership over foreign affairs.”
“Xi Jinping, general secretary of the Central Committee, chaired the meeting.”
editor’s note:
Today’s opening is interesting in the way it prioritizes the party over Xi Jinping. The party gets first mention, its personality-cult inflated chairman gets second.
Xi almost always gets top mention, so much so that the first three words out of the anchor’s mouth at the outset of the evening news is most predictably “XI JIN PING…”
Today’s narration, mirrored in the screen text below, introduces Xi in the fourth line. Minor stuff by most reckoning, but it’s the stuff of stiff editorial battles at CCTV.
“The regulations on the Party's leadership over foreign affairs are of great significance to the sound implementation of the policies, principles and strategic plans made by the Central Committee on external affairs, according to the meeting.”
“The meeting stressed the need to further strengthen the centralized and unified leadership of the Party Central Committee over foreign affairs, and accelerate efforts to create a sound system of laws and regulations on foreign-related matters. It emphasized the importance of implementing Xi Jinping Thought on Diplomacy in the whole process and every aspect of the work relating to foreign affairs to make greater contributions to safeguarding global peace and development and building a community with a shared future for humanity.”
A SHARED FUTURE FOR HUMANITY, BLAH, BLAH, BLAH.
To summarize, the party controls diplomacy and Xi guides the party with his profound thought. Xi remains omnipresent in the sense that his name, now used to describe a school of thought (Xi Jinping Thought) gets mention and frequent repetition whether he is AWOL or attends the meeting or not.
That’s the beauty of convincing the politburo (in this case a largely hand-picked one) to include your favorite catch-phrases as an integral part of the party plank. This is illustrated in the next story, describing an education campaign in Shaanxi Province. The story includes no pictures of Xi but brings to mind the importance of instilling his ideas with a mix of meeting shots and clouds hovering over the hills.
Xi has yet another earnest admirer…
When it comes time to mention the activities of number two (the most dangerous number in politburo politics) CCTV not only does not show Li Qiang’s visage but it doesn’t even run the standard line of text with his name in it as is the usual practice. It’s an admittedly small story, but every phone call or random note of congratulations penned by Xi gets its own captions.
Anchor readout: “Chinese Premier Li Qiang on Monday sent a congratulatory message to Christopher Luxon on his taking office as prime minister of New Zealand.”
Trains, trains and trains. Clearly one of the government’s flagship accomplishments.
State TV doesn’t mind tooting its own horn and saying so itself on.
A nice pictorial follows.
Gaza leads foreign news with scenes of a partial release of hostages on the ground.
Hamas wants to extend the cease-fire, Israel will comply if “Hamas releases more people.”
CCTV tends to avoid negative terms such as “kidnap victims” or “hostages.”
