CCTV FOLLIES 4.26 BLINKEN GETS SCHOOLED IN PRIME TIME!

Blinken meeting is top story! -Big propaganda win for Xi! -Blinken listens like a good pupil and takes notes -"Win-win and all-win" -China instructs the US to be a part of Xi's global humanity!

The opening shot says it all. Xi stands firmly center stage awaiting the foreign supplicant who must stride forward and reach out, as seen in the artfully blurred image of Blinken above. The camera work lends support to CCTV’s editorial line.

The handshake takes place.

A prized photo op follows.

And participants take their seats, with Xi commanding the head of the table and Blinken off to the side.

This creates a technical difficulty for the camera crew which films Xi straight on center screen but can only obtain profile shots of Blinken. Xi dominates the meeting.

-Xi proposes mutual respect, peaceful coexistence and win-win cooperation!

-Xi establishes the “three overarching principles for the relationship” which are lessons learned from the past and a guide for the future.

Xi stresses: “The finer details will fall into place when they are aligned with the bigger picture."

“The world today is undergoing transformation not seen in a century. How to respond to it is a question of the times and of the world.”

(ed. note:) Xi used similar language in his Moscow summit with Putin, only there he made it clear that he and Putin were essentially the agents of change, changes not seen in a century, changes that would enable them to rewrite the world order.

Blinken listens attentively like a good pupil should. The camera gets it just right.

Xi sticks to the high ground, the high-ground of high-falutin’ ideas that don’t mean much except as a rhetorical flourish, if they mean anything at all.

“The answer is to build a community with a shared future for mankind.”

As the Xinhua readout clarifies: “Xi’s vision has become a flag of China's foreign policy and has been welcomed by many countries.”

(ed note:) So now Xi’s vision is a flag. (along with rainbows, mists, mountains, waves, dams, etc)

“Planet Earth is only this big,” Xi sagely points out to Blinken. “Humanity is faced with so many common challenges.”

So far, classic Xi rhetoric. Empy, overblown phrases intended to blow away the listener, or at least short-circuit rational thought, with all visionary acclaim redounding to Xi.

And then the master of the pithy phrase goes one step further. He goes for the money shot, drawing on China’s long and glorious history to produce a timeless, albeit somewhat stale, fortune cookie of wisdom:

“As an old Chinese saying goes, "Passengers in the same boat should help each other."

Wow.

Scribble, scribble, scribble.

Blinken seems suitably impressed. He’s been to more Chinese-American restaurants than he can count, and he can’t recall ever getting that fortune cookie before.

Xi is kindly condescending and understanding of Blinken’s cognitive limitations as a mere American. He humors him, using easy-to-understand language, yet it is also all so very deep on account of China’s long history.

Xi: "Today, as I see it, dwellers of the same planet should help each other. We live in an interdependent world and rise and fall together. With their interests deeply intertwined, all countries need to build maximum consensus for win-win and all-win outcomes. This is the basic starting point for China to view the world and the China-U.S. relationship."

Win-win, one of Xi’s banal but predictable verbal tics, has apparently gotten an upgrade.

Now it’s “win-win and all-win.”

Like many a sage, senior statesman and spiritual leader before him, Xi uses a simple explanatory system to make it easier for Americans to grasp the profundity of his vision. It’s not exactly the four-fold path of the Buddha, or the five pillars of Islam, but it does have five pillars and it’s a mite better than the previous Four Cardinal Principles.

“There are five pillars for China-U.S. relations, namely, jointly developing a right perception, jointly managing disagreements effectively, jointly advancing mutually beneficial cooperation, jointly shouldering responsibilities as major countries, and jointly promoting people-to-people exchanges.”

“The five pillars should serve as the underpinning for the mansion of China-U.S relations.”

Wow.

Xi: “Major countries should behave in a manner befitting their status and act with broad-mindedness and a sense of responsibility.”

China obviously does that already, so he’s really addressing America’s shortcomings.

As the author of the thought, there’s the presumption that Xi ‘gets it’ and that creates a teaching moment. It is certainly not China under his command that needs prodding, but today’s America that needs to get with the program.

However, bearing in mind that Americans, too, think highly of themselves, he graciously makes the proposal more inclusive when he goes on to say:

“China and the United States should undertake responsibilities for world peace, create opportunities for the development of all countries, provide the world with public goods, and play a positive role in promoting global unity.”

"China is willing to cooperate, but cooperation should be a two-way street.”

Now there’s an original idea. Not fortune cookie material, maybe, but not bad.

“China is not afraid of competition but competition should be about progressing together instead of playing a zero-sum game."

Nice concept! Like the old propaganda line about China’s world-championship table tennis team that could decimate the opposition at will:

“Friendship first, competition second.”

(ed. note:) China has only gotten more competitive since then and it’s adopted increasingly a zero-sum, take-no-prisoners approach in seeking full spectrum dominance to be answered with abject submission in economic, military and diplomatic arenas.

Xi: “China is committed to non-alliance, and the United States should not create small blocs. While each side can have its friends and partners, it should not target, oppose or harm the other.”

Xi generously grants the US the right to have friends, but bristles at the idea of blocs, blocs being a collection of friends who might share the view that China is a threat.

“Xi stressed that, as a Chinese saying goes, "No progress means regress," it also applies to China-U.S. relations.”

Touché! Did Blinken jot that one down?

At last, Blinken gets in a few words….

According to the Xinhua readout, Secretary Blinken conveyed President Biden's greetings to President Xi.

“Blinken noted that since President Biden and President Xi met in San Francisco, the United States and China have made good progress in their cooperation in such areas as bilateral interactions, counter-narcotics, artificial intelligence and people-to-people exchanges.”

“The United States adheres to the one-China policy,” Blinken reassured Xi, using the usual obligatory boiler-plate terminology.

Blinken said that the Americans from all walks of life that he met during the visit all expressed the hope to see U.S.-China relations improve.”

Who are “the Americans” from “all walks of life” who Blinken met during the visit?

Blinken: “The United States does not seek a new Cold War. Nor does it seek to change China's system. It does not seek to suppress China's development, does not seek to revitalize its alliances against China, and has no intention to have a conflict with China.”

Thank you, Antony! China’s foreign ministry couldn’t have said it better!

According to Xinhua, the meeting ended on a positive note, with Blinken rattling off a series of reassurances. The compilation of talking points suggests that he was listening very carefully to what Xi said.

It also sounds suspiciously close to a recitation of Chinese Foreign Ministry party line.

Much of the seemingly innocuous language doubles here as diplomatic code that portrays China as the responsible partner while patiently educating the US on the correct line.

Blinken: “The United States hopes to maintain communication with the Chinese side, follow through on what the two presidents agreed in San Francisco, seek more cooperation, avoid misunderstandings and miscalculations, responsibly manage differences, and achieve stable development of U.S.-China relations.”

Well said, even if that just happens to correspond with what they want you to say.

To put the Blinken meeting at the top of the news demonstrates CCTV’s editorial confidence that it was a propaganda win for China.

Xi’s “Chinese lesson” to Blinken was beautifully portrayed. It contained classical allusions and ancient philosophy. It showed Xi to be patient, kind, wise and generous. As for talking points, everything went Xi’s way. On each and every intellectual issue he got the better of his interlocutor, which is to be expected, for Chinese viewers at least.

But even docile Chinese viewers wowed by this bravura performance on the part of their paramount leader still need to be hammered with more Xi propaganda before the half hour news program is over.

In other news, and there is other news, the news is all about Xi.

CCTV resorts to re-runs from earlier in the week to drive home the point that Xi is everywhere, all the time, setting China’s course, acting as the great national navigator.

Candid interviews conducted across China heap heated accolades of unsolicited praise on China’s mild-mannered leader—more than usual! There is not an interview aired that does not cite Xi as an inspiration. It’s one of those Xi days, Xi, Xi, Xi.

The emphasis on Xi leaves little room for other issues, but after a nice spread on China’s space program, truncated reports about Gaza, Ukraine and Japan economic woes follow.

The classic US-bashing segment at the program’s close which might be described as “bad news from a bad country,” is not quite so bad today, perhaps in recognition of Xi’s meeting with Blinken.

After all, did Xi not tell Blinken that "China welcomes a confident, open, prosperous and thriving United States?"

Instead of the usual stories about shocking gun violence, industrial pollution, street protests, racism, rampant homelessness, train derailments and fueling the fire in Ukraine, America gets off light today. A mere wrist slap.

Today it’s just money woes, energy woes, shipping woes and other bits of bad news from a bad economy. Enjoy!

Zai jian!

A postscript:

China’s charmless foreign minister Wang Yi pounded Blinken with five hours of strident rhetoric to soften him up for his audience with Xi. Wang set the tone by starkly warning the US side “not to step on China’s red lines” as seen in this excerpt from the 4.26 Guardian report on the Wang Yi meeting below.

A gloomy piece of footage captured via a pool camera operator (The camera in question did not enjoy the angle or illumination afforded to the front and center CCTV cameras) but it is illuminating in that it suggests that Xi was not exactly thrilled about meeting with Blinken.

Xi can been seen brooding and complaining. He paces the meeting hall with the dark solemnity of Alfred Hitchcock making a cameo in the minutes before Blinken’s arrival.

4.27 Update:

The scripted disrespect accorded to Blinken during his meetings with Wang Yi and Xi Jinping on April 26 was followed up by what has been called a diplomatic no-show at the airport.* Going against established protocol, Blinken didn’t get much of a send-off. He did, however, enjoy a quiet moment with US Ambassador Nicholas Burns.

There’s no reason why Blinken should be botherered personally, he’s a seasoned diplomat after all, but symbolically it’s a slap in the face for the country he represents.

update: Bonnie Glaser of the German Marshall funded tweeted:

“The claim that no Chinese official went to the airport to send off Blinken is not true. Chinese senior diplomat of Yang Tao, Director of N. America and Oceanic Affairs Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs was there to see Blinken off.”

Bonus material! Some world-class tea-leaf reading from an enigmatic podcast host who does not use her full name.

Lei’s Real Talk presented on April 27 offers a side-by-side comparison of the Xi-Blinken meeting last June with this week’s meeting.

Lei makes several interesting observations. Some of the commentary would be superfluous under better conditions, but given the sudden downward shift in US-China relations, these are the kind of little differences that can make a difference and will play out in non-trivial ways.

-Blinken (and Yellen before him) had their travel routed in a way that forced them to stop first in a coastal city before going on to Beijing. This indirect pilgrimage route supposedly harks back to old imperial practice of barbarian handling. It also hints at a lack of enthusiasm about the meeting.

-In more than five hours of talks with Wang Yi, the question of whether or not Xi would deign to see Blinken was left hanging in the air.

-Blinken was alerted by a high police official that Xi agreed to a meeting at the last minute

-Xi’s verbal greeting last year was polite, this time he doesn’t say hello

-Handshake is more abrupt this time

-Symbolism inherent in the floral decorations is less positive. Instead of lotus flowers, the floral display composed of “change-leaf wood” which is a leafy, poisonous plant. Wikipedia’s description of the plant, a kind of croton, says “when broken or cut, every part of Codiaeum variegatum will "bleed" and drip a milky, caustic sap.”

Not very pretty, and the symbolism is not so good, either. Maybe the unspoken message is that China can get prickly, so better to “handle with care.”

Meanwhile, there are contrasting images of Xi waiting to greet Blinken circulating on the web, some bright, others dark.

I was alerted by a sharp-eyed reader who goes by the Twitter tag “Lun” that the photos in question represent different dates.

Lei’s podcast clarifies the confusion by imprinting the different dates on the shots in question. Both meetings took place in the Fujian Hall. The well-illuminated shots are from last June, the gloomy shots are from the more recent meeting this week, though the two have been used interchangeably in much of the recent Blinken coverage.

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