Tuesday, May 6, 2008

May 4th, Feloy Square.



May 4th is international youth day. In this day, Youth of China in the U.S got together to support China and the coming Olympic. Here is a vedio of what was happening.

Monday, May 5, 2008

Jarhead

“Jarhead” is adapted from Anthony Swofford’s best-selling novel of the same title in 2003. The Author is the former marine and serviced in the First Gulf War. Directed by Sam Mendes, who directed “American Beauty,” and its script written by William Broyles Jr., who is the former marine as well, this movie is based on Swofford’s pre-Desert Storm experiences in Saudi Arabia.

The movie starts from a group of “Jarhead,” freshman soldiers who have the haircut similar to the jar shape, are sent to the desert in Saudi Arabia to training and prepare for fighting in Kuwait. They don’t know where their enemies are, but just accept the training and wait for next order in the arid desert day after day. At first, they eager to kill enemies in a real battle; however, they spend most of time to waiting for a battle coming. During the long wait, they just play football, read the letters or pornography from hometown, and get drunk to waste their time and energy. After the long wait, operation of the Desert Storm, they are finally dispatched to the Saudi-Kuwaiti border to practice the military campaign. They walk through the desert, see the burned oil wells, the battle-destroyed ruins and the causalities, but still face no enemy in person. After the war, they join the parade celebrating the victory of war. And their good mood is disturbed by a Vietnam veteran suffering from the memories of the war experiences. Afterwards, they come back home and keep going on their lives, but still have the effects of war.

Basically, this movie is an anti-war movie. Anti-war movies often denounce the brutality of war, and praise the development of friendships from battle via displaying realistically the war scenes. For example, in “Black Hawk Down,” it takes almost over 100 minutes to rebuild the real battle scenes. However, unlike other anti-war movies, “Jarhead” just describes the visceral mentality of soldiers in the war- the endless and aimless waiting.
The marines in the film are not so brave and skillful as the press reports before. They always wait for the command, repeat the military training, play footballs, read letters and pornography to waste their time. Waiting is a whole part of their lives. They are always waiting for next order, next letter, and next mission. There is no battle and killing scene in the movie, except some dead bodies. Even in the end of the war, the marines still don’t encounter any enemy. They are frustrated and anxious, and only they can do is shooting to the sky. After they come home, they still have to try to get used to the normal life and to forget the experiences from the desert. Ironically, they don’t really know what the war really is, but still suffer from the effects of war. This movie points out that the brutality of the war for soldiers is not cruel killing in the battle but endless and aimless waiting during the war and alienation from the real life after the war.

Differing from the former anti-war films, the director uses different techniques to present this film. He doesn’t use the magnificent background music as former war films but use rock music instead. And he uses hand-held camera and fast-rhythm editing to express the anxiety of marines. The director emphasizes on that these marines are not fighting for any humanitarian cause; instead, they don’t know who they are fighting against and they are dying in frustrated and anxious feelings.
The movie uses some elements of classic war movies to make metaphors. For example, a group of soldiers watch the village attack scene in Francis Coppola’s “Apocalypse Now.” For another example, one soldier plays “The Dear Hunter,” but he finds that the content is about his wife having sex with his neighbor. And then he is close to breakdown immediately. On the one hand, the scenes express that these soldiers cannot go to the real battles, they only can watch the Vietnam War movies to be satisfied with the present situation. On the other hand, thee scenes describe the soldiers’ anxiety about the relationship with their lovers. They are afraid that their relationship would be broken up because of the war.

In this movie, it satirizes the credulity of news reports. Staff sergeant forces the unit to wear NBC (an acronym of nuclear, biological, and chemical) suit and play football in high temperature in order to show the good equipment and the discipline of military when the reporters come. However, when the cameras roll, the marines don’t play the game but do some sex-intention actions. Staff is embarrassed by their actions that show poor disciplines. He removes cameras and punishes his crew later.
This scene reflects that the news reporting can be designed and lack of credulity. The report of war shows “the reality of war” might be just propaganda. We cannot just totally believe the news because the news can be made up for political purpose.
For another example, after the marines come back hometown, they join the parade celebrating the victory of war. People admire and welcome the brave and royal soldiers coming back home. People don’t know the real situation the soldiers meet in the war, the only source of information they can get is from the press reporting. The gap made from the press reporting is not only between the reality and audiences but also between soldiers and the public.
Another interesting point is the interview of individual marine. Someone is conservative to respond the formal answer that he’s glad to fight for justice. Someone is excited about joining the war. Someone keeps quite to express his compliant. Someone misses his relatives and home. And the main character, Anthony Swofford, says that he is scared and regrets to join the war. This not only breaks up the normal image of the marines that is always with one voice, but also reveals that the speech would be controlled by military. The movie shows the duality of the press reporting-it can manipulate or disclose the reality.


“Jarhead,” as an anti-war movie, doesn’t accuse the cruelty of war. It just reflects the mentality of some soldiers. “Welcome to the suck.” is their comment to the nature of the military life. These soldiers waste their time waiting, don’t know what they fight for and who they fight against, and even don’t really encounter any enemy. After the war ends, they feel alienated to the public and still suffer from the memories of war. It seems to be absurd but it’s really happened. In addition, the reality of war is not the same as the press reporting reveals. The information of war can be designed and recombined. This makes a gap between the public and the soldiers. This movie makes some links to the Vietnam War and the First Gulf War, and breaks up the myth of hero soldiers and the war of justice. Just like the character Anthony Swofford says, “Every war is different, every war is the same,” now America encounters another war in the Middle East. The movie seems to warn not to make the same mistake again.

Critiques of the bias of media

The main point of “Representation of Class” is that the media deliberately blur the boundary of social classes and attempt to present classlessness and individual class mobility. The media extol the merits of the riches and blame the poor people for their defective personalities. The only resolution of the poor is pursuing “American Dream,” that is, the poor people or the minority can achieve self-transmission by means of diligent working. The middle-upper class lifestyle is the classic pattern of representation of class on the media.
In Joseph Turow’s book, Breaking up America: Advertisers and The New Media World, there is the similar point of view as this article. At the standpoint of Advertising, the media target the middle-upper class which might consume a part of their disposable income in particular lifestyle activities, as well as the riches, so “Upscale” has become the mainstream of the media until now to lure the affluent audiences or the audiences who want to satisfy their fantasy.
As a result, “Hypercommercialism” is a big issue to the media. Advertisers and marketers encourage people to consume luxury products or services which are not really necessary for their daily lives via the media. “Upscale” is still the favorite content in the current media. The media manipulate “lifestyles” as a commercial intrigue to trap audiences into high-consumption, and produce the special formats, such as reality shows and product placement, to send commercial messages to the audiences. Consumers are not easy to escape from the customized, targeted, persuasive messages from the media bombarding, and even enjoy themselves in these products. For example, “Amazing Race” provides big prizes to the competitors to increase the dramatic effects and attract the audiences. On the other hand, these prizes also disseminate their providers’ brands to the audiences. Take Hollywood films for another example, the actors use high-tech or luxury products that show their brands to attract the audiences. There is the same technique applied to the TV shows. Advertisers try to create perceived-to-be status symbols to drive the consumers to buy these products that make them more access to the celebrities. In the past, the audiences could choose to skip the commercials, but now the audiences are exploited their options for the formats and the contents without commercials. They even accept commercials unconsciously and indulge themselves in this marketing strategy.
Another notice point is “Celebrity-oriented” phenomenon of the media. “American Idol,” “Who Wants to Be A Millionaire,” “The Apprentice” are based on American Dr6eam spirit. The TV programs as shortcuts help common people become rich and famous by means of their intelligence and diligences. The shows present the glory of the celebrities and make the audiences agree with the merits of the riches and the celebrities. And another kind of TV programs is adverse-operation of celebrity-oriented shows. For example, in “The Simple Life,” Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie, who are two upper-class girls, do various internships in a road trip. The show seems funny that the audiences can see the celebrities make a fool of themselves. However, the audiences just feel themselves more close to the celebrities by means of watching this reality show. This show does not really degrade the celebrities, but acclaims they are the same as common people instead. It does not apparently extol the merits of the celebrities, but tries to eliminate the dissatisfaction of the celebrities.
On the one hand, the media cover up the socioeconomic diversity to ignore social inequity. On the other hand, the media try to differentiate the audience segments to target potential customers more accurately. In order to target accurately various consumers’ lifestyles, “both competing and cooperating, the executives searched for ways to exploit social rifts they perceived in the nation at large.” The advertisers and the media label Americans, create targeted formats to signal an interest in the specific audiences and tailor to the contents of advertising and the media with new interactive technologies and the responds of the consumers in order to attract the correct potential consumers and exclude the wrong ones. For example, the TV channels divide into different themes to target specific audiences according to different lifestyles. BET (Black Entertainment Television) is a classic black media that targets African Americans. And MTV VH1 targets the twenty-five- to thirty-four-year-old audiences who would be upscale and hip. As a result, the fragmental media will lead to more fractional American society.
This differentiation of American society results in social alienation. The fragmental media respond to social fractionalization and strengthen social diversity. As a result, the media are responsible for social alienation. For example, when we concentrate on watching our favorite TV channels or TV shows, we may overlook other issues which are worthy to care about. Moreover, we may feel annoyed or disturbed by other formats or content we are not interested in. The alienation will undermine the link of interpersonal relationship and the entirety of society. Ironically, American society is composed of diverse cultures and races, but it is gradually losing the macroscopic perspective of a whole society. The audiences have audiovisual identities to choose their favorite contents, but ignore the considerations of other the same important interests.
In conclusion, the bias of media presents not only the representation of class but also the differentiation of society. In hypercommercialism media culture, the media praise the upscale lifestyle of the riches and the celebrities. The media manipulate the upscale lifestyle to drive common people to consume luxury products and ignore social inequity. At the meantime, they also set up the audience segments, customize and tailor to the commercials massages for various audiences. The media present classlessness and individual class mobility; however, they create a more fractional society. Although the interests of commercials is one of the most important economic supports of the media, they should notice this ethical crisis and not to deteriorate the social inequity and the audience segmentation.

Is Fox’s “24” political-oriented or just entertainment?

MSNBC's Keith Olbermann criticized that Fox’s drama “24” is a sort of propaganda to keep citizens in fear of domestic terrorism to advocate Bush’s anti-terrorism policy. There are many terrorist attacks in the city in the U.S., such as suicide bombs in the mass transportation. The background and plots are too closed to our daily lives. He questioned that if this drama has a political orientation to lead people to support military activities to anti-terrorism.
In addition, other criticizers complained about that the plots of abusing detainees have negative influences to the military- some military investigators might do the techniques they have watched on television before. Furthermore, some people worried about that these tortures indicated “that the letter of the American law must be sacrificed for the country’s security- was hurting and encouraging real-life U.S. soldiers to think about that torture is acceptable.”
Is “24” really political propaganda, or a bad example to the U.S. military, or just entertainment we don’t have to be too serious? Does the TV show have to pay attention to its plots that cannot violate the norm or basic spirits of nation, or the producers have rights to produce whatever contents they want except violating the laws?
In my point of view, I don’t think we should be too serious to this drama. The TV dramas often do exaggerative performances and have unreality plots to attract the audiences. The audiences can have fulfillments and achievements via the behavior of the actors that the normal people cannot experience in their daily lives. The dramas are fictional, not realistic. After 911, many events would be looked too political. Anti-terrorism is emphasized by the media. However, the political view cannot interfere in the entertainment.
On the other hand, some army trainers is angry about the plots about torture hurting the reputation of military and give soldiers a bad example to learn. Admittedly, torture and abuse in the real life are criminal and violate human rights. However, in the drama, they are just the attraction for the tensional and dramatic entertainment purpose. We can worry about that these plots are not appropriate for children, but adults can have their own judgments to tell from reality and fiction.
Syracuse University media scholar Robert Thompson said such TV melodrama, while shocking to some, serves as a kind of wish fulfillment for the masses. “If you can’t be shown kicking the enemy’s butt in real life, we then demand it in fiction. And that’s what’s so satisfying about ’24.’ It’s the Lone Ranger fantasy,” Thompson said. ”So while I would never want to support the kinds of torture that go on in ’24’ in real life, I would miss them if they went away in the show.”
In conclusion, the TV shows have their rights to create fictional, even absurd plots to allure the audiences to watch them in order to raise the ratings, as long as they don’t violate the regulation. For example, “Desperate Housewives” have many plots about murders, affairs, sick mentality. However, there is less criticism to this drama than “24.” We don’t have to be too serious and critical to the subjects about the terrorism and military activities in this show. “24” just adapt today’s news for the tension of the drama.

Say Everything

Since the blogs become popular, more people put their personal information on their blogs, such as pictures, albums, diaries, and videos, etc. The attitude to privacy transfers from keeping personal affairs in privacy to expressing ourselves by personal styles. About this transformation, the author claims that since the real privacy become utopian because whatever we do can be tracked, the young generation has changed their attitudes to personal information. They “show off” their personalities via editing blogs to grasp more people’s attention, document their daily lives, and establish the bridge to others.
First, I don’t think people who are willing to express themselves on internet are bold and don’t scruple others’ opinions. Some people would use the blogs as their rostrums to announce their opinions, share their thoughts, and even state some speeches they have no chance to speak up to others in the real life. On the one hand, they can write publicly whatever they want on internet to express their thoughts to their friends or other invisible audience. On the other hand, they are protected by indirectness and anonymousness so that they can avoid face-to-face responds. They don’t have to receive the immediate reactions. They are not shine, but they are not bold and show-off as we thought before.
Second, do people reveal the real life on internet or just make up the life they want to be in? Admittedly, some people won’t hide themselves and are willing to show imperfect pictures on blogs. However, most people will pick up the pretty, dreamlike, and aesthetic pictures to exhibit themselves. The blogs are like the ideal-life exhibitions more than the real-life documents. People select the pictures and the thoughts that they want the public to see in order to shape the images they want the public think about them and correspond to the expectations they give themselves.
As for the connection between users on internet, the blog users might build the connection between themselves via responds and replies the contents. The connection may not be limited to different regions; however, the connection is so fragile. They can express themselves easily, but they can hide the real selves much more easily. The connection won’t be solid if it bases on the unreal foundation. It is possible that when we meet someone we know from internet, and then we find he’s not the person we thought. The connection based on internet is wild but unreliable.
Finally, should people be judged by the information you put on internet? I think the performance on internet is as the same as in the real life. Since we choose this kind of expression and cannot stop others googling us from internet, we have to bear others judge us from that. That’s the way we show who we are and it becomes a part of our lives. We cannot distinguish the two lives so separately. We still have to be responsible for our behavior.

Sunday, March 23, 2008

Truth

March 14th, 2008, riots happened in Tibet. Many harmless people were killed. Buildings and cars were burnt. Many of Chinese consulates were destoried by exiled Tibets... I made this video to record this riots and expose the truth.


Tibet


I did my best to avoid bias in this video. I just want to show some fact and let my audiences to tell the truth themselves.

A policy reform topic beyond rural China’s health system

In the 1970s, China was the first large nation in the world to develop a nationwide rural health insurance system. At that time, China emphasized prevention and public health for rural health care based on community financing schemes called the Rural Cooperative Medical System (RCMS), making essential drugs and basic health care widely available, and creating an organized three-tiered health care delivery system of village health posts, township health centers and county hospitals From that time, China’s rural health system is characterized by a 3-tier structure – county health facilities (Including county hospital, disease prevention station, maternal and child health center), township health centers, and village health posts. Under the RCMS, the financing of health care relied on a pre-payment plan. Most villages funded their RCMS from three sources:(1) premiums-depending on the plan’s benefit structure and the local community’s economic status, 0.5 to 2 percent of a peasant family’s annual income was paid to the Fund; (2) the collective welfare fund—each village contributed a certain portion of its income from collective agricultural production or rural enterprises into a welfare fund, according to State guidelines; (3) subsidies from higher-level government structures. In most cases, this subsidy was used to compensate health workers and purchase medical equipment. By the mid-1970s, about 90 percent of China’s rural villages, called “communes” at the time, were covered by RCMS schemes. This community financing and organization model of health care was believed by many to have contributed significantly to China’s success in accomplishing its first ‘health care revolution’

Since the 1980s, China has moved away from central planning towards a market economy, a trend that is also reflected in the health system. Along with growing commercialization within the economic sector, access to health care has been increasingly dictated by ability to pay. In rural areas, the transition from agricultural collectives to what is termed the household responsibility system weakened the financial base of the cooperative medical system. The RCMS schemes collapsed in the majority of rural communities. In 1993, insurance coverage for rural residents had fallen to 12.8%. By 1998, only 9.5% of the rural population was insured. This decrease in insurance cover for the rural population has taken place at a time when medical costs have escalated.
Internationally, as a country’s income increases, the share of that country’s total health expenditure accounted for by government also tends to increase. But in China, a country with very rapid income growth, while total health spending as a percentage of GDP increased from 3.2 percent in 1980 to 4.8 percent in 1998, the government share of that total decreased from 36.4 percent to 15.5 percent. Over the same period, the private spending share increased from 23.2% to 57.8%. Since the collapse of the once successful RCMS in the early 1980s, many rural residents, especially the poor, have faced severe problems. User charges and high direct costs now effectively block access for the many people who lack sufficient income to purchase basic healthcare when they need it. Moreover, medical expenses have also caused financial catastrophe for many rural families. According to the MOH’s national health services surveys, nearly 80% of the rural residents do not have any insurance coverage today, although overall insurance coverage improved somewhat (mainly due to an increasing percentage of people buying private insurance) over the 10-year period between 1993 and 2003.
Lack of insurance coverage coupled with escalating medical costs causes serious access and impoverishment problems for Chinese rural residents. According to the China 2003 National Health Services Survey, 30% of the rural patients who were recommended hospital admissions by the doctors refused to be hospitalized. The majority of those who had forgone hospitalization (70%) cited lack of financial means as the major reason for their decision. Even among those who were hospitalized, 43% discharged themselves against medical advice. When officially designated rural “poor households” were asked to identify the major reasons for their impoverishment, the most frequently cited reason was disease and injury.
Why has a rural health insurance system not emerged to meet the needs illustrated above? Prof. Liu (2004) analyzed some major factors affecting the development of rural health insurance system in China. These factors include lack of ability to pay by low-income families, adverse selection among those who are able to pay, and lack of the organizational capacities needed to run such schemes. But by far the most important issue is the little investment sponsored by central and local government and the weak role they played (see Table 3). This main problem will directly influence on both demand-side and supply-side of rural China’s health system.
Lack of the corresponding subsidy of government, insofar as a health insurance system is not compulsory, people’s ability to pay and willingness to participate/contribute is vital for sustaining the system. Therefore, it is not surprising that higher-income regions in China have higher insurance coverage than lower-income regions (Wang 2001). Aside from ability to pay, there are other factors affecting people’s willingness to participate in voluntary risk sharing schemes.
Supply-side issues: Financing takes the form of regular budget allocations from the county and township governments to cover some basic salaries of the staff and capital development and depreciation. The money from these government budgets, however, only accounts for less than 30% of the total income of the county and township health facilities. The rest of their income comes from services fees these facilities charge and from the proceeds of drug sales (the dominant source of revenue). Furthermore, since the majority of village health posts are private practitioners, they receive almost no budget allocations from the governments, and thus rely totally on revenues for their income.

According to World Health Organization annual report of 2005, a health system is a means to an end. It converts resources into outputs, which produce desirable outcomes. These outcomes (or goals of health systems) at least include: Health status; Financial risk protection, and Consumer satisfaction (both levels and fair distribution).
For the purpose of this analysis, a rural health system in China can be defined to include the people, organizations, and institutions that:
1.Deliver health care, including treatment, prevention, and promotion
2.Finance and pay for health care • produce or provide the specialized inputs to health care
3.Organize, control, and regulate those that do the above.
Therefore, a health system can be described by a web of inter-relationships among the five major stake-holders: consumers (patients as well as general public), resource producers (producing material as well as human resources such as pharmaceutical manufacturers and medical schools), service providers (e.g. hospitals for providing inpatient care and schools for providing health education), payers (e.g. government, employers, insurance companies, and of course households), organizers and regulators (e.g. government agencies and professional associations). Without efforts to all the goals above, reform is just required by circumstances.

Since the early 1980s, the rural health care system has undergone far-reaching marketization reforms in tandem with China’s overall economic system. The major motive for market-oriented reforms in the health care sector lies in the government’s attempt to use market function to deal with the problem of public health financing and control of health care costs. While pursuing financial decentralization, governments at a higher level have often delegated the responsibility of health care financing to the governments at a lower level, but the latter, however, are often in financial difficulties that result in the transfer of the responsibility further down to health care institutions. As a result of financial decentralization, the three-tier health service network in rural China has been challenged by the decline of public investment. The share of public health expenditure in the total financial expenditure declined from 2.49% in 1980 to 1.71% in 2000. The cooperative health care system virtually disappeared following the collapse of the People’s Commune System, and the overwhelming majority of village health clinics were privatized.
The New CMS differs from the old CMS in several important respects. Contributions from households—starting at 10 RMB per person, and to be paid on a voluntary basis—will be supplemented by a subsidy of 10 RMB or more from local government and a 10 RMB matching subsidy from central government in the case of households living in the poorer central and western provinces. The major difficulties may be encountered include financial strain on the local government budget, high administrative costs in collection, and lack of administrative capacity.
The New CMS differs from the old CMS in several important respects. Contributions from households—starting at 10 RMB per person, and to be paid on a voluntary basis—will be supplemented by a subsidy of 10 RMB or more from local government and a 10 RMB matching subsidy from central government in the case of households living in the poorer central and western provinces. The major difficulties may be encountered include financial strain on the local government budget, high administrative costs in collection, and lack of administrative capacity.

The strong recommendation that should be made from this policy comparison is that Chinese health reform should insist the “20 Yuan” path and begin to set up a more constructive rural health system. The Government subsidy for the New CMS is a significant step in the history of rural health development in China. It shows the commitment the Government has made to improving the health of its rural population and to reducing their financial health burden. It will also significantly influence the rural health care delivery system, patients' health treatment-seeking behavior and the rural-to-urban population transition.
But going down the path, the New CMS will face complex technical problems. First, a realistic benefits package must be formulated. If the services offered to farmers do not meet their needs, they will soon choose not to participate in the program. On the other side, while protecting farmers from poverty caused by catastrophic disease is an admirable goal, it is most likely counter-productive to set such an ideal as the predominant goal, invariably at the expense of other needs. Health care is a life-long process, and resources might be more wisely spent on more effective preventive efforts like insuring that New CMS subscribers receive immunizations and have access to early disease detection programs and regular checkups, or are convinced to stop smoking.
Another concern is that the New CMS will need a large but dynamic management to deliver fairly priced services to its subscribers. The bureaucracy must be large because of the sheer number of subscribers it needs to survive, and dynamic because it must respond to the demands of those subscribers or else they will decide not to participate. The Government must expand its provision of the important public good of management expertise and development if it hopes for a successful program. And the role of Government as supervisor, monitor and enforcer of standards is the only hope for quality healthcare. Without this Government regulatory and enforcement role, good management, improved funding and even the best efforts of local officials are not likely to suffice.

Saturday, March 22, 2008

Crisis Management for Martha Stewart

Martha Stewart is the creator and namesake of Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia Inc. (MSO) She was indicted and sentenced for lying about ImClone stock sale which was based on insider information she got from Samuel Waksal, the founder and former CEO of ImClone System Inc. After this seemly innocent deal, MSO stock began a steady fall. Ms .Stewart lost her credibility, her position as the chairman and Chief Executive officer of MSO, her splendid future as a director of a US publicly traded firm or about $400 million in stock value.

The situation could be better if Ms. Stewart applied crisis management when she dealt with this scandal.

From the perspectives of Public relations, time is very important when crisis happens. “A quick response is an active response because it tries to fill the vacuum forms”. Ms. Steward released her statement about this scandal on June 12th. But the news was breaking out in the early June. Her slow reaction generated enough time for public to think about whether she got insider information or not. Oppositely, her public relation people should be very sensitive to notice what happened and act properly once the scandal broke out. If I am her PR, once I got to know what was going on, I will tell shareholders of MSO and media that we are investigating into this trade devotedly. We faithfully trust the law and will be responsible to the fair conclusion.

Besides Ms. Martha herself, there were several representatives make public announcements for her, such as her spokewoman, Susan Magrino and assistant Ann Armstrong. Furthermore, they gave public entirely different information. Ms. Stewart defended herself being innocent in this scandal confidently. Her sporkwoman did it as well. When the truth was coming out, Ms. Stewart’s assistant testified that Stewart personally altered the log of a message Bacanovic left on the day she told her ImClone stock. What they did is a blunder accord to crisis management theories. Consistency means that various messages sent by an organization are free of contradictions.Inconsistency erodes the believability of a message. The contradicted messages didn’t provide Ms. Stewart is innocent but disclosed her dishonesty and guilty. If I was Ms. Stewart, I wouldn’t assert Ms. Martha got insider information or not before I get enough evidence to support my statement.

I think the most controversial recommendation, openness, in Ms. Stewart’s is crucial. Ms. Stewart didn’t make openness in the whole process. What she did is try to conceal the truth. She always denied she got the insider information. Meanwhile, Ms. Stewart and her associates sold $79 million worth of MSO stock. These trades made some shareholders became disgruntled because they were made prior to information about Stewart’s investigation being made public. I think she could deal with this problem better is she fully admit she got the insider information. As one of 46 who got ImClone failure news, selling her share is reasonable. Ms. Stewart couldn’t refuse others to give her information. Gotten this message, conservative shareholders would definitely get rid of stocks expected devaluated. If Ms. Stewart can frankly admit her trade based on the insider information and be responsible for this results. From perspectives of PR, full apology is very high acceptance and corrective action is high acceptance. If I was her PR, I would help her to analysis the crisis and encourage her to admit what she heard and what she did. Even though frankness may be damaging, for a long term, it will help to reinforce a positive, honest, responsible American idol. Furthermore, I will persuade her to correct what she did. In this situation, I think the best correction is making up in other ways. For example, donate the unlawful income to charity. Doing this will clarify that Ms. Stewart is not a greedy woman; she makes mistakes involuntarily and tries her best to correct them.

Another detail needed to be mention is Ms. Stewart’s emotion control. In the whole process, Ms. Stewart’s action and talk is improper. She used adjectives such as ridiculous to blame literally everyone from the media to her brokerage to public. She canceled future segments on the show where she was asked a question about ImClone by the anchor. She always emphasized good thinks she did but avoid the unlawful trade. Even after she got the final judgment, she tired to testify she is a good person by analogy herself with South Africa’s persecuted anti-apartheid hero, Nelson Mandela. Ms. Stewart‘s image was demolished is no doubt. In PR practice, attitude is important. When crisis happen, no matter your organization is right or false, innocent or guilty, the crisis team should be modest and genuine. If I was Ms. Stewart’s PR, I hope when the crisis came out, she could behave as normal as before. I won’t advise her cancel any segments because of unpleasant experience and use excessive expression either.

If Ms. Stewart knows how to manage crisis or apply what I suggested above, I believe the final situation will be more favorable to her.


Wednesday, March 19, 2008

How can Tibet be flourishing

As a people who was born and raised in China, when I heard people protest to free Tibet, I cannot help wondering what kind of freedom these people are asking for. Do these people really understand what freedom is? Do they really know what situation is best for Tibetans?
First of all, I have to say, Tibet was and is one part of China. Even though Chiang Kai-Shek gave away Outer Mongolia, he still admitted Tibet is one part of China. The government of People's Republic of China never and won't ever give up Tibet. This is a fact and never will be changed.
July 1st 2006, Qing Zhang railroad launched. The great railroad changed Tibetans' lives. Tourism industry help Tibet get billions revenue annually. Developing economic situation helps Tibetans approach better living standard and happiness. If happiness and better living standards don't represent freedom, so what is it?
Let us trace back to when Tibet under Dalai Lama’s reign. 80% or more resources were controlled by landlords and monks who are just less than 20% population. Tibet is one of the few places controlled by religion. People were hunted rudely under such tyranny. Their skin was peeled, their eyes were scratched, and their arms were stumped. No Tibetan would like to go back to danger. They have no reason to refuse better lives.
In a word, Tibet being a part of China is unchangeable truth. Only as one part of China, Tibet develops smoothly and quickly.

Wednesday, March 12, 2008

Chinese Americans in American President Election

2008/2/13


Clinton and Obama sent open letters to celebrate Chinese New Year separately last week. It is obvious that both of their intention is getting Chinese Americans’ support. There are about three million Chinese Americans. They can affect not only the competition between Clinton and Obama in the Democratic primaries, but also the whole American President campaign.

Until Feb 12th, Obama got 1181 delegates and Hillary got 1173. It is worth mentioning because this is the first time Obama surpassed Clinton in the number of delegates since the Iowa caucuses. According to Democratic primaries rule, in primaries, candidate has to get at least 2025 delegates to clinch the Democratic nomination. Obama and Clinton have been devotedly fighting for each delegate. Naturally, the community of about three million of Chinese Americans is an important part of their targets.

Compared with Republican, more Chinese Americans support Democratic. The most important reason is that Democratics give more protection on minorities’ interests and claim culture diversity. On the other hand, Republicans show more conservative toward immigrations. That is why in 2000 President Election most Chinese Americans voted for Gore.

It is easy to find that Chinese Americans support Clinton more in California Democratic primaries. Obama never stop his active pursuit of Asians’ supports. He sent his Chinese New Year greeting letter out even one day earlier than Clinton did. His sincerity helped him win considerable supports from Chinese American community.

There are eleven million Asian Americans and over one fourth of them are Chinese. It is an important political power and cannot be ignored. Chinese Americans will play a more important role on American politics. It is not only due to the big population but also because of the more and more important role of China in the world. I believe that Chinese Americans will affect American politics more along with the development of China.