Beijing, Pollution, Olympics - and Thought Control

Unfortunately for the 2008 Olympic Games, the industrial revolution in China is going on now - and according to the Associated Press, the Central Committee that rules China with an iron fist is closing all of the factories in the region in an effort to improve the air quality, at least temporarily, so the Olympic athletes can actually compete. Beijing today resembles London of the mid-19^th century, with air pollution so thick that the sky turns gray, and in order to breathe while just walking down the street, residents are forced to resort to a filter of some type covering their faces.

Why was the air in London so noxious in the middle of the 19^th Century, and toxic in the 21^st Century in Beijing? Coal.

Coal has been used for about 10,000 years as an energy source, and perhaps not surprisingly the earliest recorded use was in China. However, with the Industrial Revolution that swept through England beginning in the mid-18^th Century, the need for reliable power supplies in London and other British cities led to the "smokestack" industries for iron refining. Once steam engines became safe for widespread use with the advent of new steel manufacturing techniques, coal was the king became the worldwide king of energy supplies - and would continue to hold that spot but for the toxic chemicals that come spewing from burning it.

At the end of the 19^th Century, electrical generation came on the scene, and coal-burning power stations scattered within cities became virtually extinct within industrialized nations - but coal was still being burned in ever more tonnage, only isolated from the population centers as distribution networks became more interlocked and reliable

For electrical generation, coal is still the number one energy source worldwide, with some nations, such as the United States, India, and China, relying upon coal-fired plants as their primary source for electricity generation. But both China and India are relative Johnny-come-latelies to the industrial revolution, and their consumption of coal, especially in China has skyrocketed in the past decade. China now leads the world in consumption of coal, with latest figures indicating it is burning nearly twice the amount of coal as the United States every year - with that amount rising steeply when compared to the US.

China is on course to build a new coal-fired electrical generation plant every month through 2010 - and apparently refuses to use scrubber technologies to remove the worst of the pollutants from the smokestacks.

Which leads us to the 2008 Olympics and the dictators of China, its Central Committee, are dictating a shutdown of all of the factories in which its 12.5 million citizens work. According to the New York Times, all construction projects will be mothballed. Gasoline sales will be forbidden in at least 10% of the filling stations around the city. They are forcing the closure of mining quarries, cement plants, and chemical refineries. And they plan on bottling up 30% of their coal-fired power plants. All in an attempt to paint a positive picture to the world of what China is about.

The question lurks - how do you keep 12.5 million people from rioting in the streets? How do you keep the masses from displaying their disfavor to the world, when the world's eye will be squarely on China for the next 6 months. Information control.

In China - the answer was seen by the world in Tiananmen Square, and is being played out in Tibet today - guns and tanks, followed by And thought control via information control straight out of George Orwell's "1984."

Likely Page BreakThe Chinese government has consistently shut off internet connections to the outside world, and imprisoned then deported reporters who do not report exactly what the Chinese government wants said. Television in China is totally under state control. YouTube was blocked from any form of access within China during March 2008, in order for the Chinese government to force down the throat of Google the removal of videos from those events. Even getting access to those stories that show up in a search of Google is problematic, since Yahoo apparently capitulated to China and removed this story from its archives.

How does China accomplish blocking and filtering so much information? One answer is by using the US-made supercomputing technology given to the Chinese by President Bill Clinton to filter all dissenting viewpoints from reaching the Chinese people.

Will the Chinese Central Committee be able to keep that many out-of-work citizens under control? Or, will they force them to leave the area during the 2008 Olympics, when so many foreigners will flood the area that controlling all of them will become virtually impossible? The answer will be played out over the coming eight weeks - and the world will be watching.

The question is - will anyone care?

And will this article even be available to people who live in "free" societies?