Wednesday, August 15, 2007

Breaking point?

Is the American public near the breaking point yet?

More lead paint on children's toys with Mattel recalling more Chinese-made toys and
tainted toothpaste in our prisons. Of course the "Exoerts" say there isn't enough of the toxic chemical in the toothpaste to seriously hurt anyone, but tell that to the almost 400 people that died in Panama from the diethylene glycol in their cough medicine.

Poison is poison, and if it is in consumable products, shouldn't there be a bit more of an outcry? And lead paint on toys? Can you imagine if any U.S. manufacturer tried to pass that off as simply a mistake by the paint supplier?

Oh, but the biggest outcry I read was not about product safety, but about us horrible Americans being too racist. Yes, racist. Apparently our jokes about Chinese take-out food has lead some to think there is A Taste of Racism in the Chinese Food Scare. I am sure that author has continued buying his kids leaded paint chips for toys.

But as scary as taking toys away from children is, it is nothing compared to finding out China now makes 90% of all vitamin C on the U.S. market. And what is Behind the problem?
The reputed lack of central government control to rein in corruption on the part of individual bureaucrats may be a contributing factor in the eyes of most experts, but to focus on that individual corruption is to miss the point. Lord Acton famously remarked, “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” The totalitarian communist regime that has ruled China with an iron fist for almost 60 years has had a major corrupting influence on those who wield power from top to bottom. But the power vested in the top officials puts them in a position to blame their underlings for the corruption, deflecting attention from the fact that the system itself is corrupt and will not be changed by replacing one corrupt official with another.
Not funny, but interestingly enough, one executive is executed for his involvement in the scandal, and now another Chinese executive kills self.

Bad day to be an executive in a Chinese export company, worse to be taking the vitamins that are made by such a company.

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