I don’t blame the Chinese people. The many Chinese people I’ve met were wonderfully straightforward, caring, honest and polite. They have good, strong morals. But I do disagree with centralized, autocratic and sometimes brutal government. Many people there have been moved long distances away from their homes against their own will.
We know that censorship has always been with northern and eastern Asia, but I also disagree with censorship against political speech. Censorship for public decency can be very good, as we’ve had the same in earlier America. But censorship against political speech: very disagreeable.
As a longtime non-Chinese observer of the Middle Kingdom, I'm not defending either the Chinese people or the Chinese political system. I'm just pointing out that China's is a capitalist system to which the government has applied lipstick and referred to a socialist system with Chinese characteristics.
Richard Pipes once said, more or less, that the problem with the Soviet Union wasn't Marxism-Leninism, but Russians, who haven't gotten rid of their worldview that Russia's destiny is to bring the world under its rule. China presents more or less the same problem, but its ambitions are thousands of years old. Our dilemma is that we are allied with countries that have been targets of Chinese ambitions for millenia. How much sacrifice should Americans be prepared to shoulder on behalf of allies who will always be there for us when they need us?