Weekend Question 3: Why Is The Wall Street Journal’s Concern About Russian State Expansion Hypocritical?
ANSWER: Because it was somehow OK for Chinese government-controlled companies.
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A subscription-only editorial on Thursday in the Jounal raised alarms about the buying spree state-owned companies in Russia have embarked on, and ended with this paragraph:
For the Kremlin, gas, oil, metals, aircraft are not just tradeable goods. They are also tools of political power and security leverage. To devise the proper response on this side of the old Iron Curtain, that must be kept in mind.
This from the paper that supported the purchase of Unocal by Chinese oil company CNOOC last year, and whined in unison with the People’s Republic when CNOOC backed down after intense opposition from Unocal shareholders and US politicians.
What, the Chinese government doesn’t use corporate assets as “tools of political power and security leverage”?
