issues2000

Gary Bauer on China


The verdict is in: sanction China

BAUER [to Forbes]: China is in the middle of a massive arms build-up. They’ve taken technology from the US. We’ve got threats on Taiwan. This Chinese defense minister said: War with the US was inevitable. Will you repeal MFN status for China? I will in my first week in office.

FORBES: We must let the Chinese know what the rules of engagement are. On human rights abuses: We will criticize them. In terms of trade, it has to be two-way.. If they don’t adhere to those rules, then you take the appropriate steps including taking trade sanctions.

BAUER: Will you repeal MFN status for China or not?

FORBES: If China violates those rules of engagement, then trade is going to be on the table including MFN. But you must first lay out what those rules are. If they want a relationship with us, here’s how you can have it. If not, they can have that confrontation and we’ll win against them just as we did against other tyrants.

BAUER: You’re ignoring 10 years of history. The verdict’s already in.

Source: (X-ref to Forbes) GOP Debate in Manchester NH Jan 26, 2000

Shame on those who sent tech to Chinese military

Money originating with the People’s Liberation Army, in Communist China. made its way into the American political process and then we’re supposed to believe that coincidentally a few months after that technology gets sold to China. The politicians and the corporate presidents that allowed that technology to go to China that can be used by the Chinese military, ought to be ashamed of themselves. If we have to send people to an Asian battlefield again, they will have some answering to do.
Source: GOP Debate in Johnston, Iowa Jan 16, 2000

Entrepreneurial China trade same as with totalitarian Cuba

BUSH [to Bauer]: Capital that goes into Cuba will be used by the Castro government to prop itself up. Dollars invested will end up supporting this totalitarian regime.. It’s in our best interest to keep the pressure on Castro until he allows free elections, free press & free the prisoners.

BAUER: You just made the case for withdrawing MFN status from China. Everything that you just said about Cuba applies to China.

BUSH: There is a huge difference between trading with an entrepreneurial class like that which is growing in China and allowing a Castro government to skim capital monies off the top of capital investment.

BAUER: Tell the people rotting in the prisons of China that there’s any difference between Castro’s Cuba & Communist China. There is none.

BUSH: If we turn our back on the entrepreneurial class that is taking wing in China, we’re making a huge mistake.

BAUER: They are using that money for a massive arms buildup that our sons will have to deal with down the road.

Source: (cross-ref from Bush) GOP Debate in Michigan Jan 10, 2000

Stop allowing China to play us for suckers

BAUER [to Bush]: I will stop allowing China to play us for suckers. We’ve given them Most Favored Nation status 10 years in a row. They dump their goods here. And Iowa farmers are selling less to China now than they did 10 years ago. The time of them playing us for suckers will end in my presidency.

BUSH: I’m glad you brought it up. You’re not for China getting into the WTO. I am. And let me tell you something-the amount of corn that’ll be moved if China gets in the WTO will rise from 250,000 metric tons, to 7.2 million metric tons. Opening up Chinese markets is good for our farmers.

BAUER: Governor Bush, here’s your fallacy: You believe the Chinese government will keep their agreements. They haven’t kept their agreements for 20 years.

BUSH: That’s why we let them in the WTO. That’s part of agreement keeping.

BAUER: That just gives them another agreement to break, Governor.

Source: (cross-ref. to Bush) Des Moines Iowa GOP Debate Dec 13, 1999

Apply Reagan’s USSR policy: No MFN; insist on human rights

BAUER [to Bush]: Ronald Reagan never gave the Soviet Union most favored nation status. He always insisted on progress on human rights & national security. Our new challenge is China. They persecute their people, arrest those who practice their religion, forcible abortions, etc. Yet you’ve embraced the policy of Clinton and Gore, you want to give them MFN status & membership in the WTO. Why not follow a Reagan policy instead of a Clintonian policy?

BUSH: [I don’t] follow the policies of Clinton-Gore. They believe in what’s called a strategic partnership. I believe in redefining the relationship to one of competitor. But competitors can find common ground. It’s in our best interests to sell to the Chinese, and to make sure that the entrepreneurial class in China flourishes. If we make China make an enemy, they’ll end up being an enemy. If we trade with China, and trade with the entrepreneurial class, and give people a taste of freedom, I think you’ll be amazed at how soon democracy will come.

Source: (cross-ref. to Bush) Phoenix Arizona GOP Debate Dec 7, 1999

End appeasement based on corporate bottom line

In a speech before the Commonwealth Club of California, Bauer delivered a scathing denunciation of China and accused “the Wall Street wing of the Republican Party” and the Clinton administration of conducting a policy of appeasement based on economic, rather than security, interests. “Our foreign policy must have a greater purpose than the corporate bottom line,” Bauer said.
Source: Mark Z. Barabak, Los Angeles Times Sep 28, 1999

Cox Report marks failure to protect our nation

[Regarding the Cox Report,] Gary Bauer, who has made China policy a cornerstone of his campaign, accused the administration of failing in “its most basic duty to protect our nation.” Bauer said in a statement, “it is time for new American leadership, it is time for a new foreign policy, and it is time for new congressional hearings to investigate who is directly responsible - politically and commercially - for endangering America’s national security.”
Source: Associated Press, “Republicans on China”, by K. Srinivasan May 26, 1999

China is a threat; refuse MFN status & WTO membership

In the 1990s, China emerged as the world’s gravest threat.. China brutalizes its own people, steals American nuclear secrets, threatens. its neighbors with ballistic missiles, and represses free expression and religious liberty. Instead of embracing China as a “strategic partner,” we must renew our commitment to a peaceful, democratic Taiwan. We should refuse to renew China’s Most Favored Nation status or grant it membership in the World Trade Organization until it changes its behavior.
Source: www.bauer2k.com/html/indepthissues.html 5/24/99 May 24, 1999

Target sanctions against companies owned by Chinese Army

Sanctions [against China] have to be targeted. Let’s take a look at the trade between the US and those Chinese companies owned by the People’s Liberation Army. A significant portion of the trade we have with China is not with freestanding commercial enterprises. It is with the same army that runs the slave labor camps, with the same army that is engaged in the middle of a massive arms buildup in order to dislodge the US as the predominant power in the Pacific. [That is] morally unacceptable on its f
Source: Speech at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government Apr 13, 1998

Moral obligation to speak out for Chinese Christians

There’s something deeply wrong with saying that any government can regulate the content of the faith that can be practiced in their country. There are millions of Christian Chinese who are serious about their faith, and even in the face of oppression will insist on practicing it. We have a moral obligation to stand with those people and to speak up for them, and demand that they be treated fairly and be accorded the same rights to worship that free men and women enjoy all around the world.
Source: Speech at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government Apr 13, 1998

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