Comments on: MM Lee lectures Americans on the “Chinese mindset”

By: sophus

sophus — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 02:12:31 +0000

@thomas
Those are myths, not history. History need to be backed by records in writing. The myths are mostly stories like how a goddess made human from soil, how someone discovered fire, a king chose a talent but not his son to be his successor, a hero controlled the flood, etc. Historical scholars do not consider the start of china history to be myths.

By: thomas

thomas — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 09:53:30 +0000

@anewbie

LKY is correct. If you include the Three Sovereigns and Five Emperors (2852 BC to 2205 BC) and the Xia Dynasty 2100–1600 BC, its 4861 years of history.

By: anewbie

anewbie — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 01:03:22 +0000

It’s a joke, LKY must have failed his high school history lessons. China has 5000 years history? The first writing system appeared earliest in 1600 BC Shang Dynasty and the appearance of writing system signals the start of a civilization. We can only say China has at most 3600 years of history. Even the earliest civilization in the world, the Sumerian, has only 4000 years history. Revise your history, get the facts right, LKY!

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 15:13:07 +0000

@ Ben Gee on Sat, 24th Oct 2009 9:26 pm I think there is a price to pay for non-convertibility of Yuan to US dollar. How does Chinese corporate hedge their interest rate swaps on foreign borrowing while corporate borrowers outside China can benefit from capital market efficiency?

With Chinese business investing globally in billions and exchange rate volatility, wouldn’t the Chinese want to lock in the exchange rate risks when the payback on these investment may be highly uncertain and contigent on exchange rate movements?

So I don’t think it is wise decision for China to retain its non-convertibility for ever. It may be adverse retardation for the development of Chinese business ventures abroad.

By: Ben Gee

Ben Gee — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 13:26:57 +0000

Lee Kuan Yew ” ate more salt than you ate rice” is an old Chinese saying for people that criticize older and wiser persons. Mr. Lee is NOT wrong about Chinese leaders, they accept criticism politely,but continued to do what they think is right for China. For example, they acknowledge that the yuan is under valued, but they will not allow it to float because they will not allow speculators to come in and dissablize the yuan which will put the Chinese economy on a roller-coaster course. That was exactly what happened to Japan in the 1980’s. But China do need advance and new technolgy, if the US refused to sell China these new tecnology, and if China has to steal them. You know the result.

By: can't protest

can't protest — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 08:30:24 +0000

LKY is an ethnic Chinese? i thought he is baba?

By: Muhammad Shamin

Muhammad Shamin — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 07:20:41 +0000

“The insidious “sinicization” of Singapore has caused widespread resentment and unhappiness on the ground even amongst the local Chinese who are culturally and linguistically different from their counterparts in China.”

True. Local Chinese have been “malay”ed and “indian”ized. They eat prata and nasi lemak in the morning.

Chinaman and Chinadoll will just swallow anything including drinking baby soup.

By: thomas

thomas — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 06:50:56 +0000

“Look, they don’t want to be an honorary member of the West, unlike Russia. They’re quite happy to be Chinese and to remain as such…So when you tell them you ought to do this, you ought to do that, they say yes, thank you. But at the back of their minds, (they ask) ‘We’ve lasted 5,000 years, have you?” said Lee.

Brilliant. Revealed is the mindset of staying intact, in power for as long as possible. Never mind if over 90% of the useful concepts and contraceptions in use right now are not invented by the Chinese who lasted 5000 years but the modern western world’s history of around 300 years.

Just brilliant!

By: Kancheong_Spider

Kancheong_Spider — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 04:05:11 +0000

1980s? where got so late. no lah. started in 1960s when they begin to send in N.Z. grass because it was greener.

http://www.unescap.org/drpad/vc/conference/bg_sg_17_vfp.htm

That first stab was a disaster but eventually they learn. just like the amt spent by DSTA on foreign talent only end up one even have to drive taxi for a living.

Look at the surrounding now, spend so much to deforest and then make the area into park but all fully grown, imported horticulture. nothing native except maybe the few users. no doubt these native users will be fixed eventually (sic – batam, penang or johor) so that new users can integrate with these imported horticulture.

Also look on the brite side, when we say welcome to Singapore, we really do.

By: Ben

Ben — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 04:04:50 +0000

And more recently, MM Lee is trying to milk the media limelight by meeting with Obama. This, from a man who not too long ago dismissed the President of the United States as a ‘flash in the pan’. He’s courting the Chinese too heavily, and the Chinese are only too pleased. He needs to exercise a little realism in his relations. We may have a majority of Chinese, but China does not see us as a close ally.