Continuing with my penchant for the oppressed Chinese people lately, today's story in the news is about Chinese dissident, Ai Weiwei. Ai is an internationally acclaimed conceptual artist from Beijing who has been vocal about the Chinese's oppressive (Communist) government, and consequently they handed him a bill for $2.4 million for "unpaid taxes." Ai was detained for three months earlier this year as part of an overall crackdown on dissent. Ai believes his detention and subsequent claims of tax evasion is a way to punish him for his often-outspoken criticism of the authoritarian government.
Since he announced last week that the Beijing tax bureau is demanding that he pay the "back taxes," nearly 20,000 people have sent more than $840,000 to Ai, with some throwing money attached to fruit into his yard, and dollar bills in the form of paper airplanes. The STATE-RUN newspaper, Global Times, criticized the outpouring and warned it could be illegal. They also cited UNNAMED experts as saying he could be suspected of illegal fundraising and said the movement did not represent the larger Chinese population.
The donation campaign is rare for Chinese dissidents because of the threat of retaliation that comes with supporting high-profile government critics. But his supporters see the mammoth bill as 'government harassment.'
And so I have to ask, is this raising any red flags for anyone?? Is any of this sounding familiar here in the U.S.?? All of our Big Media is paramount to state-run media. And I also remember when Bill Clinton was president, and he wanted to harass his "dissidents," they would suddenly be audited by the IRS. And even with the current "regime," they allow the Occupy Wall Street gang to protest without all of the valid permits but the Tea Party had to procure and pay for all of the necessary red tape permits.
Wake up Americans, we are losing freedoms daily...
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