>>'Democracy', 'human rights', can you imagine that these words are here on the UT in the alarm filter?! In China they are! And Microsoft fully cooperates! Shame on them! Or not? Their standpoint is that it is better to be present in each country then to be banned from a country. They also say that they are obliged to follow the law of a country. So, where does this all lead to? I tell you: A corporation that submissively cooperates with undemocratic landlords and dictators will loose all remains of sympathy of citizens of democratic countries. That loss of sympathy will have big, HUGE, consequences for its existence. Microsoft is warned, they MUST stop this type of cooperation! Yes or no?
>
>I'd like to think that you're right in your analysis about what will happen to MS because of this, but the truth is, I doubt it very much. If countries won't stop courting China in spite of China's horrible record of human rights abuses, then I'm sure corporations won't feel any such obligation. Money always wins, and China is willing to spend.

China is willing to SPEND?????

China ain't spending! China has an "elite" - high Party members and high military members - who have FULL CONTROL OVER ALL OTHER PEOPLE THERE.

These relatively few people (who probably number close to the population of Canada, but still tiny given China's population) do spend some, but that is not why the corporations of the world are rushing INTO China.

They are all, without exception, headed there because of the absolute CONTROL OF THE WORKERS by the Chinese authorities.
This gives corporations cheap labour and regulation-free working conditions without fear of unions or regulatory infringement.
Wal-Mart leads the way, even having a department that helps its suppliers to move their operations to China.

We have let phrases like "business has no conscience" and "all that matters is the bottom line" become fact. And we are witnessing in the west, since the demise of western Communism (apparently the Chinese style of Communism is OK, despite no human rights or freedoms), the accelerating of the povertizing of the people and correlating obscene growth of wealth amongst the rich. All aided and abetted by our governments.
Corporations cut benefits, then cut wages, then seek tax relief, then eliminate pensions, then move to China. All the while, for the few jobs that remain, people are deathly afraid of losing their job so they shut up and work longer hours for those declining wages/benefits.
Yep, we still got our freedom. So we can go from place to place and watch as factories shut down. But we don't dare say a word about the sitaution lest we lose our job.