CCTV FOLLIES 11/04
-Scholz in Beijing looking as stiff as a member of Xi's puppet politburo
-20th congress spirit rings through the land till ears ring
-More Russian hot takes on Ukraine
-US fans the flames and fuels the fire
-China is beautiful
Olaf Scholz, after getting a Chinese-supervised PCR test on his own plane, spends 11 hours in Beijing complying with stiff protocol in hopes of scoring some business deals. The air crew waited in Korea to avoid quarantine.
Departing Premier Li Keqiang walks the red carpet with the freshly-arrived German Chancellor. Both are easily outplayed, neither of them seem remotely able to get the better of Xi.
But there's more good news, too. The soul-stirring fixed expression "in the spirit of the 20th Congress" is being repeated and amplified throughout the land.
More of the same. The guy on the bottom right is the only one to deviate from the fixed "20th" script.
What a maverick. He says:
"Let us study Xi Jinping's Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for the New Era"
This story combines two hot phrases:
"General Secretary Xi... AND... "the report of the 20th congress."
There's something about all the tough talk of "strengthening security" that reeks of insecurity.
Happy farmers produce happy products. Minorities farmers can hardly contain themselves, they dress up to work in the fields and always look to be on the verge of breaking out into song and dance.
China's ambitions increasingly reach beyond the country's traditional borders.
It's looking for full-spectrum dominance in space.
All indicators are up, or up and up.
More territorial projection into the cosmos.
Interesting to note that even "space" shots of China's provinces are provided with borders, whereas poor Ukraine has to do without them.
It's part of the CCTV art kit.
And now over to you, Moscow...
Russian TV showing Ukraine prisoner exchange.
More of the usual Russian artillery shots and again, that famous borderless map of Ukraine, highlighting Crimea.
Russia warns the British ambassador about his country's suspected involvement in the nautical drone attack on Russia's Black Sea fleet.
Doing that makes UK a terrorist state.
Unlike Russia. Russia's just keeping the peace with its special military operation.
And back, by popular demand, CCTV does a generous spread of US planes and US pallets for it's inimitable
"fanning the flames" segment.
caption on bottom left:
"US and various countries in the West must stop adding oil to the fire."
Time to get out the violin. Cue sad music.
CCTV feels so sorry for Britishers who are fighting inflation and interest hikes. (They did this for months with Germany and scored the Scholz visit.)
Maybe England's new leader will feel obliged to pay obeisance to Beijing as well.
Not enough bad news in the US today? What to run for the "bad news from a bad country" segment?
CCTV settles for archival footage of the Tulsa Race Riots of 1921.
The anchors bid a sweet farewell by fading into beautiful scenery of the motherland.
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