Thread by @jinpeili

CCTV FOLLIES: 10/3 Xinwen Lianbo
Today is a holiday so the news is exceptionally light, most of it a narcissistic love letter from China to itself.

-Ukraine and Russia trade shots
-US fans the flames
-US suffers a hurricane
-All is good, all is coming up roses in China

"I love you China"

"I love China"

A proliferation of red symbolizes the success of communism in China.
The unhealthy looking beach in Panjin, Liaoning is not covered with algae, but the red plant, Suaeda salsa

Ever see an aircraft carrier illustrated with drones?

Xi-style aphorisms get "aired."

How about that militant fist?
"Contribute to the new era!"

Red leaves are somehow another sign of the success of the Communist Party.

Go early, the trees get picked clean really fast.

"Our motherland just keeps getting more and more powerful!"

The usual bumper harvest shots in a land of plenty.

Can you spot the cameraman's mistake?

(He mistakenly zoomed in on a tractor made by the Japanese industrial giant Kubota)

Elsewhere, the Russians and Ukrainians trade shots. It's just a little special military operation, but, wow, Russia can really launch those missiles.

In an unexpected twist, shots of Ukraine weaponry get almost as much airtime, but there's a reason for it.

The US and Germany and supplying Ukraine with weapons.

"The US is fanning the flames of the fire," said a man in South Africa. "And making the whole world miserable." Oil prices are up. Grain shortages loom.

In an extraordinary coincidence, these are the precise talking points that CCTV has been hammering home for months now.

Russian satellite image of the Nord Stream leak.
No surprise which way China is leaning on this one.

(hint) Shame on America.

"The EU is facing gas shortages of historic proportions this winter."
(If you don't know who to blame, you haven't been paying attention to the Chinese media)

CCTV's patented "bad news from a bad country" (TM) is today composed of US hurricane damage.

The anchors proudly convey the sense that China loves itself. Oh, to live in this paradise called China. Wait, is that really the refrain of "I love you China" in the background?

Yes, it is! The program closes to the tune of "I Love You China" with brilliant stock photography totally unmoored from the harsh current realities of brutal lock downs, crazy quarantines, citizens in revolt, cataclysmic drought and killer heat waves.

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