Another day of violence in Hong Kong as the protest there is on the 17th week.  As China's national day on Oct. 1st approaches, we can expect more violence over the next few days.  As a former Hong Konger who is now an American, I wish to give advice to both the protesters and the authorities in Hong Kong and China.  I know nobody on either side have any interest in what I have to say.  But I am going to say it anyway.  So here is an open letter to the protesters, particularly the young ones.  Later on will be an open letter to the authorities.

Dear Protesters: 

I know the overwhelming majority of you are peaceful people who just want to protest without causing damages to Hong Kong and injuring innocent people.  You also do not want to be injured or arrested.  But the problem is there are people among you who are dangerous and is causing havoc that have led to violence.  While you may believe it is the police who are causing the violence, I don't see it that way.

I live near LA.  If a million people are out in the street of LA protesting and some of them crash their way into the city council building, raise foreign flags, sing foreign national anthems, burn the American flag, shut down LAX, shut down some of the subway (although we don't have those here), throw Molotov cocktails, petrol bombs and bricks, what do you think the LAPD would do?  It would be much worse than the tear gas and water cannon that the Hong Kong police have used.  In 17 weeks there would be death at the hands of the police here for sure.

A few weeks ago French police were using the same tactics against protesters at the G7 summit.  There were only a few hundred protesters at that time, hardly a threat.  Do you remember the tactics the French police used against the Yellow Vests protesters last year?  Way more number of and severity of injuries then than those in Hong Kong now.  But was there complaints by other western nations against the French police?  I think the Hong Kong police have been rather restrained in comparison.

Some of you are worried that Carrie Lamb will use the Emergency Regulations Ordinance against you.  This is a draconian law that basically lets the Chief Executive do whatever she wants.  But you do know this is not a Chinese law but a law left over from British colonial rule?  It was put into law to stop the Chinese seamen who were protesting that their white counterparts were making several times as much money.  This rule was used in 1967 in the leftist riots by the British forces.  If the British were so worried about human rights in Hong Kong, why didn't they repeal the law all these years, particularly when they handed Hong Kong over to China?

I understand that many of you don't like the policies of China.  But I don't understand why you would raise the British or American flags and sing their national anthems.  The rights that you demand from China were not given to you by the British until it was obvious that they are going to hand Hong Kong over to China.  This way they can say China is abusing you.  But to the day of the hand over, the people of Hong Kong had no right to vote for their chief executive.  It was a governor appointed by London.  And I don't know of any instance where the U.S. chastise the UK for human rights abuse in Hong Kong or in any other of its former colonies. 

Yes, there are good Americans who are rooting for you.  But the U.S. government have always look for its own self interests above human rights.  The U.S. went to Vietnam to fight the communists.  But did the U.S. protest French colonial rule in Vietnam?  Sure, China should be called out on human rights issues in Tibet and Xinjiang.  But the U.S. is only giving out toothless protests all over the world over human rights.  China gets hit by western nations more than others because it is their biggest competitor for world power.  But you should not believe that any nation, including the U.S. will be of any real help for you.  If China wants to stop U.S. complaints, it will just give Trump a trade deal.  If you don't think money talks, just ask the family and friends of Jamal Khashoggi.

Most of your families originally came from the mainland to have a better life.  I would say that life in China is way better than that of your ancestors before they made their way to Hong Kong.  I would also say that even though you may not think so, I think Hong Kong today is way better than in the 1960s when I left.  Improvements in China and Hong Kong took place slowly.  Those in power do not give it up easily, whether it is communist China or colonial Britain.  The Western nations will give you verbal support but there will not be concrete help.  You have won the extradition bill battle.  It is time to let things go back to normal because there is a minority who will take violence to much higher levels.  This will eventually lead China to put down the hammer.  This will cause damage to Hong Kong that may be impossible to repair.  Good luck.

AYM

New SNL hire Shane Gillis was found to have made disparaging remarks about Asians, including calling them chinks and mocking Chinese accents.  Presidential candidate Andrew Yang weighed in and took the high road.  He said he would forgive Gillis and would sit down and talk to him, using this as an educational moment.

That is very generous of Yang.  But I don't agree.  Gillis also said in the past that one can get away with making fun of Asians.  The implication to me that he is too much of a coward to attack another group the way he attacked Asians.   Can you imagine if he used the N word and mocked black speech?  We would not have a discussion of if he would be fired by NBC.  NBC would have fired him the same day the news came out.  It has been a weekend so I will give NBC another day or so.  If nothing happens, I say we need to boycott NBC.

I believe in forgiveness and not punishment in every instance.  But in this case, Gillis believed that he could get away with mocking Asians.  I am sure a lot of people do too.  Thus we need to send a message that they can't get away with it.  Gillis says that he is just pushing the boundaries as a comedian.  Is there a joke somewhere when you call people chinks?   He has fell over the boundaries and into quick sand. 

Take Gillis' "apology".  Yes, take it and shove it up your you know what.  He said he would be happy to apologize to anyone who is actually offended.  This is a non apology.  It implies that there is nothing wrong with what he said but that if someone is so sensitive that he feels offended, then Gillis would say he is sorry to him.  If someone says the N word in front of only white nationalists, nobody would be offended.  So does it means he is not wrong and does not need to apologize?  If one is sincere about making an apology, he should say he is sorry about what he said because he knows that it was horribly wrong.

Yang has been criticized for enhancing Asian stereotype by saying Asians are good at math and that lots of Asians are doctors.  I agree that those remarks are not funny and adds little to his campaign.  (Although MATH stands for Making America Think Harder is pretty good,)   But if you remember  Obama, when asked about people claiming  that Bill Clinton was the first black president, replied that he has to see if Bill can dance first before calling him a brother.  I don't think blacks were offended by the implication that they dance better than whites.  So I can live with people giving us Asians positive stereotypes.  When the false negative stereotypes go away, the false positives will go away also.

Watched most of the debate last night, so here is my take:

Corey Booker once again did the best, I thought.  Beto was right up there with him.  I thought it was the best Klobuchar did of all the debates and the town hall last week.  Warren again was the best of the Big Three.  Pete led the middle three.  Biden was very good in fending off Warren and Sanders in the beginning, his best performance so far.  But he faded toward the end of the third hour.  Yang, as in previous debates, got the least amount of questions and time.  Other than the beginning where he said he was giving away a thousand dollars a month for a year to 10 people, he was flat in his limited time.  Harris came across as combative, trying to show she will fight Trump by calling him out.  She was, however, on the defensive over her time as DA and AG.  Sanders again was near the bottom as Biden beat him, I think.  He also was not as good as Warren, by far, in holding up the progressive flag.  Castro was last again, especially since he attacked Biden for his memory, which came across as mean and he was actually wrong about what Biden said.

Not much changed as a result of the debate.  Klobuchar and Beto got the most boost, I think.  Klobuchar came across as a moderate, which she is, but also fair to the progressives.  Beto had the advantage of being from El Paso, site of a recent massive shooting.  He was able to speak passionately about gun control.  He even said he would take away AK47s and AR15s.  This may give the GOP ammunition to say the Democrats will take away your guns.  But, hey, they were going to say that anyway.  I think it is maybe time to lay it on the line.  Do we really think that people should have guns that were meant to be used in war?  If you need these guns to hunt, you are a cheat!

The big winner last night:  Obama!  Everyone said something nice about him.  Obama has become the Reagan of the Democrats.  All GOP candidates before had to mention Reagan.  Now all the Democrats had to mention Obama.  I think they recognize you can't attack Biden by attacking Obama.

I was not home last night so didn't watch the town hall of Democratic candidates on CNN.  Just as well since all 10 candidates got 40 minutes and so the whole thing went on for several hours.  No way could anyone watch the whole thing.  I watched excerpts of each candidates after I got home last night.  So here is my take on the event based on somewhat limited information.

I think the format made everyone looked good.  There was only one topic: climate change.  So it is easy to prepare what you are going to say ahead of time and be able to answer any questions that may come up.  There was nobody attacking you, like at a debate.  Instead of one or two minutes, like at a debate, you have much more time to make your view or ideas more clear.  So it helps everyone participating look good.

I think this helps someone like Yang the most, if people choose to watch while he is on.  During the debates, I felt he was called on less often than some of the other candidates.  He was also not as loud as some others.  His ideas need more explanation than can be done in one minute.  His humor also came through more last night.  So I think he did well.

Not surprising, Klobuchar was the most moderate and Sanders the most radical.  His 16 trillion price tag was 13 trillion more than that of Warren.  Booker was also more moderate than expected, saying nuclear power is not off the table as many progressives demanded.  I am actually surprised that this former Stanford football player who is well spoken, is not doing better at the polls.

I thought mayor Pete brought out a good point, asking would God want you to take care of the planet or destroy it?  This maybe helpful to persuade some conservatives who are most likely to be climate change deniers.  It may not work but at least it shows that he is not just preaching to the choir like most of the others were doing.

Of the big three, I think Warren did the best.  She came across as more detail oriented and spoke clearly.  Biden did ok but given the format, I don't think he did great.  There was the question of him attending a fund raiser hosted by an oil executive.  He denied that the man was an oil executive.  It may be semantics but it is not good to have to defend when he should be bringing out policies.  To me Sanders was just too far to the left and not as good a speaker as Warren.  So I declare Warren the winner of the big three.