Subject: Share the View -- on a Martyred Saint and a China Crisis
From: "Bloomberg View -- Tobin Harshaw" <[email-masked]>
To: <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 22 Mar 2012 06:44:18 -0400

_Share the View_
   _Bloomberg View _

A Quick Look at Bloomberg News's Opinion Section for March 22,  2012

   Well, the View editors feel that Wednesday will  be remembered as a blue day
   for Britain, a sinning time for Saints and a crisis of confusion in China.

   Let's start across the pond. "The budget announced Wednesday by Britain’s
   Conservative government was less a change of economic direction than an
   exercise in political theater," write the editors. "The good news is that
   the outlook is no longer deteriorating. For the first time since coming to
   office in 2010, the Tories didn’t have to explain how worsening growth
   projections had wrecked their plans. Chancellor of the Exchequer George
   Osborne could have simply confirmed his previous revenue and growth targets,
   but in Britain budgets call for melodrama. So he enraged the Labour
   opposition by cutting the top rate of income tax from 50 percent to 45
   percent."[2] Link.
     Links:
       2. http://bloom.bg/GDO0x1

   Meanwhile, we have a martyr in the home of the muffaletta: "After leading
   the New Orleans Saints from the post-Hurricane Katrina doldrums to a Super
   Bowl victory in 2010, Sean Payton was widely heralded as America’s Coach.
   Now, facing a one-year suspension over so-called Bountygate, many feel he’s
   become America’s Scapegoat: the one taking the fall because National
   Football League Commissioner Roger Goodell is “shocked, shocked” to find
   violence being rewarded in this inherently brutal sport. Although there’s
   some legitimacy to this view, we think Goodell made the right call."
   [3]Link.
   As for China, the fall of Communist Party bigwig Bo Xilai wasn't what many
   Westerners took it to be. "To hear some tea-leaf readers tell it, the
   high-flying Bo was the creator of the 'Chongqing model' a program that
   melded support for state-owned enterprises and measures to help the poor
   with a relentless campaign against crime and corruption and a rekindling of
   revolutionary fervor," explain the editors. "When his comeuppance came, it
   represented a victory for reformist liberals led by outgoing Premier Wen
   Jiabao, proof that even a 'princeling' -- in this case, the son of Bo Yibo,
   one of Mao Zedong’s revolutionary comrades -- could be brought to
   heel. Although no tears should be shed at Bo’s downfall, that narrative is
   flawed. First, Bo was more an opportunist than an ideologue." [4]Link.
     Links:
       3. http://bloom.bg/GKdmbN
       4. http://bloom.bg/GEuwna

   Then again, many Chinese -- especially those using the microblogging site
   Sina Weibo -- are also a tad confused about it all, explains World View
   contributor Adam Minter: "Some suggested that a coup d’etat had taken place
   Monday night near Zhongnanhai, the Chinese Communist Party's leadership
   compound. This rumor spread rapidly, in various forms (and forums), online
   and offline ...  Several claimed they’d heard shots near Chang’an Avenue.
   Meanwhile, Weibo users, and The Epoch Times, a U.S.-based newspaper with
   connections to the banned Falun Gong spiritual movement, circulated photos
   of military vehicles on Chang’an Avenue that were allegedly taken during the
   alleged coup." [5]Link.
     Links:
       5. http://bloom.bg/GKOgoE

   Also, columnist Caroline Baum thinks Ben Bernanke might be facing a coup of
   his own; Amity Shlaes looks at dorm-roomz gone wild; and op-ed contributor
   Scott Turow draws his light saber against the Darth Vader of the book world,
   Amazon.com.

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   And check out our editors' blog, [7]The Ticker.
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