When I read this on Sunday, for some reason I thought that the game show might have actually ended in a three-way. As in three-way sex. I pictured Bob from Michigan on the left (reigning champ) kind of slowly making his way over to the center console where Irene from St. Paul, who hasn’t had sex in years and who just answered wrong in Final Jeopardy, lets Bob have his way with her. And Chris, the young challenger from the Bible Belt, on the right who kept on going for “true Daily Doubles,” can’t think of a better way to commemorate his dismal performance than to get behind Irene, take down her pants and go to work. It would have been great for ratings. But as I read past the headline, I realized that’s not what happened. “Jeopardy!,” the staple American television quiz show, ended in a three-way tie on Friday. Jamey, Anders and Scott all answered Final Jeopardy correctly and each finished the show with $16,000. The final question, or answer, depending on how passionately you buy into the show’s silly format, dealt with “Women of the 1930s” and the contestants all identified Bonnie Parker (of Bonnie and Clyde) as the woman of the 1930s who once, as a waitress, served one of the men who shot her. Alex Trebek, sans mustache, had this to say about the tie: “We’ve had a lot of crazy things happen on ‘Jeopardy!’ but in 23 years I’ve never seen anything like this before.” Jeopardy’s so “crazy.” The game show consulted a mathematician who found that the odds of such an occurrence are 1 in 25 million. Doesn’t that sort of sound like bullshit. The number sounds a little too round. Almost like some mathematician couldn’t be bothered with computing Jeopardy odds and just picked a really big number. All 3 contestants returned as champions and taped a rematch that will air Monday.

•UPI: Jeopardy Finish Historic

Media mogul Ted Turner apologized Tuesday for dropping “Chinaman” during a speech he gave last week to the Bay Area Council on global warming. According to a San Francisco Chronicle story Wednesday, the panel of Bay Area community leaders asked Turner last Thursday what he suggests America do to gain Chinese support in the global cause to reduce greenhouse gases. At which point the 69-year-old Turner went all senile. He replied, “The Chinese are very smart. Just think: Have you ever met a dumb Chinaman?” Eek. He continued, “Very seldom do you see Chinese restaurants close. I’m in the restaurant business, and it’s very tough. They work very hard.” All racial insensitivity aside, how did that come remotely close to answering the question you were asked, Ted? You were asked about global warming, not about Chinese takeout. In his scripted apology Tuesday, Turner said, “As many people know, I do not believe in any form of prejudice or discrimination and was unaware that the term ‘Chinaman’ was derogatory and hurtful to the Asian Pacific American community.” The term “Chinaman” has been distasteful for about as long as Jane Fonda hasn’t been hot. A while. The term, describing a man of Chinese origin, came from the California Goldrush days when whites would refer to a Chinese worker as a “Chinaman.” This word is in the same class of racial language as the word “oriental”– while it was once common in American usage, political correctness has rendered the word completely unacceptable. And similar to “oriental,” the offensiveness in the word stems not from its meaning, but from the fact that it was primarily used by whites and not the Chinese themselves. In Ted Turner’s defense, old white people still use these words, not because they are bigoted (most of the time) but because these words, in their lifetime, were frequently used and were not considered “racist” or even “hateful,” but just words. And sadly, most of these old people haven’t a Chinaman’s chance of changing.

•SF Chronicle: Ted Turner Apologizes for Remarks on Chinese

There’s no business like show business and it’s time for China to know. Next week, Nederlander, a major Broadway theater owner, will give new meaning to “off-Broadway.” The company will join forces with China-based company Beijing Time New Century Entertainment to create Nederlander New Century, a new theater company that will present tours of Broadway shows throughout China, as reported by the New York Times Wednesday. There had been talk in Shanghai over the last few years of building a Broadway-like theater district near the foreigner-friendly area Xintiandi, however details of the plan are sparse. Beijing has hosted short runs of Broadway shows including “The Sound of Music” and “Beauty and the Beast” and Shanghai ran a 13-week production of the Lion King last year. According to the Times story, “The King and I,” “42nd Street” and “Mamma Mia” are scheduled to come to China in the coming months. And it’s good timing for “Mamma Mia” because ABBA is so hot right now in the mainland. Nederlander operates a number of Broadway shows that could potentially hit China in the near future. For instance, the Chinese could be lining up to see “Zu Jun,” a musical about a group of 20-something Bohemians living in Alphabet City during the AIDS crisis of the early 90s. Or perhaps another Nederlander production titled “Fa Jiao,” the story of a fat girl in 1962 Baltimore who realizes her dream of appearing on a daily television dance show. Surely, both stories will resonate with an audience full of Chinese people.

•NYT: Broadway Shows in China

Chinese media reported Tuesday that a student died in a mass riot over a hike in public transportation costs in Zhushan village in Hunan province last week. Nearly 20,000 villagers stormed a government building Friday in protest of the fare hike. According to the South China Morning Post, the transport fees have doubled in Zhushan since Chinese new year last month. The situation turned violent when provincial authorities dispatched 1,700 riot police, dogs and cattle prods to control the crowd. The rioters burned 9 police cars (photo) and threw rocks and other objects at police. The riot continued through the weekend and it was only when the province rushed in 20 truckloads of additional armed police Monday night that the riot subsided. According to an AP report Tuesday:

The protesters in Zhushan were “very, very angry and were shouting ‘Beat the government dogs to death,”‘ Zhang (a local activist) said in a phone interview. They were throwing rocks and bricks at the officers, he said. At least 1,500 paramilitary police and riot police wearing helmets and carrying batons yelled back “Beat them to death,” Zhang said. “They beat everyone including old people, children, women and people who were just passing by,” he said. At least 60 people were injured, Zhang said.

Sounds like a real deal riot. A number of police were injured. These farmers mean business. According to the South China Morning Post, the student who died was in junior high school and was hospitalized Sunday due to injuries. According to the paper, he died on Monday. This comes as Beijing has made countless promises to shrink China’s wealth gap and make life more affordable for the nation’s massive peasantry.

•AP: ‘60 Injured’ in China Protests

Monday night at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York City, Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five became the first hip-hop act to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Before I begin I’d like to congratulate Flash and say that I loved your work on the Chris Rock Show. Now I’ll begin. Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five have no business in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. None whatsoever. For one, this group had only one hit song, “The Message” in 1982. And two, Grandmaster Flash, despite being the undisputed pioneer of mixing, scratching and pretty much every element of what we know to be hip-hop music, has nothing to do with rock and roll. And this is what makes his musical accomplishments so impressive. Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five in the late 70s helped create a totally unique genre of music that shared none of the musical qualities of any existing genre at that time. And this music has become synonymous with urban culture in America and in cities throughout the world. No small achievement. But this is not an achievement that needs to be recognized by the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Not everyone has to be invited to the party. And if the justification for Flash’s induction is that the museum is for anyone in any genre influential in music, then why isn’t John Coltrane in? Why isn’t Frank Sinatra in? Because clearly the Rock Hall of Fame isn’t just for any type of music. It’s for rock. And now, it’s a rock museum that includes Grandmaster Flash, but not actual rock stars with actual rock careers like Iggy Pop, Alice Cooper and Kiss. The lines that distinguish different forms of art are not evil and don’t always have to be blurred. Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five should have waited until Jay-Z and whoever else erected a Hip-Hop Hall of Fame in the South Bronx to honor this art form. This would have been more appropriate. And way more rock and roll.

•NYT: Hip-Hop Is Rock ‘n’ Roll
•YouTube: Grandmaster Flash-The Message

Antigua-based online gambling site Bodog.com is taking bets on whether or not Heather Mills’ prosthetic leg will fly off during her run on the show “Dancing With the Stars.” On March 19, Mills, former wife of Paul McCartney, will debut on the ABC dancing reality show. Mills lost half of her leg in a 1993 motorcycle accident and will be the first contestant on the show with an artificial limb. On Bodog’s TV and Film betting page, odds are given for certain events on reality shows. For instance, one can bet on whether someone will throw up on stage during an American Idol performance. And for the Mills bet, the title is “Will Heather Mills prosthetic leg fall off during a dance routine on Dancing with the Stars 4?” The fine print for the bet is as follows: “If Heather Mills does not participate in Dancing with the Stars, all wagers will be graded as No Action. Heather Mills’ leg must fall off, not be purposely taken off, during a dance routine for all Yes wagers to be graded a Win.” First of all, why would Heather Mills purposely take her leg off while dancing on TV? And second, how did Heather Mills become the only acceptable disabled person in this world to make fun of? A New York Post headline Monday read “Break A Leg, Heather.” And a Long Island Press Story is titled “Put Your Money Where Mills’ Leg Is.” Good headline, but isn’t this kind of in poor taste? She’s an amputee! Apparently, Mills even has a sense of humor about her stump. She told EXTRA last week, “It’s very very unlikely my leg’s going to fly off even though it would be quite funny to knock one of the judges out.” Uh, no it really wouldn’t be funny Heather if your leg “flew off” and hit a judge in the face. It would be seriously disturbing. As of Tuesday, the odds for “yes (it will fly off)” are +425 which means one would have to wager $100 to win $425. If you believe the prosthesis will remain attached, you need to bet $800 to win $100. I’d say the odds are about as good that she wins.

•Reuters: Will Mills’ Leg Go Flying?
•Bodog: Television and Movie Betting

Margaret MacMillan’s “Nixon and Mao: The Week That Changed the World” chronicles U.S. President Richard Nixon’s iconic visit to China in 1972. I can’t really review the book for one simple reason: I haven’t read it. But from what I hear, it’s very solid. And I have read a fair amount on the Nixon visit to China. What I find interesting about the Nixon visit, besides for the fact that it planted the seeds for an economic relationship like the world had never seen, is that when Nixon was on his way to China, he didn’t even think he was going to meet Mao. Apparently, during Nixon’s visit, it was a chore for Mao to get out of bed, much less pose for photos. Another element of the trip that is seldom discussed is how Nixon and Kissinger insisted on keeping every detail of the trip highly secret. MacMillan writes that these two men were obsessed with secrecy. And despite Nixon’s staunch anti-communism and Mao’s strong commitment to communism, these two leaders were more similar than the world knew in 1972. Both men were astute historians, exceptionally paranoid and in the end, profoundly corrupt. Their union was not only significant in the opening of China, but the meeting itself, to this day, is probably the most important diplomatic event in the history of both nations.

•USA Today: Review: Book Remembers Nixon’s Groundbreaking China Efforts
•Excerpt: ‘Nixon and Mao: The Week That Changed the World’

I came across an editorial Monday in The Standard, China’s business newspaper, that mirrored my own thoughts with regard to America’s annual report on worldwide human rights abuses. The editorial by James Rose, titled “Just Look in the Mirror,” urges the U.S. State Department to do just that, rather than partaking in this annual finger-pointing exercise. And considering the American abuses in Iraq, Guantanamo Bay and the pending Italian war crime indictment of 25 U.S. CIA officers for kidnapping an innocent Muslim cleric, perhaps this year, the State Department could have kept its ideas about human rights to itself.

In the 2006 report, released Tuesday, the U.S. State Department points its finger most harshly at China, Russia and Pakistan for rights abuses and declares the Darfur genocide to be the world’s gravest human rights crisis. The U.S. perennially chastises China for rights abuses and in this annual report goes into great detail of how China “fell short” with regard to its goals. This year, the U.S. reported the Chinese government sanctions the harassment, detention and imprisonment of journalists, activists and lawyers and permits extrajudicial executions, torture and forced labor. Barry Lowenkron, the U.S. assistant secretary of state for democracy, human rights and labor told reporters last week, “Against the backdrop of 30 years, they (China) certainly have made progress, but against the backdrop of last year, I am disappointed.”

For the eighth straight year, the Chinese government fired back at the State Department issuing its own report on U.S. human rights abuses, released on Thursday. This year, the Chinese response was particularly vicious. The document touches on the Abu Ghraib prison abuses (above); accuses American forces of 500 violent deaths per day in Iraq; discusses the 6,742 individuals held by the FBI since 9/11, 75% of whom were released due to a lack of evidence; said “racial discrimination is deep-rooted in American law enforcement;” claimed American women are not paid equally for doing the same work as men; and addressed the violations of privacy on American citizens by the federal government as sanctioned by the Patriot Act. The document says, “The United States has lorded it over other countries by condemning other countries’ human rights practices while ignoring its own problems, which exposes its double standard and hegemonism on the human rights issue.”

James Rose in his editorial Monday is equally condemnatory of the U.S. rights record and the presumptuous nature of the U.S. report. Rose focuses on the post-9/11 use of the U.S. naval base in Guantanamo Bay. Rose writes, “what about the 250 or so detainees at Guantanamo Bay who have been held in most cases, for years, without charge, and who are likely to be held indefinitely without any charges? Rose also brings up America’s abnormally high execution rate and the fact that it was only in 2005 when capital punishment for juveniles was abolished. These two points were noticeably absent from China’s report– the death penalty for obvious reasons and Guantanamo perhaps because Chinese Muslim dissidents were held there on the request of Beijing.

In response to accusations of hypocrisy, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice stated, “We do not issue these reports because we think ourselves perfect, but rather because we know ourselves to be deeply imperfect, like all human beings and the endeavors that they make. Our democratic system of governance is accountable, but it is not infallible.” And in fact, in the U.S. report, the State Department admitted to falling short of international standards for human rights. It seems as though human rights violations are being used as political ammunition and not as actual problems in the world that need resolution.

I believe if the United States is genuine in its commitment to achieving true human rights throughout the world, it should start by scrapping its annual report on human rights. While the report may have been useful in years past, today’s America has no right to single out any other nation for human rights violations. We have uncompromised independent groups, such as Amnesty International and the Human Rights Watch, to point fingers when they need to be pointed. And with every day that there are prisoners sitting in Guantanamo without charge, lawyers or even a trial date, not one person in this world, Chinese or American, should care at all what the U.S. government has to say about human rights.

•The Standard: Just Look in the Mirror
•Xinhua: China Issues Human Rights Record of the United States
•Herald Tribune: U.S. Releases Report on Human Rights in 2006

Hong Kong’s leader and quite possibly the world’s nerdiest statesman Donald Tsang is at the center of a censorship scandal that hit China’s mainland over the weekend. Saturday, Tsang appeared on CNN International’s Talk Asia where his use of the “d-word” apparently alarmed China’s political censors. And by “d-word,” I don’t mean “dipshit.” As the AP reported Sunday:

During CNN’s Talk Asia program, Tsang was talking about his plans to consult the Hong Kong public on how to bring universal suffrage to the territory. He said he was anxious to address the democracy issue if he wins a second term in office later this month. The show was then abruptly cut to make way for commercials, after which the screen blacked out momentarily. When the show resumed, Tsang was speaking about his relationship with Beijing state leaders.

If your initial thought upon reading this was the same as mine– there’s CNN in China?– yeah, apparently there is in the hotels and apartment complexes for foreigners. Hong Kong, since being handed back to China in 1997, has struggled with the prospect of becoming fully democratic. As it stands now, the “chief executive,” as the leader is called in Hong Kong, is elected by an Election Committee composed of around 850 carefully selected citizens of the territory. The AP points out that most of these voters are “Beijing loyalists.” While Tsang is expected to be elected to another term on March 25th, his opponent, Alan Leong, is running as a pro-democracy candidate and has publicly questioned Tsang’s commitment to democracy. He has not, however, questioned Tsang’s commitment to rocking a bowtie. And no one has asked Tsang what it is like being a Chinese guy who rocks a bowtie. While CNN is busy asking the hard questions about suffrage and democracy, maybe the voters are like me and would merely like to hear Tsang explain to the public why he has made the choice to go with the bowtie as opposed to the standard modern necktie.

•AP: CNN interview with Hong Kong Leader Apparently Blocked in China

The New York Times ran a piece Thursday about a Chinese orphan, one of the first babies to be adopted when China first began allowing international adoptions in the early 1990s. Now, the babies of the 90s, mostly all of whom are girls, are becoming the teens of this decade. And for some who were adopted to Jewish families, many of these Chinese babies are becoming Jewish adults. The girl pictured left, Cece Nealon-Shapiro (formerly Fu Qian) was born in Jiangxi province in 1994 and was abandoned by parents who had violated the one-child policy. Cece was adopted by a lesbian couple in New York City and had her Bat Mitzvah on February 17th at the historic Rodeph Sholom synagogue on Manhattan’s Upper West Side. As the Times piece points out, there are no official statistics on how many Chinese babies are placed in Jewish households but there were nearly 20,000 Chinese babies adopted into American homes in the 90s, and one can only assume that a considerable amount of these are Jewish homes. Furthermore, Cece told the Times, “most of my Chinese friends are Jewish.” Most of my Chinese friends aren’t. At Cece’s Bat Mitzvah, there were yin yang yarmulkes, dragon kiddush cups and kosher Chinese food at the reception. Cece chose to have a casino theme for her party and she and her friends played cards and gambled away fake money. The gambling theme is just an interesting fact, not part of the China motif of the Bat Mitzvah. Because that would be in poor taste. Six of the girls from Cece’s orphanage flew to New York for Cece’s ceremony. As Cece said in her speech to the congregation, “Just like Jews were once strangers in the land of Egypt, we have all been, or will be strangers at some point in our lives.” Amen.

•NYT: Chinese Orphan’s Journey to Jewish Rite of Passage