Interestingly though, the Taiwanese basically ignored both of us, voting more or less the way everyone thought they would and spending the hot election day basking in the sun at the beach and trying to catch a glimpse of the superpower games. The U.S. is constantly lodging protests with whomever will listen about human rights violations in China. These have been mostly protests about political prisoners. Lately, however, the accusations have turned ugly. Some groups in the U.S. are accusing China of starving and otherwise abusing orphans.
China vehemently denies all charges and adds that it is none of our business anyway.
Here the bitch is that China is allowing wholesale theft of U.S. computer software. Finally there is the issue of China selling nuclear components to third countries that could be used to make atomic bombs. At stake underneath all these claims and counter-claims is tons and tons of money. U.S. business is flocking to Asia in general and China in particular looking for vast and lucrative new markets for their products. Well, there is Microsoft, king of the PC software hill.