Culdesacs that administration, the u. S. Government found itself to have sped down to the end of what was a complicated and bad and quickly worsening relationship with the largest country on earth by population, the country with the Fastest Growing economy on earth and the country that was fast emerging even then as our most important strategic counterpart on the globe. The george w. Bush administration had a tough second term in a lot of ways. But one of the ways in which they had a tough second term is that they had a super rocky relationship with china, including a lot of unforced errors on the part of the United States. So in 2005 they were trying to kind of recast that important relationship with china. They were trying to work out some of our worst disagreements with china and the george w. Bush white house invited the chinese president at the time to come visit the white house. And again, this is just one of those times in life when it was clear this might not work. I mean, it was at least clear it was going to be very tense from the beginning. I think it was maybe even clear from the beginning that it was going to go badly. I mean, in the first instance the chinese wanted hu jintao to be given the full state treatment. George w. Bush said, no, it will just be an official visit, which is one big wrung down the ladder in terms of protocol and pomp and circumstance. The chinese wanted hu jintao to have a state dinner at the white house. George w. Bush white house said, nope, we want you to come, but were not willing to give you dinner. How about lunch . Then an even bigger problem. Hurricane katrina blew ashore in the gulf coast and devastated the Great American city of new orleans and the bush administration, of course, disastrously botched the response to that hurricane. Huh jintaos visit had originally been scheduled for the week new orleans had almost been wiped off the map so that of course would not be an auspicious time for that delicate visit. The whole thing had to be called off lastminute because of katrina. It was finally april of 2006 when they were at least able to do this difficult thing. It did turn out to be a nice day at the white house. Hu jintao got his 21gun salute on the white house south lawn. They brought out the drum corps which is always a cool thing to see in the colonial drum corps outfits. But quickly thereafter things started to go off the rails a little bit. You can tell that in part because even today the archive a. P. Video footage summing up how that visit went at the white house that day in 2006 is slugged with this title. Announcer misnames china, protester ejected, bush pulls hus jacket. Thats not me naming it. Thats, like, how its named in the a. P. Archives. And it is true. In very quick secession all in that one day, all in that one ceremony, all of those bad things happened. Start with the first little point of light there. Start with announcer misnames china. Ladies and gentlemen, the National Anthem of the republic of china followed by the National Anthem of the United States of america. National anthem of the republic of china. Sounds like hes almost right, right . But hes missing a very important word. He should have been introducing the peoples republic of china, which is the official name for what we shorthand as china. If you drop the peoples and you just say republic of china, technically what that means you are introducing is the National Anthem of taiwan. So on this very fraught, very delicate, very sensitive occasion, the white house announcer is announcing that the president of china would stand there while we played the National Anthem of taiwan because thats what the republic of china is if you dont say peoples republic of china. And, you know, that may not have been a seemingly important point for the george w. Bush white house, but thats a really sensitive subject for china, so that was a, you know, tough way to start. Here he is, the president of taiwan. Oh, god, not taiwan. Also, what was the other strange thing the a. P. Put in the headline . Oh, yes, bush pulls hus jacket. That actually happened, too. That was this moment. The two shake hands. They stand there for a brief moment side by side. Hu jintao moves off the stage. Its less of a pull, its more like a yank, but george w. Bush actually reaches out and pinches the arm of his jacket and yanks him back. Can we play that one more time . And hu jintao looks at him like, really, youre pulling me back by my okay. I mean, again, this was already a kind of fraught occasion. A lot of protocol concerns. The chinese were asking for a lot more visual displays of respect than they were getting. A lot of focus on the chinese side in particular on getting the visuals just right. Making sure that everybody knew that appropriate respect was being paid to their president. So thats not awesome to have the u. S. President reaching out and yanking back the chinese president by his jacket elbow, even if hu was about to walk off the stage in the wrong direction in that moment. But the real problem that day turned out to be this other thing. Dialogues expand common ground, deepen trust and cooperation and promote the overall growth of constructive and cooperative u. S. china relations in the 21st century. So thats the chinese president speaking chinese. He pauses after every few lines so the english language translator can repeat what he said in english, right . Its a very form allocation. Very serious. This woman then starts screaming her guts out in the middle of hu jintaos speech. Shes actually really quite close to hu jintao when shes doing it. Shes on an elevated press podium from where bush and hu are making their remarks. The photojournalists up there on the platform with her, theyve all got their long lenses to try to get closeup shots of hu and bush as theyre speaking at the white house. Once the woman interrupts the whole proceeding, it doesnt stop and shes screaming in chinese and english and its not ending and its sort of taking over this event, and hu at one point stops speaking. Bush says to him, go on, youre okay. Urges him to go. One of the things that happens on the press platform, the photographers all realize theyre facing the wrong direction. The news event theyre there to cover is suddenly no longer taking place at the podium, its on the platform where theyre all standing so they all turn in place to try to start photographing this woman who has really taken over the event. Theyve got these big tel photo lenses on this cameras. Its hard to photograph somebody who is an inch and a half away from when youve got an 8 1 2inch telephoto lens designed to shoot the dais from far away. It was really something. And part of what made it so memorable is that very high tone of her voice which is kind of piercing. That made it i think harder to understand exactly what she was saying. A combination of her high voice and the fact that she was really hollering and the fact that she was speaking in a couple of different languages and the fact that hu was speaking in chinese and there is an english translation over him. Nbc news later quoted her as saying in english, screaming out, president bush, stop him from killing. President bush, stop him from persecuting. Nbc also quoted a mandarinspeaking cameraman who said what she screamed in mandarin was fal gong. Your time is over. Evil people will die early. Nbc nightly news also led with the story of her disruption of that event that night on the network news. This was considered to the president a major embarrassment. It came on a day that was tightly scripted down to the last detail. Reporter the atmosphere was formal for hu jintaos first visit to the website. When president hu began to make his remarks, there was a rare interruption. President bush, stop him from killing reporter some protester was latest identified as a reporter working for a newspaper linked to the Spiritual Group fal gong which is banned in china. Mr. Bush encouraged hu to keep speaking, saying youre out, but the outburst was a major irritant to the chinese leader since the white house gave her a day pass to attend the event. She was arrested and later charged with Disorderly Conduct and attempting to intimidate a foreign official. Again, this happened back in april 2006. We actually were able to obtain the criminal complaint that in fact was brought against this woman in d. C. Federal court when she was charged. The affidavit that accompanied the complaint tells you how seriously u. S. Authorities took this as a potential criminal matter. Quote, on april 20th, 2006 at 9 57 a. M. On the grounds of the white house located at 1600 pennsylvania avenue, northwest, washington, d. C. , the defendant coerced and harassed a foreign official, hu jintao, the president of the peoples republic of china as he was giving an official speech to invited guests of the u. S. Government. Ms. Wang began to yell at mr. She was standing on a press platform directly across from president hu. President hu was standing next to the president of the United States as ms. Wang began to yell. The words that ms. Wang yelled at hu in chinese have been translated by a certified interpreter. It goes on and on in that vein. Secret Service Affidavit for bringing charges against her for not just Disorderly Conduct, but specifically attempting to intimidate a foreign official while he is acting in his official capacity. So serious charges brought against this woman who was arrested that day. She went on and on and on yelling for, like, three minutes. They finally got her out of there. She reportedly spent the night in jail after they hauled her out. That said, ultimately within a couple of months prosecutors did a deal with her. Those charges did get dropped. This was a really consequential thing that happened. The first visit of the chinese president to the george w. Bush white house. It was considered to be a huge bust. There was no agreement on any kind. China didnt budge on any of the things the Bush White House and the president himself asked them to move on. In fact, it was the source of great embarrassment and consternation between the two sides. President bush himself ended up apologizing to the chinese president personally for president hu having gotten screamed at while he tried to give remarks on the white house lawn. The woman who was arrested for protesting that day, interestingly, she ultimately brought a foil lawsuit to try to support her allegation that the cameraman who had actually ended her disruption by grabbing her around the neck and shoulder and ultimately covering up her mouth, she says he was applying pressure points to her before he covered her mouth to close her mouth. She says that cameraman who grabbed her while she was yelling to stop her protest was an employee of china state television. She filed a foia lawsuit to the white house to find out if thats true, if thats who he was, and ultimately that foia lawsuit was not successful, but the allegation itself added more fuel to the chinese fury over this incident, right . The perceived insult by the Chinese Government here because of the prospect that it had basically been a Chinese State cameraman. It had been the Chinese Government acting itself, using its own people who ultimately controlled that protest and quieted this woman in order to prevent the chinese president from continuing to be yelled at for minutes on end at a formal speech on the south lawn of the white house, right . So it was all bad. It actually got worse when the white house explained defensively that there is no way they could have seen this coming. They say the woman who was arrested for disruption was just a reporter. Shed covered other white house events. There was no way they could have known there was any red flag about where whatsoever. Actually, it turns out that that same woman had gotten herself into a similar event featuring hu jintaos predecessor as president where she screamed at him and heckled him, too. Same woman five years earlier screaming at a different chinese president at a Different Event just like this. The white house apparently did not know that when they gave her a oneday pass to come cover this chinese president s visit as well. Its just a remarkable moment in the george w. Bush presidency. Remarkable moment between the u. S. And Chinese Governments. Remarkable moment between White House Security and protocol. Now, the woman was cece very ded credentialed to be there. The Chinese Governments prosecution which is a chinese religious movement that has been engaged for years in a very loud, very big brawl with the Chinese Government. Fallun gong was outlawed by the Chinese Government in 1999. The members claim to have suffered brutal oppression at the hands of china, including allegations of murder and torture at the hands of the government. They have relentlessly denounced this group as if its some very dangerous cult that must be suppressed. And whatever you think of this fight between that religious sect and the Chinese Government, the cult part of the Chinese Governments allegation has been helped along in the world press by the founder of that religious group repeatedly telling reporters about how he believes he possesses the ability to fly. He also says he can levitate through walls. He says that he needs people to know that the earth is slowly being infiltrated by extraterrestrials and also naturally that the end times are near. So, the year after the Chinese Government banned fallun gong in china, again, which led to remarkable and very scary allegations of serious serious persecution by the Chinese Government. A year after they outlawed it, practitioners of that religious movement founded an english language newspaper in the United States basically to support that religious movement. Its a newspaper called the epoch times. You might have seen it over the years. Free newspaper stands in major cities. Youve definitely seen profallun gong protesters anywhere in the western world. This is a protest movement against the Chinese Government that has popped its head up in the United States. Sometimes to great and nearly catastrophic effect, including that fateful day in 2006 on the white house south lawn. But this religious movement in its conflict with the Chinese Government and that newspaper promoting the interests of this dissident chinese religious sect has been a china story, right, much more than it has ever been a u. S. Story. Occasionally like on the white house lawn that day its in americans faces and occasionally they have these big loud faces, but it is a story that has not been seen about our own government, its a thing having to do with china and this dispute. Well, nbc news has a scoop out today about that group, about how that paper, the epoch times has transformed itself a lot in the trump era. Its a real revelation, this reporting from nbc news. I mean, epoch times and its media group, theyve made themselves into a whole new thing entirely and in a very big way. Over the last six months, the single Largest Organization that has spent more money on facebook ads promoting donald trump and Donald Trumps reelection is as you might expect the donald trump Reelection Campaign. The Second Organization on that list, though, is this fallun gone newspaper, the epoch times. There is no bigger advocate on facebook than the epoch times. Theyve spent more than 1. 5 million in the last six months on about loichbl,000 protrump advertisements according to data from facebooks advertising archive. More than any organization outside the Trump Campaign itself and more than most democratic president ial candidates have spent on their own campaigns. So why is this little special interest newspaper becoming the Biggest Online booster of Donald Trumps reelection other than Donald TrumpsReelection Campaign itself . Well, its apparently their new business model. Here, for example, is their list of special offers showing what you get when you subscribe to the epoch times. You get two special gifts valued at 30. One is a special report titled american revival about 70 ways donald trump has changed the nation and you Better Believe theyre all for the good. So you get this big glossy center fold love note thing about how wonderful donald trump is. Thats one of the presents you get if you subscribe to this newspaper. The other thing you get is a large Spygate Infographic poster. So you can put it on your wall and track the conspiracy at home. The conspiracy in this case being something about donald trump saving america from satanic democratic pedophiles. Also something something sally yates, something something john mccain, something something donna brazile. Anyway, thats part of your 34 value gift if you just subscribe to the paper. Theyre also quite desperate to make sure you subscribe to their various social media channels. Click on that button below and try the the epoch Times Newspaper for just 1. Experience the wonder of pure american journalism that is based in traditional values. Just click on that button below. As nbc puts it, this whole shift toward trump and specifically trump Conspiracy Theory stuff has been a financial transformation for this, you know, Little Corner of the we are mad at china niche