Freedom?

My blog post today is about an article I've read in the New York Times recently. It is named, "Chinese Court Denies Appeal by Jailed Activist." For those who don't know, China's official name is the People's Republic of China, and is a Communist government. Wait, is that an oxymoron? After reading this article, you will think so. Liu XiaoBo, a Beijing scholar (funny thing is, China usually prizes their scholars; at least until they become too smart), wrote a document stating that China was in need of political and legal reforms. He has been sentenced to eleven years in prison, and the government is not even considering changing the sentence. Tan ZuoRen was sentenced to five years in prison after sending e-mails with information about the military crackdown on protesters in Tiananmen Square on June 4, 1989. Does this sound like a "People's Republic?" We should be grateful for the freedom we have here in America. While living in Taiwan (Taiwan is located about 50 miles of the coast of southeast China) for two years, I had a lot of contact with Mainland Chinese. It was funny that when you asked them how the government was, they would almost always respond that it was a great government, then in hushed tones as if they were afraid to be overheard, they would state how things really were. These people were in a different country and they were swill afraid to say anything about the government. Like I stated before, let us be grateful for the wonderful country that we live in and all the freedoms we enjoy.