Where's Waldo: Xijinping Edition

Apparently he disappeared for a few days, which even led to the cancellation of the meeting with Clinton. Where do you guys think he's at?

Or it could be just a veiled snub against Hillary. It's ironic that the US media doesn't report nearly at all on anyone elses politics except their own. Now just because Xi doesn't show up, it must be turmoil behind the scenes or he's gravely ill. I would snub Hillary for her irresponsible show-boating only and no substance as Secretary of State. She's about to leave office anyway. Why bother with her? Lately I've been reading a lot of stories suggesting Hillary has been setting her own agenda apart from Obama. And since Hillary has higher approval ratings than Obama himself, he's just letting her do what she wants especially since it's been more PR trips and not actually diplomacy. She's a lame duck Secretary of State. If you think about it she is setting up to run for President in 2016. Before she was attacked for her lack of foreign policy credentials. Remember her claim that she was under fire in Kosovo. It was 80s comedian Sinbad who was on the same plane who called her out on her fib. Her run as Secretary of State has been more about image which is good to say something about foreign policy when running for President. Look at Sarah Palin who never went to foreign country before. Then she goes to Hong Kong and gives a speech just so it can be said she has a foreign policy for an upcoming possible run as President. Is that all it takes?

Remember the rumours about Jiang Zemin's death a while ago?

As I recall most senior Officials about to take new top positions disappear during the transition phase.
Partly this is due to the incomers being closeted with the incumbents advisers, being brought up to speed and partly to ensure that they do not upstage the outgoing officers enjoying their swan songs.

I guess the media silly season is still with us.
I do agree with the Clinton snub, though. Xi is a part of a future that she will not be sharing, so why bother to meet her?

Passing on rumors and wild speculations without anything remotely substantive to support any of it, is this what passes for news these days?

Surfing the web at home and laughing at the stupid speculations about him.

Heard he disappeared for two weeks. And just received news that he and hu jintao attended an senior official funeral not sure if that true or not but its better than the rumor saying he's in ill health. I kind of like Xi JinPing, he's a bit more hawkish and frank when it comes to diplomacy.

AaHa We can look forward to more interesting times then.

He's back in the public view, after an absence of a fortnight. I don't understand the secrecy of all of this. I doubt he's done anything shameful like been involved in a sexual orgy or crashed a Ferrari whilst making out with a number of girls. The suggestion is that he had a health issue. If the Chinese authorities can't admit to something like "Xi hurt his back/had a mild heart attack and per doctor's instructions won't be attending any public functions for x period of time", what does that do for confidence in the Chinese government to tell the truth in really difficult circumstances?

And the lack of a detailed explanation just allowed the Chinese rumour mill to go into overdrive. For example, if he had just hurt his back, why not release a picture or two of him being visited in hospital? It would show his human side for one thing. The only reason most people could think of why you wouldn't do that would be if he was critically ill. Unless the CCP is so anally-retentive it can't stand the idea of its top leaders being seen to be vulnerable! If the CCP doesn't like rumours about it, the need to release more information and get a reputation for telling the truth, rather than being secretive.

Would Romney admit to a health problem if he could get away with not telling anyone? Xi is not just some politburo member, he is China's next president in waiting, and any confirmation of health problems could hurt him politically just like any health scares would hurt the election chances of a candidate running for president in the US.

That is all assuming that Xi had some health scare to start with, which in itself is nothing but unsubstantiated wild guesses by people who have no idea what actually happened, and the only reason this non-story got any traction is because the western media decided to elevated above the ideal gossip that it is by reporting prominently on it.

It seems that sometimes the western media is not content to merely wait for bad things to happen to/in China so they can cherry pick them to report, they get so restless when nothing bad happens for a while that they have to go and try to find something to the point where they are believing baseless speculation.

The Chinese gave the reason for Xi missing his appointments was because of a minor back injury sustained during his daily swim. If Obama hurt his back and had to cancel some appointments, would the White House feel a desperate need to parade his bed-striken form in front of the cameras? No, of course not. If journalists refused to believe that perfectly reasonably explanation, that' their problem.

All the subsequent hype about Chinese spokesmen not having information about Xi that helped fuel this non-story is more a case of misreporting rather than something the Chinese did wrong. When pressed, the Chinese foreign ministry spokesman said he 'had nothing new to add'. How that could have been twisted into 'the Chinese spokesman didn't know' as was widely reported speaks far more about the utter lack of standards and accountability for work in the western media than some PR blunder by China.