Thank you very much. I must say, as someone who spent most of his professional career talking into a machine, it is rather daunting to be able to see one's audience. On my way over from Hong Kong for this book tour, I was leafing through The Economist magazine which had an article a few weeks ago about how horrible book tours are. I must say, if it is all going to be like this I am not sure the article was that accurate.

As we were planning this tour for my book, China Live, earlier this winter, I was consumed with one great fear -- and it was not fear of bad reviews; rather, it was fear of missing the death of Deng Xiaoping. I kept thinking of the true story that I had heard early in my career about a Beijing-based European journalist who, in January of 1977, decided he would take a vacation and was thus out of Beijing when Premier Zhou Enlai died. He cut short his holiday and raced back. He decided to resume it in April and thus missed the first Tiananmen Square riot which lead to the ouster and second purging of Deng Xiaoping. He cut short his vacation again and came back. He tried to get some time off in the Summer and missed the Tangshan earthquake, which killed 500,000 people. After losing that holiday opportunity, he tried again in September and was out of Beijing when Chairman Mao died. So I must admit, I had nightmares of stepping off the plane only to be called back to China by CNN, which would simultaneously ruin my book tour and my chances of making the best seller list, but also force me to cover a story which I had been waiting for for years. In fact, I extended my tour in Beijing for many years in hopes of being there for Deng's death, and I had this fear that I would end up having to cover it with one of the world's worst cases of jet-lag.

But throughout my career, I have always been lucky in my timing: starting out as a China- watcher in that turbulent year, 1976; being in Beirut when the U.S. embassy and the U.S. Marine barracks were blown up in 1983; getting to Manila shortly before Cory Aquino's People Power Movement toppled the government of Ferdinand Marcos; being in Beijing shortly before Tiananmen Square in 1989; accompanying former President Carter as the only journalist to go with him on his historic trip to North Korea in 1994 (one of my eight trips to North Korea); and not being on my book tour when Deng Xiaoping died. In fact, I was able to get up to Beijing and help CNN with its coverage.

I did not plan any of this, obviously, but it occurred to me that the timing of my book, China Live, this spring was also quite fortuitous because the book deals with the issue of covering China. How does it work? What does a Beijing correspondent actually do? Trying to share with the reader a sense of the process of gathering news in a place as difficult to work in and as hard to understand as China. What is the connection between that and what you see on your television?

China's turbulent transformation from Maoist poverty and isolation to an emerging superpower is one central theme of the book. But, as I mentioned, it shares top billing with this issue of coverage, especially with the impact of satellite news and its power to transmit human experience in real-time across vast distances, crucially influencing political attitudes and decisions. The reason that I think the timing is significant is that the book has come out at a moment when not only the China story is back in the headlines, but when American perceptions shaped by media coverage over recent years are setting the framework for the current high- decibel debate about such controversial issues as the overall Sino-American relationship, the handover of Hong Kong, and the campaign financing scandal, Donor Gate. I have to say, at the risk of being critical of some of my U.S.-based colleagues who have been reporting on China- related matters, that the lens through which they, and I fear too many others, appear to be looking at China today seems to me to be very distorted. The depiction of China that I see over and over bears relatively little resemblance to the reality I covered for so long and which I write about in China Live.

There are many reasons for this, but I think the main one is clear: it is called Tiananmen Square. The 1989 student movement in Beijing, which was shown live on CNN in the U.S. and around the world, captured the imagination of millions. The Chinese army's ruthless crackdown on the night of June 3rd and early in the morning on June 4th was also captured by our camera crews. Incidentally, just how we did that and how I was subsequently denounced by name as a rumor- monger by the Beijing Daily, the behind-the-scenes story of that period, is a central part of my book, China Live. But that moment remains today, almost a decade later, the defining moment in American perceptions of China. Those televised images from Tiananmen -- the goddess of democracy, the man standing in front of the tank -- have been seared into our consciousness, taking their place among the most memorable instances of resistance against tyranny of this century. Even now they retain the power to stir emotions, so much so that they have contributed, I think, to a picture of contemporary China that is in many ways distorted, one-dimensional and over-simplistic. It is a picture of China solely as a country of brutal dictators, beleaguered dissidents, and corrupt deal-makers, intent on using its economic clout and its military might to dominate its neighbors and challenge the United States for regional supremacy. It is now accused, in some ways it would seem, of trying to subvert the American political process through an alleged conspiracy that is as vast as, it seems to me anyway, it seems impossible.

Before leaving Hong Kong, I took an informal poll of colleagues there and in Beijing for the major U.S. newspapers, the daily newspapers, the weekly news magazines, the wire services, and broadcast outlets. I told them I was hoping as I traveled around the country on this book tour to challenge what I see as this rather narrow-minded conventional wisdom on China. They were virtually unanimous in saying, "Great, it is about time." From our vantage point on the other side of the Pacific, many of my colleagues and I have been disturbed and sometimes frankly appalled by what appears to be the demonization of China, a frenzy of assertions and allegations often without real, credible evidence, often showing even less understanding of Chinese reality. These have sometimes smacked of little more than stirring up long-dormant fears of the Yellow Peril. China has a nasty authoritarian government. I should know that better than most -- I worked there for 8 years as a correspondent. It is often difficult to deal with and, as the 1996 Missile Crisis over Taiwan showed, Beijing is not averse to flexing its muscles from time to time to make a political point.

But I would argue that the reality is that the People's Republic of China today is in many crucial ways dramatically different than it was in the immediate aftermath of the Tiananmen Square crackdown, and to put the picture in a broader and more useful context perhaps, than it was when I first went there in 1973. As I recount in China Live, back then at the time of my first visit, the Chinese Communist Party controlled literally the smallest aspects of daily existence: what you thought, where you lived, where you worked, whether you could travel, even what clothes you wore. Remember how everybody, it seems, used to wear varying shades of blue or gray? Today, as any recent visitor to China can testify, the degree to which the state interferes with people's private lives has shrunk dramatically: you can dress how you want; you have opportunities to study abroad; you have opportunities to start your own business; carry a portable telephone; login, albeit with restrictions, to the internet; watch MTV; eat at McDonald's; even, to some degree, legally, to watch the news on CNN. Tens, perhaps hundreds of millions of people, have seen their lives change beyond recognition, emerging from poverty to, at least in the cases of some people, remarkable wealth.

These changes, as undoubtedly you are all aware, are the product of the country's reforms -- the move from a planned to a market economy. With ideology more or less consigned to the dustbin of history, the Communist Party seems interested in two things: staying in power and doing business. That is why, for all the things people can do, if you go out in the streets and say, "Down with the Communist Party," or, "Down with President Jiang Zemin," or if you try to organize an opposition group, you will probably get knocked on the head and hauled off to jail. And reporters like me who try to cover an event like that may not fare all that much better. But short of open protest, you would be surprised, perhaps even amazed, to discover that people can think and, in private, say pretty much what they want. The last series of stories that I did before I finished my assignment in Beijing in 1995 was a half-hour program on Chinese culture in the 1990s. I am sorry I do not have a video machine here to show you segments of that, but it dealt with a side of China that I think many Americans do not realize exists: we have punk rockers, avant garde artists, experimental theatre troupes, things that you do not associate with the conventional notion of the Butchers of Beijing.

The highly respected former Ambassador to China, Stapleton Roy, was fond of saying that the changes in China over the past 15 or 18 years have been so far-reaching that every other society in the world that has experienced change on the same scale in such a short time-frame has collapsed. I think that is probably a pretty accurate observation. To my mind, it is this process of change, both its achievements and its immense problems -- corruption, the growing gap between rich and poor, challenges of carrying out further market reforms, a profound crisis of political legitimacy and national identity -- this process, in my view, represents the real China story. However, news coverage by definition seems to be driven by events, by a need to simplify, and by the fact that it is a medium that is good at conveying action and emotion, but less good at portraying complexity or ideas. Process is not usually associated with riveting television. A story about legal reform, for example -- there is legal reform in China, as even the leadership recognizes that a functioning legal system is essential in perpetuating the market reforms which it has begun and whose continued success are crucial to the leadership's continued hold on power. Or a story about the subtly subversive effect on Communist Party officials of continued exposure to foreign ideas, people, organizations, and ways of doing things,. These kinds of stories are a lot less sexy or dramatic than the man standing in front of the tank, or detained dissidents, or menacing outbursts of nationalistic rhetoric. But in terms of where China may be heading, they are arguably as important, and I think one could make a reasonable case that they might even be more important.

My point here is simple: China is far more complex, multi-dimensional, and full of paradoxes than is widely acknowledged in the discussion of important China-related issues, especially in the US-based media, or in certain sections of it. Take my current beat, Hong Kong, for example: I suspect the prevailing opinion in the U.S. is that Hong Kong is about to be sacked by the Butchers of Beijing, who are going to roll into town, eliminate all political freedom, and make the place a shadow of its former self. I have to say, such an outcome is not impossible. I was at Tiananmen Square, after all. And China has moved to roll back certain laws on civil liberties, such as the recent announcement about new regulations governing permission for demonstrations, or its appointment of a provisional legislature to replace the current elected one, or the intimidating presence in Hong Kong of mainland Chinese businesses, or fears about the potential spread of corrupt mainland business practices in Hong Kong. All of this is real, and my colleagues and I have reported on such developments in great detail.

And yet, as in China, this story is more complex. The new Chief Executive designate, shipping tycoon Tung Chee-hwa, whom I interviewed a few weeks ago, has re-appointed all the top Hong Kong civil servants, including the Chief Secretary, the head of the civil service, Anson Chan, and Donald Tsang, the Financial Secretary. Both of these people have been outspoken in support of Governor Patten's moves for greater democracy. At the same time, Tung has kept open a quiet dialogue with Martin Lee and the Hong Kong Democrats -- much to the consternation, I suspect, of some of the more hard-line elements in the Chinese apparatus in Hong Kong. In the territory I left a few days ago, with less than three months to go before the handover, the stock market was at a record high, property prices were booming, there has been no last-minute outflow of capital or people, and public opinion polls consistently show a surprising degree of overall confidence, despite the undeniable political concerns that people do express. Moreover, for all of its overbearing posture, one has to acknowledge that China has a huge amount at stake in making the Hong Kong transition work. It will affect not only how Hong Kong fares in the future, but how China deals with the rest of the world. Moreover, it is absolutely critical to China's hopes of having any kind of negotiated deal for eventual reunification with Taiwan. If "one country- two systems" does not work in Hong Kong, chances of it ever being applicable to Taiwan will vanish.

But my sense is that on any issue dealing with China so many attitudes here in the United States remain both shaped by and to some degree frozen by Tiananmen, those images from Tiananmen, and the dark side of the Chinese system, without even acknowledging that there is another side. People by and large seem automatically ready to accept the worst, to write off Hong Kong, for example, even before the handoff takes place. This attitude toward China, it seems to me, has been most evident in the coverage and public discussion on donor gifts.

Here, a disturbingly large number of press reports have essentially vilified China in what seems to me to be a frenzy of often sensational, occasionally careless reporting. They demonstrate little appreciation of China's vastly complex reality, doing so in a way that has sometimes seemed to me to be blatantly racist. Obviously, I admit I do not know the whole story of what some Chinese individuals, or organizations, or government officials may or may not have done, or have tried to do, or talked about trying to do to win friends and influence people in the American political system. I have no doubt that Beijing is plenty capable of playing dirty when it wants to. The questions about the Clinton behavior in the White House seem to be legitimate and worthy of discussion. I feel very strongly that there should be a serious debate in the U.S. over how best this country can and should deal with an assertive China seeking a new and higher profile on the international stage. But from a lot of what I have seen and read, when it comes to Donor Gate, the portrayals of an elaborate Chinese plot simply do not hold up.

Let me offer a few examples. Take the sensational U.S. intelligence intercepts of alleged Chinese embassy discussions of possible payments to U.S. politicians. These seem, by at least some parts of the media, to have been taken at face value; and yet, as a U.S. intelligence source of mine who has heard intercepts (not these, but others over the years) pointed out to me, intercepts are not necessarily evidence. They are scratchy recordings in Chinese which have not been heard and the transcript not seen by any independent outside observer, recordings leaked to Bob Woodward and a few other reporters for an explicit political reason by an individual in the intelligence community. Yet Newsweek, for example, in its 24 March edition, wrote, "here was a warning about a plot by a rising power with a $40 billion trade surplus with the United States." I suspect that discussions about how best to influence the U.S. political scene take place virtually everyday in virtually every embassy in Washington. It seems to me that it is important in trying to write about this issue and to discuss this issue that a little bit more context and background -- and a few qualifications -- would be in order with a leak of this kind of magnitude.

Take the descriptions of the Chinese businessman who had coffee with President Clinton, Wang Joun. He has almost invariably been labeled China's top arms dealer with the implication that he was some kind of unsavory character who should never have set foot in the white House. I've never met Mr. Wang, I don't know if he is savory or unsavory. But the fact is that Wang is the chairman of CITIC, a $23 billion conglomerate and China's first and largest multinational. It is true that a subsidiary of CITIC, Polytechnologies, does deal in arms sales, but my sources tell me that Polytechnologies' total annual volume of arms sales is somewhere between $200 million to $300 million. That is a very small proportion of CITIC's business. To me, it is hardly implausible that Wang, who in many ways is China's most influential business man, would be interested in meeting President Clinton. And it is not necessarily sinister or suspicious that the White House would be willing to make it happen.

Or, take the flap which I have read about over efforts by the Chinese national shipping line, Cosco, to invest in the Long Beach, California shipping yards. Cosco is the largest container line in China, and the fourth largest in the world. Its reputation in Hong Kong is of a reputable business. In fact, another journalist friend of mine interviewed a top official from Cosco recently and asked why they had set up such a big office in Hong Kong. He said, "Well, you know, doing business in China is really corrupt, but in Hong Kong you have the rule of law so that is why we want to be here." I think in some ways Cosco's interest in Long Beach is as much an indication that China is becoming a somewhat more normal country with its own corporations looking for business opportunities overseas as it represents anything else. Yet it was reported here in large sections of the media as part of a sinister Chinese effort to seize control of a strategic American asset.

I read an article on my way over which quoted a man interviewed in a CBS news spot who asked, "Are you going to make a compact with the devil in the name of jobs, jobs, jobs?" That is a great soundbite, but I have to say, my own sense is that the People's Republic of China is not the devil, however nasty its political system. And it is nasty, although it has to be said that it is a lot less nasty now than what existed in the early 1970s when I went there, or in the early- and mid- eighties at the height of the American infatuation with China. The People's Republic is a huge, complex, ancient, still largely rural nation with immense problems and a complicated national psyche shaped by two decades of conflict and tension with the west. All of this is further complicated now by a leadership which is fueling nationalistic feeling as a way of bolstering its own hold on power, as socialism as a unifying ideology has collapsed. It is a tremendously complicated place struggling to find its way in the modern world. China's U.S. lobbying effort through its embassy in Washington and its consulates has been known for years as among the least effective of almost any foreign nation. The Chinese were outmaneuvered and outspent by their archrival, Taiwan, and that has been going on for years. It came to a climax in 1995, when Taiwan paid a U.S. consulting company over $4 million for help in lobbying Congress to win support for the United States to issue a visa for Taiwan's president Lee Teng-hui to visit the United States. It is entirely possible that in trying to play catch-up, watching a U.S. political scene dominated by money, some Chinese may have overstepped the bounds, or considered doing so, or perhaps were taken in by unscrupulous or self-serving Chinese-American operators who could convince Beijing they could secure access at high levels in Washington. As I said before, I don't know all the details; those we will just have to find out.

But none of this, in my view, necessarily makes China the new evil empire, even if in certain fundamental areas the U.S. and China may have conflicting interests. Yet so intense is this feeling , especially in parts of the media, that at times -- even within news organizations -- rational discussion on this topic can be threatened. I know of several cases where the Hong Kong or Beijing correspondents of major U.S. news organizations have raised questions or objections to certain aspects of Donor Gate coverage related to China. But there have been instances where, in response to these internal queries, reporters in the field have essentially been told by their editors to get lost -- you have been out there too long, you've gone native, you obviously do not appreciate how big a story this is, or sometimes, even, you are soft on China. As one distinguished journalist who edits a regional magazine in Asia remarked to me as we were talking about this a few days ago, we are getting a faint twinge of what McCarthyism must have felt like. I personally do not think it has gone that far, but I do frankly worry that the anti- China feeding frenzy in portions of the media could further push the U.S. into a new cold war with a China that bears relatively no resemblance to the place that is being denounced daily in the press. If that happens, I think it would be a tragedy, and I hope when the history books of this time are written, they won't say -- if such a conflict comes to pass -- that in its creation, the American press shares part of the blame.