John Montgomery Presents This Week's	April 7, 2001	Creep Logo by Alan Fraser
	The Chinese Apology Diplomats
	So Sorry, We Regret We Cannot Apologize

You better hurry down to your favorite local Chinese take-out place while you can. That Shrimp Lo Mein and Kung Pau Chicken ain't gonna be around much longer. The guy who runs it and those 50 underage, illegal aliens who work back in the kitchen are all headed for detention camps any day now. If you're under 75 years old, start getting back into shape because that letter from the draft board will be in your mail box before you know it. Break out the American flags, the John Wayne movies, and the Tony Orlando songs because we're going to war! Yeah, a good old fashioned, shoot-em-up, bomb-em-into-parking-lots, bring-em-home-in-body-bags war! Exactly what we need to get us out of the doldrums caused by the past eight years of peace and prosperity!

And not just any war! We're not up against one of those pussified countries like Iraq or Kosovo that bend over passively and take our American aggression up their dark-skinned bung holes. No, we got us an enemy with some balls this time. We're talking about China. China! That's the country that contains not only nuclear weapons, but also vast quantities of identical, robotic little slant-eyed guys with ugly brown suits. Vast quantities! As Carl Sagan used to say, "Billions and billions!" And they're all headed for your home town!

How'd we get into a mess like this? Last week, an American spy plane collided with a Chinese fighter jet in international air space near China. The collision caused the Chinese jet to crash into the sea and forced the damaged American plane to land on the Chinese island of Hainan. The American crew of 24 men and women are now being held by the Chinese. That's pretty much the only things both sides agree upon right now.

The questions of: "Who caused the collision?" and "When will the Americans be released?" and especially, "Who is going to apologize to whom?" are the points of contention. And getting more contentious by the minute.

First, Secretary of State Colin Powell sent a letter to the Chinese government saying the United States regretted the loss of the Chinese pilot in the collision. Colin may be one of the most admired men in America, but he can't get no respect in China. "Regret not same as apology," was the response. "No apology, no releasee!"

Then our Supreme Kung Fu Fighter took his turn at diplomacy. "I regret that a Chinese pilot is missing and that one of their airplanes is lost," said George W. "But the Chinese have got to act. And I hope they do so quickly." It's a bit difficult to understand why he thought that would work any better than Colin's statement. And it didn't. "Regrettably, the U.S. statement on this incident so far is unacceptable to the Chinese side, and the Chinese people have found it most dissatisfying," said Qian Qichen, China's top foreign policy official.

There's that Regret word again. It doesn't seem to be helping. How much different is Regret from Apology anyway? Do you think the Chinese language really makes such a distinction? What's the big deal? When you get on the phone with that nasty lady from the insurance company to try to get your claim settled and she says, "I'm sorry, sir, your policy doesn't cover that condition," you know she's not really sorry. And she knows you know. Why can't we chalk up this Regret / Apology disagreement to a translation error? Both sides could save face.

The latest wordsmithing has American officials believing that an Explanation of the collision might make the Chinese feel better than Regret did. Do we Regret we didn't offer an Explanation sooner? Sorry! It could be worse. By misplacing only a few Chinese characters, we could just as easily be saying, "Your mother has a fat yellow ass!"

Meanwhile, as the Wise Men battle over semantics, the 24 crew members sit in detention, enjoying their daily ration of Sweet and Sour Chihuahua. They are said to be in "high spirits". Maybe that's because they're not getting enough arsenic in their drinking water.