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Great post, but I'd like to correct two things.
First, I'd recommend putting the word "overpopulation" in quotation marks. Hong Kong, Singapore, and Taiwan all have population densities much higher than China's, but they aren't suffering from "overpopulation." For free human beings living in a free capitalist society, "overpopulation" is impossible.
Back in the 1960s, tens of millions of people in China starved to death. People on the radical left blamed this on "overpopulation."
Around 1978-1980, China swithced from collective farming to private farming. As a result, food production skyrocketed.
Today, China has a lot more people than it did in the 1960s. But today, the people of China are much better fed than they were in the 1960s. This blows a huge hole in the theory of "overpopulation."
What the believers in "overpopulation" theory refuse to acknowledge is that human beings create wealth, and that people respond to incentives, and that free market prices communicate important information about supply and demand, and that private ownership of natural resources encourgaes the owner to take care of them.
So, for example, the people on the radical left continue to complain about the problem of "overlogging," and they blame this on "overpopulation." But they don't seem to understand that when timberland is privately owned, the owner has an economic incentive to preserve the future value of his property, and because of this incentive, he always plants new trees after cutting down the old ones. Despite this real world evidence, the people on the radical left continue to insist that government ownership is better than private ownership. They don't understand that in the real world, human beings respond to incentives.
Private ownership of timberland is the solution to the problem of "overlogging." But people on the radical left aren't interested in real world solutions.
Economic growth is the only real world way to solve the problem of third world poverty. But again, the people on the radical left aren't interested in real world solutions.
Water shortages are caused by government price controls that cause the demand for water to exceed supply. My proposed solution is to allow water prices to rise, so that water users will voluntarily conserve, and water suppliers will have an incentive to make more water by using desalination, which costs about $3 for 1,000 gallons. This is a real world solution.
But people on the radical left hate my idea. Instead, they prefer to have the government make it illegal for people to water their lawns, wash their cars, and fill their swimming pools, and they favor government bans on toilet tanks that hold 3.5 gallons of water. Again, people on the radical left aren't interested in real world soltutions to problems. We can desalinize as much water as we want, but instead of doing that, they prefer to complain about so-called "shortages." They don't want to actually solve the problem. They prefer the totalitarian ideas of making it illegal for people to water their lawns, and making it illegal for people to have 3.5 gallon toilet tanks. There is no area of people's lives where the radical left doesn't want the government sticking its nose. They are true totalitarians.
My second correction to your post: the Chinese government did *not* take control of the businesses in Hong Kong. Hong Kong still continues to hold the #1 rank in the Wall St. Journal/Heritage Foundation "Index of Economic Freedom." Hong Kong offers better protection of private property rights than does any other country in the world.
Before 1997, I was worried that the Chinese takover of Hong Kong would turn Hong Kong into a communist society. My doomsayer prediction was wrong. It looks like the opposite is happening. It looks like China is becoming more like Hong Kong. But it still has a long, long, long way to go.
You could easily start a business in Hong Kong right now, and be perfectly secure in knowing that your assets would be safe and secure from government seizure.
My doomsayer prediction about Hong Kong was wrong. And I am perfectly willing to admit that I was wrong. And I am very glad that I was wrong.
But note that the radical left has never admitted to being wrong about all of their doomsayer predictions. And they still keep making the same kinds of predictions. Paul Ehrlich will never admit that he was wrong. He will never admit that Marxism, not "overpopulation," is the true cause of famine.
30 years ago, the radical left said that economic growth would make the environment worse. Their "solution" was to have the government take contorl of the economy. They were wrong. Economic growth in free capitalist countries made the environment better. Government control of the economy in communist Eastern Europe made the environment worse.
But they won't admit that they were wrong. They still claim that economic growth is bad for the environment. And they still want the government to take over control of the economy in order to "solve" this "problem." They refuse to admit that capitalism and higher incomes lead to a healthier environment. They still refuse to admit that capitalism economic growth makes the environment better. They refuse to admit that government planning of the economy in Eastern Euope made the environment worse. Their real goal isn't to protect the environment. Their real goal is to have the government control people's lives.
The Kyoto Treaty would give no real world benefit, but it would increase government control of people's lives, and hurt economic growth. The real goal of the radical left is about having the government control people, and they are using "protecting the environment" as an excuse.
Studies of old tree rings show that global warming of the Earth is caused by fluctuations in the sun's activities, and that Mars is also experiencing global warming. But the radical left insists that we need the Kyoto Treaty to "save" us, just as they insisted that we needed to listen to the Club of Rome's "Limits to Growth" 30 years ago. They were wrong 30 years ago, and they are wrong now.
The very computer models that are used by the radial left show that the Kyoto Treaty won't stop global warming. But they don't care. They just want an excuse to control people's lives.
The California legislature now has a bill that will raise the gasoline tax by 50 cents a gallon, and place a $3,500 tax on SUVs. This is basically their own "starter version" of the Kyoto Treaty. But that's only for automobiles. They still aren't forcing people to cut back on use of natural gas and electricity by 30% or 40% like what the Kyoto Treaty would likely require. Real world people will never put up with this kind of nonsense. Only the elitist radical left would ever support this much governemnt control of people's lives. And they don't care about the negative effects that these things would have on people. Of course the elitist legislators who support these kinds of things are always exempt, because they don't want to give up their limosines and SUVs. Elitists like to exempt themselves from the laws that they expect everyone else to follow. (Federal workers were exempt from Social Security taxes before 1983. Al Gore showed up at Earth Day with a fleet of SUVs. Lots of people who want to ban guns either have their own gun, or hire an armed bodyguard.)
And speaking of forced abortions in China - the radical left groups in the U.S. who claim to be "pro-choice" are actually in favor of having the U.S. government supply funding for these forced abortions. Whenver Bush or some other Republican proposes an end to U.S. government aid of these forced abortions, the radical left groups in the U.S. always speak out against the cuts in funding.
I myself want a complete seperation of government and abortion. I am truly pro-choice, because I want the government to treat abortion the exact same way that I want it to treat religion.
The radical left is lying when it says thay want the government to stay out of the bedroom. In reality, they favor government funding of birth control and government funding of abortion.
The radical left is also lying when they say they want seperation of church and state. They favor government funding of "artists" who cover religious things in feces and urine. They also favor government funding of day care in churches, and government funding of Pell grants for students who go to religious colleges. If they truly favored seperation of church and state, they would be against government funding of these things.
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