Buzz's Letter of Thanks to the Chinese Ambassador to Washington

December 20, 2010

His Excellency Zhang Yesui

The Ambassador of The People’s Republic of China

2300 Connecticut Avenue Northwest

Washington D.C.

Dear Mr. Ambassador:

President Obama today signed a significant tax reduction law, which will put real dollars into my pocket. I want to thank the Chinese people for this gift to me. Like all Americans, I can’t resist a freebie, and this one is real good. As you know, we Americans don’t tax ourselves enough to pay for our government and this tax reduction bill is no exception: all $840 billion of its cost will be borrowed from China and others. If it weren’t for the willingness of your country to loan us this money, I wouldn’t get the tax relief, which I really will enjoy having.

Of course I know that we Americans have got to continue to do our part to make sure that you Chinese have enough dollars to lend back to us. So, I pledge to you that I will buy only things that are made in China. This is not very difficult to do because America no longer manufactures much; only 10% of our GDP is devoted to manufacturing. Unfortunately, I recently bought a netbook computer made in Taiwan (I won’t let that happen again), but I’ve been reading about the tremendous buildup of your military, especially your navy, so I suspect that you’ll end up with Taiwan anyway. You’ll be happy to know, however, that yesterday I purchased a beautiful cashmere sweater, a product heretofore associated with Scotland, but I checked the label, and it, too, was made in China, so, consistent with my pledge, I felt free to buy it.

Even though you are nominally lending the money to us, you and I know (wink wink) that Americans will never be able to repay the debt and that when it comes due, you will just roll it over, including the interest, as you have so consistently done in the past, and if you don’t, we will just print the dollars to repay you. So, in a very real sense this is a gift from the Chinese people to Americans.

Again, thanks so much.

Very truly yours,

Howard “Buzz” Singer

Scottsdale, Arizona, USA