Word: hu
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...Chinese have long looked to the skies--at least since Wan Hu, a 16th century official, lashed 47 gunpowder rockets to a chair with kites attached to it, ignited the rockets and vanished in a plume of smoke, never to be heard from again. With technology having improved significantly since then, the Chinese are on the verge of sending a Long March 2F rocket hurtling into space from a secret launch facility near the Gobi Desert. The payload: Shenzhou (divine vessel), a capsule carrying China's first astronaut. The mission: enter a low Earth orbit, circle the globe 14 times...
...compartment of the Shenzhou V capsule, taking photographs, naps, and at one point producing a tiny Chinese flag?an iconic image that would soon be broadcast to 1.3 billion fellow citizens back home. The mission-control room outside Beijing burst into cheers, already buoyed by a message from President Hu Jintao who announced that the liftoff was "the glory of our great motherland." Then, Yang fished around and produced another flag, this time a pale blue one bearing the emblem of the United Nations, and held it up beside the red Chinese ensign...
...Still, comparing Hu to Thomas Jefferson is premature. At last week's meeting, Hu prefaced his comments by saying, "most important is maintaining party leadership." Moreover, the study session coincided with the detention of a local party official in southwestern China who organized a direct election for a township leader...
...Hu's comments seemed designed to encourage political experimentation, especially at the grassroots level. In the countryside, some officials are already holding public hearings and various kinds of local elections. Hu's speech, says Wang Changjiang, a professor at the Central Party School, the leadership's top training academy, "suggests the party center is also steadily recognizing that it needs to supply more" political reform. "If it doesn't," Wang says, "it can create even bigger problems...
...1980s, Communist Party chief Zhao Ziyang arranged similar briefings for his staffers?until he was purged in 1989?but kept them secret to avoid criticism. In contrast, a story on Hu's "study session" hit the front page of the People's Daily, the party's mouthpiece. Hu wants extra points for addressing political reform?but hasn't aced the class...