– Plans to cleanse Beijing of smog not working despite previous closure of thousands of factories and banning automobiles.
– Water diverted from needy regions to prettify Beijing. Electricity too. Oh heck, no foreigners will see those rural peasants, so who cares if they go thirsty in the dark.
– China reneges on pledge to allow open Internet access during Olympics. If you can’t find bad things on the net while in Beijing then they must not exist, apparently.
Wikipedia: “‘Potemkin village‘ has come to mean, especially in a political context, any hollow or false construct, physical or figurative, meant to hide an undesirable or potentially damaging situation.”
Of course, every dissident in the region would like to do something spectacular while the whole world is watching. These Olympics could get real lively.