By Huo Zhe
Entertainment Correspondent

Jiang was in fine form Monday, even doing his famous Charlie Chan

BEIJING (China Daily Show) — Former president Jiang Zemin has ended months of speculation about his health this week by finally appearing in public to announce his comeback tour.

The celebrated owner of a pair of “awesome” spectacles was wheeled out Monday at the CCP’s Xinhai Revolution centenary party, where he upstaged everyone by announcing the release of his longstanding project: an English-language hip-hop album Jiang has been working for the last four years.

J-Z Reprazents: The Blueprints is an attempt to codify Jiang’s sometimes-baffling political ideology, particularly his Three Represents Theory, into a street language that resonates with today’s youth – as well as simply being a “banging rap album,” said The Source magazine’s China editor, Bo “Jangles” Luo.

“The Party regularly promotes a blend of Mao Zedong Thought, Deng Xiaoping Theory, Hu Jintao’s ‘scientific development’ and even Ice-T Thought.  Hell, Hua Guofeng gets more ideological airtime,” Bo observed. “Jiang has long been considered merely a useful idiot and decided to reclaim his rightful place in history the only way he knows how: via hip hop.”

Little is known of the contents of the album, other than a track bootlegged onto Baidu and quickly deleted. But one user who heard the rough cut of album opener “Harmony’s a Bitch” commented that “JZ’s rhymes flow like fermented soy-bean sauce over a sizzling wok of East Coastal city beats.”

For months, speculation has run rife about Jiang’s whereabouts after a Hong Kong broadcaster suggested he had died.

One newspaper even claimed Jiang’s family had sold commercial rights of his image to a domestic fried-chicken firm, who hoped to make Jiang’s trademark cackle as mouth-watering as Colonel Sanders’ smirk.

Now his recent absence from political life can be attributed to Jiang putting the finishing dope touches to The Blueprints in his Macao recording studio.

Due to drop in February 2012, the album has already gone triple-platinum on the mainland, with young Chinese pre-purchasing debut single “Ain’t No Motherfucking Flower Vase” in their millions.

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By JONAS WHALE
Entertainment Correspondent

Jiang last got props for his subtle heckle of Richard Gere at a 2002 UN convention on human rights

NEW YORK (China Daily Show) –A sensational plan to sabotage Ai Weiwei’s latest Manhattan art installation in May has been leaked to the media, after New York police detained an 84-year-old man on suspicion of trespassing yesterday.

According to sources, a plot for a senior Communist Party official to “do a Kanye West” at the launch of Ai’s Circle of Animal Heads/Zodiac Heads at the Pulitzer Fountain early next month was signed off by several key Politburo figures.

Former Premier Jiang Zemin is rumored to have caught wind of it during an afternoon tea session with top officials and immediately volunteered for the task.

Pointing to his ownership of a pair of awesome white aviator sunglasses “ideally suited to the job,” Jiang insisted he should take on the burden , proposing the task be modeled on West’s infamous stage-crash in support of Beyonce at the 2010 Grammy Awards.

Artist and government critic Ai Weiwei was detained by police earlier this month for alleged “economic crimes”  as he went to board a plane at Beijing airport.  The “Kanye-ing” was apparently planned with foreknowledge of Ai’s arrest, as Jiang was concerned that the plan might falter if, during the Kanye, he “got punched.”

Jiang apparently planned to take the stage before delivering his heckle, worded thus:  “Hey, guys… Imma let you finish but I just wanna say, these heads are cool but Henry J. Hardenburgh made one of the best hotels… of all time!” The reference is thought to refer to the Plaza Hotel’s original architect, where the Pulitzer Fountain – and new sculpture installation – is located.

The New York Police Department (NYPD) released a brief statement regarding the unnamed 84-year-old ’s arrest this morning.

“A citizen of the People’s Republic of China, who cannot be named for diplomatic reasons, was taken into custody today on suspicion of conspiracy to cause a public nuisance. The aforementioned gentleman informed us that his detention was likely to cause him to miss a planned rendezvous at Shaquille O’Neill’s beach-front home in Los Angeles. When NYPD was able to confirm these statements, we released the gentleman without charge,” the statement said.

A Chinese  Foreign Ministry spokeswoman refused to be drawn on the issue. “Premier Jiang Zemin has been in his home recording studio in Macau, as usual, for the last month,” was the terse official response to questions.

Previous examples of attempts to sabotage entertainment figures deemed “enemies of China” include:

• Foreign Minister Tian Ming submitting a snitty Amazon.com review of Guns n’ Roses’ 2008 album Chinese Democracy that mocked singer Axl Rose’s vocals and production, and made unfavorable comparisons to Nickelback and The Spaghetti Incident
• Embassy official Kan Wei pretending to forget Brad Pitt’s name when they met backstage at the 2009 Academy Awards
• Vice-Minister of Culture Eyou Ebao is said to have been instrumental in persuading Sharon Stone to star in Basic Instinct 2

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By SHUO CHANG
Political Correspondent

Bing Chaxue is believed to have wrested control of the O.G. faction away from Cao Nima during a drunken argument at the 2010 Playaz Ball

BEIJING (China Daily Show) – A political turf war has resurfaced after an obscure Shanghai lawmaker promoted “Ice-T Thought” at this year’s Two Sessions legislative body.

Bing Chaxue, a National People’s Congress (NPC) delegate from Shanghai’s notorious Fubai District, left the rubber-stamp legislature in uproar after  comments denouncing grass-roots hostility against corruption.

“Muthafuckas bes’ step up and quit their bitchin’ ’bout corrupt officials,” Bing told shocked delegates. “Corruption lead to extreme forms of protest, like petitions and rude-ass blog posts. Certain bo-janglin’ members of society bes’ not hate the Playa… but by all means we should  re-examine the Game.”

Bing, best known for a notorious “Home of the Bodybag” homelessness reduction program, was last year criticized for his role in brokering a Hong Kong tycoon’s takeover of 12 Shanghai orphanages.

But despite his relative obscurity outside the city, Bing is a pivotal mover in the so-called Shanghai Playaz, a militant O.G. faction of the CCP that dates back to President Jiang Zemin’s tenure.

The Playaz follow an ideology known as Ice-T Thought on a platform of “Four Reprazents,” inspired by American actor, gangsta rapper and all-round P.I.M.P. Ice-T, whose body of political philosophy (his songs include “Lifestyles of the Rich and Infamous,” “Pimpin’ Ain’t Easy,” “Grand Larceny” and “Forced To Do Dirt”) appear to speak volumes about Shanghai’s political elite.

“By 2006, Ice-T Thought with ‘Chinese characteristics’ was the dominant ideology in Shanghai, epitomized by the drive-by slaying of [Vice-Minister of Transport] Ma Xiaobei,” said Professor Yao Qiang, a Renmin University legal expert and NPC delegate.

Bing’s comments have enraged members of the Shanghai Fifth Plenary Committee, known in Pudong as the Wu-Tang, who still blame the Playaz for Ma’s unsolved murder.

“Mr. Bing pretends to grasp the principles of Law and Order but overall should be denounced as a little bitch,” Hu Jingfan, a hard-line Wu-Tang figure, and fierce opponent of the Playaz, told China Daily Show.

Bing dismissed the criticisms. “The country is ready for straight-balling political reform along socialist lines,” he said. “Feel me now?”

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