|
 For most Americans, it was a sideshow: the main news networks were
deep into their fourth straight day of blanket coverage of Pope
Francis' historic U.S. visit.
Xi's U.S. trip has - at least in terms of U.S. media coverage - been
firmly overshadowed by the wildly popular pontiff, raising questions
over its timing and contrasting sharply with the wall-to-wall
coverage of Xi by Chinese media.
China's tightly controlled state media has focused heavily on the
pomp, ceremony and shows of respect Xi has been treated to in
Seattle and then Washington.
The adoring domestic coverage is important for Xi, who is grappling
with Chinese market instability and a flagging economy at a time
when he is seeking to consolidate his grip on the leadership ahead
of a crucial Communist Party congress in 2017.
 On a visit to a high school in Tacoma, near Seattle, where Xi and
his singer wife Peng Liyuan were serenaded by the school choir,
state television showed children screaming their appreciation. A day
earlier, Xi had quoted Martin Luther King and sprinkled references
to U.S. pop culture into his speech to tech executives.
China has also stressed Xi's personal connection to the United
States, with the Xinhua news agency carrying a video on its Facebook
page - not mentioning that Facebook is blocked in China - showing
him putting on a friendly face for Americans.
"From Iowa visitor to White House guest," the English-language video
explains, referring to a brief 1985 visit when Xi was an animal-feed
official in Hebei, Iowa's sister province.
The pope's visit to the United States, by contrast, has barely
featured in the Chinese media. The Vatican has had no formal
diplomatic ties to Beijing since shortly after the Communist Party
took power in 1949.
Francis, the most socially progressive pope in generations, has
drawn large crowds and the kind of welcome normally reserved for
rock stars during his first U.S. visit, which ends in Philadelphia
on Sunday. U.S. live news networks have hung on his every word and
step.
ONE-SIDED MEDIA BATTLE
Talk of the pope dwarfed any attention given Xi's visit, according
to data provided by MediaMiser, which tracks news and media content
online, on television and radio.
 From Aug. 26 to Sept. 25, tweets in the United States about Francis
topped 765,000, compared to 107,000 for Xi, according to MediaMiser.
Online articles from Sept. 20-24 mentioned the pope nearly four
times more than Xi. On television, the pope was mentioned over 25
times more.
Xi's mostly buttoned-down interactions with tech executives also
contrasted with those of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who
displayed an emotional side on Sunday in a town hall forum with
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg. Modi's voice broke as he described his
humble beginnings.
As relations with China become tenser for many tech companies due to
cyber-hacking and market access issues, Modi's visit has highlighted
the huge potential the technology industry sees in India.
Francis flew out of Washington, heading to a rapturous reception in
New York and a star turn at the United Nations General Assembly,
just as Xi was arriving.
[to top of second column] |
Under Xi, U.S.-Chinese relations are at a low, hurt by tensions over
cyber theft and China's assertive moves in Asian maritime disputes.
"To be contrasted with someone who has no military, no economic
might and be completely eclipsed, I think it’s astounding. I don’t
think the Chinese are noticing the contrast in messages,” said Jorge
Guajardo, the former Mexican ambassador to China from 2007 to 2013
who lives in Washington.
Chinese officials played down any suggestion that the pope's visit
had eclipsed Xi.
"The pope's visit, we noticed that and that ... he is welcomed by
the public. His visit has his own bearing here. President Xi's visit
has its own bearing," said Chinese delegation spokesman Lu Kang.
Xi slid further down the U.S. news agenda on Friday morning, when
Republican House of Representative Speaker John Boehner announced
his resignation. The big networks quickly cut off Xi speaking at a
news conference with Obama to follow a briefing by Boehner.
Chinese officials have kept security around Xi's visit particularly
tight, limiting his ability to go off script and interact with the
public. He left his wife Peng to fill that role in Washington, where
she accompanied First Lady Michelle Obama to name a new-born panda
at the Smithsonian National Zoo.
Officials in Tacoma said the security preparations had been
grueling.
"We met with advance teams six or eight times over the summer,"
Tacoma Mayor Marilyn Strickland said of Xi's visit to the high
school.
Ming Xia, a political science professor at New York's City
University who traveled to take part in an anti-Xi protest outside
the White House, said the pope's humility during his visit had
highlighted what he called Xi's arrogance.
"The pope was praying with the homeless and said we are all equal in
the eyes of God, the real father. Xi thinks he's the father of the
Chinese people - he has assumed the power of God."
(Additional reporting by Megha Rajagopalan and SueiLee Wee in
Beijing; Michael Martina in Washington,; Edward McAllister in New
York; Steve Trousdale and Yasmeen Abutaleb in Seattle; writing by
Stuart Grudgings; editing by Mary Milliken)
[© 2015 Thomson Reuters. All rights
reserved.]
Copyright 2015 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
 |
