China Blasts Buttigieg as Biden’s ‘Vanity Political Appointee’

China’s state-run Global Times said on Tuesday that the recent Ohio train derailment has gone viral on Chinese social media because it exposes the corruption, incompetence, and hypocrisy of the U.S. government, in particular that of Secretary of Transportation and diversity hire Pete Buttigieg.

“Many netizens, when criticizing the U.S. for not properly handling the disaster, also questioned if the U.S. government is trying to deliberately withhold information, and hype a balloon incident involving China to divert domestic media attention,” the, hammering Beijing’s favorite new talking point about how President Joe Biden’s administration targeted China’s harmless and lovable weather balloon to distract Americans from the Ohio disaster.

Chinese social media is reportedly buzzing with comparisons to the Chernobyl nuclear disaster of 1986. “Why on earth is the U.S. withholding details about such a serious accident? If you look at the U.S. media right now, it is all about Chinese balloon stories. I doubt they are deliberately hyping the balloon stories to divert people’s attention from the real catastrophe,” charged one commentator on Weibo, China’s state-controlled version of Twitter.

Chinese social media is also obsessed with reports that a journalist was arrested while attempting to cover the Ohio derailment.

“So much for the U.S. style freedom of press. Imagine if such thing happened in China, a big accident, and stifling journalists, how would the Western media not cover this?” hooted one Weibo user.

The Global Times heaped scorn upon “Mayor Pete” Buttigieg, whom it called “essentially a vanity political appointee by the administration of President Joe Biden to help boost his political score.”

Sounds like the Chinese media is more honest and perceptive about American politicians than our own media are.