before the Communists arrived, they liked to say, China was run by four dominant families, and the Party had handed those fortunes back to the people. Now it was becoming clear that China, on the one hundredth anniversary of the end of the last dynasty, was returning to a form of aristocracy. The scale of privilege and self-dealing struck an especially awkward blow to Wen Jiabao’s reputation, because he had put himself forward as one of the Party’s liberal standard-bearers. Nicknamed Grandpa Wen for his attentions to the poor, he had declared, “I often say that we should not only let people
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