Open letter demanding Xi's resignation now seems at most a silly putsch (even by putsch standards)

This Asia Times editorial offers a good alternative analysis of what's really going on with Xi Jinping's recent media mishaps. Unfortunately, it increasingly looks like the vaunted open letter demanding Xi's resignation was, if not an outright hoax, a silly putsch even by putsch standards.

Mind you, Xi is indeed establishing direct personal control of the state media - but he's doing it by playing down his own personality cult, not augmenting it.

The compelling evidence is that the CCDI memorandum which effectively slams the cult of personality remains accessible to Chinese netizens - a clear indication of Xi's personal approval of it. It thus follows that, far from an overreach of personal authority, the recent intensification of the state media campaign to promote him - and silence his detractors, i.e. Ren Zhiqiang - may have instead been a deliberate attempt to discredit him. It depends how far you want to surmise that propaganda chief Liu Yunshan, a current Politburo Standing Committee member believed to have been promoted by Jiang Zemin (though not formally a member of Jiang's "Shanghai clique"), has been tussling with Xi for control of the party's messaging.

In fact, whether or not it was an intended effect, the excessive "Xi-ist" propaganda of late and general muzzling of dissent has so broadly equated the central party leadership with Xi himself that it's become a political liability to the latter, not least within the party itself. It thus made sense for him to do an about-face and pose as an enlightened leader always welcoming of well-intentioned criticism from subordinates; one can't even rule out that the CCDI memo was in fact his idea.

So, whether or not Liu wanted to take a swipe at Xi by puffing up his boss' image, the boss is probably much further ahead of the political perceptions curve than first meets the eye. And it's pretty convenient for Xi, too, that Mr. Liu - set to retire at age 70 next year along with everyone else on the Standing Committee save himself and Li Keqiang - can be a fall guy of sorts if the media continues to be a source of trouble.

To conclude, in that light the open letter seems increasingly implausible as anything other than an attempt to further tarnish Xi's credibility within the party by elements within the party which stand to benefit from such a fall from grace (even if not an outright resignation). Everyone who's gotten on the record about it has denied or repudiated it, and while the state's characteristic heavy-handed response exacerbates Beijing's chronic credibility problem, for sure, as it becomes clearer that there's no such thing even approaching a viable internal party opposition anyway, by process of elimination you have to narrow it down to one of the most pathetic putsch attempts against a major authoritarian regime on record - so much so that it's not a stretch at all to just dismiss it as a hoax (or even prank).

In the meantime, though, there's some real good news to celebrate: Xi appears to have little choice now but to expose himself to legitimate criticism, after all.