Up until now, China's communist regime has had a grand old time blasting President Trump's Ukraine-linked impeachment troubles from its state propaganda outlets. They hate the guy based on his calling them out on their unfair trade practices, hitting them with tariffs, and their economy is not doing well.

According to the New York Times:

BEIJING — Since a trade war broke out with the United States, China’s state-run media has not held back from commenting on the swirl of political controversies around President Trump. At least, not until now.

But now that the tale of House Biden's pocket-lining has spread to China (what a family!), they're getting tongue-tied.

After Mr. Trump openly urged China on Thursday to investigate former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. and his son Hunter, Chinese news media and officials were strikingly muted.

While news of Mr. Trump’s request has seeped onto the Chinese internet, official media have been silent so far and social media mentions have been sparse, suggesting censors are at work. As of Saturday, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs had not publicly responded. Even Global Times, a nationalist Chinese tabloid that is reliably voluble about Mr. Trump, has been quiet.

The lack of response reflects China’s awkward choices as it tries to stand tough against the Trump administration while trying to avoid a spiral of worsening tensions, several experts said.

The Times piece begins well, but then goes on to quote experts who attempt to pin the whole thing on the Chinese interest in supposedly not rousing Trump. Fine and dandy, that's probably part of the equation as it implicitly admits that Trump does scare them.

It also goes on to quote experts who believe China is quite concerned in international circles with not appearing to be a hypocrite given its previous pieties about not interfering in other nations' internal affairs. Color me skeptical on that one, they've been getting away with that for years. The idea that they've suddenly gone bourgeois and care about what other nations think of them is ridiculous. Not Chicoms.

It leaves on one giant elephant in the room.

That the Chicoms with zero doubt don't want anyone inside China to read about those billion-dollar crony money-flingings with the Bidens in the Chinese state's bid to buy influence in the states. A spare billion dollars will buy a lot of shark's fin soup in still-poor China, and right now, the economy there is in a recession.

Here's another piece of fat already on the fire: The Hong Kongers are in open revolt and not only demanding their rights, they're drawing supporters rolling in from red China itself, people who are likely to spread the implacable message and we already know the Chicoms are worried about that as they try to stop them.

News of sleazy crony deal from China's princeling elites is gasoline on the already-burning fire. The ordinary Chinese people can't stand the cronies as it is, and now that the details of a crony deal, done for political purposes, by the Chinese elite, legally, for the purpose of increasing their power in America, is going to provide China's people with one more grievance as they stand impoverished ... and one more reason to revolt. The fact that it all was done legally, is going to fuel the matter further. If it weren't, it would be a fairly easy matter for the Chinese authorities to arrest the Chinese participants and dissociate themselves from the obvious corruption. They can't quite do that, at least not now. China, incidentally, has a tradition of populist revolts over crony activity with today's China is no stranger to it. 

All communist parties seek to protect their nomenklaturas first and foremost, that's what communism is actually about. That's why the spread of the Biden scandal to China really terrifies them. It sure as heck has to be the biggest reason their propaganda outlets, even the chattiest of them, have all gone dark.