The threat from (or to) China

Via Instapundit: More really bad news about Chinese import items -- several people in Chicago became ill after eating "monkfish" from China.

This on top of the news of the toxic toothpaste in Australia and Panama and the pet food terror.

It's hard to keep myself from seeing a conspiracy in the recent spate of woes -- please, somebody show me this isn't some sort of internal sabotage to screw up the capitalist, internationalist bent developing in this newcomer to industrialization. It would be so very simple for a handful of "true believers" to completely undo any modernization and outreach, simply by making international trade impossible and forcing them inward, to become a militaristic slave society again.

I genuinely hope it's just half-assedness, and not malice. At least dipsticks who can't tell the difference between glycerin and diethylene glycol can be replaced fairly easily in a growing economy. Scary would-be international and political murderers are tougher to clean out, especially if they're super-scary and in positions of power.