History Book: Five years since China ended leader term limits

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Today is Monday, March 6th. Good morning! This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Mary Reichard.

NICK EICHER, HOST: And I’m Nick Eicher. Up next, the WORLD History Book. Today, the premiere of a surprisingly influential science fiction radio drama.

Plus, the removal of term limits for China’s leader.

REICHARD: But first, a natural disaster hits southern California. Here’s Paul Butler.

PAUL BUTLER, REPORTER: We begin today on March 10th, 1933 in Long Beach, California…and a 6.4 magnitude earthquake.

NEWSREEL: March 1933 brought havoc to southern California as violent earthquakes ripped the area from Long Beach to Los Angeles…

The earthquake’s epicenter—part of the Newport–Inglewood Fault—is just off-shore…

NEWSREEL: Once thriving streets were suddenly junk-yards.

…the city of Long Beach is the worst hit.

NEWSREEL: Ruined buildings stood precariously on cracked ground which clung to the trembling edges of unseen chasms below…

The earthquake began at 5:55pm—as many people were settling in for dinner or other family activities.

NEWSREEL: Rescue workers work through the night, feeling their way through the debris…

Tens of thousands of homes and businesses are damaged or destroyed. More than 200 school buildings are declared unsafe. Students attend classes in tents for months. Clean-up is slow.

NEWSREEL: Much of the work had to be done carefully by hand. The night of terror was over. Even casualties pitched in on the mammoth cleanup out of the rubble…

Nearly 120 people died in the quake with an estimated $40 million dollars worth of property damage.

Within 30 days of the quake, Governor James Rolph, Jr. signs the Field Act—governing the planning, design and construction of public school buildings. The act is the first of many bills over the following decades that mandate high building standards for buildings in earthquake prone areas of California.

MUSIC FROM HG2

Next, a fictitious calamity: the destruction of the earth. Radio listeners learn of the event on March 8th, 1978, during the first-ever broadcast of a quirky science fiction radio drama by Douglas Adams on BBC Radio 4.

DRAMA: This is the story of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, perhaps the most remarkable, certainly the most successful book ever to come out of the great publishing corporations of Ursa Minor…

The 6 episode series introduces listeners to the adventures of the unhappy and unfortunate Arthur Dent, who, as the story opens is trying to prevent his home from being torn down.

DRAMA: Look, there’s no point in lying down in the path of progress. I’ve gone off the idea of progress. It’s over-rated. But you must realize you can’t lie in front of bulldozers indefinitely…

The scene foreshadows the destruction of the earth as a race of aliens make way for an intergalactic bypass. Dent’s friend, an alien posing as a human, tries to explain.

DRAMA: Time is an illusion. Lunchtime, doubly so. Drink up. The world is about to end…(sigh) It must be Thursday, I never could get the hang of Thursdays…

Dent and a female character, are the only humans to escape. They’re joined by a cast of odd-ball alien and robot characters. Over the rest of the story, they learn that the Earth was actually a giant supercomputer—built by its creators to try to figure out the “Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything.” The answer was already known: 42…but they were unsure of the question.

DRAMA: Could a mere computer solve the problem of life, the universe, and everything?

What began as a fairly successful short radio series, turned into a cult following. Two years after its debut, it was re-released as a 12-episode radio series…today’s audio clips come from that production. It was turned into a novel, then a series of novels, stage plays, television series, movies…

MOVIE CLIP: I have an idea…

The evolutionary themes, adult subject matters, foul language, and its anti-religious undertones require discernment and may make it unsuitable for many families. But fans of the story see it as a great work of philosophical fiction wrapped up in a science fiction comedy including Space X’s Elon Musk:

MUSK: And it sort of highlighted the important point, which is that a lot of times the question is harder than the answer. And then whatever the question is that most approximates what's the meaning of life? You know, that, that's, that's the question we could ultimately get closer to understanding.

When Elon Musk launched his Tesla Roadster into an elliptical heliocentric orbit in 2018, he placed a copy of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy in the glovebox.

And finally, five years ago…

SOUND: PEOPLE’S CONGRESS

On March 11th, 2018, China’s National People’s Congress meet in the Great Hall of the People. They cancel term limits for their leader—allowing Xi Jinping to serve as president for life…if he desires. He addresses the congress.

CHINESE PRESIDENT XI JINPING: [CHINESE]

President Xi Jinping says he will defend the authority of—and be loyal to—the Chinese constitution and the motherland. He pledges to purge the party of corruption. And he’ll strive to make China a “prosperous, democratic, civilized, harmonious and beautiful” modern country.

According to data from the Chinese government—in the five years since the vote—both China’s national GDP and its military have grown, while the poverty rate is on a downward trend.

And for all its publicized advancements, China faces a huge demographic problem as its population ages. Plus, the nation’s international reputation continues to decline due to its abuse of the Uyghurs, the spread of COVID, the reduction of internet freedom for its own people—and its digital espionage on others. Not to mention China’s renewed pressure and persecution campaign against the Christian church.

That’s this week’s WORLD History Book. I’m Paul Butler.

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