This is the Cato Daily Podcast for Wednesday, August 21st, 2019.

I'm Keelb Brown.

The protests in Hong Kong bring into sharp relief the tensions that have long simmered between mainland China and the relatively free and open Hong Kong.

Cato's Doug Bandau recently returned from Asia offers some advice for protesters and an assessment of the concessions they can reasonably

expect from Beijing.

China has been increasingly extending its control over domestic policy in Hong Kong which was contrary to the promise when

Hong Kong was returned to China back in 1997 and the latest demonstrations were triggered by a proposal for an extradition bill, it would effectively allow

China to reach into Hong Kong and grab people where it had commercial disputes and particularly political disputes.

So it's a real threat to the independence of people in Hong Kong.

China, based on some of the propaganda that I've seen coming out of China in discussing this, it seems that at least

as far as they're asking the world to respond or react or think a particular way about this, it seems that they don't really understand

what the grievances are. Is that fair? No, China clearly understands the grievances,

but they're not going to acknowledge that. I mean in China itself we're seeing a very

wide-ranging crackdown on independent thought, liberal views, any sense of human rights, those kinds of things. So China is doing this

across the board. Hong Kong is merely one piece of it. So to its own people,

Hong Kong is arguing that the opposition in Hong Kong is being

fomented by foreigners, particularly in the United States. A lot of Chinese view these people

as being spoiled, they have all these privileges.

So China is trying to sell this in its own way.

These are riders, they're a threat to security and stability.

So China wants to play this along the lines of its overall policies within China itself.

Is there anything but defeat here for people in Hong Kong? Is there any sense that Hong Kong would be willing to give

...