Olympic flame: whose PR-disaster?

attacked by protesters and now a hero

The PR-disaster surrounding the Olympic Games in Beijing I mentioned in previous entry plays out in a whole different way in China itself. An interviewer suggested earlier today, there would also be a negative impact among the domestic Chinese audiences. The opposite is true, as also ESWN shows in his translations here.
Most of China still gets a very sanitized version of the relay of the Olympic flames in London, Paris and San Francisco, where often the protests are not even mentioned. But for the 220 million internet users in China is the situation - in theory at last - different. Here most of the anger against the protests and nationalistic reactions are most obvious. The overwhelming majority would attack the protest and support their government.
ESWN:

For the Chinese Communists, the responses from western government, media and citizens are immaterial. If German Chancellor Merkel won't attend the Olympic opening ceremony, it only means tickets for some others who want to come. It won't impact their existence. The paramount goal of the Chinese Communists is to retain control of China, and therefore it is the response from the Chinese citizens that matter. Thanks to the protests, the Chinese Communists may have consolidated support by its citizens for years to come.

It seems a fair assesment: international protests like this make the position of the government only stronger. Even the Shanghai Daily, where editors can expect that most of their readers do read other sources too, would rather focus on the success of security forces in foiling a plot by people from Xinjiang to kidnap Olympic athletes.