Commentary This is the first article of a two-part series on the growing risks of China investment.  U.S. companies renewed their investments in China in the latter half of the 20th century once President Richard Nixon opened diplomatic relations with the country in 1972. For 40 years, after Congress excepted China from the rules otherwise required for Most Favored Nation (“MFN,” now “normal trade”) status and granted it to China, U.S. policymakers have hoped that foreign direct investment (FDI) and other elements of a market economy would “grow the seeds of democracy.” But nearly two generations after opening America’s doors and pocketbooks to Chinese exports and FDI, an intransigent Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has retained a firm grip on power over the Laobaixing, “Old Hundred Names”; the average Chinese “man in the street.” Democracy is really no further along in China after 40 years than it was during the Cultural …