YA THINK? The Hill: Chinese Dissident Becomes Political Headache For Obama.

But wait, it gets worse:

The Chen Guangcheng saga gets stranger and stranger, but also is becoming a major diplomatic embarrassment for the Obama administration. What was already a confusing tale of “he said, she said” moved into the realm of near-parody this afternoon, when Chen himself called his U.S. supporter and activist Bob Fu during a congressional hearing, was put on speaker phone, and directly asked to be let out of China. What has particularly spun the case out of control is the growing assertion by many that U.S. officials relayed threats by Beijing toward Chen’s wife to the blind activist, thereby forcing him to accept a deal to leave the U.S. Embassy and remain in China. Within 48 hours of a supposed deal to ensure Chen’s safety in the country, the lawyer’s friends began spreading the word that he had feared for his wife’s life and agreed to leave the embassy, but now wanted to flee the country.

What seemed like a coup by U.S. diplomats has instead become the biggest circus sideshow in Sino-American relations since 1989, when the Chinese massacred hundreds (possibly thousands) of college students demonstrating for freedom in Tiananmen Square, and famed dissident Fang Lizhi took refuge in the U.S. Embassy. Back then, Ambassador James R. Lilley succored Fang for a year before Chinese authorities agreed to let him live in exile in the United States. Given the doubts about who said what to whom, it is imperative that the Obama administration dispel rumors that it may have, even unknowingly, passed official threats to Chen, thereby causing him to take the path of least resistance for both governments.

A debacle.