Friends, this week's Newsmaker Show reflects on two fascinating stories re: the People's Republic of China. One, China's Foreign Minister inexplicably disappeared and has since been replaced. Can you imagine if Joe Biden or Antony Blinken suddenly went missing, and all of a sudden some DNC hack took their place? We can only hope... Story number two: China is no longer America's top trading partner!!! That's an economic sea change. Now, Mexico is #1, Canada is #2, and China is #3! Wow. U.S. companies are thinking twice about betting their futures on the stability and economic buoyancy of the PRC, and I can see why. China's (relative) decline isn't all good news, though. A China that is struggling is, perforce, a China that is dangerous.
In addition to China's woes, Brian and I contemplate the global kerfuffle over Israel's judicial reforms and what it says about the Left's obsession with maintaining its grip on power. We also talk about Musk's audacious rebranding of Twitter, the ongoing humanitarian crisis at the U.S.-Mexico border, the outrageously false Dem smears against RFK, Jr., and the outrageously false Dem smears against Ron DeSantis and Florida's new black history curriculum. Historically, we also ponder the impact of the Suez Crisis and the early 20th century founding of what became the FBI.
What a lineup! What a masterful survey of everything that matters in the here and now (and the came and went)! Listen in -- you won't be sorry.
https://wlea.net/newsmaker-july-26-2023-dr-nick-waddy/
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In other news, the Hunter Biden plea deal is at least temporarily on hold, although I would be shocked if Hunter didn't manage to wiggle out of his present legal predicament. No one really cares about Hunter, of course. The $64,000 question is whether his dirty dealings can be tied definitively to "the Big Guy".
https://www.cnn.com/politics/live-news/hunter-biden-tax-charges-hearing/index.html
Republicans, including Donald Trump, are increasingly coming to the conclusion that they need to support early voting and absentee voting efforts if they want to have a prayer of winning in 2024 and beyond. I agree. I would underline the fact, however, that the lack of action on these fronts in 2020 and 2022 largely explains our losses in those years, and our country may never recover from those serious tactical errors. In other words, Trump and many Trumpers are late to the party, and the party may in fact already be over. I have grave doubts about whether the 2024 election will be fairly conducted, or whether, even if Trump wins, he would be allowed to take office.
Republicans are bloodthirsty lunatics, right? Whereas Democrats love the rule of law and democracy, right? Well... It isn't quite that simple, as you can see in these polling results. An increasing number of Dems and progressives are "mad as hell" about Republican/conservative wins on issues like abortion, and they'd be happy to even the score by violent means.
Finally, things are about to get interesting in the Black Sea, as Russia steps up its efforts to impose a naval blockade on Ukraine -- and, presumably, Ukraine steps up its efforts to sink Russian ships (with NATO aid). I predict that, if there's ever to be a direct clash between NATO and Russia, it will probably start at sea. I hope it won't, because it might end with several hundred mushroom clouds...
Dr.Waddy from Jack: Re: antiamerican left decisively intended violence: I think it has always been certain at some point. Yes, Americans are understandably busy leading positive, constructive lives and honoring the rule of law. At some point though the far left's incipient totalitarianism will become too open, obvious and unapologetic to ignore. When it meets resolute resistance, the left's snit at recent law driven setbacks will explode into an all out thrust at final victory, using "any means necessary".
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy from Jack: With their proximity to the Black Sea, both Russia and Ukraine are unsinkable aircraft carriers and land based air power may be decisive in a naval war. Consequently, air bases may be be prime targets for both sides. I agree: at sea is the most likely setting for use of nukes anywhere. A blockade of Ukrainian grain exports could bring terrible hardship to many African countries. China has close economic and some military ties with some African countries. MIGHT we see Chinese naval sorties into the Med and knocking at the door of the Black Sea?
ReplyDeleteDr.Waddy from Jack: China is heavily invested in Africa. Protection of its trade with Africa is seen by some well informed observers as the prime reason for the numerical expansion of the Chinese navy. So they are in waters not too far away from the Black Sea already. What would Nato think of an incursion?
ReplyDeleteTest from Jack
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy from Jack: Your observation that the surprising drop in trade with China may be China reducing the stakes should they have to fight us is perceptive and plausible.
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy from Jack: At any rate I don't think the "Middle Kingdom" (or Jung Gwo, China's real name) bears any nation good will. I think their 19th and 20th century shame and degradation ( including the Maoist ordeal- Marxism being a foreign screed) has bred in this very old, proud and continuing civilization an implacable determination never to suffer it again. That doesn't rule out benificial intercourse with the world but I think they do not trust anyone.
ReplyDeleteDr.Waddy from Jack: In considering leftist pollution of Israel , consider the virulent leftist antisemitism commented upon frequently and plausibly in the conservative journal Commentary. The sainted Marx advocated extermination of Judaism and those countries cursed with marxist rule all did seem to have their problems with Jews. Commentary often holds forth on anti Jewish Jews. Is it possible they would be as evil as to cooperate in leftist destruction of the Jewish state?
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy from Jack: Your very well informed exposition on the 1956 Suez Crisis was enlightening to me. When I started following current events in 1960 one of the first things that struck me was the profusion of newly independent African states. But I never thought to attribute the recession of colonialism to the Suez Crisis.Just for fun, imagine if Churchill had been PM. I read that Ike told PM Eden he would ruin the Pound if perfidious Albion did not relent.But say that to Churchill. . . ?
ReplyDeleteSorry, it's" beneficial" not my misspelling.
ReplyDeleteJack, you say the Left's radicalism and inclinations towards violence and illegality will at some point become impossible to ignore. Sadly, I'm not sure anything in human history has ever been "impossible to ignore". Half of the USSR probably chose to ignore Stalin's beastliness, or at least to believe the nonsensical propaganda that justified it, and, if Stalin can get away with it, why not Biden?
ReplyDeleteJack, so far neither side in the Russia/Ukraine war has been able to claim aerial superiority, much less supremacy, over the battlespace. I doubt operations in and around the Black Sea will be any different. Yes, Russia has more of everything, but Western logistics, intel, and weapons can keep Ukraine "in the game". I mean, look at what happened to Russia's Black Sea flagship...
I personally find it inconceivable that China would intervene in the Black Sea. Will a Russian blockade against Ukrainian grain shipments raise the price of grain? Sure. There's no reason (yet) to suspect that millions will starve, though. For now, the West is very capable of subsidizing developing countries' grain purchases, if it really cares about the ordeal they are facing. So could China. Now, a Western, U.S., or NATO intervention in the Black Sea isn't entirely out of the question...but it would require considerably more moxie than we seem to possess at present.
Jack, I've gotten the impression that relative declines in China-U.S. trade reflect a reprioritization by American companies, but you make a good point that Chinese companies (and the regime) may be making similar calculations. Both countries may want to "decouple".
Jack, we're about to find out how serious the Netanyahu haters are about punishing Israel for its perceived sins (too much democracy=no more democracy, obviously!).
Hmm. It's an interesting question how Churchill would have handled Suez, and how Ike would have handled Churchill. The bottom line, though, is that the U.S. was strong, in every sense of the word, in those days, and the British Empire was rotten at its core. If it hadn't been Suez that knocked the Brits off their perch, it would have been something else... And, if it wasn't Ike, it would have been some other (bloody) American!
Dr. Waddy from Jack: Russians cursed by Stalin's rule were terrified to express any opposition. They may well have simply chosen to bear up as best they could. Solzhenitzin said that one of the most telling condemnations ofhim was how many Russians and Ukrainians took the forlorn chance of fighting for the Nazis to be shut of him.
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy from Jack: Totalitarians seek to closely control all aspects of life. With technology very much superior to that of Stalinist Russia, the antiamerican left bids fair to invade microscopically into our lives. I've read that some leftist American emigres in Paris in the 30s scoffed at the Nazi threat. "Why we experienced American oppression and nothing could be that bad". After the war one of them said"The Nazis would not allow you to endure them. If they thought you were getting along they found new ways to wrong you". I expect the antiamerican left to be similarly fanatic. They are demonstrated perfectionists and would never relent; they would blithely make it impossible to ignore their ubiquitous presence
ReplyDeleteDr.Waddy from Jack: In Julius Caesar, Octavian and Antony speak of their nominal triumvir, Lepidus,"this is a slight man". No doubt so is Biden to those who simply used him counter the obstacle DJT so unexpectedly and insolently presented. If they achieve full latitude, they would make unseemly haste to make their vindictive and onerous will a ubiquitous burden. Campfire Biden has not the visceral badness even to envision that he enables this s- - tful prospect!
ReplyDeleteJack, the problem is that we can only guess at how typical Russians felt about Stalin in the midst of the purges. Sure, a few might have documented their disgust (at great personal risk), but most kept their heads down, and quite a few (presumably) loved Stalin and hated his enemies, as they were told to. Once Stalin was dead, everyone remembered himself as an anti-Stalinist, but that tells us little about public opinion at the time.
ReplyDeleteQuite right, Jack: the Left is laboring to create, and is succeeding in creating, a world in which neutrality is impossible. Try working for a living and dissenting from DEI orthodoxy, for instance. You can't square that circle.
Dr. Waddy from Jack: Good point about Stalinist Russia. War,invasion by subhumans, artificial famine, realization that a better life was not at hand, slave labor, unrelenting terror of authority, execrable new housing, plus the always terrible winter: life was not good. Vodka and political privilege may have offered the only sanctuaries; resignation made much sense. Hope may well have been extinguished in most people, so Stalin, McGillicudy . . . Votevah, da.
ReplyDeleteJack, that makes me think of the Russians who plowed through eastern Germany in 1945 (metaphorically speaking) and their wonderment at high German living standards. That is to say, for people beaten down so badly and for so long, Stalinism may not have seemed like the horror that it was.
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy from Jack: Yeah Russia always was a hard job to live in. The marxists made it much worse! That took some doing. But this is nothing to the neo marxists, whose radical evil is thus affirmed.
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy from Jack: But your point is well taken. Perhaps no one who hasn't lived inRussia can fully understand what possible consolations it offers . Perhaps even that profoundly sadistic cacodemon could not expunge them, though, as a hellhound he no doubt would have worked suffering beyond even life had he the power!
ReplyDeleteA very creditable article I read said that in order to understand Russia one must appreciate Russian winter, because both its trials and its redeemng confirmation of Russian fortitude define the Russian character.
Jack