China Syndrome

 

I had coffee this week with a friend who, after living in Everett for many years, moved, two years ago, to China. His wife is Chinese and wanted, following tradition, to be able to help her aging parents, back home. He had several interesting things to say about his adopted home, especially how foreigners are treated.

As a retired military lifer, he gets a decent government pension. For the first five years of living in China, that income is not taxed. After five years, he’ll qualify for what amounts to a permanent Green Card, allowing him pretty much all the benefits that citizens enjoy there, like owning a business. He and his wife live in a commodious apartment with an ocean view, for which he pays $400 per month.

But they’ve just bought a brand-new condo, in the process of finishing of which to make it livable they are. It’s in a “small” city, by Chinese standards: 450,000 people. In pictures he showed, the city bursts with development: high-rise buildings everywhere. Cars. Restaurants. Other stuff.

He plans to buy an electric car; the leading Chinese automaker, BYD, makes EVs now considered the best in the world. He intends to get their top model, which sells for $19,000. They’re pushing the envelope in battery technology, too, surpassing Elon’s by far. 

As a foreigner, my friend is allowed his own VPN, whatever that is, providing access to all of the internet that we have, here. Chinese citizens have no such freedom. I suppose his is because the government recognizes that most non-citizens are there doing mutually beneficial business.

My point is not to tout Chinese governance, but it’s apparent that its one-party autocracy is able to get things done there, and much faster than we do. Making efforts to combat climate change, for example, which Trump is deliberately undoing. My friend says his city has more EV charging stations than gas stations. When, if ever, might that happen here?

I have no desire to move to China, though I hear they have good Chinese food. I like living in a two-party, democratic republic. Especially when both parties have the greater good as central to their goals. Since Newt Gingrich and those of his time in power, that stopped being the case for the once-great Republican Party. It’s unpleasant.

As Trump steadily withdraws the US from the world stage, speeding the time when our country will no longer be seen as “indispensable” or a source of generosity and humanitarianism around the world, China acts to fill that void. Unlike Trump, they understand the value of “soft power;” not just for the recipients, but for their national standing, too. Trump’s America pulled its support for the World Health Organization, saver of countless lives. China just donated $500 million to it.

MAGA likes the idea of letting the needy, here and abroad, fend for themselves. Moochers. “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free...” Emma Lazarus. What a load of liberal crap, even if it’s exactly what Jesus taught. We’re MAGA. We make our own rules.

Our drastic reduction of support for USAID is already costing thousands of lives, according to people who know. Especially in Africa, especially children, from disease and starvation. It’s likely China will step in there, too. And the world will look to them, not us, for leadership. 

It’s depressing to see the US coddling dictators, insulting our allies, isolated, handing the future to other nations. RFK, Jr. just announced that scientists of the NIH will no longer be allowed to publish in such highly respected journals as Britain’s The Lancet, the Journal of the American Medical Association, The New England Journal of Medicine. Because, he said, without evidence, they’re “corrupt.” He should know: in Trump, he sees corruption up close.

But maybe it won’t matter: he’s cutting funding for medical and other scientific research to the point where it may become impossible for those important labs to continue, no matter where they might have shared their results. Happily for humanity, science is still valued in China, in Europe, in Israel. So research will continue, just not here. Unless Trump’s destructive tariffs make them too expensive, the scientific and technological advances in those countries will, presumably, be available to Americans. We’ll just have to wait for them; takers, not makers, dependent on countries with more outward-looking priorities.

As the economist Dani Rodrik wrote, “Three things made the US a rich and powerful nation: the rule of law, its science & innovation system, and openness to foreign talent. Remarkable how Trump has taken a sledgehammer to all three. No enemy of this country could do more.” 

Meanwhile, Republican-controlled Congress ignores Trump’s increasingly blatant self-enrichment, while crafting a budget that represents the greatest transfer of wealth from the poor to the wealthy, cutting those things that might, you know, MAGA. 

Anyone for dim sum?

86 The 86

 

By now we can all agree we had a leader who, in the latter part of his presidency, was failing mentally. Until it wasn’t, his team was successful in hiding the decline; on more than one occasion, even his wife stepped in to lead him out of a sentence in which he’d become lost. It was as sad as it was shameful.

Nevertheless, history remembers him more for “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall” than for the Iran-Contra scandal, the “tax cuts pay for themselves” lie, or “trees cause air pollution.” Or ending all the energy-saving measures his predecessor had put in place, which, had they remained, might have prevented subsequent energy crises. Not to mention addressing climate change when we still had a chance.

So let it be with Biden. May he be remembered more for guiding the country out of the throes of the grossly mishandled pandemic and crashing economy left to him by his predecessor, than for his end-of-term failings. Not for the NOT-wide-open border but for rebuilding infrastructure, bringing down post-pandemic inflation, never as high in the US as elsewhere. Enacting the CHIPS Act, adding millions of jobs. Strengthening NATO. Et several more ceteras. 

If Trump and his coterie of confabulators have any say in it, he won’t be. Last weekend, for example, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, doing the Full Ginsburg, claimed that, under Trump, inflation has come down for the first time in four years. That’s like insisting that Trump made the sun rise in the East for the first time. Not a single show host called him on it. Trump has successfully threatened honest news agencies into avoiding the truth which once, as they say, had the ability to set us free. History may judge his snuffing of the free press to have been even more damaging than stuffing his sidekickery with amoral acolytes willing to carry out his every act of lawless government weaponization.

Hair-triggered, Trump and his outrage-ready cadre pounced on former FBI Director Comey for shelling out a picture containing the numbers 8647. Had he showed up at the White House, armed, in combat gear, they concluded, his intentions wouldn’t have been more clear. That Trumpists sold 86-46 paraphernalia slipped their “minds.” Same with Matt Gaetz bragging he’d “86ed McCarthy, McDaniel, and McConnell.” The term, legend has it, came not from murderer’s row, but from restaurant lingo.

Which should be considered more threatening? Comey’s beach photography or Trump saying, of Liz Cheney, “... Let's put her with a rifle standing there with nine barrels shooting at her, OK? Let's see how she feels about it. You know, when the guns are trained on her face.”

But weaponized outrage points only leftward. Recall the Foxian apoplexy when President Barack Obama, thankfully not wearing that shockingly disrespectful tan suit, bent slightly at the waist when meeting Saudi Arabia’s murderous Mohammed bin Salman? What, other than groveling, shall we call Trump’s words to him? "He's your greatest representative, greatest representative. And if I didn't like him, I'd get out of here so fast. You know that, don't you? He knows me well. I do -- I like him a lot. I like him too much. That's why we give so much, you know? Too much. I like you too much." While MBS sat grinning like the cat who trapped the canary, fattened it up, toyed with it for a while, then ate it. Was there silence from the right? Is the Pope American?

Nor was there a peep about the worshipful, Kim-Jong-Il-mimicking, larger-than-life poster of tough-scowling Trump hanging from a government building, meant for public adoration and submission. 

The cult of Trump approves his every normative transgression. Like the lib-sticking, white-supremacist-coddling importation of white South African non-victims of non-existent “white genocide of farmers.” Not only might they not be farmers, at least one appears to be an antisemite worse than the college students (anti-Israel ≠ antisemite) Trump has been deporting for formerly protected speech. 

We’re living in the Upside Down, where intelligence analysts are fired for truths that disprove Trumpic lies. Where, if not fired, they’re pressured to change their conclusions. Where, when corporations like Walmart announce price hikes due to tariffs, Trump demands they “eat” the costs, confirming his lie that China pays. Like so many other institutions that are money strong but democracy weak, they’ll probably cave, too.

Trump’s unrelenting attacks on every Constitutional creation intended to secure and protect democracy are working. Their success depends on dictatorial threats, willingness of his crew of unconscionables to enact them, and, most of all, the cowardice and greed of those given the power to stop it. Without evident irony, Holy Mike Johnson says that since Trump’s corruption is unhidden, it’s okay.

Trump wants us to become so inured to it that it becomes ignorable. For much of the country, it already is. Even arresting legislators, former government officials, students, and legal immigrants. And petty, thin-skinned threats toward pop stars who speak out against him.

Corruption? What Corruption?

 

If people charged with oversight look away, does corruption exist? If deporting migrants is all MAGAs care about, is Trump selling his “presidency” to the highest bidder not happening? If a crime falls in Trump’s forest, does it make a sound?

So sure is Trump of the hypovertebral cowardice of Republican Congressfolk and the yes-boss, how-high sycophancy of his appointees that he’s not bothering to hide the corruption, greed, and grift that, were it anyone else, would have led to bipartisan impeachment and removal. What Trump is doing makes the alleged transgressions of the “Biden crime family” seem like kids selling lemonade without a license.

Nevertheless, Republicans conducted years of made-for-Fox “hearings” about it; all up with which they came were crimes to which Hunter Biden had already confessed. Now? With unprecedented corruption screaming for investigation? Butkis. (sp?)

Had Joe Biden, right before taking office, created eponymous cryptocurrencies for himself and his wife and encouraged foreign governments to purchase them, had offered White House tours and private dinners to individuals who purchased the most, Republican outrage would be at eleven and he’d be removed from office in the blink of an “aye.”

For comprehensive explication of the trail-blazing conflicts of interest in Trump’s crypto-kleptocracy, read this. And this. Then this. I could hotlink this Trumpery till the cowed come home and still not cover it all.

And that’s before mentioning the influence-peddling his sons are pushing around the world: Twenty Trump-branded building projects in nine countries, all of which will be in position to seek presidential favors. And, as history shows, receive them. But Hunter made bank because of his surname, causing Jim Jordan (R-OH) and James Comer (R-KY) jugular-ballooning apoplexy. These potatoes, they are small.

According to MAGAs, proof that Trump “loves America” is that he donated his salary to the US Treasury last time around. That love now operates a government-underwritten cash machine. It’s estimated that his family members have increased their wealth by $3 billion since the election and his entry into the crypto game. Ever tried to wrap around how much a billion is? This should help.

Trump’s enforcers and acolytes don’t simply ignore it. They bend over backwards to justify it. Attorney General Pam Bondi, America’s bulwark against liberalism’s lawlessness, argues that accepting a $400 million plane from Qatar, a country that may have had a hand in 9/1, finances Hamas and the anti-US campus protestors that Trump arrests for speaking freely, isn’t a Constitution-defined emolument. Because he’ll only use it till he’s out of office, at which point he’ll keep using it. Or something. He’s gotta have it, though: it’s gold-plated. 

No matter that accepting a 250-foot-long, three-story plane from a shady government is risky. Other than disassembling everything, including its toilets, fold-flat seats, gilded staircase, and wiring, how could we be certain it doesn’t include spyware? Whether or not the gift-grift happens, Trump loves the idea and Republicans far and wide-bodied are all for it, too; falling in line like Boy Scouts for his every whim, even his Alcatrazific impossibility. 

None of this will make the tiniest crack in the enlightenment-proof wall surrounding Trump voters. The divide between those who live in that world and people inhabiting the one that exists is getting wider every day. Consider the “deals” Trump recently announced with the UK and, later, China. To MAGA, they confirm the brilliance of the artiste o’ the deal; the pendulumistic backs and forths, markets ricocheting like pinballs, ports, including Seattle’s, empty of cargo; all part of a grand plan working out perfectly. Which was to isolate and break China. Then not. Which was that tariffs would erase our national debt and eliminate taxes. Then canceled. Every U-turn, every message reversal accepted as if from Mount Sinai.

Reality-based observers have noted that when Trump’s tariffs on China were announced, it responded in kind, immediately stopped selling stuff to the US while opening new markets everywhere else. Their brilliance, as opposed to Trump’s dimness, meant that while shelves empty here and prices creep up, while Trump shamed Americans for wanting toys for their kids, China, selling elsewhere, flourished. Outflanked, Trump caved. His nonsensical tariffs on China were an ego trip over which, in full planetary view, he tripped.

It must be obvious to world leaders that, facing pushback, he backs down. Spin it his mouthers might, but spin ain’t spinach.

The fruits of Republicans’ attacks on critical thinking are seen as MAGAs are as happy over the flip as they were over the flop. Ensuring a steady supply of such easy marks, harbinger Oklahoma, already at the bottom rung of American education, will now teach their youth that Trump’s stolen election lies are truth, removing all the rungs above those unfortunate kids. Like the MAGAfied, they never had a chance. 

No, Man. It's An Island

 

San Francisco is where I learned the art and craft, the calling and commitment to life as a surgeon. Except for a detour to Southeast Asia arranged by my draft board, we lived there for seven years. Time for fun was scant, but we did manage, thanks to a couple of surgery professors and their heavy-keeled sailboats, a couple of exhilarating sailings on the Bay. We got close to Alcatraz Island, the occupation of which by American Indians was still going on, but the first time we took a tour was many years later, when, on a return visit, our young son announced he wanted to.

It was impressive. Among other niceties was a self-guided audio tour, voiced by prisoners and guards who’d been there. “Now go down ‘Broadway’ and stop in front of cell 120... Me and Mugsy was in here when we wasn’t in solitary.” Stuff like that. Sounds of yelling and taunting, clatter of silverware. Eerie, but impactful.

As part of the National Park Service, Alcatraz brings in over sixty million tourism dollars a year. With characteristic brilliance aforethought, His Majesty has revealed plans to resurrect it as a prison. Because, doncha know, he’s tough on crime. (Not his and his family’s, but there’s only so much crime a guy can tough on.)

A recent retrofitting of the dock cost around thirty-six million. Refurbishing and modernizing the buildings to current prison standards would be huge. Not to mention future operating costs for an island accessible only by boat, three times that of other prisons, which was among the reasons for shutting it down. Might that money be better spent reinstating Trump’s reckless funding cuts to life-saving medical research, or consumer protections, or Medicaid? But, as always, his reasons were succinct and thoughtful. 

That’s Donald “I can do whatever I want” Trump for you. Like announcing 100% tariffs on movies made outside the US. Out of which (or whose) orifice did he pull that one? How it’ll work, he didn’t reveal. Movies, he may not know, don’t come through ports to be unloaded by cranes. Add a buck to each ticket, maybe. What’s next? Getting Mexico to pay for walls around hurricanes?

But it’s no joke. With our Republican-controlled Congress, formerly eager to investigate government corruption but now strangely silent, producing no legislation at all while ignoring Trump’s usurpful, authoritarian acts, everything that’s happened since he took office has been by executive order. While not all are illegal, most amount to vindictive punishment of the vulnerable or those he perceives as enemies. Or sad ego-trips, like taking over the Kennedy Center, replacing the board of the Holocaust Museum, or renaming bodies of water, geological formations, and holidays. Plus lustful leers at Canada, Greenland, and the Panama Canal.

The authority for Trump’s nasty orders was available to preceding presidents, too, though none were granted immunity for the illegal ones, as the wise men of our Supreme Court did for him. (The women are wiser.) But, until Trump, everyone who’s held that office, even, for some of his time, Richard Nixon, had enough respect for the presidency and the law to recall the oath to which they swore.

Not Trump. As stated last weekend on Meet The Press, he isn’t sure he’s obligated to abide by our Constitution at all, assuming he knows what’s in it. “I don’t know. I’m not a lawyer.” It’s up to “his” lawyers to tell him, he said. Pam Bondi, Kash Patel, sycophantically prostrate protectors of the law. Who made a nauseating show of braggadocio after arresting a judge in her courtroom, intended to intimidate all judges into ignoring his lawbreaking, assuming what the judge did was, in fact, illegal. One minute it’s, “I run the world,” next minute he’s a helpless tabula rasa who knows nothing.

Nor will he get pushback from Republicans in Congress, who’ve said only this. Scores of judges from both parties have spoken up, forcefully, though. Not that Team Trump cares. Probably loving it.

Megalomaniac. Sociopath. Narcissist. Pathological liar. Based on direct observation, all of those terms have been applied to the person who, when he’s not golfing, occupies the Oval Office long enough to display yet another executive order, showily adorned with his ventricular-tachycardia-mimicking signature, offering nothing for anyone but himself. Plus, as he plans drastic cuts to military leadership and intelligence services, Vladimir Putin and all who wish us ill.

If Trump cared about country over self, which he doesn’t, instead of focusing on prisons foreign and domestic, movies, forcedly reverential parades, and honoring convicted seditionists, he’d attend to problems his mindless firings have created; like the fiasco at Newark’s airport, a major hub for access to New York City. We used it a couple of months ago. Not again. Not till Trump lays down his Sharpie and does something beneficial or thought-out for a change.