China News Thread

[FCP Bob 1,312]

TPP wasn't just a trade deal but had massive geopolitical benefits as well that were lost.

 

The United States Is Losing Asia to China

 

 

With Washington in disarray, the Belt and Road Forum kicking off this weekend in Beijing should be a blaring wake up call that U.S. leadership in Asia is in peril. For two days, China will play host to more than 1,200 delegates from 110 countries, including 29 heads of state. The event will be centered on China’s “One Belt, One Road” program — more recently rebranded as the “Belt Road Initiative” (BRI) — which aims to provide much-needed infrastructure to connect Asia, the Middle East, and Europe.

 

Announced by Chinese President Xi Jinping in 2013, BRI is nothing if not ambitious, with plans to involve upwards of 65 countries and marshal in the neighborhood of $1 trillion. While skepticism is warranted about the novelty, value, and feasibility of many of the proposed projects, leaders around the world — with nary a better prospect of satisfying their development needs — are pining to take part. This is only the latest manifestation of Chinese leadership at a time when U.S. commitment to the region is less certain than ever.

 

Washington’s response so far? More U.S. defense dollars. Senator John McCain has proposed a $7.5 billion “Asia-Pacific Stability Initiative” ($1.5 billion annually through 2022) that, according to a McCain spokesperson, would “make U.S. regional posture more forward-learning, flexible, resilient, and formidable,” as well as improve military infrastructure, buy additional munitions, and enhance the capacity of allies and partners in Asia. The idea is popular, receiving preliminary endorsements from Defense Secretary James Mattis, a bipartisan group of lawmakers on Capitol Hill, and the editorial pages of the Wall Street Journal.

 

But here’s the catch: Even though larger U.S. defense budgets are sorely needed, no amount of military spending alone can resuscitate American power in Asia. As essential as it is to strengthen U.S. partners and shore up the U.S. military’s position in the region, the near-term battle for influence in Asia will rise and fall on economics instead. And on that score, the United States is losing badly since withdrawing from the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade agreement. Trump and his team have only made matters worse by threatening to undo or renegotiate existing deals, such as the U.S.-Korea Free Trade Agreement.

 

Beijing can’t believe its luck.

 

With no indication that the Trump administration has plans to lead on trade and investment, China is busy stealing the mantle. And not just with the Belt and Road Initiative. Beijing also launched the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank in 2015 — absent U.S. participation — providing half of the $100 billion in initial capital. The organization has been growing steadily since, welcoming 13 new countries in March (including Belgium, Canada, and Ireland) that brought its total membership to 70. Meanwhile, China is steering the New Development Bank, founded in 2014 by the BRICS grouping, with $100 billion in start-up capital.

 

China is similarly poised to lead on trade, sitting in pole position in negotiations on the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), a regional trade agreement that aims to bring together the 10 members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) plus Australia, China, India, Japan, New Zealand, and South Korea. The grouping accounts for almost half of the world’s population and just under a third of global GDP. Negotiations, underway for four years, have picked up pace since the end of 2015. While big cleavages remain and the deal may never be done, RCEP is now the main game in town and the United States isn’t at the table.

 

These initiatives are important not primarily because of their raw economic impact — which is assuredly less than meets the eye — but instead because they have induced snowballing perceptions of inevitability about the future of a China-led economic order in Asia. And it isn’t lost on anybody that the United States is not participating in any of these programs. This isn’t simply anecdotal or the product of inside-the-Beltway theology. A recent survey revealed that Southeast Asian elites see the United States losing strategic ground to China, and Trump’s Washington as less interested in the region, less dependable, and less likely to uphold free trade.

 

Which gets back to the efficacy of a strategy predicated primarily on military strength if the administration’s economic policy toward Asia looks more like a noxious mix of neglect and contempt. Officials in the region are now quietly warning that Southeast Asia is rapidly approaching (if not having already crossed) the line whereby countries will be unwilling to initiate major new security activities with the United States for fear of economic retribution from China. This is the case not only among America’s new partners like Vietnam and Malaysia, but also its longstanding friends like Singapore and Australia. After all, would Canberra agree today to a new U.S. force posture initiative akin to the deal the Obama administration successfully negotiated in 2011 to rotate up to 2,500 U.S. Marines in Darwin? The answer is decidedly “no,” and although some of that has to do with Trump himself, the more fundamental reason is the emerging belief (however misplaced) that Australia’s economic future is now hitched to China’s wagon.

 

The United States will need strong, independent, and reliable allies and partners to advance its vital interests in Asia. But the only way something like McCain’s Asia-Pacific Stability Initiative can succeed is if the United States provides the region with an alternative to economic dependence on China and Chinese-led institutions. Reviving U.S. participation in TPP (or some version thereof) is the simplest and obvious first step. The politics of trade are abysmal right now, but so too are the consequences of U.S. withdrawal and protectionism. If an about-face on TPP is too much for even the Trump administration to bear, then it will be on the hook — and fast — for an equally ambitious economic endeavor in Asia. Otherwise, the United States will soon be squeezed out of large swaths of the region, no matter how many billions of dollars Congress commits to strengthen U.S. military power in Asia.

[Balloon guy 158]

So you want the USA involved in other countries to influence them and direct their economic directions? We are the world's police?

 

What if we want to pull back our influence to our own borders and let other countries decide their own destinies?

 

And if China is such a threat, Why shouldn't we partner with Russia and knock them down a peg or two? Or better yet, let the UN handle it. Why is America responsible for Japan, Philippines? Australia?

[Scrim 115]

Currently, the biggest running joke on Chinese social media is the "white left" - that's how you insult someone in China who you feel is a naive retard.

 

The phenomenon has generated so much buzz among the Chinese- traditionally known to be numerically oriented and not adept with creative use of language- that they were forced by necessity to coin a word to describe it.

 

Baizuo.

 

There are even reports of Chinese actually laughing out loud about white western cartoon-liberals, which is an equally odd occurrence as there are only a small handful of historically documented instances of the Chinese engaging in laughter, and most of those involve mass slaughters during war.

 

https://www.opendemo...internet-insult

 

So what does ‘white left’ mean in the Chinese context, and what’s behind the rise of its (negative) popularity? It might not be an easy task to define the term, for as a social media buzzword and very often an instrument for ad hominem attack, it could mean different things for different people. A thread on “why well-educated elites in the west are seen as naïve “white left” in China” on Zhihu, a question-and-answer website said to have a high percentage of active users who are professionals and intellectuals, might serve as a starting point.

 

The question has received more than 400 answers from Zhihu users, which include some of the most representative perceptions of the ‘white left’. Although the emphasis varies, baizuo is used generally to describe those who

“only care about topics such as immigration, minorities, LGBT and the environment”

and “have no sense of real problems in the real world”;

they are hypocritical humanitarians who advocate for peace and equality only to “satisfy their own feeling of moral superiority”;

they are “obsessed with political correctness” to the extent that they “tolerate backwards Islamic values for the sake of multiculturalism”;

they believe in the welfare state that “benefits only the idle and the free riders”;

they are the “ignorant and arrogant westerners” who “pity the rest of the world and think they are saviours”.

 

Why do you suppose that the Chinese reject those 'values'?

Is it ignorance?

As a Bernie Sanders voter, I, for one, hope that we can open college campuses in China that are dedicated to charging Chinamen tens of thousands of dollars for college degrees in Gender Studies. If China needs one thing, it's lots of degreed 'case managers' for oriental non-profits focused on expanding social justice to inner Mongolia.

[scuudagouch 15]

As a Bernie Sanders voter....lol

[Dubey 1,035]

says the Donald Trump voter... LOL

[FCP Bob 1,312]

China ‘systematically dismantled’ CIA spying operations by killing or imprisoning informants: report

[scuudagouch 15]

quality link, you can read up on the failures of the CIA under Obama as well the Katy Perry / Taylor Swift feud...and Ozzy's sex addiction!

[FCP Bob 1,312]

Really interesting story about a rogue Chinese billionaire.

 

Who is Guo Wengui?

[Scrim 115]

Really interesting story about a rogue Chinese billionaire.

 

Who is Guo Wengui?

 

I forget who, but someone drew the metaphor of China being a glistening, 6 lane highway, perfectly paved with shiny cars but up ahead lies a very bumpy road (sorting out the inherent conflicts between Communism and Capitalism) and how that resolves itself is to be seen. Do the wheels fly off?

 

India, on the other hand, is a dirt road with most people driving ox drawn wagons, but up ahead lies a decent, two lane highway that might one day turn into a respectable 4 lane highway. They have most of their market issues sorted out, but they're just not high performers like the Chinese (Chinese having an IQ well above the global average while India has an IQ well below the global average).

 

Right now, the Chinese are making a killing in both India and Africa, which is rather perplexing since neither Indians nor Africans can manage to do the exact same thing with the exact same resources but since were all 'born equal', this doesn't quite wash.

 

Oh well. Must be racism!

[Balloon guy 158]

Lot of buildings sitting half built in Shanghai, no workers, no activity.

 

The notion that a central government agency can run a country effectively, especially one that has access to an Internet, it's naive

[FCP Bob 1,312]

[Balloon guy 158]

The cruise ship I was on 2 weeks ago went right by this circular on ramp. I took some pictures of it from the water because it seemed weird to have a corkscrew on ramp to a freeway.

 

Chongqing is a big city.

[Balloon guy 158]

Weird $18B donation from shady Chinese corporation to NY charity

[FCP Bob 1,312]

Weird $18B donation from shady Chinese corporation to NY charity

 

HNA is a facinating company. Nobody really knows who owns it and it's huge and the number one Chinese investor in the US. It's also the company that is buying "The Mooch's" hedge fund.

[FCP Bob 1,312]

Very interesting story.

 

Steve Wynn of course owns casinos in Macau and has to stay in the good graces of the Chinese government.

 

Matthew Yglesias‏Verified account @mattyglesias 9h9 hours ago

Major GOP donor Steve Wynn convinced Trump to deport a Chinese dissident who was saved by his Mar-a-Lago membership.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/chinas-hunt-for-guo-wengui-a-fugitive-businessman-kicks-off-manhattan-caper-worthy-of-spy-thriller-1508717977

 

[FCP Bob 1,312]

China's Surveillance State Should Scare Everyone

The country is perfecting a vast network of digital espionage as a means of social control—with implications for democracies worldwide.

[Balloon guy 158]

China is getting their feet in Africa and Mexico / South America with their telecommunications installations.

Read an interesting article about how the long term result is China being able to control so much because they will have access to so much.

 

So we either get to have the trade war now, and greatly curtails China's expansion, or we get to have the military war later.

 

Trade War is the first step, Space Force is the second one.

[FCP Bob 1,312]

China is getting their feet in Africa and Mexico / South America with their telecommunications installations.

Read an interesting article about how the long term result is China being able to control so much because they will have access to so much.

 

So we either get to have the trade war now, and greatly curtails China's expansion, or we get to have the military war later.

 

Trade War is the first step, Space Force is the second one.

 

the best way to win wars is to have Allies and the US would have had the entire Pacific Basin as Allies if Trump wouldn't have pulled the US out of the TPP. Also something a lot of the lefties would have done.

[Balloon guy 158]

We had bad deals. I like having a president who puts America first in trade deals. I don't have a problem when Canada puts Canada first, or China puts China first, every country except France should put their country first.

[FCP Bob 1,312]

We had bad deals. I like having a president who puts America first in trade deals. I don't have a problem when Canada puts Canada first, or China puts China first, every country except France should put their country first.

 

I know it's asking a lot to know what was in the TPP but it opened up access to markets for the US better than before and fixed most of the areas that the US considered problems with existing trade deals like NAFTA. It's a massive shame that both the Nationalist right and the extreme left in the US are so ignorant about trade and just like to use platitudes like "put America first" or "protect jobs".

 

Trade isn't a zero sum game. Trade makes both sides better off.

[Balloon guy 158]

Look I'm all for "US companies leaving their homelands to open up sweatshops in poor countries, then ship the products back to the Us for sale so they can make so much profit that they don't pay taxes on, without any tariffs reducing their profits", as the next guy.

 

I'm just saying that maybe we should look at the long term results of letting China grow their military to the point of their communist regime being able to threaten Taiwan and their other neighbors.

 

You know, think about tomorrow and not just today's profits.

 

Apple makes $407,000 profit per employee each year. OF course they have to have their phones built by Taiwanese children because their margins are super thin.

[BigDMcGee 3,352]

BG arguing on behalf of fair labor practices, will wonders never cease.

 

 

Also the idea that we can let or prevent China from doing anything militarily through a trade embargo is hubris at this point. China has an advanced economy with advanced technology and an advanced military. They aren't north Korea, they already have a gigantic, nuclear capable military. If we wanted to prevent them from creating a military that threatened Taiwan or their other neighbors, we should have dropped the bomb on them during the Korean war. That ship sailed long ago. What prevents China from invading Taiwan is the same thing that kept Russia at bay during the Cold War, mutually assured destruction and them not willing to risk the US keeping it real.

 

For the record, I don't think the US would be willing to keep it real to save Taiwan, and I also think China knows it. How tolerant they are to take that risk in the future is a whole other question..

[FCP Bob 1,312]

Why does BG hate American consumers and want them to pay more for consumer goods ?

 

Also if you want to counter China militarily it helps to have Allies who you have friendly trading relationships with in the area and who you maybe are part of a Pact that covers the entire Pacific Region with. Maybe it could be called a partnership. How about the Trans Pacific Partnership.

[brvheart 1,752]

I think we would all be on board with that name. Now we just need to structure it so that the US alone isn't being screwed.

[FCP Bob 1,312]

I think we would all be on board with that name. Now we just need to structure it so that the US alone isn't being screwed.

 

you do realize, well I guess you don't based on your comment, that the TPP pretty much gave the US everything they wanted. After the US dropped out the other countries changed some things that they didn't want in the agreement that were only there for the US.