Indefensible. That’s the word for the actions of police who continue the same arrogant conduct, even after all that has happened. It’s also the word for the Biden campaign.
A virtual convention that looks like a press conference can’t compete with a party convention on the White House lawn. Biden’s appeals are too much akin to Carter’s at the close of his defeated debate with Reagan. If I didn’t know better, I’d say the Democrats want to lose. It’s more likely that they don’t know when they are losing because they don’t know how to adapt. That goes for arrogant police as well as losing Democrat campaigns.
Take careful note of the dissent, complaints, doom-mongering, accusations, and verbal vomit coming against the leaders steering us through these times. This barrage of doubt befits the same ilk any victor faces in the hours and minutes before breakthrough and victory. Remember it well. After Trump wins and does more of what they said could not be done, the same accusers will deny that they ever claimed the inevitable was impossible.
These days, Taiwan is the perfect poster boy in China bashing. Yes, China needs to be confronted. No, China can’t own the world. Yes, China wants to own the world. Yes, China responds to anything and everything like a friendless student carrying a Grandiosity complex. But, that doesn’t mean mindless China bashing will help.
We are engaged in mindless China bashing.
Learn from Germany. WWII developed because the free world punished and insulted Germany after WWI. We need healing, gentle leadership, and grace. Trouble maker countries must be coached and guided, not merely insulted and smeared. Whatever conflict we see with China on the horizon, it will only grow back with a vengeance if we fail to handle it correctly now.
In the China bashing narrative, Taiwan is the perfect innocent—the victim everyone pities. Poor little Taiwan struggles to stay afloat with the tsunami of Chinese conflict. But, as part of that narrative, don’t deify the poster boy.
Taiwan has many of its own problems that go unreported. It’s people are friendly in many ways, but also oblivious. Success with the pneumoniavirus developed a Royalty complex, where Taiwan has a higher regard for itself without understanding the foreign nations that struggle with relations, investment, and trade in these times. There is a growing reputation Taiwan’s government continues to set for itself and Taiwan will need to face that sooner or later.
Taiwan’s troubles are not uninvited. But, when we over-simplify global conflicts, brainwashed thinking wants pure villains attacking pure victims. There is no such thing. And, a peaceful future requires us to stop living a news narrative of fantasy.
The US has has taken a hardline on NATO. Of course, NATO members love to criticize the nation that pays the bills that their economic policies can’t afford—or perhaps that their economic priorities refuse.
Germany wants an American debt-funded military and complains like a cat when something is taken away. Everyone wants to negotiate with an Iranian government that actually issued an arrest warrant for the American president. It’s not that those nations believe negotiating is an answer; they don’t know what the answer is. For them, negotiation is nothing more than their ongoing career habit that guided them through fundraisers and elections.
Europe is largely Liberal anymore. It’s like a nest of baby birds whose economic theory is that mamma and pappa bird need to give them more worms—and this is the way to keep the economy going. None of these baby birds demonstrate awareness that worms don’t just appear; the adult birds must go find them! The solution is for baby birds to grow up and learn to hunt for worms of their own. But, tell that to European Liberal leaders these days and you’ll get a response of aloof entitlement and condescension.
There are ways in which things must be done so that cash flows. Money doesn’t move merely because the government told it to. People are driven to invent and pursue dreams and healthy ambitions. Keep them from killing each other, stay out of their way, and then they will gladly generate profit on which they gladly pay enormous taxes.
Ambition is unimaginable to a baby bird who thinks it will never be able to fly simply because it never has. Lucky for us, many Americans are growing up. But, Europe might not grow up in time.
All of us enjoy the results of the paths we choose, paths which no one can choose for us. Americans believe this so strongly, it often leads to unhealthy apathy toward others in distress. When America finally decides to help others, it is often from a kind of “Messiah” complex, viz Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan. From this American worldview, including the good and the bad, America would have no motive to “keep China from rising”. We just don’t think about others that much, you see.
Nonetheless, China has frequently claimed its destiny and right to rise to greatness, using this claim as an excuse to threaten, attack, and oppress others, all the while adding another claim that resistance to forced Chinese subjugation is an attempt to “keep China from rising”. But again, free-minded people, whether self-absorbed or genuine, have no motive to keep others from rising.
Why do voices from China’s government suppose the intended motives of a free-thinking people, which the Chinese Confucian Communists cannot themselves identify with? Is this a random misunderstanding? To suspect ill motives of others toward oneself while at the same time seeking unchecked authority over others is more reminiscent of the paranoid narcissist. Adding to that China’s legislated policy for Hong Kong, against its UN-registered treaty of 1984, and for Taiwan, of which it still remains unable to assert jurisprudence, we now have signs of Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder. OCD was never about being clean and organized, but rather using excess rules of organizing as a means to control others. Added up, China demonstrates personality disorders from all three clusters.
That is an explosive mix, so to speak.
But, while insanity is a threat to others it is always a greater threat to itself. In addition to narcissism, an over-inflated view of self falls within purview of the Biblical proverb, “Pride goeth before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall.” We in the West should not fear Chinese aggression, rather the fallout of narcissistic rage as China painfully learns that it cannot be a worldwide dominator. That lesson may cost a tuition of lives in the millions.
Yes, we are going down this path. August 15, this past weekend, marked the 75th Anniversary of Japan’s surrender to the United States and serves as a reminder of Western resolve to stop the map from changing. Almost four years prior, Japan had provoked the West against the wise advice of China; today, those roles seem reversed. We have no reason to fear, but we must be honest with ourselves enough to be ready for what has been brewing a long time.
The ability to attain and maintain peace is special, especially these days. It’s what government should do, but doesn’t always know how. The police in Kalamazoo, Michigan did the right thing by being close enough to act if needed, but not being the “main event”. The role of the police is to preserve the peace, not to prevent the consequences of a radical group choosing to provoke another radical group. Conflict only lasted 10 minutes, then quickly calmed down. Less could be said for other parts of the nation.
Our president’s brother passed away at 71, God rest his soul. As the family grieves, business in the nation continues.
Israel now has formal ties with the UAE, which could mean direct flights between Dubai and Jerusalem. The Palestinians aren’t happy; the world isn’t surprised. This affects the Unites States on the international stage as well as the election. Foreign relations help at the ballot box.
Biden has all but formally announced the VP nominee. It won’t matter because he doesn’t stand a chance of winning. Headlines about the Democratic ticket doomed to fail do little more than distract Democratic voters who don’t know they have been duped by the media into a false hope based on false fears and slanted polls. But, those lies sure do sell newspapers!
Trouble is on the rise. It comes in spurts, but it is growing. People are moving out of Californian cities. Protests continue in Portland and Seattle. The trouble is complex, much of it is deserved, and much of it is necessary for our nation to confront the issues that keep us from healing from our past. The only way out is through. To do that, we’ll need to listen to each other.
China received two-and-a-half slaps in the face this week: financial sanctions against a few Chinese and Hong Kong leaders, who don’t have money in the US anyway, and the first formal diplomatic visit from America to Taiwan in over 40 years. To add “insultlett” to insults, the purported reason for the US visit was to discuss health and disease cooperation in the face of the Wuhan-famed pneumoniavirus, with Taiwan being the safest place in the world from the disease.
All of these actions from the US are perfectly understandable.
Countries should visit each other. The US is wrong for not having visited Taiwan over the last two score, just as North and South Korea are wrong for their tensions. The world needs people to talk to each other, whether in government, religion, or otherwise. At least Taiwan and the US seem to be getting along much better than Democrat and Republican voters in America.
Sanctions over Hong Kong’s turn of events are also understandable. Beijing doesn’t have jurisprudence over the world, but certain people in Beijing seem to think so and aren’t afraid to put their opinions in ink and law. No, Americans shouldn’t do business with such folk; no one should, no matter what country they’re from.
As understandable as US actions are, they are nonetheless provocative. We can’t expect Beijing to be happy. America found the perfect storm, and bet the bank that people in the Pentagon know what’s going on. But, something seems different in this week’s volley of cross-Pacific insults: Beijing didn’t pop a hernia like it usually does.
Could the Chinese Communists be learning to not feed taunts from the US? Or, more likely, has Beijing read the clear message of actions and decided to quietly plan retaliatory “messages” of action in ways other than rhetoric? The next few months will tell us.
