Tag: Free Trade

[2020] Republicans blasting China forget that the GOP enabled Beijing’s rise

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)

As a deadly pandemic wreaks havoc in an election year, Republicans are leveling relentless attacks against China. To be sure, Beijing’s initial response to the coronavirus outbreak was littered with errors, egregious injustices and conspiracy-mongering.

Republicans blasting China forget that the GOP enabled Beijing’s rise

Related:

What Republicans did 15 years ago to help create Donald Trump today

Urged on by their presidential standard-bearer, Texas Gov. George W. Bush, and by nearly all of the business lobbyists who represented the core of the party’s donor class, three-quarters of House Republicans voted to extend the status of permanent normal trade relations to China. They were more than enough, when added to a minority of Democrats, to secure passage of a bill that would sail through the Senate and be signed into law by President Bill Clinton.

Inside the Trilateral Commission: Power elites grapple with China’s rise

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)

Inside the Trilateral Commission: Power elites grapple with China’s rise (original)

Each new candidate for Commission membership is carefully scrutinized before being allowed entry. As a rule, members who take up positions in their national governments — which is uncannily common — give up their Trilateral Commission membership while in public service. Those include U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Jake Sullivan, the U.S. national security adviser, Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen and Indian External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar.

This revolving door between the commission and senior government ranks has always been fodder for conspiracy theorists. Its first director in 1973, Zbigniew Brzezinski, later became U.S. President Jimmy Carter’s national security adviser. The very existence of the commission, meanwhile, seems predicated on the question of whether governing should be left to the people. It is a question the commission itself has tackled head-on since 1975: Is democracy functioning? Or does someone need to guide it?

That year, three scholars — Michel Crozier, Samuel Huntington and Joji Watanuki — wrote a report for The Trilateral Commission titled “The Crisis of Democracy.” In it, Huntington wrote that some of the problems of governance in the U.S. stem from an “excess of democracy.”

Related:

The Crisis of Democracy – Trilateral Commission – 1975

Anti-China Protests in Thailand: Who is Behind them & Why? Searching for Asia’s “Zelensky”

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)

Nov 22, 2022 – As the US proxy war against Russia in Ukraine destroys a nation and destabilizes a region, similar meddling that preceded the 2014 coup in Kiev is unfolding across Southeast Asia and in particular, in Thailand.

Who is the “Zelensky” of Thailand? Documented evidence exposes the Thai opposition as a product of years of US interference all in a bid to pivot Thailand aways from its largest economic and trade partner – China – and transform it into a belligerent proxy against Beijing on Washington’s behalf.

References:

Anti-China Protests in Thailand: Who is Behind them & Why? Searching for Asia’s “Zelensky” (Odysee) via The New Atlas

Previously:

Thailand: US-backed Opposition’s Violence Intimidates Critics, Paves Way for Regime Change

NPR is Not Your Friend

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)

NPR is a problem. Good and proper leftists who read Current Affairs may already realize this. “Of course. NPR (Neoliberal Propaganda Radio) is a bastion of establishment groupthink and orthodoxy that gives cover to imperialism and corporate capitalism.” By contrast, readers on the Right who find themselves consuming Current Affairs may have an equally disdainful but entirely different critique. “Of course. NPR is an elitist liberal propaganda cult that serves as a mouthpiece for the Democratic Party, is openly hostile to any conservative voices, and ought to be defunded!”

NPR is Not Your Friend

A Final Word on “MAGA Communism” and Social Conservatism

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)

Opportunism and foolishness have resulted in the latest example of U.S. decline, the concept of “MAGA Communism.” This absurdity is proof that a true socialist movement is badly needed.

A Final Word on “MAGA Communism” and Social Conservatism
Trump and Wall Street vs the working class.

Yes, it’s a thing! At least on Twitter and YouTube! Almost makes me want to open up a Twitter account just for laughs!

Is that a threat or a warning?!

There’s so many other philanthrocapitalist organizations that need to be “destroyed” than just Open Society Foundations! Trump is also a war criminal for assassinating Qasem Soleimani, dropping the mother of all bombs on Afghanistan, eased restrictions on drone and air strikes, which resulted in more airstrikes than Obama, and so much more (no healthcare)!

Gross! He gives his sexual partners the same toothbrush!

Washington’s Africa Strategy Seeks to Counter Russia and China

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)

Geopolitical competition has no limits. This is especially the case when superpowers with global ambitions compete. As long as the competition is fair, it could drive development (although it might still have its socio-political and economic discontents). But when competition itself is projected as a phobia, it becomes more of an anomaly than a driver of growth and development. The most recent example of the super-power rivalry being framed in terms of ‘Sinophobia’ and ‘Russophobia’ is Washington’s newly revealed ‘Africa Strategy’ – a document that seeks to insert the US in Africa not as a competitor but as a country solely responsible for imparting ‘democracy’ and ‘openness’ to the so-called ‘backward’ societies of Africa. This is classical colonial statecraft reframed as a strategy for ‘engagement’ and ‘development.’ The document stipulates a US strategy to “foster … open societies”, “deliver democratic and security dividends”, and “support conservation, Climate Adaptation, and a Just Energy Transition.” This is an ambitious agenda with very ambitious objectives. But are these the real objectives?

Washington’s Africa Strategy Seeks to Counter Russia and China

Africa taken for ‘neo-colonial’ ride

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)

By Anis Chowdhury and Jomo Kwame Sundaram – Jul 26, 2022

SYDNEY and KUALA LUMPUR, Jul 26 2022 (IPS) – Like so many others, Africans have long been misled. Alleged progress under imperialism has long been used to legitimize exploitation. Meanwhile, Western colonial powers have been replaced by neo-colonial governments and international institutions serving their interests.

Africa taken for ‘neo-colonial’ ride