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Europe knows that what's been called Trump's Trade War against China is in fact the USA response to the CCP's attacks -- now led by Xi Jinping -- against both trade and the entire post WW II global system. Beijing's practice of its mercantilism is also designed to bust up international rules of trade, interaction, interrelationships. 

Trump's so called Trade War is in fact a counterattack against Beijing's industrial espionage, intellectual theft, restrictions on capital, investment and imports, a multiplicity of regulatory and bureaucratic barriers and controls. It is to reverse Beijing's policies to support its own exports with massive and extensive subsidies to include of course price dumping, threats to cut off medical supplies during the global pandemic and so on as yet another means of its political control throughout the West. 

The drive of the CCP Dictator-Tyrants in Beijing is to become a global hegemon -- a word they use all the time against the USA -- and now the US has got busy putting a stop to it by first slowing and reversing it. The European economy is itself more than strong enough to allow negotiation on better than a level playing field against the CCP. So the challenge is to get the Europeans and the USA with Japan back together to play in the same league against the other guy in the opposing league led by Beijing and where they hate democracy and human rights with a malign passion. 

On 9/15/2020 at 3:27 PM, DrTuner said:

First demand should be turning off the Great Firewall. After that, CCP would eventually be toppled by the Chinese themselves, after they see what the world thinks of them.

 

Otherwise, wall the commies in and throw long knives over the wall. Check again in 200 years.

Every China dynasty has failed, each and every one of 'em. 

The present bunch of CCP Boyz in Beijing are but another Chinese dynasty, this time in business suits and Florsheims. CCP and their wholly owned and operated PRC Government constitute a young and nervous dynasty which is why they are more obsessed about internal control than any dynasty that came before it and collapsed. This dynasty has unprecedented technological controls as you reference in your post, controls they are correct to believe precludes another Tiananmen by 'em.

The inherent flaw that will take down the CCP dynasty is that when things get tough as they are presently the Chinese give more power and authority to the ruler who is also the guy who is mucking up things. Xi has already become emperor for life and this is the dead giveaway the CCP dynasty has already begun its decline. Indeed, the CCP Dynasty that is built on quicksand will be long gone 200 years from now.   

Here's an account of what Trump said about Gen. Kelly as a source of the quotes and the media publicity of 'em. Gen. retired Dunford who was present is not mentioned in this article, nor is the fact Dunford was present at the Kelly gravesite mentioned much in most articles.

Trump disliked Dunford hugely, replacing Dunford on the NSC with Stephen Bannon. Dunford was restored to the NSC with strong support of the then SecDef Mattis and Kelly as WH chief of staff. Trump considered Dunford to be an egghead, ie, thoughtful, analytical, consistent.    

Trump says John Kelly could be source for salacious article on U.S. war dead

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2020/sep/4/trump-says-john-kelly-could-be-source-for-salaciou/

On 9/9/2020 at 11:19 PM, nattaya09 said:

Bolton and Kelly were there. Bolton would have featured it prominently in his book had it happened. Neither of these men are big Trump fans yet both know nothing of it. The "anonymous source", if they exist, should come forward and convince us that they were in a more credible position than the Chief of Staff and National Security Adviser 

Trump said "a John Kelly could have done that" in confirming a reporter's question concerning whether Gen. retired Kelly could have been a source, or the main source. Indeed, virtually every one of the thousands of political animals in Washington knows or believes absolutely Kelly is the principal source.

John Bolton said in his Fox interview Trump did not make the remark when Bolton was in the room and Trump was advised the trip to the cemetery was cancelled due to weather and security concerns about a motorcade over that distance and physical environment. Bolton said "I can't prove a negative," when he noted he was not with Trump before or after the briefing in which the trip was cancelled. Bolton did note Trump insults people whose last name is not Trump.

Kelly was of course at the grave of his Marine 1LT son Robert in Arlington National Cemetery on the Memorial Day when Trump made his grotesque remark of "What's in it for them?" among other crass statements about deceased members of the armed forces since 1776.

Also present was Marine Gen. "Fighting Joe" Dunford the then chairman of JCS and former commandant, Marine Corps, who was a witness and who in his retirement since last year may also be one of the 4 sources. Each Kelly and Dunford remains silent, saying only that he can neither confirm nor deny the reports about Trump's gross statements. In Washington-speak "neither confirm nor deny" something means it's true and because discretion is the better part of valor you won't or you can't say it publicly. State Department uses it almost daily about one thing or another, as does the Pentagon, CIA and the rest of 'em.

Moreover, each Kelly and Dunford spent more than 40 years living each day by the chain of command so neither of 'em is going to become a 4-star general officer publicly telling the commander in chief and potus he's unfit and unsuitable to be either and both. A public pissing match of this kind would be horrendous for civil-military relations in the USA that would be made worse yet because other 4-star retired flag officers would very likely feel compelled to speak up for Kelly and Dunford, to include the other sources.  

Xi Jin Pingpong has made clear the Boyz in Beijing want to dominate the world in (their stolen) technology by 2025 yet no Potus is going to sign up for that. U.S. Government is in fact unsigning from the many giveaway deals it's made over the past 30 years in particular. So anything that hurts or hinders the Tencent owner of WeChat, QQ and much else is good -- excellent indeed.

US, Japan and EU are developing our own 5G technology rather than rely on the Chinese Communist Party owned and operated Government of the People's Republic to run with it. We got WeChat out of the QQ platform copied by the owner of Tencent who the Party sent to the University of Chicago graduate school of business to learn how to do all of this stuff and more.

CCP Dictator-Tyrants in Beijing have been sucking off the teat of the United States for more than 40 years so its past time to bust up the party with its fun and games and to turn out the lights over there. Pull the plug on 'em tug by tug which is what this does. 

2 hours ago, Mama Noodle said:

Two things:

 

1 - Its about to get really nasty in American politics. 

 

2 - Before anyone invokes the "McConnel Rule" and revisits history, the rule was that SC seats shouldn't be filled in an election year if the WH and the Senate are controlled by different parties. 

No matter how you slice it, it's still baloney. 

Because where I come from it's called the Five Minute Rule. It was a rule for the 5 minutes it took McConnel to say it then walk off to end the rule forever. 

That's why baloney is still called baloney.  

On 9/16/2020 at 1:09 AM, geriatrickid said:

China is holding several Canadians hostage.

It tried similar with an Australian.

The only two countries China won't threaten are Russia and the USA.

True yet I'm back in China again and Americans are getting hassled in what are normally routine matters that never get attention. 

I get stopped to produce my Residence Permit papers which hadn't ever happened until this year. Americans in China I know are getting the same thing. 

Americans suddenly this year have to pay for a Visa extension when no one ever had to pay to get a Visa stamp for whatever number of dayze, whether it be 30 dayze, 60, 90. 

And in having suddenly to pay for visa extension, Americans are paying 1000 RMB/Yuan for the dayze while others suddenly have to pay RMB/Yuan 150 or 200 in comparison. 

I used to be able to go to Hong Kong routinely for the visa extension stamp to turn around and reenter the mainland for that stamp, no charge, which was the case for every foreign devil. Since Covid19 however HKG will quarantine you if they think you're viral, and an American from the mainland is target number one.

I haven't returned to the USA this year for even a short stay because it definitely would brand me to be isolated on my return to China and my business consultancy. Already a Chines medical doctor refused to authorize my blood pressure meds because she said I could not prove I had not been in USA this year despite my showing her my passport stamps and all. The doctor demanded I prove it so I showed her my passport and she simply said NO. She's one of the few MDs in China who know English btw.

So while no foreign devil goes to HKG anymore for visa extension, Americans absolutely don't go. We have to go to the local Public Security Bureau Flatfoot Police who are the guys who follow people around on suspicion. This is in contrast btw to the Public Safety Bureau Flatfoot cops who chase a thief running out of a shop with a fistful of cash...they don't chase him far before they give it up btw.  

It takes the Security Bureau Flatfoot Cops several dayze to process your extension as opposed to taking a couple of hours for you to process out of the mainland into HKG, turn around and process out of HKG back onto the mainland with stamps in your passport, and no fee involved. 

I'm well known and accepted in the neighborhood where I live and work yet even the residence building private security guards want to see my Residence Permit papers now whereas they never asked previously. It's normal for Security Police to canvass the residence building -- each building in China -- to know who lives there and, for a foreign devil such as myself, to show passport with proper visa, confirmation of employment, name of employer; and to say why you decided to come to China in the first place. The Flatfoots are businesslike about it yet what I want to tell 'em is that I came to China for the globally recognized Wuhan bat fried rice.   

On 9/16/2020 at 4:36 AM, onebir said:

I left China in Dec 2019, with 6 hour overstay, on a 6m visa (UK passport) because my original flight had been shifted, I'd missed my connecting flight and the flight I'd rebooked had been delayed. Passport control questioned me for at least half an hour, asking for documentation of all the above, before letting me go.

 

Until pretty recently, overstays of less than 24 hours were just waved through; overstay a few days and you'd get a minor. So there was already a clear change even then: Chinese officialdom is dishing out maximum punishments to foreigners for minor infringements.

 

My American neighbour on one of those flights confirmed this impression: a colleague of his had recently miscalculated his dates - easily done because only entry dates are stamped, and the official basis for calculation is not well-publicised - and overstayed by one day. When attempting to exit he was given a choice between a five year blacklisting, or applying for an emergency visa extension at his local immigration office, and rebooking his flight out. He apparently chose the latter at significant expense.

China immi are simply a part of the authoritarian and secretive regime when it comes to visa runs and overstay, ie, the date they stamp is not the date. The date China immi stamps is your one day overstay. Every expat gets this so it's an equal opportunity screw job. 

In Thailand and later in China I never had to concern myself with it because the employer whomever it was took care of everything. In the Former Land of Smiles and in China the employer loaded those of us whose turn it was to get a new one year visa into a van, took us to immi and we got processed. Yet while being processed in China we always saw a bunch of expats being screwed for a one day overstay. 

In China they cancelled your Visa for the one day overstay, made you go to your local Public Security Bureau Police to get a 30 day visa for 1000 RMB/Yuan and exit the country. This applied to everyone even though while I was in China three passports were considered golden, the UK, USA, Australia. Even Russia was not favored anywhere near these three and still isn't given the characters who appear on foreign shores from Russia. Yet still today -- and presently especially -- Americans who overstay by even one day get busted out of China; same for Aussies and Brits.

The small comfort if there might be one is that you left China with a valid visa rather than being denied on your application for one, so you were able to return without having to try to explain away being denied a visa on your applying for it. The worst expats treated for overstay are Africans who are made to beg and argue for even the 30 day punishment visa. 

I taught English in Gwang-Ju City in the SW of SK. It was memorable militarily in several respects.

First, the Gwang-Ju Electronic Technical High School was a stone's throw from Gwang-Ju Air Force Base. It was a new school on a campus of community college size in the U.S. The school was in a newly annexed district of the city and both were still being completed. First time I walked into the Language Lab I'd thought I might be at mission control instead. But that's another story (which is off topic). 

One autumn morning the AFB scrambled to launch fighters in a roaring succession that drowned me out in the classroom. A swarm of F-15 Eagle fighter planes both U.S. and SK were lifting off the runways that sent 'em past the front of the school and rising just above it. At the windows of the classroom the planes were just right so that we could see each pilot in his flight helmet. No one had advised me of anything about it and the grade 11 learners didn't know any more than I did, which was nothing.

The 17 year olds looked as uncomfortable as I did as the fighters roared past and upward in a constant stream of thunder. We tried to put on a brave or nonchalant face and demeanor, saying it was an unannounced exercise which of course it was. Thingy was that nobody knew for sure. After about twenty minutes the commotion had passed and we let the 5 of so minutes of the class that remained simply pass without anyone saying anything. The general silence was truly golden.

It was helpful that during the takeoffs commotion no announcements came from the school central office via the address system. We figured without saying it that since we were left on our own there was no need to do anything or to consider going anywhere outside the classroom. I can still picture all those intimidated faces and scared eyes there in front of me, and I knew I didn't present my own self much differently than the kids themselves were. Many of 'em pressed back in their seats and slid down a notch or two. There were a lot of frozen people all around in our view outside. All the kids said they'd never been that up close and personal to anything like it either at home or at any school.

One can understand and appreciate the need of confidentiality in any military exercise in SK but all the same it would have been very good to have had some advance inkling of this particular one. We wanted to assume it was an exercise and to simply continue with our class lesson as per normal, but acting normal was just impossible under the noisy circumstances. So fighter jets roaring skyward outside our window became the new normal. More of 'em sometimes, fewer of 'em other times. Many times during the school year.

I made the visit in 1997 with my Korean American friend named Kim from New Jersey (each time I called his name 17 people turned their heads hah). He and I were among the several hundred English teachers in SK from US and Canada (usandcanada).

Eerie and creepy is how I found it. We didn't take cameras and I think the photo policy was the same then as now but I can't be sure at this point. We were led into a tunnel or two and got good looks across the DMZ and over to "Peace City" and the NK flag on its tower. Had lunch there at a restaurant with window walls that gave a view over much of it. So thanks for the excellent photos which are vivid. It wuz btw better to leave than to arrive.

I also met a Korean Korean Kim which was after he' been assigned to the border on conscription into the SK army. He wuz a shorter stronger guy who was assigned at the DMZ because he could fit down gopher holes and move easily in the low tunnels, negotiate a fence effectively and the like. He said he didn't like it but he accepted it and he did it for God and country and so on.

I taught public middle school then high school and the kids were very nervous about the stalemate and dangers. They're happy kids who daily hit on their parents for bucks in their prosperous democracy but they get to muse a bit when sitting on a train for a school trip. I always tried to assure 'em the Kim Dynasty had nothing to gain from war or conflict.

That however was before Kim the Nuclear Kid and Trump the Lunatic Madman. Korean adults back then always kept it in the back of their minds and they did what they had to do, i.e., soldier on in their daily lives. Given it was tough then on adolescents and teenage young adults I figure it hasn't got any better for 'em in these times. I was with a group of canadiansandamericans in Guang-ju City in the SW that didn't get too much effect of the Korean War, especially those who lived on the islands. These same folk know though there'd be no escaping another one.

It's impossible to consider nuking NK now or of a war when you've still got the Kodaks of the Korean families and friends you got to know over some years, to include their kids in the classrooms, playing sports and while on the fun school trips. So indeed, the only time to use military force is when you see the other guy starting to squeeze his trigger. Then you plug him between the eyes. And not before then.

On 10/26/2017 at 11:53 AM, hawker9000 said:

Why don't you go and visit it if you think it's such a great idea? 

 

What would REALLY be surprising is if wingnuts could ever stop yammering about Trump and the election he won.  All the incessant loser lunacy really is pathetic.   There's a spoiled brat billionaire in California who's actually spending a few million to air impeachment ads on television - join his support group.

 

 

Oh my, another sore winner.

On 10/26/2017 at 8:53 AM, zydeco said:

Nobody is going to be able to pressure Xi any more than they could Mao. Xi has just been made Dictator For Life in China.  All those fools, the Bushies, Clinton, and Obama funded and built this monster, China.  All based on a cockamamie neocon theory that free trade going in one direction would result in democracy, freedom, liberty, and free ice cream throughout China. How utterly stupid.

Chinese people could learn to like ice cream whether it's free or otherwise.

It's their tyrant leaders who won't allow the toppings.

Taiwan Chinese consume heaps of it. Sells big in Hong Kong too. The problem is Xi Jinping who stays happy crunching down rice cakes. 

Kim stopped ranting about dropping some missiles off the waters of Guam after the 7th Fleet with the SK Navy did some exercises on both sides of the Korean peninsula. Kim has gone quiet as a church mouse about it.

Japan has the powerful and penetrating Thaad radars only but it is looking very seriously at adding the interceptor batteries to make a complete package of it. Thaad on Guam and in SK and with Thaad radars in Japan tell us the temperature of Xi Jinping's morning tea each day. Word on Kim is that he likes his tea nuclear hot.

Russia has taken now to hollering while flapping their arms that the Thaad deployments all over the place cover completely all their ICBM trajectories to the USA. Thaad already in Romania makes Russian headaches into migraines. 

All of it could go quickly to the hounds of hell if President Strangelove at the DMZ suddenly went OTT launch happy. Or started scaling a fence to get his meeting with Kim. So even if Trump up and orders a visit while he is in Seoul the secret service might well drive him south instead because of personal security concerns.  Secret service will of course obey their commander in chief who they'd be certain said take him to the DMV. 

ZhongNanHai is the CCP residence and ruling compound in central Beijing.

The ponds are Nan and Hai. The Zhong means center, also, middle. The Chinese name of China is Zhong Guo, meaning of course central country aka: middle kingdom. (The Chinese have a vivid and roaming imagination as we have seen over millennia of failures.) At any rate, the Chinese name of USA is Mei Guo, meaning one of two things or both simultaneously...

...mei means beauty but it can also mean not; mei yo for instance means no....mei li means beautiful; mei shi refers to a delicacy. So mei guo can be somewhat ambiguous but it sounds respectable overall. However, anyone who's lived and worked in the PRC can attest that when the Chinese people ask you where you are from, and you say mei guo, they are pleased to meet you -- enthusiastic often. My Chinese is atrocious so that's about as far as I ever got into it. The Chinese gave me their name of hao. In Thailand my close Thai friends called me the Thai variant of Chinese Hao, i.e., Porn (which is also what my friends back home called me hah!)

So anyway, in China one is either a yang qui zi which means foreign devil or we are lao wei which means you're an ok foreigner. Lao wei is more common by far these dayze. My own experience is that being a fahlang in the former LOS is much preferred (farang of course). Others may have their own take on these things.

This view of Zhongnanhai is from above the only gate which is guarded by the People's Armed Police. Highrise buildings are forbidden in this district of Beijing whether inside ZhongNanHai but outside of it especially.

Peace.

4 hours ago, Srikcir said:

But when compared to Trump and Prayut?

Xi is more of a high lumen LED.

I have posted that Xi and Trump have very little difficulty getting into the head of the other. Neither is a general in a monarchy btw.

The Chinese always lie low and keep their divisions and madness to themselves and away from the world to see, know, understand. Trump loves to flaunt his madness and Americans do most of our stuff out in the open.

If Xi and Trump were to take the notorious IQ test referenced recently then Rex Tillerson would go to the head of the class. It is well known Chinese leaders holler red faced and throw things at one another to include throwing one another around, but they do it behind the high and thick walls of the huge Party-Government compound ZhongNanHai off Tiananmen Square. Coup attempts, arrests of plotters and their imprisonment are regular but the Western MSM prefer not to publicize 'em much or at all for the sake of a dubious peace and tranquility with CCP censors going forward.

Shown at left by U.S. military satellite is ZhongNanHai CCP residence and governing compound containing two ponds inside walls next to the Forbidden City. The Great Hall of the People is out of the photo left bottom. Xi Jinping lives here (upper left corner) and he has his offices here, as do the major CCP-PRC ruling officials. Tunnels connect all three grounds and buildings.

We know where you live President Xi. Same place as Mao and Deng lived.

Xi Jinping has in fact broken precedent by failing to identify a designated successor at the beginning of this term he's just begun.

The Party practice is that a designated successor be named by this time. Former prez Hu Jintao did in fact name Xi as his own successor in the final year of Hu's first of two five year terms. Xi did succeed the mental eunuch Hu, as we well know.

All of the appointments this week to the 7 member Standing Committee of the 25 member Politburo are only several years away from the standard retirement age of 68. So none of 'em are eligible to succeed Xi (unless more Party practices are ignored which they won't be). 

The two age eligible guyz who have the most initial Party support to succeed Xi were unsuccessful candidates for appointment to the Standing Committee. They are Hu Chun-hua 54 and Chen Miner 57 both of whom got the coveted consolation prize of being voted to the Politburo. Hu Chun-hua is governor of the premier $1.5 Trillion GDP Guangdong province which is the CCP center of political and economic reform adjacent to Hong Kong  and which extends eastward to the Taiwan Strait. Chen Miner is Party chairman of Chong-qing city which is huge, developed, and dominates the southwest of CCP near Vietnam. It's helpful to think of Guangdong province as a sort of California and Chong-qing as a kind of Houston times ten or as a Seattle for its relative quality. 

Some shameless CCP syncophant stated these developments in a truly comical way as reported yesterday in the Hong Kong South China Morning Post....

"If nobody is appointed, the first explanation is not that Xi is trying to stay on, but rather that there is no one seen as a suitable replacement," Trey McArver, co-founder of Beijing-based research firm Trivium China, said. 

As was referenced in scrolling Xi has put into the Party constitution that he is the Party "Core." Xi is the third such CCP dictator enshrined in this way -- the previous two are Mao and Deng Xiaoping. So there is no question Xi Jinping has made himself emperor in a business suit of the new CCP dynasty of junior emperors in business suits, and that Xi fully intends to be emperor for life. CCP are a new and nervous dynasty of only 68 years that needs a dominant figure to assert its needed stability (avg life of a Chinese dynasty = 250 years). After Xi's five year purge of political reformer opponents under the guise of an anti-corruption campaign there are few who remain to oppose this. 

One significant reason Chinese dynasties fail in succession one after the other is that the emperor is never the sharpest knife in the drawer. And that his drawer is full of other dullards all around him. It wuz back in 2012 that the long time China hand Perry Link at UC put it this way: "Xi Jinping is a man of modest intellectual gifts." I prefer to add that Xi with his plastered face smiley is in fact mentally slow. Dim as a 40 watt bulb.

The big issue at the center of Trump's 12 day East Asia trip next month is to head off Trump's strong desire to visit the DMZ while he's in SK to include addressing the national legislature. Trump had said he wants to hit the DMZ after speaking to the SK National Assembly (they don't have a parliament-style government due to the security issues).

Everybody is against Trump popping up at the DMZ with binoculars. Strong opposition includes some of Trump's hawk China advisers in the WH, Xi Jinping, SK Pres Moon, PM Shinzo Abe, Asean leaders and right across the globe to leaders of Nato countries. The fear is of course that Trump standing at the DMZ will say madman things that will effectively set in motion a hard to reverse military "solution."  

“It’s important for U.S. presidents to show America’s resolve by going to the DMZ and seeing the division first hand and how close the two sides are in proximity,” Duyeon Kim, a visiting senior fellow at the Seoul-based Korean Peninsula Future Forum, said in an email.“But the danger and concern is Trump’s tendency to go off script and make provocative and bombastic comments. The DMZ is certainly not the place to be in to aggravate the North,” she added.

http://www.businessinsider.com/trump-north-koreas-dmz-visit-escalation-personal-safety-2017-10

There are also very real personal security factors given the commotion going on throughout the year. No one puts it past Kim to order up some lunatic display that would make his point even to risk the severe consequences Kim would expect never to occur. Photos were issued by Pyongyang after Tillerson's DMZ visit that US-SK intelligence said were taken from 50 feet away. When Potus Clinton ventured unexpectedly onto the Bridge of No Return he was several strides away from shaking hands with NK guards.

As to Trump and Xi meeting in Beijing, most everyone expects them to check the boxes on their Mara-Lago Hundred Day Agreement on economics and trade. Thingys such as Xi confirming his reversal on the ban of importing US beef, Trump agreeing to continue Beijing's huge number one import from the US of soybeans which had been in doubt,  China's big bucks import of aircraft parts and equipment; the big numbers import of GM and Ford passenger cars, industrial capital machinery, copper, plastics, pulpwood paper and so on that CCP needs so much to maintain some measure of economic growth against the sharp slowdown of recent years.

At the DMZ

U.S. 8th Army in Korea captain of infantry at the DMZ with South Korea army captain R and lieutenant center points at North Korean soldiers and emplacements. SK military officers need to be competent in the English language. Capt. Jordan wears his "battle rattle" equipment. The SK officers are also armed at all times. Seen are the central control tower and the flags of USA, UN, SK.

But no president has ever taken such a vocally hostile line towards North Korea as Trump has. Trump has threatened to "totally destroy" the country with "fire and fury," far more colorful statements than any of his predecessors dared.

According to Daniel Russel, assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific affairs under President Barack Obama, Trump's heated rhetoric could take on a new meaning in the DMZ.

“The DMZ functions as a kind of amplifier," Russel told the Washington Post. “The message takes on a more martial and ominous tone when it comes out of a military command post on North Korea’s doorstep.

http://www.businessinsider.com/trump-north-koreas-dmz-visit-escalation-personal-safety-2017-10

Thaad is fully operational in South Korea

USAF General John Hyten commander of Strategic Command, Army General Vincent Brooks supreme allied commander UN Forces in Korea, Admiral Harry Harris Jr. military commander in chief U.S. forces Pacific-East Asia inspect fully operational U.S. Thaad missile site in South Korea.

Very wealthy old men at that.

The figures I've seen from Western good governance type organizations is $5 Trillion of corruption in China since year 2000.

The wife of former PM Wen Jiabao the reformer ran the jewelry business in all of the CCP, from imports to licenses to sales and prices. Then there's gold which is hoarded in China for millennia anyhow. 

Xi Jinping is said to be a wealthier man than Donald Trump even if Trump, ahem, might not be lying. Xi, Trump and Putin carry their corruption markets in their back pockets.

Good news but mostly bad news on the sweeping five new appointments to the 7-member standing committee to which the only ones to return are Xi and the English fluent PM and CCP lawyer Li Keqiang. 

As noted elsewhere, Li Zhanshu, Zhao Leji, Han Zheng, Wang Huning and Wang Yang were promoted, replacing five retiring members including anti-corruption chief Wang Qishan, a key Xi ally.

Three contending pro Maoist pals of Xi were failed candidates: the Shanghai CCP chief Han Zheng, the Party head of Chongqing Chen Miner, and the Party Puppet Master of Beijing Cai Qi. It's four Xi pals counting the so called anti-corruption guy Wang Qishan who technically had to retire because of age (68 max) but who is counting on Xi to find something off the committee for him, such as maybe personal adviser on party provincial affairs. 

Boss of the huge Chongqing City in the southwest, Chen Miner was never a serious contender. Xi putting forward Chen's name was to enhance the young rookie's profile. Xi appointed Chen after arresting the Chongqing powerful boss Bo Xilai for coup plotting and scheming. Xi found out about the coup plot when Bo's chief of police showed up in the middle of the night at the U.S. Consulate in Chengdu city begging for asylum. CCP armed security police forces closed the Consulate area for blocks around and out until the U.S. gave up the chief cop and wobbly coup supporter to CCP justice. Bo, his chief and some generals are rotting with other plotters in an iced over old prison on the Chinese side of Siberia. The thingy though that ticked off ordinary Chinese wuz Bo's son at Harvard and his Ferrari full of hot babes, which is all that the people of the People's Republic knew of any of it. Like father like son btw. Xi's wife is with him for murdering a British businessman by poisoning his gin and tonics, as revealed by an autopsy several years after the fact by the demand of the UK government.

The always high profile Shanghai boss, this one being Han Zheng, got screwed out of a position because Shanghai is the base of Xi's ferocious enemy Jiang Zemin the former president and unrepentant ogre. One can like Xi's plastered on smiley face but nobody likes Jiang's heart of coal. Jiang doesn't ever pretend. 

Xi doesn't need his so-called anti corruption guy Wang Qishan any more cause Wang made enemies everywhere bulldozing Party reformers Xi ordered purged. Wang has more enemies than than Trump could ever inspire against him. The new personnel and promotions boss Zhao Leji has little bulldozing left to do anyhow.

The one bright note is Wang Yang winning appointment after five years as third vice-PM and before that the governor of China's California, Guangdong province next to Hong Kong eastward to the Strait of Taiwan. Guangdong is rich, has quality education, a huge middle class and upper middle class and it is the center of political reform in CCP-PRC. Wang is very friendly toward USA and EU and is highly regarded in both environs abroad. He runs his always hot lines of private and personal communication with Western leaders and the CCP Boyz 24/7.

Wang marks the stark contrast to Xi's Boyz who stiff arm their counterparts in USA and EU by not talking to 'em away from the table. Xi's Boyz say nothing to Western diplomats or corporate chiefs whether it's in the elevators, in the halls, on the sidelines or in the men's room etc. Xi and his people keep their distance and their silence in the presence of Westerners. They don't interact with our guys except in formal and official ways. Xi and his Boyz are afraid some plague might rub off on 'em, such as democracy to name one such menace. Or, even worse, human rights. They know it tends to happen. Heaven forbid.

Yes, Xi is a Maoist through and through. Surpress and repress everything and do power plays as your main job. Wang Qishan who is Xi's corruption guy is out (for now) which means Xi isn't as powerful yet as he wants to be. Xi's so-called corruption campaign of the past 4-5 years has purged the provinces of Xi's Party enemies, i.e., political reformers.

Xi's father was a general with Mao which is how Xi grew up, i.e., Mao was the Chinese God and the PLA was Supreme. Xi has named himself commander in chief of the armed forces which he was anyway but Xi wanted the title to further bamboozle people and to be the China equivalent of Potus. Xi hasn't served a day in the PLA and I wouldn't be surprised if the mentally slow Xi awarded himself the CCP equivalent of the purple heart. Also bizarre is that during the Cultural Revolution both Xi and his general father were purged to the countryside, later retrieved and restored by the PLA. Xi owes his career to the PLA which reveals the root of Xi's aggression throughout the region to include the South China Sea. Xi's wife spends her time traveling around singing to and entertaining the troops (which explains the rates of mass desertion immediately before her appearances hah!)

Xi and PLA hard core Pary loyalists have caught and stopped two coup attempts by high ranking PLA generals instigated by Xi's mortal enemy, the former president and eternal emperor Jiang Zemin. Xi acting in the guise of anti-corruption has cleared out Jiang's people to include Jiang's son from his powerful position of communications minister (internet) but he still can't nail the ogre Jiang himself who in his 90s is still mentally and politically agile. The hapless former president Hu Jintao is Jiang's persistent target stuck between Xi and Jiang but Hu gets protection from Xi given Jiang is the common enemy of both and because Hu can still help Xi whom he always favored.

Recall when in 2012 Xi was the rising new president he disappeared for seven days in a complete blackout of his whereabouts and what was going on. Reliable word is that that was Jiang's first coup attempt to head off Xi before Xi could begin his new adventures. Jiang's second coup attempt by still loyal generals in 2014 was a last ditch effort to stop Xi but it failed too. Xi has since reorganized all the provincial and Beijing military commands to his liking. It's the biggest open secret in PRC that Xi wants at least 20 years in the job that is limited to ten years (two five years terms). Mao would be proud. As would Xi's father.

It is no surprise either that Xi and Trump have a common understanding and a promising working relationship despite the commotion over North Korea. Xi has in fact scaled it down in the South China Sea and he's gone silent and still toward Japan. One of the first things Xi will do now is to reorganize the Taiwan Affairs office to make it more friendly toward Pres. Tsai Ing-wen and her independence party that also controls the parliament for the first time. CCP Boyz need to ease the concerns on Taiwan that are drawing it ever closed to Trump and his savvy but radical China advisers in the WH who want to shatter everything by establishing diplomatic relations with Taiwan. As Xi begins his second five years as dictator in chief Hong Kong has released on bail young protest leaders jailed during summer for the Umbrella Movement that shut down the city center for almost three months in 2014. CCP Boyz know they need to ease up on HKG too.

Xi has also caved to the Party that has shifted under him to get tougher on Kim Jong Un. Xi had been the last holdout to go easy on Pyongyang lest things fall apart there. While Americans talk in conflicted terms about regime change or nuking 'em all the CCP Boyz are interested in changing one guy and one guy only over there. Kim's gotta figure as we all do that where there's a will there's a way. Xi is anyway going to have to do something about Kim so the only question is what, when, how. The Boyz know if they don't do something the U.S. is likely to do something nobody will like.

It is important to recognize that Xi and Trump don't have a hard time getting inside the head of the other. While Trump flaunts his madness and loves it, Xi and the CCP Boyz know they have to keep their equally wild stuff in the closet and to cloak it at all times. The Boyz know perception is reality.

On 10/21/2017 at 4:10 PM, dunroaming said:

Xi Jinping's consolidation of power just re-affirms that at the moment he is probably the most powerful leader in the world.  Why on earth would he take any notice of a buffoon like Trump?

Xi Jinping is the most powerful leader in China. That's it. The world remains well beyond his grasp.

CCP Boyz in Beijing are struggling and stumbling trying to become a regional power, never mind a global power. China is locked down regionally by wealthy and strong democracies that will not submit to the CCP Dictator-Tyrants in Beijing. And CCP know that before they could become a global power they must first become a regional power.

So forget it.

PM Shinzo Abe who just won big yesterday in an election speaks of the Democracy Diamond that encases CCP Boyz in their own place. The Democracy Diamond exists from SK/Japan to Hawaii to Australia and on to India back through the nations of the South China Sea that oppose Beijing, and on back up to Japan. CCP Tyrants just aren't going anywhere either regionally or globally. (CCP have to try to extend landward across Asia but others there are jealous of their realm, from Putin and his central Asian states to India, Iran, the ME and the EU.)

Trump has China savvy advisers who are hawks against the CCP. The advisers have been shut out of power in Washington since Nixon-Kissinger and the CCP adventure of the long gone happy couple. Now the strongly pro-Taiwan hawks have state power and they are directing Trump. Trump furthermore has his own ideas about how to deal with the CCP Boyz.

The Boyz had thought for instance they could buy Trump the way Putin has bought and influenced Trump but the Boyz found out they were wrong. While Trump admires Putin and aspires to be like Putin, Trump hates communists. He hates 'em. It is basically as simple and as direct as that. Add the NK nuclear menace and the fact Trump hates Kim III and his People's Workers Party besides and we see that from before Jan 20th Xi Jinping & Co are getting their arm twisted up their back to the neck. 

Xi well knows Trump signed off on examining trade sanctions which his anti-CCP advisers are cooking up for a report due around Thanksgiving. Xi is under the gun so to speak and he's got to produce for Trump or else. The Chinese have always understood person to person relations and that if you tick off somebody against you face to face you won't ever get him back. And that he will hurt you until you go to your grave. And that Trump first and foremost is a gravedigger.

6 hours ago, Machiavelli said:

Should take the Nobel Peace Prize from the warmongering Obama while they are at it. 

I admire a man who rants, er, speaks his alleged mind.

One hopes you are sitting because I'm going to mention in passing the UN got the Nobel Peace Prize several years ago.

The first Chinese to win a Nobel won the Peace Prize, in 2010. Dr. Liu Jiaobo the advocate of a peaceful long term transition to democracy in China died in prison last year.

4 hours ago, tonbridgebrit said:

+1

Actually, it's not so much American values, it's more Washington's values. And it's not just arrogance. It's sickening HYPOCRISY.

Zimbabwe is essentially a colony of Beijing. The new presidential palace looks strangely like a Walmart.

6 hours ago, Machiavelli said:

A Zimbabwean compatible with American values. Such sickening arrogance! Unbelievable. 

Sorry to hear you might be at risk of some health challenges. Something you read no doubt. I take it you are just fine however as your normal level of rage remains intact. I am in fact able to reply now as my monitor screen has been restored (at no cost to me).

I refer of course to a Zimbabweener who might have -- at best -- the values of the weenie Donald Trump. I doubt anyone could find more than that there. Still, a couple of 'em angling to succeed the often delirious Mugabe could be a refreshing improvement.

The last thing the country needs is a moneybags Xi Jinping sponsored black guy named Ilyich.