Rapprochement Or Platitudes?
Not surprisingly, Janet Yellen's high-profile trip to Beijing was long on nebulous soundbites and short on concrete results. Or at least that's the impression one might've come away with after perusing a series of short readouts released by Treasury on Saturday.
A meeting with Vice Premier He Lifeng was "candid, constructive and comprehensive," while a chat with new PBoC boss Pan Gongsheng found the two exchanging views on "global macroeconomic and financial developments, including the dispropo
Like blinken’s visit, just the fact that the two countries are speaking at high levels is an improvement. It would be good if the respective defense secretaries met as well. China is going through the middle income trap phase of economic development. It is usually a difficult period for a country to go through.
China is also in the early stages of one of the biggest demographic busts in human history — what one could call the mother of all economic headwinds. Agree 100 percent about the SecDefs of the two countries meeting.
Add to all the distrust of each other, a lot of us still believe covid escaped from China’s lab, and they know it and are defensive.
The Biden administration can try to sound a little more conciliatory, but strident voices in both political parties will probably derail any measures. Being seen as “soft on China” Is political suicide in the run up to the 2024 elections. For instance, Nikki Hailey seems to be trying to carve out a niche by being the most harsh.
In the recent past we could count on corporations doing business in China to quietly towel down particularly aggressive moves. Their power and influence is waning now that a huge swath of the GOP has joined the progressives and adopted a populist anti-business mindset.
Hi, Derek – Republicans may be turning to some anti-business positions (if the businesses are too “woke” or something), but I think democrats and republicans generally feel less trust for the CCP, which has made some less than practical public statements about how the US is old news and China is going to be the dominant power on the earth.
And that may even be true. But I think they’re hurting themselves. Xi and the CCP are not exactly showing a lot of class, patience, and intelligence. I wonder if they sent Henry Kissinger any gifts for his 100th birthday – like a picture of Xi’s middle finger, perhaps?
Not only anti-woke stuff. DeSantis’ immigration crackdown is already leading to some labor shortages at construction sites, healthcare operations and farms. The owners and management are starting to get alarmed but DeSantis is ignoring them.
In the past those kind of voices carried a lot of weight in GOP circles. Not any more.