The CEO retinue is the story inside the story. When private business interests travel alongside a sitting president to negotiate with a geopolitical rival — and at least one family member has active financial entanglements with Chinese companies under national security review — the question of whose interests are being represented at the table stops being rhetorical. Reagan's Six Assurances on Taiwan existed precisely because this kind of transactional pressure was predictable. Turns out predictable doesn't mean preventable.
The tarmac protocol is being treated like a symbolic slight, but it's actually diplomatic data. When the second-most powerful country on earth sends the Vice President to receive the U.S. President, they're communicating something precise about perceived leverage. The Taiwan arms sales comment didn't happen in a vacuum — it landed in a context where Beijing has already concluded they're negotiating from strength. That's the structural story here, and it outlasts whatever deal gets announced.
Taiwan does not need US weapons as much as they need a production deal with Ukraine. Ukraine should sell Taiwan production licenses to its drone technology. Taiwan could then produce drones for Ukraine and themselves. Taiwan especially needs submarine drones to break any future blockade of the island. The US should not build more battleships or nuclear carriers but small robot ships and drone launchers. What the US needs most from Taiwan is chip production facilities built in the US. Need to remove this major vulnerability that China could take out or hold hostage the world because everyone is dependent on Taiwan producing the most advanced computer chips. The US has to become a backup supplier of these chips. The US needs to help Taiwan so it can fight as well as Ukraine without needing direct US military intervention.
China has been eating a big slice of the American Pie for a long time. Xi will now be offered more of it for a nominal fee to be paid to the TRump syndicate.
What a juxtaposition that was seeing the members sitting across from a Chinese President that has built his whole government policy around ANTI-CORRUPTION. According to my AI, XI himself has not gotten rich, but his family has, so his image maybe a lie as well.
Every last shred of decency that the Biden Administration clawed back is now gone. We need a NO KIngs theme about corruption. See you in the streets.
Thanks, Thom, for spending a bit of time in your scary piece today on what we, the people, can do to fight back against the kleptocracy and authoritarian movement of this heinous administration. It’s critically important for all journalists and pundits to include strategies for fighting back and overcoming the wave of corruption we are seeing here. Dems have to be highly motivated and activated, “fired up and ready to go!” In Obama’s words, to win the November elections bigtime, retake both the House and Senate, despite all their attempts at voter suppression and fiddling w the elections. If the turnout is huge, it will be close to impossible to change the outcome. This is what we need, not millions of us going back home and giving up, or staying home because of both sides ism, or whatever other reasons people stay home…millions of people who voted for
Biden in 2020 just stayed home in ‘24…Biden actually accomplished a great deal for average folks, if anyone paid attention, despite inadequate messaging about the IRA, Infrastructure bill, reduction of student loan debt, and more…the legacy media provided very little coverage and these new programs take time to get going. But even despite possibly “not enough” changing quickly enough for average folks, staying home only ensured we ended up with Trump2, worse than ever. That’s why it’s critical to help motivate people to save what’s left of our democracy so we can rebuild better. And we must do that! As Timothy Snyder has said, it won’t be enough to get back to the status quo ante…we need bigtime reform and big changes when we win the presidency and Congress to fix what’s ailing us, and for that, we need to win big, period!!!!
I suspect the U.S. will come out of this meeting sort of like Britain did at the 1945 Yalta conference. Still respected as a great power, but no longer on the same level as the really big boys (or in this case, one other state). Everybody except Trump will recognize that, but he'll think he got "a good deal".
In any case, if the Democrats are smart during the upcoming campaign they'll run that, "I don't think about anybody" quote as many times as possible, and then provide alternative programs to show they do care. It is just waiting to be used and coupled with gas and food prices people will, as my father used to say, vote their pocketbooks.
Still, I must hand it to Trump as a great scientist. By killing alternative energy he's testing how good the climate change models are. And by his actions he is demonstrating how chaos theory works.
"This is what an American oligarchic kleptocracy, an emerging tinpot dictatorship, looks like when it metastasizes from domestic disease into foreign policy."
This was reposted by a friend last night:
"Collective anger is a form of wisdom in a society plagued by numbness. Sometimes the most credible response to the terrors of the world is rage." by Cole Arthus Riley.
Rage has been slow in coming but it does seem to be bubbling up from the depths. Will it be enough and will it build to a crescendo soon enough? One sees little evidence of it in the media.
What is rage? - writing to all the incredibly astute substacks available today? for what? it seems expressing our "rage" by writing or blogging or even demonstrating gets us very little. What might cause enough "rage" to accomplish anything? Maybe...
- $10/gal gas - most people reading this could afford that price though
- $10/head of iceberg lettuce - well, I can grow my own lettuce at least during summer
- $10/loaf of (white) bread - many brands of bread at my store are $6 or close to it -
- $1/ per stamp for mail - that starts to hurt if you can't auto pay your bills
- $?- price for a cup of coffee - many restaurants charge $5+/cup already
- $? - $0 social safety net - getting close
- $20/gal gas - possibly
How much damage needs to be done to us before the "rage" factor comes over enough Americans to do something?
You are asking the $64,000 question. But what everyone seems to be forgetting are the many people who do not have even $1 for a gallon of gas and who do not buy gas because they have no vehicle and no income or such a low income that every penny goes to keep them barely alive. More and more people every day are falling into that demographic in the richest country in the world. An even more egregious cause for rage is that people are being persecuted and imprisoned based on how they look or how they live and for minor infractions or status offenses and political beliefs and there are plans to come after those of us who have spoken out against this fascist, racist, criminal administration. I worry that people will need to watch much more abuse and profoundly serious violations of rights before enough of us will feel the rage and take to the streets or take more proactive steps to defend rights and oppose the fascists. We obviously did not internalize the lessons we had in school to cause us to stop these authoritarians before they acquired immense power and wealth. Too bad no one is able to understand that they should have recognized the mind control and pacification they experienced in school to enable them to see how that experience failed them and to feel rage toward the people who mislead and mis-educated them.
Cheeto lied to keep himself out of jail in the 2024 election declaring he was for small business and the farmer/rancher, he was going to get rid of the corruption of the Biden crime family, end foreign wars, and tackle inflation on Day 1 There were gullible voters who bought all of the lies and here we are not to mention that the Nazi Republicans rigged the election Now through 18mo in this Nazi regime the American people are witnessing paid off pardons, abuse of the pardon power, Cheeto’s rich friends protected in the Epstein-Trump files, Cheeto’s family profiting in cryptocurrency, lack of competitive bidding for lucrative government contracts, self dealing Cheeto suing of the federal government to his benefit and the detriment of the American taxpayer, building projects in DC that nobody wants, leaving the taxpayer the bill
Now for Cheeto inflation is surging and he says he doesn’t care about average Americans He’s elated that Jim Crow 2.0 is back and his CNPP(Christian Nationalist Pedo Party) continues to destroy voting rights At fellow fascist Netayahu’s urging he put the country into a foreign war without Congressional approval and more than likely will throw Taiwan under the bus to get trade concessions from China
Remember, that the Nazi Republicans have rubber stamped these lies and corruption rampant in Washington
Sleepy Donald has no top end to his selfishness, so if Taiwan is between him and another dollar, then it doesn't matter if it's a thriving democracy. At least Neville Chamberlain didn't sell out Czechoslovakia for personal profit. But while this is going on, Trump stands to benefit from, in effect, suing himself for $10 billion, with the taxpayers forced to pay the claim. How can this even be allowed to happen?
The Xi trip triggered a question in my mind; "Wonder what he is going to give away now - Taiwan for a handful of new chips, then declare victory in Iran and let China take over Hormuz?"
Paul Krugman described the event articulately. "Trump’s visit to Beijing is a field trip by a failing, flailing would-be autocrat pleading with a real strongman, who leads a much more serious country, to bail him out of the mess he’s made."
Please read about Kleptocracy related to #47 and China (excerpt below)
“Whatever you thought of any individual president’s execution, the basic American posture for eighty years was that we stood for something larger than ourselves, for the democratic ideals that our Founders fought and died for, and that so many Americans have died to preserve, both here and around the world.
Xi and Trump can have a nice evening discussion about how best to enforce ideological conformity. Xi's head of the military and our Pistol Pete can smoke cigars and trade stories of how they fired nonconformists.
The president of Taiwan has already gone to China, and is pro China. I don't think that China is going to invade Taiwan, it would make Russia's invasion of Ukraine look like a Sunday school picnic.
What Taiwan wants is the Taiwan Semi Conductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC ) and it is rigged to blow if it came to that.
Trump's superpower is our consumption, and if we have nothing to consume we don't have any power. And China produces most of what we consume, especially in electronics, that's why the Broligarchy accompanied Trump as they kow towed to Xi.
China's superpower is producing , electrionics, ,parts for our aircraft (civil and military) and in fact without Chines production, we don't have much of a military or civil aviation fleet China produces most of what we consume, except clothing and that is produce throughout east Asia from Samoa to Pakistan.
We can't even produce 5 or 6 military vessels per year, civilian ship building is even lower.
Our ship building is outsourced especially to South Korea. America produces nothing but grain, soy beans, lumber and oil. We import almost everything, including the fruits and vegetables we also export.
China's superpower of production is coming to a halt, as is the production of microchips, and the world is looking at hunger, starvation and inflation because of Trump's war.
Shit's going to hit the fan by September if not before. Good thing I bought a hybrid in April.
We even export live chickens and import the frozen product, we even import beef.
Thom, this in your face grift by this family is never called out by anybody even though we know it’s a grift. Thom, Hunter Biden is a boy scout compared with these grifters Thom. This needs to shown for the billions they suck up and leave the rest of us thirsty, Thom!
The CEO retinue is the story inside the story. When private business interests travel alongside a sitting president to negotiate with a geopolitical rival — and at least one family member has active financial entanglements with Chinese companies under national security review — the question of whose interests are being represented at the table stops being rhetorical. Reagan's Six Assurances on Taiwan existed precisely because this kind of transactional pressure was predictable. Turns out predictable doesn't mean preventable.
The tarmac protocol is being treated like a symbolic slight, but it's actually diplomatic data. When the second-most powerful country on earth sends the Vice President to receive the U.S. President, they're communicating something precise about perceived leverage. The Taiwan arms sales comment didn't happen in a vacuum — it landed in a context where Beijing has already concluded they're negotiating from strength. That's the structural story here, and it outlasts whatever deal gets announced.
The morbidly rich have no boundaries, geographical or moral, when it comes to exploiting workers to enrich themselves.
Taiwan does not need US weapons as much as they need a production deal with Ukraine. Ukraine should sell Taiwan production licenses to its drone technology. Taiwan could then produce drones for Ukraine and themselves. Taiwan especially needs submarine drones to break any future blockade of the island. The US should not build more battleships or nuclear carriers but small robot ships and drone launchers. What the US needs most from Taiwan is chip production facilities built in the US. Need to remove this major vulnerability that China could take out or hold hostage the world because everyone is dependent on Taiwan producing the most advanced computer chips. The US has to become a backup supplier of these chips. The US needs to help Taiwan so it can fight as well as Ukraine without needing direct US military intervention.
China has been eating a big slice of the American Pie for a long time. Xi will now be offered more of it for a nominal fee to be paid to the TRump syndicate.
What a juxtaposition that was seeing the members sitting across from a Chinese President that has built his whole government policy around ANTI-CORRUPTION. According to my AI, XI himself has not gotten rich, but his family has, so his image maybe a lie as well.
Every last shred of decency that the Biden Administration clawed back is now gone. We need a NO KIngs theme about corruption. See you in the streets.
Thanks, Thom, for spending a bit of time in your scary piece today on what we, the people, can do to fight back against the kleptocracy and authoritarian movement of this heinous administration. It’s critically important for all journalists and pundits to include strategies for fighting back and overcoming the wave of corruption we are seeing here. Dems have to be highly motivated and activated, “fired up and ready to go!” In Obama’s words, to win the November elections bigtime, retake both the House and Senate, despite all their attempts at voter suppression and fiddling w the elections. If the turnout is huge, it will be close to impossible to change the outcome. This is what we need, not millions of us going back home and giving up, or staying home because of both sides ism, or whatever other reasons people stay home…millions of people who voted for
Biden in 2020 just stayed home in ‘24…Biden actually accomplished a great deal for average folks, if anyone paid attention, despite inadequate messaging about the IRA, Infrastructure bill, reduction of student loan debt, and more…the legacy media provided very little coverage and these new programs take time to get going. But even despite possibly “not enough” changing quickly enough for average folks, staying home only ensured we ended up with Trump2, worse than ever. That’s why it’s critical to help motivate people to save what’s left of our democracy so we can rebuild better. And we must do that! As Timothy Snyder has said, it won’t be enough to get back to the status quo ante…we need bigtime reform and big changes when we win the presidency and Congress to fix what’s ailing us, and for that, we need to win big, period!!!!
Yes, "When we win the presidency..."
I suspect the U.S. will come out of this meeting sort of like Britain did at the 1945 Yalta conference. Still respected as a great power, but no longer on the same level as the really big boys (or in this case, one other state). Everybody except Trump will recognize that, but he'll think he got "a good deal".
In any case, if the Democrats are smart during the upcoming campaign they'll run that, "I don't think about anybody" quote as many times as possible, and then provide alternative programs to show they do care. It is just waiting to be used and coupled with gas and food prices people will, as my father used to say, vote their pocketbooks.
Still, I must hand it to Trump as a great scientist. By killing alternative energy he's testing how good the climate change models are. And by his actions he is demonstrating how chaos theory works.
"This is what an American oligarchic kleptocracy, an emerging tinpot dictatorship, looks like when it metastasizes from domestic disease into foreign policy."
This was reposted by a friend last night:
"Collective anger is a form of wisdom in a society plagued by numbness. Sometimes the most credible response to the terrors of the world is rage." by Cole Arthus Riley.
Rage has been slow in coming but it does seem to be bubbling up from the depths. Will it be enough and will it build to a crescendo soon enough? One sees little evidence of it in the media.
What is rage? - writing to all the incredibly astute substacks available today? for what? it seems expressing our "rage" by writing or blogging or even demonstrating gets us very little. What might cause enough "rage" to accomplish anything? Maybe...
- $10/gal gas - most people reading this could afford that price though
- $10/head of iceberg lettuce - well, I can grow my own lettuce at least during summer
- $10/loaf of (white) bread - many brands of bread at my store are $6 or close to it -
- $1/ per stamp for mail - that starts to hurt if you can't auto pay your bills
- $?- price for a cup of coffee - many restaurants charge $5+/cup already
- $? - $0 social safety net - getting close
- $20/gal gas - possibly
How much damage needs to be done to us before the "rage" factor comes over enough Americans to do something?
You are asking the $64,000 question. But what everyone seems to be forgetting are the many people who do not have even $1 for a gallon of gas and who do not buy gas because they have no vehicle and no income or such a low income that every penny goes to keep them barely alive. More and more people every day are falling into that demographic in the richest country in the world. An even more egregious cause for rage is that people are being persecuted and imprisoned based on how they look or how they live and for minor infractions or status offenses and political beliefs and there are plans to come after those of us who have spoken out against this fascist, racist, criminal administration. I worry that people will need to watch much more abuse and profoundly serious violations of rights before enough of us will feel the rage and take to the streets or take more proactive steps to defend rights and oppose the fascists. We obviously did not internalize the lessons we had in school to cause us to stop these authoritarians before they acquired immense power and wealth. Too bad no one is able to understand that they should have recognized the mind control and pacification they experienced in school to enable them to see how that experience failed them and to feel rage toward the people who mislead and mis-educated them.
Corruption Is The Name Of The Game
Cheeto lied to keep himself out of jail in the 2024 election declaring he was for small business and the farmer/rancher, he was going to get rid of the corruption of the Biden crime family, end foreign wars, and tackle inflation on Day 1 There were gullible voters who bought all of the lies and here we are not to mention that the Nazi Republicans rigged the election Now through 18mo in this Nazi regime the American people are witnessing paid off pardons, abuse of the pardon power, Cheeto’s rich friends protected in the Epstein-Trump files, Cheeto’s family profiting in cryptocurrency, lack of competitive bidding for lucrative government contracts, self dealing Cheeto suing of the federal government to his benefit and the detriment of the American taxpayer, building projects in DC that nobody wants, leaving the taxpayer the bill
Now for Cheeto inflation is surging and he says he doesn’t care about average Americans He’s elated that Jim Crow 2.0 is back and his CNPP(Christian Nationalist Pedo Party) continues to destroy voting rights At fellow fascist Netayahu’s urging he put the country into a foreign war without Congressional approval and more than likely will throw Taiwan under the bus to get trade concessions from China
Remember, that the Nazi Republicans have rubber stamped these lies and corruption rampant in Washington
Sleepy Donald has no top end to his selfishness, so if Taiwan is between him and another dollar, then it doesn't matter if it's a thriving democracy. At least Neville Chamberlain didn't sell out Czechoslovakia for personal profit. But while this is going on, Trump stands to benefit from, in effect, suing himself for $10 billion, with the taxpayers forced to pay the claim. How can this even be allowed to happen?
The Xi trip triggered a question in my mind; "Wonder what he is going to give away now - Taiwan for a handful of new chips, then declare victory in Iran and let China take over Hormuz?"
Paul Krugman described the event articulately. "Trump’s visit to Beijing is a field trip by a failing, flailing would-be autocrat pleading with a real strongman, who leads a much more serious country, to bail him out of the mess he’s made."
Please read about Kleptocracy related to #47 and China (excerpt below)
“Whatever you thought of any individual president’s execution, the basic American posture for eighty years was that we stood for something larger than ourselves, for the democratic ideals that our Founders fought and died for, and that so many Americans have died to preserve, both here and around the world.
Another home run for Thom!
Xi and Trump can have a nice evening discussion about how best to enforce ideological conformity. Xi's head of the military and our Pistol Pete can smoke cigars and trade stories of how they fired nonconformists.
The president of Taiwan has already gone to China, and is pro China. I don't think that China is going to invade Taiwan, it would make Russia's invasion of Ukraine look like a Sunday school picnic.
What Taiwan wants is the Taiwan Semi Conductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC ) and it is rigged to blow if it came to that.
Trump's superpower is our consumption, and if we have nothing to consume we don't have any power. And China produces most of what we consume, especially in electronics, that's why the Broligarchy accompanied Trump as they kow towed to Xi.
China's superpower is producing , electrionics, ,parts for our aircraft (civil and military) and in fact without Chines production, we don't have much of a military or civil aviation fleet China produces most of what we consume, except clothing and that is produce throughout east Asia from Samoa to Pakistan.
We can't even produce 5 or 6 military vessels per year, civilian ship building is even lower.
Our ship building is outsourced especially to South Korea. America produces nothing but grain, soy beans, lumber and oil. We import almost everything, including the fruits and vegetables we also export.
China's superpower of production is coming to a halt, as is the production of microchips, and the world is looking at hunger, starvation and inflation because of Trump's war.
Shit's going to hit the fan by September if not before. Good thing I bought a hybrid in April.
We even export live chickens and import the frozen product, we even import beef.
Thom, this in your face grift by this family is never called out by anybody even though we know it’s a grift. Thom, Hunter Biden is a boy scout compared with these grifters Thom. This needs to shown for the billions they suck up and leave the rest of us thirsty, Thom!