China
December 18, 2023 — Scott Johnson
One might understand the true meaning of resistance from observing the ordeal of Hong Kong’s Jimmy Lai. He resists the tyranny of the CCP regime and goes on trial for it today. Among the accessible stories reporting on the commencement of trial is the BBC’s here. The Wall Street Journal has a highly sympathetic story by Austin Ranzy and Elaine Wu here (behind the WSJ paywall) as well as the
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December 11, 2023 — John Hinderaker
The Chinese Communist Party may be evil, but it isn’t stupid. It has been working on dominating the world’s supply of critical minerals for quite a few years now. Geopolitical Monitor has “A Brief History of US-China Rare Earth Rivalry.” First, a little background: Rare earth elements (REEs), comprising 17 (15 commercially relevant) chemical elements and soft heavy-metals like Thulium and Cerium, are vital in modern technologies from cell phones
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November 17, 2023 — Lloyd Billingsley
Back in July, the MidValley Times reported, officials in Reedley, California, discovered an illegal laboratory harboring mice, blood, tissue and bodily fluid samples, along with “thousands of vials that contained unlabeled fluids.” Closer inspection revealed “bacterial and viral agents, including: chlamydia, E. Coli, streptococcus pneumonia, hepatitis B and C, herpes 1 and 5, and rubella” along with “samples of malaria.” An outfit called Prestige Biotech had had been operating the
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November 16, 2023 — Steven Hayward
My great teacher of strategic studies, the late Harold Rood, used to say the question of war is simple: if there’s going to be a war—and there will always be another war—who is going to win it? Our friends at Kite and Key Media have produced another of their short but information-rich videos on this question, and it is sobering:
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November 2, 2023 — Steven Hayward
Herewith another bonus classic format edition, this time featuring an extended conversation with Col. Austin Bay, one of the proprietors of the indispensable Strategy Page, columnist for Creators Syndicate, and author of the splendid Cocktails from Hell: Five Complex Wars Shaping the 21st Century. His column last week is a brief and lucid tour through the proxy wars America is currently confronting (against Russia and Iran, by way of Ukraine
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October 31, 2023 — Lloyd Billingsley
“The only way we can solve the climate crisis is to continue our long-standing cooperation with China,” proclaimed Gavin Newsom during his trip to China. For the California governor, collaboration with one of the world’s leading polluters, a one-party Stalinist police state, is the “only way” to solve a “crisis” that is an existential problem. Gov. Newsom allegedly raised human-rights issues but failed to call for China to release David
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October 22, 2023 — John Hinderaker
If there is a conflict between good and evil going on anywhere in the world, you can predict which side the Communist Chinese will be on. In the case of the Gazan invasion of Israel, you would be right: Sitting in front of a map of the world, Chinese influencer Su Lin has been live-streaming rants in support of Hamas and against Israel since the war broke out. Coming almost
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October 9, 2023 — John Hinderaker
…will be those that adopt sane energy policies. Unfortunately, that group does not include the U.S. Our government is determined to drive the coal industry, and coal-fired power plants, out of business, with natural gas next on the list. Does that make any sense? David Blackmon writes in the Telegraph: As the United States continues to rapidly retire its dwindling fleet of coal-fired power plants in the name of fighting
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September 30, 2023 — Lloyd Billingsley
Sen. Dianne Feinstein has departed this life at the age of 90. The California Democrat can be remembered in several ways, especially as the American politician most faithful to the People’s Republic of China. In April of 2020, Missouri attorney general Eric Schmitt filed a lawsuit charging that Chinese Communist officials are “responsible for the enormous death, suffering, and economic losses they inflicted on the world, including Missourians.” For Sen.
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September 29, 2023 — Scott Johnson
Clifford D. May is founder and president of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) and a columnist for the Washington Times. He is a veteran reporter, foreign correspondent, and editor for the New York Times and other publications. Cliff’s most recent column is “Reading the UNGA tea leaves” (at FDD, where it is posted with links). Cliff has kindly given us his permission to post his column on Power
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September 23, 2023 — Scott Johnson
In John Updike’s short story “Bech in Czech” (collected in Bech at Bay), Updike’s fictional alter ego is sent to Czechoslovakia on a cultural exchange program through the United States government in 1986, while the country is still Communist. Bech attends a party of dissident writers, one of whom had been imprisoned. Bech reflects: Jail! One of the guests at the party had spent nearly ten years in prison. He
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September 22, 2023 — Scott Johnson
Clifford D. May is founder and president of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) and a columnist for the Washington Times. He is a veteran reporter, foreign correspondent, and editor for the New York Times and other publications. Cliff’s most recent column is “Martyrs — and newsmen — for freedom” (at FDD, where it is posted with links). Cliff has kindly given us his permission to post his column
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September 15, 2023 — Scott Johnson
Earlier this week House Committee Chairman Brad Wenstrup (Select Subcommittee on the Permanent Select Committee on Coronavirus Pandemic) and Mike Turner (Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence) released issued a press release that reads as follows: Staff on the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic and Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence have heard testimony from a whistleblower alleging that the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) offered six analysts significant monetary incentives to
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July 31, 2023 — Scott Johnson
Local authorities in Reedley, California uncovered a warehouse lab that “they suspect was home to an illegal, unlicensed laboratory full of lab mice, medical waste and hazardous materials.” NBC News covers the story here. The CDC tested substances on hand and detected at least 20 potentially infectious agents, including coronavirus, HIV, hepatitis and herpes. The NBC News story buries this nugget and leaves it hanging: Officials were unable to get
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July 22, 2023 — Elizabeth Stauffer
At a Jan. 26, 1998 White House event, with wife Hillary by his side, then-President Bill Clinton wagged his finger at reporters and said, “I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky.” If not for the stains on Monica Lewinsky’s infamous “blue dress,” he would have been happy to leave it at that. But called upon to provide a blood sample for DNA testing that summer, Clinton
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July 12, 2023 — Scott Johnson
Yesterday I noted the unsealing of the indictment of Gal Luft. Reading the indictment, I could only imagine what the government might have done with Hunter Biden and the Biden family business if it had been so inclined. Luft himself anticipated my guilty thoughts in this pointed tu quoque in the video he released to the New York Post last week: “Why am I being indicted … for ghostwriting an
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July 9, 2023 — Scott Johnson
The position United States Secretary of the Treasury is exalted. It has been held by eminent officials in Democratic and Republican administrations. As Secretary of the Treasury, Janet Yellen degrades the office she holds. She revealed herself as a political hack with her toeing of the administration’s “inflation is transitory” line. She toes every aspect of the administration’s line, including its humanly destructive abortion line and its economically destructive green
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