China
On the second episode of BBC’s Years and Years, which aired in the United States on HBO July 1, the woes of the Lyons family have become more catastrophic. A year has passed since the nuking of the Chinese island of Hong Sha Do in the final days of the Trump presidency, which has brought about sanctions and trade wars.
BBC One’s limited series Years and Years tells the story of the Lyons family living in the United Kingdom between 2019 and 2034. Episode 1, which premiered in the United States on HBO on June 24, quickly shows us that President Trump will be reelected in 2020, but ends with the vision of Trump having just fired nuclear missiles at China.
On Tuesday morning, CNN’s New Day featured a hit piece on Department of Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao. The report, conducted by CNN correspondent Drew Griffin, alleged without evidence that Chao may be using her office as a tool to help her family’s business, the Foremost Group.
On Saturday night, CBS Evening News ran one of the only segments on network news that spoke of the benefits President Trump taking on China with an aggressive trade policy. Janet Shamlian, a reporter for CBS News Los Angeles, visited Christopher Farms in Gilroy, California. According to the report, Ken Christopher, the operator of Christopher Farms, has actually benefited from the implementation of Trump’s tariffs.
For more than a generation, James Carville's campaign maxim, "It's the economy, stupid," has been held up as an essential truth of American politics. There's no denying that a strong economy is an incumbent president's best friend. Seventy-three percent of voters currently rate the economy as a very important issue. As a result, if the economy remains strong for another 1 1/2 years, many analysts believe President Donald Trump will be favored to win reelection. On the other hand, if a recession hits next year, we will almost certainly have a new president in 2021.
Tuesday marked the 30-year anniversary of the bloody Tiananmen Square massacre, when the Chinese government slaughtered upwards of thousands of student protesters demanding democracy. In true Orwellian fashion, the Chinese government had effectively erased it from their history and arrested a CBS News crew for showing pictures of the massacre to young Chinese citizens. Meanwhile, outlets in the U.S. claim President Trump was the Orwellian one and the danger to press freedom.
Tech companies have been strangely silent on the subject of Chinese censorship. But one reason for their silence might be the millions Chinese companies have invested in these platforms. In a May 30 podcast with the Harvard Business Review, Reddit COO Jen Wong sang the praises of the company’s newest investor, Chinese tech company Tencent. She told the Review that Tencent was “a really impressive company” who had “enormous success.” However, she failed to mention why Tencent would be a controversial investor -- as the builders of China’s infamous Great Firewall of Censorship.
Getting rid of tariffs altogether turned out to be the common ground between Fox Business Network anchor Trish Regan and Chinese television journalist Liu Xin. Regan welcomed Xin, host of CGTN’s The Point with Liu Xin, to discuss the Chinese economy, intellectual property theft and trade tensions between the U.S. and China on Trish Regan Primetime May 29. Although they didn’t agree on everything, when Regan suggested completely getting rid of tariffs between the nations, Xin was supportive.
New York Times columnist Tom Friedman who at least until very recently suffered from extreme Trump Derangement Syndrome wrote on on May 21 that Trump is correct in attempting to reset our trade relationship with China. In case you thought this was Friedman merely experiencing a brief moment of mental clarity, he also appeared with Steve Bannon on CNBC and mostly agreed with him about the need to push China into a new trade agreement.
Presidential contenders are in a battle to out give one another. Senator Elizabeth Warren proposes a whopping $50,000 per student college loan forgiveness. Senator Bernie Sanders proposes free health care for all Americans plus illegal aliens. Most Democratic presidential candidates promise free stuff that includes free college, universal income, "Medicare for All" and debt forgiveness.
Now that Creepy Joe Biden thinks he has put to rest all the cringy questions about his grabby hands, he has reverted to one of his old-time shticks: middle-class Joe. Champion of the masses. Hero of the hoi polloi. A six-term U.S. senator and two-term vice president, which equates to 44 back-slapping, log-rolling, favor-trading years in Washington, this decrepit Beltway swamp-dweller wants flyover Americans to believe that he's really just like you and me. To which I can only reply with one hearty syllable: HA!
The U.S. government and the Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei have been locked in battle for the future of wireless technology with U.S. Officials concerned that the company will give Beijing a backdoor for intelligence gathering.