I have a number of bigger picture issues I want to hit about China-US relations but the one I will start with is stopping the Trump obsession. The term I always come back to is Presidential Wins Above Replacement (PWAR) but I want to go one step further about how 1/n
this conflict with China is well beyond Trump. Before I start, let me give the standard caveat about Trump, I am not defending him you can check my Tweets and writing on him, we all know the issues but let's look beyond him to understand the bigger picture. 2/n
First, the conflict with China has moved in a institutional non-political setting. SEC, FBI, Commerce, and branches of the US government are actively taking actions against Chinese aggressiveness. The Meng arrest warrant was issued completely independent politics 3/n
If Trump quashed it, he would have rightly been criticized for taking a political stance as he was done when he made comments to that effect. You can't have it both ways. I've gotten the sense that USG agencies understood the threats under Obama were not allowed to pursue 4/n
Institutions setting priorities challenging China changes the nature of the conflict removing it from a simple administrative/political spat. Second, this is a much broader acceptance of the challenge facing US China relations. Democrats are now firmly onboard. 5/n
They will rightly criticize Trump for rhetoric, messaging, prioritizing different negotiating issues over others but there are in fundamental agreement over the challenge China faces the United States. I hope whoever the Democratic nominee is will make this a priority 6/n
Then, this has spread internationally. Almost all Huawei focus has been on Meng but what hasn't been noticed is Huawei is getting kicked out of country after country. This is not only a political but institutional realization about the risks of dealing with China and Huawei 7/n
How big an issue is this now? Imagine in 75 days, Trump announces a deal with China that protects US but leaves all other countries on their own. This would likely and understandably be a bigger problem for US allies than anything Trump has done to date by a wide margin 8/n
Third, US and liberal democracies waking up to the absolute fact that China is not simply just wants to trade and make money but presents an actual threat to democracies and states around the world. They are actively seeking to undermine democracies around the world 9/n
The values Beijing is enforcing domestically within China and promoting abroad are entirely incompatible within anything global liberals would accept. When we consider the great authoritarian states like WWII Germany or the USSR and the similarities with modern China 10/n
are very real. For all the cheap talk about Holocaust denial and never again, NYC/DC liberals feign ignorance about Uighurs in Xinjiang even though it has been widely covered urging cooperation. How anyone can talk with a straight face about finding a middle ground 11/n
or cooperate more on concentration camps, complete religious crackdown (of all religions), total censorship, and near deification of a near totalitarian leader to this day baffles me. Nobody wants a Cold War 2.0. I wish Trump was not President leading the US right now 12/n
To use either as an excuse to defend delusional and misguided beliefs about the nature of the conflict is beyond reprehensible. You are defending the undefensible by doing anything by saying this is flat out wrong. No excuses. Done.
