This is exactly my issue. Reading the article that @ElbridgeColby highlighted, my reaction was:

1. We have a major problem in the level of understanding and frameworks with which senior generalists understand the PRC/CCP.

1/

https://twitter.com/EvansRyan202/status/1458461196986761220

2. The forms through which intelligence is conveyed probably are not good at conveying necessary context.

3. Still not sure if there is a China-related issue where the USG has not actively lied to itself more than on what the CCP was doing in Hong Kong. Repeatedly for years.

2/

I’m taking this seriously because this argument is being used inside and outside gov’t., so this is going to be a thread. I care less about what direction policy goes (OK, I have preferences) than I care that the US approach is based in reality. 1/30

https://twitter.com/shifrinson/status/1259109990406795264

If you want to argue party congress & plenary documents, certain kinds of speeches & essays are cheap speech, then you must make the argument. Dismissing them challenges established scholarship on how the CCP functions. A WP is cheap speech, not a party congress work report 2/30

This line in Wang Chi's op-ed is a familiar distortion: "Confucianism is inherently undemocratic; it encourages obedience, not freedom or personal liberty." Confucianism neutered in support of the state perhaps, but it is largely concerned with virtue. That's why its dangerous.

https://twitter.com/BethanyAllenEbr/status/1094737536998670338

During a Lei Feng revival in 2011/12, I wrote "Chinese political culture contains a lot of dangerous ideas for [the party]. This may go a long ways toward explaining Beijing’s fickle relationship with Confucius as a symbol of Chinese culture." jamestown.org/program/anothe…