hello and welcome to cross talk we're all things are considered a little in this presidential election cycle both democrats and republicans claim to be tough on china what does that actually mean in fact what does the american public really know about the china of today on this edition of the program we attempt to separate myths from reality. processing china anymore i'm joined by my guest tom wilkinson detroit is president and c.e.o. of t w and associates as well as a regular contributor to china us focus dot com and we have james bradley in new

zealand he is a new york times number one best selling author of china mirage as well as host of his own pod cast untold pacific right gentlemen across up rose in effect that means you can jump in anytime you want and i always appreciate it ok let's go to new zealand 1st james. china is mentioned over and over in this election cycle in the united states though both parties like to differentiate themselves it seems like it's the message is the same in following this election and how china is. objectified i would say what is the biggest misconception about china as it's reported by the media. too big of a question it would take too many hours if we're going to talk about misconceptions about china no i would make the case that with china's population number one country in the world it's the least understood country by americans fewer americans have been that china over the last 400 years compared to going to europe but in terms of the election if i was president trump's campaign advisor this is what i

would say to him i would say president trump there is about 11 swing states there wisconsin michigan ohio pennsylvania i mean you know what they are in those swing states in october november when you're campaigning there's going to be 2 problems for the voters number one vaccine coded disease whatever you want to call it lock down that whole bally weight number one number 2 there broke no jobs no money being a problem regarding maybe even trued so you got these 2 problems disease and no jobs then guess what it's china's fault the disease came from china and joe biden loves china the jobs where your jobs i've got the answer joe biden's administration all short of it's china's fault and joe biden loves china you're

going to win those swing states don't worry. ok well i wish it were that simple ok because. american industry has been hollowed out i would say a number of presidents allowed it to happen and watched american c.e.o.'s do it ok so i think we need like a church commission to investigate how this all happened here tom let me go to you i mean you're an old china hand same question to you because i did living in russia for 22 years and i every every single news cycle russia has misunderstood and i'd have to agree with james china's even more misunderstood and that's quite remarkable go ahead you know i remember reading i think it was in 2000 or 2000 who wants a national geographic's said that the american people are ignorant about all things asia and especially china and quite honestly it hasn't gotten any better of late this election cycle is not much different than the site create with james that the

amplifier is going to be around the blain china strategy the g.o.p. amount all that came out a few weeks about a month ago talks explicitly about that when anything comes up blain china issue that to me is that may be a good political strategy the question is whether. that's really going to set us in a good position as we move forward as james pointed out 1.4 percent. of people. a large economy growing all the time how are we going to assure that china doesn't become a nightmare more than a dream where we can find ways in order to work together we need to get past this election cycle and whoever is elected is going to have some repair work to do to assure that china's rise doesn't come that the u.s.

is demise ok well james if this kind of begs the question because. people are commenting about a new cold war i don't like that phrase because the cold war that all of us remember was very specific and it was very ideologically driven this is not the case here so it does does america need china as an enemy it seems that american foreign policy always is looking for the next hitler and it looks like china is the next hitler in the minds of the form the blob because i'd like to point out up until about the february this year it was hardly ever mention that china is a communist country and the communist party of china they constantly pound away at that and that's all obviously an echo to the cold war that we all lived through ahead james. this is a very old tradition in american politics in american history that the chinese if you listen to pompei on all the spokespeople there's the chinese people

we love the chinese people all the chinese haters say it 1st the chinese people are wonderful hardworking people we have nothing against them but if those commies so 200 years ago it was the emperor the chinese people were great they all want to be just like us christian pot luck dinner but it's the emperor that stopping them from becoming americanised and then it was my pajamas he was keeping the top people down if we could just get rid of mouths of chinese people are going to rise up demand democracy and now if you listen to it there is no more china in pompei i'll speak it's the c c p the chinese communist party as if that's like 3 guys and if we just move them put them in another room everything's going to be ok there's 90000000 people in the chinese communist party this is this is the largest i call it a mandarin you know the old mandarins there's the emperor and the mandarin beijing 90000000 chinese communist populations larger than european countries very

competent people who have to rise through a meritocracy to get where they are and we're going to push this aside the chinese people are very happy with their their government relatively nothing's perfect but look at the accomplishments of the of the of the chinese communist party from the chinese side then you'll see that pompei is just making this up yet he did come to one of the things that he did when i when i look at media coverage of china. there is this amazing unwillingness to say the obvious of what is how his china has changed in the last 40 years i mean you. always here they're building more nuclear weapons and they're building their navy and you know all of their military technology but they don't talk about how many people per pulled out of poverty and how china is on the cutting edge of so many technologies right now because you

can't admit that because it will then you have to look in the mirror and look at your own failings and this is what american elites can simply refuse to do is it it's not the success of china it you know they don't want to talk about the success of china but they certainly won't admit they're all of the neo liberalism and how that is really damaged the united states' economy and its middle class. if you take a look at what's transpired and then in the people's republic of china over the last half century clearly there's the good the bad. and if you point out the bad then you're interfering in china's internal affairs and and you can get banned and pushed aside as it's relates to working with the party and others within china but as you pointed out peter there has been in the fact is that china's more people out of abject poverty then and we have people in the united states of

america perhaps double that number as we look at trying to to hold china back that's not going to happen going to think that somehow or another that we're not sunk our chest and china is going to fall to the united states of. wishful thinking and so while we need to defend it's a strategy to address the issues the real issues which china between the united states china and other democracies we also need an investment strategy in the american people when we take a look at what china is doing around artificial intelligence big data technology it's not just the factory of the world anymore they're in the game to win a medal gee you're going us box you're up in the. russian d.c. suburbs and when i got into the rank you know with my best friend i was there to win and it should come as no surprise to us i mean i find it kind of amazing that people say china is looking to beat us well no candidate. who strives to be number

2 said china is going to be there so the question has to be whether it's to biden or trump records going to be the leader what are you going to do to invest in infrastructure in america our roads bridges airports train system i mean it's a joke compared to what you say the investment of the chinese people so what are we going to do to invest in an education workforce development research and research and develop those are the issues that we need to focus on and while we point to the bogeyman of china that isn't doing a darn thing to the people that james talked about in those midwestern states i'm want i'm here in michigan we certainly have been hurt not only by globalization and china but automation technology which is really wreak havoc and has been similar to the economic tsunami that kofi 19 is unleashed on the world you know james i'm

really glad that become mention this because you know the competition we elise all 3 of us i'm sure brought up competition is good because it brings out the best in you and it brings the best out of your opponent as well but it's because china is just different and it must be thing must be unfair they're cheating that they're not playing on a level playing field you know you always hear all these excuses here not just as we just heard the u.s. just refuses to invest in itself and its people and this is what happens ok it's no surprise this is happening and and in tom's absent chinese here too out there to weigh in and that makes perfect sense to me and it we need a policy to getting gauges that that avoids conflict obviously and actually competition can find. a profit for both sides if you look at it in a in a rational way if this is history great powers rise and fall maybe in one of these moments now go ahead james. you know i agree with you that there's tectonic plates

plates changing is bigger than just the u.s. and and china a lot of changes taking place but within the china u.s. situation yes they want to win and in my book it goes back to remember back in the 1990 s. when we had newt gingrich and bill clinton and sex scandals and and the new york times is full of 5 pages of detail about sex and then we moved on to bush and we had to take trillions of dollars and put it in the sand in the middle east well in the 1990 s. when we were. arguing about nonsense the founders of weiwei were sleeping on cement floor dreaming of 5 g. they're worried about the next meal. china was you know right now we're surprise you know china. and all this high tech and we've got to invest and we've got to get

gone aren't that i was training china in the early 2 thousands making these speeches we've got to get goat we've got to stop investing in blowing up sand and start investing in our own country there's a race for the future and i could see it happening in china but you know we're going to be here dessen 2016 no one is you did it ok i'm going to jump in here we're going to go to a short break and after that short break we'll continue our discussion of perceptions of china at stake there's.

going to lose there's a worth of the replacing of the police to come with the food. for the farmers the going through things i love the long of the old forms of the balls the most ruthless not. just with the. for. those of you. who was there to use the book with those gusts is going to have those that would he was a piece of. music but the other. yeah of course. a

new gold rush is underway and gonna thousands of ill equipped workers are flocking to the gold fields hoping to strike it rich. as day over to those that love our children are torn between gold. was very poor i thought i was do my best get back to school which side will have the strongest appeal. welcome back across top where all things are considered i'm peter lavelle to remind you that we're talking about perceptions and misperceptions of china. ok let's go back was go back to detroit you know tom one of the things that i have been observing here particularly there was

a pentagon report on the on the defense department about assessing china and it was pretty grim reading and i'd like to point everyone out there's a wonderful article in the american conservative at all sums it up i think it's still there. but it seems to me that there's always this kind of knee jerk response when there's a. the pentagon is you know it's a hammer and everything it's he's in the world is a nail ok and and we've seen in that we've talked about previously the 1st part of the program is that when ailes america is not necessarily china threat it is the inability to respond to that threat and i will invoke you know the military industrial complex this is a this is another gravy train just like take korean peninsula which is the gravy train for if they don't change the status quo as great as everybody is making a lot of money don't change or with nato because everybody is making a lot of money the same thing as. going is happening now with china and sitting day getting china. as the as a peer a power ok which i think we also do admit it at least on most metrics here but no

it's this plan for for military conflict it seems to me that is so counterproductive that really really needed for that kind of relationship that we should have china go ahead let really goes back you know and when i reflect on it current up in d.c. in the sixty's in nappanee relationship with china i remember 2 things my mom telling me to mikey's the children are starving in china i still have the on lokes to mail those peas to the children of china and my dad telling me to stop digging in the backyard because i'm going to let the commies m. and i'm going to fall into china. but i did in fact africa a children's book i'm in the process of getting a published where i talk about you know that i've fallen into this hole that my dad told 'd me and i look back from the 1963 falling into the hole and waking up in china in 2020 and i look back through the hole to america and i see the

challenges that we are facing whether it's split food insecurity unemployment the disaster on the response to the global pandemic you can blame china for their slow response but we have to take a look internally of what we did after we know we have serious problems in this country to address the last thing that we need to do is be going on some military it better and spending trillions of dollars and that i should imagine if those dollars the james talked about a minute ago. did invest over the last few decades in the people of the united states of america and in other western democracies in making this world truly safer for us all i think that we would see a different view of america when i look back through that hole that i fell into and

so right now china is not just eating our lunch they're eating our dinner as well if we don't get serious about invest in america and i have continue to have these problems but you know what i worry about time is that is that china will be the excuse not to invest you see what i'm saying this is the same thing the same mines that you know you know the middle east is repeated backwater of no strategic value to the united states whatsoever the world is ok with oil there's a there's still. thereby i future by distrait shouldn't won't we're going to get him we're going to go back into syria and you know and we're not going to pull out troops here i mean this is always an excuse not to invest in the american people you know james i was in beijing i think was 2 summers ago. and i was obviously invited to london for a presentation and very i mean it was amazing trip and i as the big talker i always

was asking questions and i asked the same question to i'd say like a dozen people and i'd say what is the size of the middle class who's in the middle class james you know what i got the same answer each time we're all the middle class and that is such a remarkable statement and that shows a level of confidence so when i went there and came back i came away with the following they know where they're going they know how to get there and they know they will get there and that is the sense of confidence that i've never seen before maybe when i was a child in america in the midwest that was an american way of thinking it's not it that the case anymore and so when when i look at china you know they need all of this chest beating the chinese just brush it off you know we're going to get we're going to get to it and you know and if you want to get in the way fine but we're going to get work at where our destination and i think that that's an assault confident society that i've never seen. since my child go ahead james you know i've

never heard anybody say that but that's exactly it was my 1st impression when i 1st went to china it was that these guys are better outro while they know who they are they know where they're going and eat in their bodies just hope the way they help themselves talk to you not arrogant but we're one 4th of humanity you know we have this long is story we know who we are we know where we're going. america is america doesn't have those plans we just have the next election look when john kennedy took over from eisenhower eisenhower said your biggest problem is laos. kennedy didn't know anything about laos he reaches out for the levers that a president might have been lost and what were they they were a cia secret airline laos becomes the most bomb spot in the world with china we reach out what do we have do we have like 30 years of mandarin learning like

sputnik that we started 30 years ago to you know do we start our wa ways in the 1990 and we don't have any of those levers we have the military lever so we're we're confrontational in the south china sea and in the himalayas now we're in thailand trying to do things and you know that that's that's all we've got and we should have more we have to change this and the time is not a go ahead you know that is it that is clearly a part of it but the other is we're disinvest in ways that is a really frightening to me you know as announced today that we're taking a 1000 students out of china and there's 300000 students that are time studying here and there in america i mean i believe that a future leader of china is in one of our universities today so how do we build this relationship and develop those soft power connections are going to be vitally

important and where roading a lot of the bridges that have been built between the people at the subnational low clearly i think our congress and president should be dealing with some of these national issues you know unfair trade or theft as intellectual property or tension whether in the middle east or global economic areas but it's a sub national levels the governors and mayors superintendents schools university presidents professors we have to find ways to build that cultural educational and economic bridge between the 2nd and the 1st largest economy in the world to think otherwise is to dream. and nightmare you know it james that the fundamental problem as i see it is that we always think of it we're told to think about china as it when you think in terms of its geography and the communist coming this ideology the party the leader but i think you know it both of you knowing

chinese history china thinks of itself as a civilizational experiment a phenomena it goes way beyond this c.c.p. ok and the problem is a syria but we have the largest population in the world that thinks of itself as a civilization for the good and then you have american exceptionalism and this is what makes it that's why i don't like to look at the cold war with the soviet union but now we have a phenomenon here of south america the american athletes are self-confident in american exceptionalism even though they portray it all the time they played lip service to it ok and this is this clash right here because the u.s. is incapable of and acknowledging a peer a real peer because the soviet union was never an economic threat ever and there was almost no trade with it ok this is such a top it totally different situation right now and i wonder if the american mind

mindset is capable of adjusting to appear go ahead james. i think maybe we're not capable of adjusting to appear if you listen to. you know the pump ayos folks that he has out talking this anti china thing and if you listen closely in the 3rd or 4th paragraph when they get to that essence of the threat the threat is. american dominance the threat is america that china might become a leader there you know china's not going to bomb chicago china does not want to invade you know go around the world and invade argentina what china wants to do is become a better china and america is unable to accept that for for a number of historical racial emotional reasons and we're surprised that that were

so challenge that this point well what tom just said about the challenges in america and we have to rebuild i imagine he and i were talking this way about 20 years ago you know at some point america's either got to get it got to get on the train and compete or you know what we could be a rich number 2 so what if china is the number one economic power in the world and we're number 2 we could double the size of our economy in that world but psychologically we don't we're we're not allowing ourselves to think that these chinese really have their act together you know given right in america get streaming number one. you know that old saying number 2 tries. and china has and trying hard for over 4000 years. and certainly as they struggle through the century if you only you know the asian from 1849 i think

or you know i. kind of get back to where they were and a lot of people forget that china was the world's largest economy probably you know 20. or 18 of the last 20. 21 centuries to soak some tar not of the water and its own level should come as no surprise to us we had to get up every day and compete to work to remain on number one and as james pointed out. if china because countries do surpass other countries if you look back in our world history it happens i think as they say on the straight stuff happens so what are we going to do to assure that their rise doesn't come and are the ones you know be james it seems to me that. the thinking is reverse and we've already touched on it is that if you make americans stronger and give them a future and give them certainty then then that's

a self-confident country on the world stage it's not a self comping country the world stage because most people feel alienated from it and no one is everyone has the american people what they think about china we're just told what to think about china and i think that is a real live duty it's much better to have a rich country where people have something invested in it and i think then you would have a very different america and and just relying upon that on the military but we've seen you know particularly since the end of the cold war that leads to an entry treasury a lot of dough dead american soldiers and in the human casualties of these expeditions it's been quite tragic and wasteful here are you gentlemen that's all the time we have here i want to thank my guests in detroit and in new zealand and i want to thank our viewers for watching us here r.t. see you next time remember.

join me every thursday on the alex salmond show and obviously who gets the world of politics for the. i'm show business i'll see that. problem drugs don't always come from unscrupulous dealers but from pharmacies to in every state in the united states we see me very sharp increase in the number of people seeking treatment for addiction to prescription opioids it invaded america under the banner of medicine persisted with the pain but instead of trying to wean him off though she just goes after dose after dose after dose and really became his drug dealer who's to blame patients doctors manufacturers all the governments of.

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