it's part of a technogy revolution since presi xi came to wer. >> (xi jinping): >> narrator: there arerking in xinjiang. many are involved in the surveillance systems being used there. ♪ it's rare for anyone from thesee companto speak openly about their work, but one insider agreed to talk to us about the surveillance technology he helped develop. he has since left china and conceal his identity and not disclose where he currently lives. ♪ >> (engineer): >> narrator: he says his work in xinjiang revealed to him the ways the government gathers data on the uyghur popula >> (engineer): ♪ >> narrator: it's not just the uyghurs who are subject to this intense surveillance. in kazakhstan, we interviewed a chinese kazakho muslims, who say they experienced the lisame monitoring when thed in xinjiang. >> (sholpan): >> in 2017, the chinese state began a data collection process, which is really what supports the technology in general. a they askll people in the police station and submit data, which ranged from dna collection, blood, and fierprints, to speaking into aicrophone to get a unique voic

over speech. dissent in, in xi's china.r (fanfare continues) now, what is china?ned by han chinese traditions, the han chinese official language of mandarin. and there is increasingl little space for uyghurs in atthis imagination of, of china is. (fanfare ends) >> narrator: after xi jinping became president, a series of high-profile, violent attacks took place across chin ♪ some were carried out by uyghur separatists and islamist militants. ♪ one was here in the heart of beijing, in ananmen square. in total, more than 100, mainly han chinese, were killed in e attacks. >> from xi's perspective, what's being fought in china is a new version of the war on terror, and that the uyghurs are a problem that are not going to go alay, and that need to be with. >> narrator: according to chinese government files leaked to the new york times, president xi tolofficials to unless the tools of "dictatorship"o eradicate radical islam in xinjiang. chinese officials have dismissed this as "total nonsense and a pack of lies." llowing the militants' attacks, the chinese authorities cr

and the next day could yday kowtowing to president xi again.'m afraid they're helping donald trump. i just -- they're not news, but they're actually hurting donald trump day in and day out. people see cuomo, even lifelong republicans tell me look at cuomo and like, god, there's a leader. why can't donald trump stop tweeting? why can't he shut his mouth? why can't he just do his job? obviously, those are all rhetorical questions. he can't do it, but he's really damaging his political standing by going out every day and engaging in clownish behavior and that's, by the way, conservative -- well not conservative. you can't be conservative and support donald trump. trumpists are even saying that now. >> right. right. i mean, you think about it this way, joe. you know you're on to something in a situation like this in criticizing donald trump when lindsey graham agrees with you and you've got someone like lindsey graham who never, as you know, the years when he used to criticize trump once he became president, lindsey graham will never, ever, ever sa

xi jinping has publicly said nothing so far. xi jinping might think about it this way.ight say i have got my lab director saying one thing. i need $2 trillion of capital from wall street. i need a lot of technology and buy a lot of american companies to make my plan happen. which is more important. sacrificing that lab director and having an investigation that says yes we are sorry, we made some mistakes and getting the technology and capital from america or sticking with the lab director. my guess is xi jinping will sacrifice this lab director and move forward if president trump exercises he norm sauce leverage over -- enormous leverage over china. lou: that leverage will have to be considerable given the fact that we are totally depend de -- dependent on china for anti-virals. our dependency is on china, not the reverse. the president creating an historic trade deal to lead to a balanced relationship is now it seems to me, you know, in threat without any question. the dependency of this nation -- and this dependency we have still on china is going to be part of any ca

he wanted to thank president xi for that. can those kind of statements go forward anymore? i have the president has talked a lot about the trade deal and making sure that they don't renege on their promises there. it almost feels like that's the one piece that's holding that relationship together at this point, because we are counting on those trade agreements and those trade relationships with china. >> way of seeing the president be serious about writing the disaster that was the trade relationship before he came to office. he has made it more fair and reciprocal. we have an application they will live up to their obligation. as for the relationship, we want to cooperate. 1.5 billion people. we want the chinese people to be successful but it requires leadership engaging in the international community on a fair and reciprocal basis, sharing information way we expect every nation too. it doesn't appear that happened here. the president talked about their data and the asked if anybody believed the numbers of deaths in the numbers of cases inside china. that is the kind of dou

we all understand where it came from and president xi understands that.t have to make a big deal out of it. we didn't like the fact that it came from our soldiers and they haven't pursued that. that was a midlevel person said that. that was not a high level person. so i assume, i will always assume the best. i will assume the high level people didn't know about it t was a foolish statement. so look, the relationship with china is a good one and my relationship with him is, really good. please? reporter: follow up on the point on chinese propaganda that you mentioned as well as ambassador o'brien. in the past several weeks china had been shipping ppes, masks, either been selling or donating everywhere, africa, europe, italy, russia and we hear the narrative they're taking on a global leadership role in the crisis. what are your thoughts on that and is there anytime -- >> i don't mind, i view that as a positive if they're helping other countries. we have 151 countries under siege by the virus, under siege. some are doing really badly. they don't know about

they're certainly not-- xi is willing to spend 25% on trade with america because he needs trade withmerica. so we have leverage, too, and clearly our president has been saying this about everything in terms of the manufacturing base, since he got in office, since he was a candidate for office. so, i wish, i wish we would have implemented this on the medical supply line sooner, but time to start today. there are several bills in the senate. i know tom cotton has one and so does marsha blackburn. we will take action. leland: tom cotton has been extraordinarily outspoken about this and so have you, and interesting op-ed on the heritage website. this brings up an important question about the president. his tone about china has changed. a couple of weeks ago he was calling this the china virus from the podium. lately, well, i want to have a good relationship with president xi and i hope things work well and i want to have a good relationship. is this a little bit of, you know, of i don't want to say chamberlain at munich, but a good relationship with someone who has one motive, president

that happened on xi jinping's watch. is, as much as it seems, from the west, that china is stronger than they have been historically, let's keep in mind , this is also a really bad recession for china. the economy will be harder to manage, harder to keep everyone in full employment, harder to get supply and demand back to where it was. that is a problem for xi jinping that he never thought he would have coming into this year. there are a lot of people inside the country, leaders in the country, that feel like his style of leadership has actually made china internationally and domestically more vulnerable. david: let's go across the border to north korea. what is your take on what is going on there? it is strange that there are all of these rumors about kim jong-un, and they have not done anything to dispel the rumors. it is completely unusual. weeks beforeow two he has been seen. all sorts of speculation that he is dead. no useful on the ground intelligence. if he was fine, they would be saying something. at the least, t

i think we all understand where it came from and president xi understands that.'t like the fact they said it came from our soldiers and they haven't pursued that, and that was a mid-level person said that. that was not a high level person so i will always assume the best. i'll assume the high level people didn't know about it. so, look, the relationship with china is a good one and my relationship with him is really good. >> can i follow up because on that point on chinese propaganda that you mentioned as well as ambassador ryan, so in the past several weeks china has been shipping ppes, you know, masks and either been selling or donating everywhere, africa, europe, italy, russia and really pushing this narrative they're taking on a global leadership role in the crisis. so what are your thoughts on that? >> i view that as a positive if they're helping other countries. we have 151 countries right now that are under siege by the virus. some are doing really badly. you know, they don't know about social distancing. these are countries that aren't highly sophisticate

you say to get the xi going as soon as possible.est everyone in the united states every two weeks and isolate those who test positive. how would that work? >> you know it's often easiest to bring these things down to the level where you can relate to them, yourself. i had some electricians doing work on my home in new york city when the pandemic hit. they didn't want to keep coming because they didn't want to get sick from each other. they didn't want to risk getting the infection from me. my wife and i didn't want them to come. so what will it mean to recover? it will mean we will all be happy to going back to doing things, closing up all the open wires and conduits in my house and getting some work done. to get to that point is fastest way is to get a test to say i have been tested in the last week. i was negative. my wife was tested. she's negative. we were recently tested. we're negative. that's the kind of thing that will give us all confidence to come back and do useful work. it won't matter whether the governor says you can w

president xi said... ambassador we are short on time, i find may...e they now close for good yes or no? there is no such thing about wet markets. this is a western and foreign notion to many chinese. we do have a fresh market where fresh vegetables and fresh seafood, fish, are sold and some live poultry that is very rarely. i think you're talking about the so—called illegal market for selling wildlife. that has been totally banned. and the law has been passed that it will be banned permanently. that is there for a recognition, yes, a recognition on your government's part that the dangers of those markets where live wild animals were sold alongside other foodstuffs, they were dangers that did cause the spread of coronavirus from animals to humans? i agree with that. finally we have a few points to agree with. i'm very pleased with that. that's what this market, we are talking about wildlife market. it is totally banned. it is illegal to hunt, to treat, to eat even. so... people watching this will only wish that you made that ban real before coronavirus

and since the outbreak, i think president xi and president trump keep close contact. a similar conversation with prime minister borisjohnson. we want to build an international response to this virus. i just want to let americans know that china is not the enemy of the united states. it is the virus! it is the enemy of the united states, they need to find the right target. a very important message or a sending facet could consider some gestures that would improve relations with not just the united states but many other countries including australia and the uk who have made the same point to your government. —— maybe china could consider. will you now categorically guarantee to close down the so—called wet markets, no longer the sale of these live wild animals in the food markets that are known as the wet markets? is that now something that has been banned not just short—term but absolutely banned forever in china? first to come to your first point about many countries. i cannot agree with you that china has a problem with a many countries. i think we have more friends

the result of the chinese communist party's lies and president xi's overt and deadly decision not toell western governments about the disease he unleashed resulted in the killing of almost 150,000 people of worldwide. the sickening of 2.2 million more. the contagion is far from controlled. the pandemic unleashed by the chinese government killed 32,000 americans and infected 700,000 more. fox news has learned intelligence agencies are gathering information about the laboratory at the wuhan institute of virology, trying to piece together a timeline of what the chinese government knew, and the intelligence community will report their finding to the white house so the president can determine how to hold china accountable, whether to hold china accountable. while bureaucrats in the intelligence community have worked to undercut president trump. pieced together a report we already know. individuals and business owners continue to struggle. the radical dimms refuse to push through another 2 billion for the paycheck protection program. an economics advisor larry kudlow sharing the frustratio

i told that to president xi. i said the world health organization is very china centric, meaning whatever it is, china was always right. you can't do that. you can't do that. not right. again, it's not a question of money, but when we're spending $500 million and china is spending $38 million, $34 million, $40 million, $42 million in a case. it's not money, but it's not right. so we'll see. this is an evaluation period. in the meantime we're putting a hold on all funds going to world health. we will be able to take that money and channel it to the areas that most need it. that's another way of doing it. we have not been treated properly. >> mr. president, you mentioned you're going to be speaking with all the governors tomorrow, make recommendations -- >> probably thursday. >> thursday. what if they don't listen to you or take your advice or obey you? will you consider taking away their federal funding?

i think xi jinping has put a lot of his credibility, a lot of his political future on the line. mimage around the world the region and the world, are clearly going to suffer. look, when you're in power, you get benefit for things, even if you're not responsible for them, and you get blame. in this case, the blame or the responsibility are war reranted. i think china will get their share. the markets shouldn't have been open. china was slow to respond. it covered things up. it allowed millions to have people to leave wuhan who should have been locked down. china bears enormous responsibility. they can't be blamed for our own lack of preparations here. they can't be blame ding the world health organization. no leader and no organization at the center of the crisis has covered himself with credit. >> china, the world health organization, donald trump, all failed miserably. you look at china. you can find those places. you look at donald trump. mika, saying at the end of january saying china was doing a great job. saying this would magically go away. it was only 15 people and soon t

president xi understands that. we don't have to make a big deal about it.he fact that they say it came from our soldiers, they have not pursued that. and it was a mid-level person that said that. it was not a high level person. so i assume, i will always assume the best. i assume that the high-level people did not know about it. it was a foolish statement. so the relationship is a good one, and my relationship with him is really good. >> reporter: and i follow up on that point of chinese propaganda that you mention as well as ambassador o'brien? in the past several weeks china has been shipping ppe masks, either selling or donating everywhere, africa, europe, italy, russia. and we put on the narrative that they are taking a leadership role, so what are your thoughts on that? >> president trump: i view that as a positive that they are helping other countries. we have 100 countries under siege of the virus. they don't know about social distancing. these are countries that are not highly sophisticated. they don't have great communication to the rest of the wor

and going on to thank president xi, and then there is this tweet from february. the president praising the world heath organization for, his words, working hard and very smart and throwing in the claim that the stock market was looking very good. now, the fact is the world heath organization is far from perfect.

what's happened here, i think, if you take a step back, it looks like president trump and also president xi jinping of china are putting w.h.o. in the middle of a geopolitical struggle, a big power competition, when we really should all be in this together. at a time when, if we ever needed global cooperation, if we ever needed to coordinate our response, now is the time. and think about what w.h.o., its role now. it's not just warning the united states, it's not just supporting sub-saharan africa and other low-income countries as this is going to rage in those parts of the world, but also, w.h.o. is helping to coordinate international scientific work on a vaccine. they've approved covid test kits, which the united states has never used. and there are other global health priorities that america cares about. the united states helps fund things like, at the w.h.o., mental health, aids, polio eradication, things that americans care about. it's really impossible for me to believe that the american public and our values would accept this kind of behavior. >> we will watch to see what happens nex

xi's lies and deception have been exposed to the world.e ordered the the head of the institutes of virology to go on stage on say that the virus originated in wuhan. xi and china's communist party are clearly to blame for their refusal to warn the world of the deadly virus they spread all around the world. what else are they responsible for? did they engineer the virus in the wuhan laboratory? if so, for what purpose? were they conducting research? or did they engineer a wave upon of mass destruction. the actions of xi and his government imply guilt and their stream of lies are inexcusable. as are their conscious decision to deny the truth when they could have saved millions of people from sickness and death. the wuhan virus infecting 2.5 million people around the world. it killed at least 168,000 more. in this country 141,000 -- 41,000 have been killed and 776,000 infected. the price of crude oil fell 300% as demand if collapsed. and on the final day of the trading contract the price actually turned negative. as the wuhan virus wreaked ha

that happened on xi jinping's watch.re has been a lot of that over the last few months and i think the point is that as much as it seems from the west that china is stronger now than they have been historically, let's keep in mind this is also a really bad reception for china. the economy will be harder to manage, harder to keep everyone in full employment, harder to get supply and demand back to where it was. that is a problem for xi jinping, that he never thought he was going to have coming into this year and there are a lot of people inside the country, leaders in the country that feel like his style of leadership has actually made china internationally and domestically more vulnerable. >> lets go across the border as it were to north korea. what is your take on what is going on there? we have not heard anything out of there for a a while. strange that there are always rumors about kim jong-un and they have not done anything like to show him to us to dispel the rumors. it is completely unusual. we have had two weeks b

i think we all understand where it comes from and president xi understands that. we don't have to make a wig deal out of it. we didn't like the fact that they said it came from our soldiers, and they haven't pursued that. and that was a mid level person said that. that was not a high-level person. so i assume -- i will always assume the best. i'll assume the high-level people didn't know about it. it was foolish statement. so, look, the relationship with china is a good one, and my relationship with him is really good. please? >> can i follow up on that point, chinese propaganda that you mentioned as well as ambassador o'brien. so in the past several weeks, china has been shipping ppes, masks, either been selling or donating everywhere, africa, europe, italy, russia, and really pushing this narrative that they're taking on a global leadership role in the crisis. so what are your thoughts on that? and there is there any time for the administration to take on that role? >> i view that as a positive if they're helping other countries. we have 151 countries right now

. >> the president never mentions president xi by name. he always goes after china, but not the leader. we have our cnn fact checker. what did you this i? >> this was shorter than some of the briefings, but as always, there were false and misleading claims. the president made at least six different false claims about what nancy pelosi did in china town. he said today she was dancing in the streets. >> she did go to china town, but walked around, no dancing, not holding a street fair or party like the president previously said. he willed says that presumptive nominee joe biden sadid not say that the president may change the election date. that is something joe biden said out loud. on march 9 when asked about there being 4 million tests. and vice president pence turned it around saying that was a mistake on his part. that was not a distinction vice president pence made on march 4. he said we are going to see an increase in testing and that's because of the leadership of the president. so if we misunderstood, it's because that's the way it wa

and that was because president xi was professionally handling this. i could cite many examples, but, yes, the world health organization has a lot of questions to answer about it leaving china and being slow in calling this a pandemic. the president is right about that. but who has the best intelligence about that, the world health organization or the united states of america? security raised questions about those places in wuhan. they said don't trust the chinese. we are seeing things in china that alarm us. they are telling us one thing, but intelligence is telling us another thing. back in january alarms were raised china should not be trusted. the president did not listen to that advice, called them alarmist and praised president xi and now calls w.h.o. out. >> he was praising president xi. dr. sanjay gupta is with us as well. over the years you have done a lot of important reporting on the world health organization. give us a sense of what this means for the united states in the sense it is halting 400 or 500 million in aid to the w.h.o. >> this i

were you dooped by president xi? >> i made a deal that's phenomenal.obody has been ripped off like the united states like china and many other countries. we stop it. we have done a they are paying us $250 -- they didn't do anything if us. the deal started before anybody heard about this. >> let's discuss ambassador haus is here, the president of the counsel on foreign relations and the author of "the world: a brief introduction." we thank you for joining us, ambassador. what do you think about the president's response and what does it tell you about the relationship between the two leaders right now? >> the relationship between the two leaders is good, but the bottom line is relations between countries are rarely based upon personal relationships between the leaders. this is a relationship that's been heading south for some time. i think the pandemic is reenforcing that deterioration. that's bad for both countries. it's bad for the world. this is probably the defining relationship of this century. as this relationship goes, so will a lot of the future

i just spoke with president xi last night. we are working on the problem, the virus.h situation, but i think he's going to handle it. i think he has handled it really well. >> harris: the covid-19 -- with covid-19 originating in china, whatever goodwill china had around the world appears to be evaporating. more than 100,000 people have been killed by the virus, and are u.s. officials are speaking as if in unison, blaming china for not sharing information on the virus sooner. >> they been misleading us, they been opaque come if you will. from the early days of this virus. i don't have much faith they are being truthful with us now. >> britain, germany, vietnam, india, and brazil, are joining the trump administration in condemning the chinese government management of the coronavirus outbreak, calling for the communist party to be held accountable for the pandemic spread. >> days that went by from when the leadership there knew about this virus, before they told the public at large. a lot of cases, a lot of movement, a lot of travel around the world before the chinese co

with president xi of china, and he's working very hard on this.na is very -- you know, very professionally run in the sense that they have everything under control. we just sent some of our best people over there, world health organization and a lot of them are composed of our people, they're fantastic. >> are you concerned that china is koovring up -- >> no, china is working very hard. they're in touch with our world health organization. cdc also. we're working together, but the world health is working with them. >> are you still satisfied with how president xi is handling the coronavirus? >> i think president xi is working very hard. >> donald trump's decision to halt funding to the w.h.o. has been widely rebuked. you'll be surprised to hear. the american medical association warned of wide ranging ramifications. the u.s. chamber of commerce of all people said that the move is not in u.s.'s interests. bill gates said it's as dangerous as it sounds and speaker nancy pelosi said this decision is illegal. and will be swiftly challenged. tonight, don

i know president xi loves the people of china. he loves his country, and he's doing a very good job with a very, very tough situation. >> okay. so you can't halt funding to the world health organization for doing at first exactly what you did. but most important, we can't weaken our connections to the rest of the world right now. this has been an ugly and sad reminder of just how interconnected we all are, just how profound the interdependence is. don't blame the world health organization. we don't need that right now. okay? so again, let's balance what he's doing that's wrong and what we like to see. we like him backing off his proclaim, quote, total authority over the states. why? because he doesn't have it. and it's important for him to recognize that. but in that context, listen to this -- >> i will be speaking to all 50 governors very shortly. and i will then be authorizing each individual governor of each individual state to implement a re-opening and a very powerful re-opening plan of their state at a time and in a manner a

. >> just spoke to president xi. a very tough situation but i think he's going to handle it.hink he's handled it well. i think china is professionally run in the sense that they have everything under control. i think they've handled it professionally and i think they're extremely capable and i think president xi is extremely capable and i hope it's going to be resolved. >> i think president xi is working very hard. i really believe he wants to get that done and get it done fast. >> i think president xi is working very, very hard. i think he's doing a very good job. >> the w.h.o. willingly took china' assurances at face value and took it at face value and defended the actions of the chinese government, even praising china for its so-called transparency. i don't think so. >> president also praised the transparency. now the largest professional association of physicians, american medical association, calling the president's decision to halt funding dangerous. the president of the american medical association, patrice harris, joining me now. thank you for joining us. first, who s

so president xi points out he has essentially that give us all the power.you don't have any individual rights we promise you will have prosperity and peace. that would be the glue that held the country together. and that faded away. there is no real ideology. and then maybe ethnic pride and historical pride. so that is the deal of the chinese leadership. and prosperity has increased but when china's leader advanced it wasn't like america or in the west with the young person at an old person on old candidate and a young candidate and medium. in china you advance with your generation. so you start out probably identified at ten years old as a smart person to be nurtured so the chinese advance with their age group. by the time they are president they have seen all the leaders they are now dealing with and their government bureaucracy and form policy and they have been working together for decades. >> you don't move your class or age group at your age cohort so what about today? where were they in the formative years of their lives? they were in the middle of a

that's why i asked the president if he ever spoke to president xi about that in the president said i'm not going to tell you what i talked to him about in regard to the laboratory but it does indicate that there may have been a conversation there. in the meantime, all of this new information is swirling. the president still embroiled in the midst of controversy over his decision in the rose garden or at least the announcement that he is going to temporarily cut funding for the world health organization. >> president trump and his team is standing by his decision to cut funding to the world health organization for 60 to 90 days, the white house insisted the w.h.o. dropped the ball on the outbreak in china. >> the return on investment would be for the w.h.o. to be honest about the origin of the virus in wuhan, they lied about that or want transparent about that. >> the head of the w.h.o. critical of the decision. >> this is a time for all of us to be united in our common struggle against a common threat, a dangerous enemy. >> in a statement house speaker nancy pelosi singh this is anothe

it will all work out well, in particular on behalf of the american people i want to thank president xi. what did the world, including president trump, know about the virus at that point? well, one day earlier, on january 23rd, the world health organization warned all countries should be prepared for containment of the virus including active surveillance, early detection, isolation and case management. contact tracing and prevention of onward spread. at this point stories about the virus were all over the news. china had announced the virus was being transmitted among human beings and begun locking down hubei province. as for the u.s. government, on january 18th, a week earlier, health and human services secretary, alex azar had briefed trump on the dangers of the virus, according to the "washington post". on january 24th, there were two confirmed cases of the disease in the u.s. on january 27th the centers for disease control issued a level three warning to avoid nonessential travel to china. on january 29th, trump tweeted just received a briefing on the coronavirus and china from all

sanctions and decoupling restricts china's ability to goingnto the world, xi is to find himself in a of trouble. the argument is excellent stuff it is clear and straightforward in a lot like the argument that say this fear rally is dramatically overbought in the market is going to take now because here are the reasons why it go down. i have been hearing these arguments about china being unable to survive in the system breaking down and falling into crisis when it can't the expectations of citizens for 20 or 30 years, just like the last month everybody in the market has been hearing, the market is going to drop again quickly but it hasn't. china has gone from success to success 2. going forward, are you bearish or bullish on china? they're are good reasons to think that china is actually going to face problems. on the other hand right now, the's response to the crisis has been so pathetic that china looks good in comparison. the question will be when things settle down, after the dust is settled, who looks more competent at the end of the day. francine: at the same time, we hearing fr

the he is performing a difficult balancing act, he wants to maintain good relations with xi because heope he will get a big trade deal and he's banking on that personal relationship. whether he can straddle that for the next several months is going to be interesting to watch. >> bret: last word, different topic. that's about the food supply in the u.s., concern about the meat-packing plants possibly closing down because of all of this. the president taking action with an executive order and the balance back and forth of telling people you got to get in there and protect the food supply for americans. it's interesting to see the administration's take on this. >> i think it shows the overall impact economically of this virus and the domino effect it has to continue on even as the economy opens up in certain areas. the food supply chain is something the administration and congress thought was safe about a month ago with the grocery stores but now we are seeing with the restaurants being shut down and not taking in a lot of produce, that of course makes it so farmers are unable to sell the

i'm thinking particularly, for example, of climate change, where the 0bama administration and xi jinpingut i can't see this changing until the us election, and that will depend on the results of the us election. until then, europe is providing some leadership on some things, at least individual voices are. in europe we have merkel at the end of her time, we have macron who hasn't quite made it as a substitute, hard as he is trying. we have britain in a state of political vacuum, still. so it's very difficult to see where it's coming from, where constructive leadership would come from at this point, and into a vacuum of course all sorts of negative forces rush. we have screening propaganda aimed at domestic constituencies coming from all sorts of places, particularly, again, the us and china and, in the middle of this, toxic disinformation and bad actors who simply paralysed the political process, so it's not a great situation right now. let's spend a couple of minutes dealing directly with the sniping between the us and china. the pandemic almost turned into a proxy for this great power