Pelosi arrives
 

Sooo glad to see Speaker Pelosi arrive in Taipei….in a 737
Ya think her crew was nervous?

I'm glad she manned up and stuck to her guns on that.

I'm glad the WH didn't roll over either.

I suspect that PRC activity in the area was monitored closely. Entirely possible the 737 wasn't all by it's lonesome out there.

Also glad she didn’t have to arrive “under sniper fire”, tee hee.

Reminds me of a scene at a bar where two groups of guys who really don't get along, mutually keep separated and drink peacefully knowing chit would start immediately if either side starts a move.

All is peaceful until someone's idiot girfriend starts mouthing off to the other side without a clue as to what she is doing or who she is fck-ing with.

I have know problem with a fight with a good reason, not for BS politics which is exactly what she is doing.

I know that President Biden told her publicly not to go.

What did he tell her privately? I don't know, and neither do you. Maybe he wanted her to go to tweak China's nose. That could be interesting.

Joe

I don't care why she went. ANY US citizen can go to ANY other country (aside from PRC) for ANY reason and the CCP doesn't get a vote. Eff them.

If she tries to go to PRC uninvited, then they can shoot her down I guess.

Absolutely. The visit needed to be made to show China that intimidation is not going to work.

As much as i abhor her political leanings, I’m impressed she had the stones to take the trip. Even more impressed the dems let her go. Glad to see them backing a US ally for a change. If only we could get them on board to back Israel better.

Which makes it good that she's barely understandable a lot of the time.

I'm sure someone knows, I didn't really follow much. But why the Speaker of the House and NOT the Sec State?

Anything that antagonizes the CCP is good with me. I'm generally not a fan of our middle east/Levant "allies", nor our general foreign policy for the last 40 years, but when it comes to the CCP, I'm unusually hawkish. That organization and their socio-cultural ethos of control/governance is nothing I want expanding into our sphere of living. I rather live with the warts of our [American] empire misgivings, than a CCP Chinese one. Thankfully their demographics are crushing their ability to project power in the next 5-10 years.

Now that ^^^^ deserves a toast.

I’ll second that

If the visit was not coordinated with the WH... Nancy is a member of the legislative branch, and is mostly free to do what she wants. The executive (the administration) isn't her boss. The executive can forbid US citizens from traveling to specific countries for national security reasons, but that's an extreme measure. And it cannot be selectively applied to specific individuals, it would legally have to be all or nothing. Most famously, Cuba.

If the visit was coordinated with the WH (appears that it was)... a congress person is actually less inflammatory than SECSTATE. The former is an elected rep of one congressional district. The later is a member of the executive, and the direct rep of POTUS and the United States.

Nancy sends a stronger message than a junior congress critter from Oklahoma. But not as strong a message as SECSTATE, VPOTUS, or the man himself.

I'll take "Who participates in a congressional delegation? For 100".

Has someone been listening to Peter Zeihan?

What a stupidly misogynistic opinion.

That all makes sense to people with democratic governing principles.

But does China ACTUALLY care about all that?

Yet steeped in reality.

Who is Peter Zeihan?

A number of news articles have been floating around for close to a decade discussing how the combination of China’s one child policy and the crippling cost of raising a child in China’s urban areas was crushing their birth rate. One predicted China’s population would crash this century to below that of the US. If current demographic trends continue in China, it could be very destabilizing for all of east Asia.

I don't know if the PRC cares. I was explaining it to someone who asked.

But PRC understands the distinction, they are by no means oblivious to the nature of their enemy. Sun Tzu was one of them.

He’s a geopolitical strategist that gives talks on the exact stuff you mentioned. That’s why I thought you’d heard of him.
I started watching / listening to his stuff since the start of the Ukraine invasion and I was pretty impressed by his predictions coming true on its ramifications.
Here’s a talk he gave to the Army’s Maneuver Warfare Center a while back. Pretty interesting stats and exploration of the second and third order effects we may face. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l0CQsifJrMc
apologies for the drift.

That's true, but actually makes them potentially more dangerous... peaking-power syndrome.