The Fundamental Difference between the U.S. and China

Why is the United States so anti-Chinese? Why all this Sinophobia?   

It’s because of the basic difference between China and the U.S. that virtually none of our basically ignorant “leaders” — much less the mainstream media — seems to understand. Let me explain.

On the one hand, you have the United States. It’s leading a coalition of overwhelmingly white European colonialists who with less than 25% of the world’s population think they somehow have the right to control the entire world. In this context, the U.S. with 4.2% of the population considers itself the leader that can dictate terms to the other 95.8% of the world, including those Europeans whom it has successfully and surprisingly reduced to the status of obedient and subservient vassals.

In its position as world hegemon that alone emerged unscathed from the ravages of World War II (aka the second Intercapitalist war) the U.S. has decided to maintain control the world militarily. As a result, it annually invests more of its national treasure in war and preparation for war than the next nine countries combined (including China and Russia). A huge proportion of that treasure is spent on maintaining more than 750 military bases in more than 80 countries across the planet.

U.S. bases represent a key element in our country’s neo-colonial strategy aimed at controlling the Global Majority (i.e. former colonies) by regime-change interventions. These interventions have the United States removing from office any governments seeking to directly improve the lives of their citizens by redistributing income, or by providing healthcare, education, or other benefits and laws directly benefitting working classes rather than the wealthy and corporate interests. Since the 1950s, the world has witnessed such interventions in Iran, Guatemala, Korea, Vietnam, Cuba, Nicaragua, Iraq, Venezuela, Libya, and other locations too numerous to list here.

Yes, regime changes benefit the rich and powerful. However, in terms of directly benefitting you and me, those operations and the bases that support them contribute virtually nothing. Yes, they keep millions of military personnel off the streets as well as providing jobs for those working in weapons manufacturing plants. However, the bases and forever wars they stimulate are otherwise completely counterproductive.

For instance, over the past two years, Washington has spent $175 billion on its proxy war in Ukraine which according to Lloyd Austin is aimed at regime change in Russia. That means $175 billion not spent on universal healthcare, not funding college tuition, not providing improvements in infrastructure, not spent on highspeed rail or on mitigating the effects of climate change. All of us can see the results in our decaying urban centers with homeless beggars sleeping on sidewalks and in tents under our bridges.

In other words, overseas military bases are completely parasitic. They live off the rest of us devouring the nutrients that would otherwise sustain and improve our quality of life. Internationally, their purpose is to maintain “stability” in a world where power and wealth have since WWII been concentrated in the U.S. and Europe – the imperial countries that have controlled the world for the past half-millennium. It’s a world of billionaires on the one hand and grinding poverty on the other – especially in the former colonies.

Contrast this U.S. parasitism with the policies of China. As indicated above, China spends far less than the United States on its military. China maintains but a single military base outside its borders. It hasn’t fired a bullet beyond those confines over the last 40 years.

Instead of investing in bloodsucking military bases, China maintains what might be described as development nodes across the planet. Over the past decade and more, its “Belt and Road Initiative” has constructed highways, ports, electrical grids, and highspeed rail systems across Asia, Europe, Africa, and Latin America from Beijing to Tierra del Fuego. And those installations have vastly improved the lives of ordinary people wherever they appear – including those of the Chinese people themselves. As everyone knows, China was recently recognized by the United Nations as successfully raising more than 800,000 of its own citizens from extreme poverty.

What I’m describing here is the rebalancing of the world. Led by China, the planet’s majority is asserting the power that belongs to it in terms of population, which by the way is not white. China has about 18.5% of the world’s population; Africa has about the same; India has slightly more. All those non-white people are rebelling against the humiliation of control by the whites who have drawn completely arbitrary borders. That’s legendary in Africa and the Mid-East where colonizers in their tents drew lines on maps arbitrarily cutting up Africa and all that Mid-East desert land floating on a sea of oil. And they did so with virtually no knowledge of the countries, cultures, and populations they were dividing.

Accordingly, the non-white victims of such ignorance are currently refusing to honor such geographical restrictions. Under pressures from climate change (induced by the colonizers) and by the absolute decimation of western regime-change wars, the victims of such policies are relocating massively. And they won’t be stopped by walls, laws, or border patrols – and much less by ignorant nativist arguments. Yes, people of color are here to stay. Get used to it. Trump or no Trump, they will not be denied.

 It’s a new multi-polar world. It’s time has come. It is long overdue. My only fear is that the “leaders” of the collective west might find the loss of hegemony so threatening that they’ll decide to end the world by initiating a nuclear war. They’ve thought about this before. Remember “It’s better to be dead than red?”

Their new line seems to be: “It’s better to be dead than not in complete control.”

God help us!

U.S. Divide & Rule Strategy vs. China’s Unifying Belt & Road Initiative

Readings for Pentecost Sunday: Genesis 11: 1-9; Psalm 104: 1-2, 24, 35, 27-30; Romans 8: 22-27; Acts 2: 1-11.

Last week Russia’s Vladimir Putin got the red-carpet treatment when he and virtually his entire government leadership met with Xi Jingping and his governing counterparts for a two-day summit in Beijing.

The collective west was apoplectic in response.

What were these two villains up to? Surely, they’re conspiring to take over the world.

The Washington Post fretted about connections between Russia and China on the one hand and with Iran and North Korea on the other.

But of course, what transpired last week in China is far bigger than any of that. It’s not just a worrisome alliance between the countries just mentioned. Ultimately, it’s a question of pacts between China, Russia, and the entire Global South (aka the Global Majority) that’s now taking practical form in BRICS+. And the threat there is not primarily military. It’s economic.

It’s the fearful (to the west) specter of a world order of cooperation, mutual benefit, and majority rule replacing that of western neocolonial empire with its ancient “divide and rule” tactics.

In the context of this Pentecost Sunday homily, you might even call such replacement “spiritual,” “biblical,” or (yes) “Pentecostal.”

Let me show you what I mean by elucidating what the west can’t understand about Russia and China’s shared project, about the difference between that project and the one favored by the collective west, and finally about the connections between all of that and today’s readings for this Pentecost Sunday.

The Project of the Collective West 

What the collective west cannot understand about China is that its worldview is radically different from its own.

Especially since the Reagan-Thatcher era, the west has returned to the Hobbesian and social Darwinian superstition that human beings are primarily individuals constantly at one another’s throats.

They’ve become convinced that humans are basically selfish and locked in a “war of all against all.” Hence, “forever wars” are normal and the best we can do.

Westerners have also come to believe that government is somehow the enemy, that its size must be reduced to such an extent that it (as Grover Norquist said) can be drowned in a bathtub. This means that market regulation and taxation must be reduced to a minimum.

Even more importantly, the prevailing western belief system holds that its somehow natural and divinely ordained that just 4.2% of the world’s population (i.e. the United States) should run the world. White people are exceptional. In traditional terms, the DICTATORSHIP of the collective west’s bourgeoisie (of the G7) is part of the natural order.

As a result, any threat to such hegemony must be crushed.

Westerners take all that as self-evident truth forgetting that IT’S JUST A POINT OF VIEW – that btw happens to perfectly support huge wealth disparities and favorable profit margins of the military industrial complex. They forget that there are alternatives – other viewpoints that happen to be working far better than the positions just listed.

The Project of Russia and China

And that brings us back to Beijing.

China, Russia, and the Global Majority have a different approach to political economy. And virtually no one in the west gets it.    

And it is here that China leads the way. It is led by a workers’ party that as such seeks to replace the “divide and rule” dictatorship of the bourgeoisie with the leadership of working classes and their political representatives.

This simply means that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP} aspires to walk a fine line that prioritizes the welfare of the majority over that of corporations, billionaires, and of a state entirely beholden to their interests.  The CCP has the final word. It protects local currency. Without stifling private enterprise, it protects its majority from the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie.

Accordingly, the CCP for example easily exercises eminent domain to advance projects (e.g. high-speed rail) deemed necessary to serve the common good. The CCP recognizes and suppresses as “corruption” egregious exercise of power on the part of the billionaire classes.

In short, Chinese political theory rejects “divide and rule” in favor of common good, multi-polarity, national sovereignties, and international cooperation. It seeks a world with room for everyone, with abundance for all, and where independent nations trade freely for mutual benefit. It is a world governed by international law directed by the United Nations. That’s the vision of “socialism with Chinese characteristics.”

Pie in the sky, you say?

Not really. Witness China’s success in eliminating extreme poverty in record time. Witness the success of its Belt and Road initiative. Witness all the countries lining up to join BRICS +.

For China, the west’s “divide and rule” gives way to multipolarity and cooperation. In contrast to the United States’ forever wars and its 700 military bases throughout the world, China hasn’t fired a shot outside its borders in more than 40 years and has only one military base outside its borders.

Today’s Readings
And that brings us to the readings for this Pentecost Sunday. They too contrast “divide and rule” strategies with those of mutual understanding.

What follows are my “translations” of the readings. Check out the originals here to see if I’ve got them right.

Genesis 11: 1-9: So, you think the “divide and rule” principle came from the Romans? If so, you’re wrong. “Divide and rule” came from the mysterious “Powerful Ones” (the biblical Elohim) who once ruled this earth. Where they came from no one knows. Perhaps from another planet or from all those leagues under the sea. In any case, they were terribly threatened by the humans they needed to supply them with the beef, gold and young virgins. (Powerful Ones always seem to require those.) So, when the Elohim saw humans cooperating to build cities with skyscrapers reaching to the heavens, the Powerful Ones intervened. They somehow made it impossible for people to understand each other. Suddenly they were divided into incomprehensible language groups. Ever since, other Powerful Ones (yes, like the Romans and the “Americans”) have aggressively adopted their own “divide and rule” strategies. They invent borders along with cultural, religious, and racial identities to keep humans apart lest they discover the immense power of universal cooperation.

Psalm 104: 1-2, 24, 35, 27-30: Far from dividing humans, Yahweh’s Great Spirit wills a New Earth whose creatures share the same breath and live in complete harmony, not division. Yahweh’s earth provides abundance for all including food and every good thing imaginable. Everything belongs to humans as a gift from Yahweh. She is indeed to be praised.

Romans 8: 22-27: This abundant Spirit of God is on our side as we earthlings struggle to replace the results of the Powerful Ones’ “divide and rule” strategies with God’s New Earth and its abundance for all. That shared plenty is what we’re all hoping for even though it’s hard to see in this purposely divided world. Resist! Be strong! Believe! Hope! God’s New Earth is possible! Another world is on the horizon. It is necessary.

Acts 2: 1-11: Fifty days after Yeshua’s assassination, his Spirit of community replaced the Elohim’s “divide and rule” scheme. With the descent of Yeshua’s Spirit, all language barriers vanished. Parthians, Medes, and Elamites, inhabitants of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the districts of Libya near Cyrene, as well as travelers from Rome, both Jews and converts to Judaism, Cretans and Arabs, all understood that they shared a single Spirit uniting them all. They vowed to resume building the City of God –TOGETHER.

Conclusion

Yes, today’s readings suggest that China, Russia, and the Global Majority represented by BRICS + are on the right track. The United States and the collective West are not.

If Planet Earth is to survive, something like China’s approach to government, national sovereignty, common good, abundance for all, international cooperation, and multipolarity must replace Hobbes, social darwinism, forever wars, minority dominance, and divide and rule.

Ironically, the CCP is closer to the spirit of Pentecost than the “Christian” west.

In Defense of Higher Education: How To Address Genocidal Congress-members

As a life-long academic, I’m still smarting from watching Minouche Shafik, the president of Columbia University, being bullied during her nearly four-hour testimony before the Republican-led Committee on Education and the Workforce.

The House committee was convened to uncover anti-Semitism on U.S. campuses in the context of students protesting the genocide taking place before our eyes in Gaza and on the West Bank.

It was embarrassing to see President Minouche Shafik grovel before congress-members who evidently know nothing about higher education. Adopting her best baby fundie voice and attitude, she squirmed, smiled, and assured her interrogators that student “mobs” protesting Zionist genocide would be duly restricted and professors exposing students to Palestinian history and viewpoints would be fired.  

Previously, the committee exuding full redolence of the McCarthy era, had been successful in forcing the resignations of the presidents of Harvard and the University of Pennsylvania. The resignations resulted from the women’s alleged failures to restrict student demonstrations on their campuses against the slaughter taking place in Palestine over the past six months.

Evidently, the intention in grilling president Shafik was to add a third victim to their list of forced presidential resignations. 

 While my disappointment with the Colombia president was real, my heart went out to the poor woman. She seemed intimidated, anxious to please, fawning, and frankly fearful of losing her job.

Imagine having to answer questions like the one posed by Representative Lisa McClain (R Michigan). She demanded a “yes or no” answer to her question: “Are mobs shouting, ‘From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free,’ or ‘long live the infanttada (sic)’ – are those antisemitic comments. Yes or no?

In response, poor Ms. Shafik was at a complete loss for words.

She shouldn’t have been.

As an academic, she should have had the wherewithal to say, “Ms. McClain, that’s not a yes or no question. It’s like the old saw, “’Yes or no, are you still beating your wife?’ Or like my asking you, ‘Tell me, yes or no, are you still accepting bribes from the military-industrial complex.’ I mean, it’s either a trick gotcha question or (with all due respect) an ignorant one. The answer is complicated.

“For example, Benjamin Netanyahu has endorsed the slogan ‘From the river to the sea’ to define Israel’s ambitions in Palestine. Yes, he has. You can Google it. Was Netanyahu’s (as you put it) an anti-Semitic comment? Remember the Palestinians are Semites too. Or perhaps you’ve forgotten that.”

“Do you see the complications I’m talking about?’

And as for your questions about Intifada. . .. (And by the way, it’s pronounced ‘in-teh-fah-dah’ not ‘infant-tah-dah’) Do you know what the word means? Yes or no, do you?

“In case you don’t, let me tell you it refers to aggressive nonviolent resistance to illegal Zionist occupation of Gaza, the West Bank, and East Jerusalem by the apartheid Israeli government. You can Google that too.

“And even if such protests turned violent, are you familiar with Article 51of the UN Charter? Yes or no.

“I can see by your hesitation, that perhaps you don’t. So let me inform you that Article 51 gives the right to those in illegally occupied territories to use violence against their occupiers.”

It would have been fun to see Ms. McClain squirm a bit and to hear her comments.

Can’t be done, you say?

Yes, it can.

Left-wing member of the British Parliament George Galloway showed how. In 2005 he testified before the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. He had been accused of making a questionable oil deal on behalf of his campaign to end the Iraq war. Had the deal included a kick-back to the then villain of the hour, Iraq’s Saddam Hussein? Yes or no.

Here’s a shortened version of how he addressed his questioners. (It’s also worth reviewing his entire 48-minute statement): 

Had President Shafik adopted George Galloway’s confidence and tone, she would have said something like this:

“Honorable congress-members, thank you for inviting me here today and offering me opportunity to defend the University of Colombia and  its students from the slander, calumny, and outright lies endorsed by this committee. Let me assure you that Colombia University today under my leadership is the same institution of higher learning that its proud history has always shown it to be. In that tradition, we have a first-class faculty that has been vetted, constantly peer-reviewed, and evaluated, and held to the highest standards. Those standards require professors in every discipline to introduce students to all sides of every debate. There can no limits to topics addressed. Absolutely none. So, for you to summon me here under accusations that a topic or point of view forbidden by the state has been addressed, discussed, or expressed by members of our faculty is frankly insulting. It is also insulting for you to demand that I dismiss Columbia faculty members on the mere accusation of their engaging in speech forbidden by the state. We have rules and procedures at Colombia that restrict such precipitous termination without hearings and deliberation by faculty commissions. That is, your demands reveal a profound misunderstanding of the function and democratic procedures governing higher education. Similarly, your evident desire to prevent students from taking sides with the victims of genocide now unfolding in Gaza flies in the face of our university’s valued tradition of freedom of expression, and of our nation’s Constitution which guarantees freedom of speech and the right of petition. In this committee, you seem unaware that more than 34,000 Gazans (fully half of them children and their mothers) have been slaughtered by the Zionists over the last six months before our very eyes. At Colombia, we are proud that our students can recognize such genocide and reject the very crimes that you, are aiding and abetting. I mean, everyone here who has voted to supply the Zionists with arms is guilty of genocide. Shame on you all! Your participation in that crime reveals this present reincarnation of McCarthyism for what it is. This hearing is nothing more than a smokescreen to divert public attention from your crimes and from those of Zionist apartheid settler-colonialists. Again, I thank you for the opportunity to set the record straight.”

Yes, Ms. Shafik could have responded just as George Galloway did. That she didn’t shows how not only our representatives and the mass media have become agents of state propaganda. So has higher education.