With the economy on the brink of a slowdown, this has put President Trump in a very difficult position. It's put him in a position where if he takes a strong stand against China, it could in fact damage his re-election prospects in a serious way. And so, in a time when we should be ratcheting up the possibility of economic sanctions, we're actually ratcheting down the possibility of economic sanctions. Whereas before when we should have been negotiating a trade deal. We shouldn’t have exited the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), we should have renegotiated it. It was a mistake to exit TPP which is a trade deal directed against the economic strength of China in Asia. All the lies about the TPP that it was good for China was a lie. TPP was designed explicitly as a counterbalance to Chinese infiltration economically in the region.
You know, in a time when we should have been looking for a trade deal, we were searching instead for trade conflict. In a time when we should be ratcheting up trade conflict, as an effect of trying to help the Hong Kong protesters, we're not doing any of that. And so, this has led President Trump to this bizarre kind of halfway position on Hong Kong. So, in the last 24 hours he's tweeted out, "As usual, China said they were going to be buying 'big' from our great American Farmers. So far they have not done what they said. Maybe this will be different!"
I don't know what the h*ll that means. And then he added, "Many are blaming me, and the United States, for the problems going on in Hong Kong. I can't imagine why?"
Again, Trump is not responsible for what's going on in Hong Kong. But this would be a time for him to stand up for freedom, in an area of the world that deserves it. It had negotiated for it and now is not receiving it from what is a geopolitical enemy of the United States. China is stealing our technology, building rival 5G networks that attempt to provide a counterbalance to our 5G networks that we are building right now. We are in a second Cold War with the Chinese.
It will stay cold, we can all hope. But the fact is that the Chinese are an expansionist power, and they have been both militarily and technologically. They're doing so at the expense of the United States, and if we're going to take harsh action against China, you need to make the case. Now Trump keeps making this sort of weird case where Xi Jinping is his best friend, and we're great, going to negotiate a deal together, and at the same time the Chinese keep jacking us, and the Chinese are the worst. They're cheating us, and they're stealing our manufacturing jobs.
Explain what it is you are doing, President Trump, if you want the American people to be with you — and especially again in the midst of a time when there are protesters in the streets in Hong Kong who may be mowed down by the Chinese government in the very near future — this would be a time for you to stand up.
[You should] say, "This is why we've been putting tariffs on China. It's because of crap like this that we've been putting tariffs on China, and as JFK put it, 'We will bear any burden in the name of liberty.'" And I'm sorry, but getting slightly more expensive goods from China in the name of liberty doesn't seem like all that much of a burden to bear to help the people of Hong Kong. They are flying the American flag while they are protesting for their freedom. This would be the time when Trump should stand up with the protesters. [...]
https://www.dailywire.com/news/50676/shapiro-trump-needs-stand-hong-kong-daily-wire
