China’s Ticking Time Bomb

After decades of unprecedented economic growth, the CCP seems on the verge of a new era.

By and
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Happy Wednesday! As is always the case with these regional meetups, we were blown away by the turnout and the quality conversations at Café Hollander in Wauwatosa, Wisconsin, last night!

Next up: Des Moines. Iowans, keep an eye out for additional details in the coming weeks!

Quick Hits: Today’s Top Stories

  • Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo will travel to China next week, the Commerce Department confirmed Tuesday. Raimondo, whose unclassified email was the target of a Chinese hack earlier this year, will be the latest in a series of Biden administration officials to visit the country as the United States implements export and investment restrictions on  China. Ahead of the trip, the Biden administration lifted some limits on exports to 27 Chinese entities while also imposing visa restrictions on some Chinese officials for abuses against Tibetan children.
  • The Biden administration on Tuesday rolled out another student loan repayment plan, months after the Supreme Court struck down Biden’s effort to cancel up to $20,000 in student loan debt for some borrowers. The SAVE Plan—Saving on a Valuable Education—will adjust loan repayment based on income and household size and caps interest accrual for borrowers who enroll.
  • House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan and Ways and Means Committee Chairman Jason Smith subpoenaed several FBI and Internal Revenue Service agents on Monday in an effort to probe whistleblowers’ allegations regarding the investigation into Hunter Biden. The Republican lawmakers believe—based on claims by IRS whistleblower Gary Shapley—that the subpoenaed officials were privy to an October 7, 2022, meeting where David Weiss, the federal prosecutor investigating Biden, may have suggested the decision whether or not to bring charges was not ultimately in his hands. 
  • John Eastman—one of former President Donald Trump’s former advisors and a co-defendant in the Fulton County, Georgia, case regarding attempts to overthrow the 2020 election—turned himself in to Fulton County authorities Tuesday with an arraignment expected in the next several weeks. The judge overseeing the case ruled Tuesday the arraignments—including that of Trump—could be televised.  Meanwhile former assistant attorney general Jeffrey Clark and David Shafer, one of the fake electors, joined Mark Meadows in filing notices of removal to have the case taken out of state court and moved into the federal system. 
  • Existing home sales fell in July for the fourth time in five months, slipping by 2.2 percent month-over-month and 16.6 percent yearly, the National Association of Realtors said Tuesday. The slump comes amid rising mortgage rates, limited supply, and spiking home prices—the national median existing-home price rose 1.9 percent in July from the previous year. 
  • Iran unveiled a drone—similar in design to the U.S. MQ-9 Reaper drone—Tuesday which it says has a range making it capable of reaching Israel. Iran’s state-run news agency claimed the new unmanned aerial vehicle could carry a bomb with a more than 600 pound payload or surveillance equipment.
  • President Joe Biden appointed Ed Siskel as the new White House Counsel Tuesday. Previously deputy counsel during the Obama administration and counsel in the Chicago mayor’s office under Rahm Emmanuel, Siskel will replace Stuart Delery, whose departure Biden announced last week. 
  • Former Democratic Rep. Debbie Mucarsel-Powell of Florida said Tuesday she will challenge Sen. Rick Scott for his seat in 2024. Mucarsel-Powell served one term in Congress from 2018-2020 and is currently the only candidate running against Scott, who was formerly governor of Florida. 
  • A Chicago woman was charged Monday with threatening to shoot former President Donald Trump and his teenage son Barron in a series of emails to the headmaster of Barron Trump’s Florida school in May and June. Tracy Fiorenza—whom the Secret Service has been aware of for several years and whom law enforcement officials say struggles with mental health issues for which she’s stopped taking her medication—was remanded into the custody of U.S. Marshals and will likely be transferred to Florida, where the charges were filed.

China’s Beaten Economic Path

HANGZHOU, CHINA – AUGUST 18, 2023 – The logo of Evergrande Real Estate is seen at the construction site of a real estate project in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province, China, August 18, 2023. (Photo by Costfoto/NurPhoto via Getty Images)

Traveling outside of China for just the second time in 2023, President Xi Jinping was scheduled to deliver a speech in Johannesburg on Tuesday during the annual BRICS Summit that features Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa. At the last minute, however, he decided to skip it. Chinese Commerce Minister Wang Wentao spoke instead.

The summit came a week after dismal economic data showed the Chinese economy continues to sour—perhaps the reason for Xi’s speaking absence. Bad news in China is like fight club: you don’t talk about it. For example, the National Bureau of Statistics suspended its reporting on youth unemployment last week after it reached 21.3 percent in June—the highest rate since China started publishing the data in 2018. And more storm clouds are on the horizon for the “miracle economy.”

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  1. BDM

    China's demographic issues are the reason I give credence to the idea that the laboratory escape of Covid, a disease that can be particularly deadly to the elderly and the infirm but is relatively harmless to the young and healthy, may not have been an accident.

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      Jeff Walden

      I can't envision a scenario where someone releases a novel virus inside its own country in an attempt to hobble other countries.

      And, as in warfare, you don't really want a virus that kills people, as this one (overall) infrequently did (yet much more so with age, infirmity, etc.). You want something that incapacitates people so that you clog up all the systems designed to keeping people alive. (I have vague recollection that one non-death casualty on a battlefield ties up several times more people dealing with it -- I want to say 10 but can't find corroboration and am not confident in that memory.) COVID-19 fits that some, but it would be better if it didn't actually kill people, as the death is what makes people most panicky. Sure, it killed "few" -- but fewer would be even better.

      There's still plenty of debate about it leaking out of a lab accidentally. But I can't make out a scenario where the leak is deliberate -- and in the same city as one of your internationally-known BSLs, even.

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    2. Neelthakrebew

      It's a question worth asking, but I don't think it could possibly be true.
      Until a virus has infected a number of subjects, its qualities cannot be known. SARS 1 was also a coronavirus, but because the infection settled deep in the lungs, it was it was quite hard to spread. So, it killed a total of 7000.
      SARS 2 (usually called COVID) settles throughout the entire respiratory tract, including the nose, so that it can be coughed out very easily. So, it's death toll was over 1000 times more than SARS 1.
      I think that the very high transmissibility of SARS 2 and the population it would impact most would be completely impossible to predict. Unless they did a trial run on a prison population or the Uighurs, in which case it would have escaped from that trial population, before it ever got to Wuhan.
      Note that, SARS 2 is one of the most transmissible viruses in history— somewhere up there with measles, and far moreso than flu.

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  2. Wlbrockman

    Re today's question: The realistic and the absurd are the same given the quality of the field. They'll all make fools of themselves, further cementing Mr. Trump's lead. Now, if Kevin Williamson was, in fact, the moderator, well....🤣

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    Richard Maxton

    OK, who had "plane crash" on the "Nothing to See Here, Move Along, DEFINITELY Not Suspicious Russian Death" Bingo card?

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  4. Nicco

    Realistic: It will be boring.
    Imaginative: Christie runs away with the show, eliciting rapturous applause, followed by the actual Rapture and freezing over of Hell.

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    Mattjabour

    I don't know why everyone just repeats the "1.4 billion" number like we can just trust any statistic China puts out. I've seen a conflicting study that suggests their population is closer to 1.2 billion.

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    C C Writer

    I like the word "subpoenaed" because it contains two diphthongs.

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  7. Deanjens

    I'm glad that Pence made the debate, not because I expect him to say much, but because his very existence is a reminder that anyone around the former guy who is still capable of embarrassment should be embarrassed.

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      Show Jay Janney the 🚪!

      What do you dislike about Pence?

      I am curious, once Trump locked down the Republican nomination, who did you want him to select as Veep?

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      1. Deanjens

        I think you've read what I wrote in almost the exact opposite way from how I meant it. I think Pence more than anything right now is a symbol of having some kind of spine, some kind of moral compass, some line he is unwilling to cross to secure power at the expense of the country. It seems like "declined to hold down the republic and rip the beating heart of democracy out of its chest" is a rather low bar, but the fact that he in particular cleared it highlights how many people failed to.

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  8. Dnels

    LUK:

    1) DeSantis will implode in a manner that will make his meltdown against Crist look like Lincoln-Douglas debate material.
    2) Trump will fly in from the wings WWE style, throw verbal haymakers at everyone, including the FOX moderators, and run out leaving devastation in his wake.

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  9. R. James

    China has also likely overcounted its Under 40 population by 163 to 220 million, which means that the population of China is not 1.4 billion but closer to 1.2 billion. If this is the case, China is much further along in their demographic crisis than commonly understood.

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      Abridge683

      This is an interesting assertion. Can you connect it to a reliable source? I'd be interested to see the analysis.

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      Jean-Christophe Jouffrey

      Dear R. James,

      if this is the case, then youth unemployment is not as bad, by a very big margin, as what is reported.

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    PJ

    LUK:
    1. It will be mistaken for a Jerry Springer rerun.
    2. Jesus will rapture all of them from the debate stage, and The Biggest Loser from his golden seat in his living room, wearing just underwear with a big mac in his mouth.

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