The Ben Shapiro Show - EVERYBODY’S LYING: Trump Outplays China’s Xi!

00:00:00.000 You've been hearing all week long that President Trump was going to get rolled by the Chinese. 1.00

00:00:03.000 They have all the leverage. 0.80

00:00:04.000 Trump is going to chicken out.

00:00:05.000 China is on the rise.

00:00:07.000 Wrong. 0.53

00:00:07.000 Trump just got China to commit to opening the Strait of Hormuz without Iranian tolls, opposing Iran ever having a nuclear weapon and also buying more American oil. 0.53

00:00:18.000 So, um, that's called winning, not losing.

00:00:21.000 I'll give you all the details in just a moment.

00:00:23.000 Plus, we will also talk about people who hate the idea of American hegemony or don't understand basic economics or both and how these folks threaten America's dominant global position.

00:00:32.000 Plus, We'll get to the Democratic attempt to stop Spencer Pratt from becoming mayor of LA.

00:00:36.000 This is the Ben Shapiro Show.

00:00:43.000 So, if you listen to the legacy media, President Trump had none of the cards.

00:00:48.000 He's going over to Beijing and he's in Beijing, and this means that he's now going to get shellacked.

00:00:52.000 The New York Times had a bunch of headlines all saying the same thing with about the same credibility as a Nick Kristof column on rape dogs.

00:00:59.000 The New York Times had a headline that said, quote, Xi holds the high ground on trade and Iran.

00:01:06.000 Does he, though?

00:01:08.000 Does he?

00:01:08.000 The New York Times.

00:01:09.000 Why Xi doesn't need a deal with Trump.

00:01:11.000 The Washington Post.

00:01:12.000 A president bogged down.

00:01:14.000 How the Iran war stripped Trump of leverage with Xi.

00:01:16.000 The Economist.

00:01:17.000 The Art of the Heel.

00:01:18.000 Why Donald Trump is on the back foot in Beijing.

00:01:20.000 Foreign Affairs.

00:01:21.000 The Diluted Superpower.

00:01:23.000 Why the Beijing Summit favors Xi's long game.

00:01:25.000 CNN.

00:01:26.000 Trump heads to China as a suitor, not a conqueror.

00:01:29.000 Time Magazine.

00:01:30.000 Why Xi Jinping is the real winner of Trump's second term foreign policy.

00:01:34.000 All of this is a lie.

00:01:36.000 None of this is true.

00:01:37.000 The reality is that China is in a historically weak position, truly weak position.

00:01:43.000 China is having serious trouble with its export markets.

00:01:46.000 China has massive debt.

00:01:48.000 China has demographic problems.

00:01:49.000 And now China is missing its oil supply, as we'll get to in a little bit.

00:01:53.000 Democrats, meanwhile, are trying to claim that President Trump is going to go over to Beijing and suddenly surrender, which again, that seems like that's more of a democratic thing in the recent past.

00:02:03.000 After all, it was Bill Clinton.

00:02:04.000 Who decided it was important to bring China into the World Trade Organization?

00:02:08.000 Here's Chuck Schumer talking about President Trump supposedly caving to the Chinese.

00:02:14.000 We all ought to fear what Donald Trump may concede to China just so he can claim a headline.

00:02:20.000 Trump has fantasized about $1 trillion in Chinese investments in America that would give the Chinese a stranglehold on our economy, threaten our supply chains, our economic independence, and our national security. 0.55

00:02:37.000 This is Trump empowering Xi's made in China ambitions. 0.59

00:02:44.000 Hey, I'm just wondering what?

00:02:47.000 What?

00:02:48.000 I mean, the idea that President Trump, who's been the harshest president of my lifetime with regard to China, is somehow going to be caving into Xi based on what?

00:02:57.000 Based on what?

00:02:58.000 Joe Scarborough over at MS Now is saying something of the same thing, criticizing President Trump for quote unquote siding with dictators.

00:03:05.000 Again, just going to point out Democrats are currently siding with the dictatorship of Iran.

00:03:12.000 Him praising the thuggish dictator of Belarus, him continuing to do everything he can to help Vladimir Putin.

00:03:20.000 I mean, it's obvious.

00:03:22.000 Really, it's just crazy.

00:03:25.000 He goes out and he praises Xi as if he's Thomas Jefferson, while a prominent political prisoner, he attacks for causing chaos in China.

00:03:39.000 It's just insanity.

00:03:41.000 He continues to side with dictators.

00:03:46.000 And the idea that Democrats are somehow siding against dictators is rather insane given the history of the recent foreign policy of the United States.

00:03:54.000 But here's the thing all this is predicated on the idea that China has tremendous leverage over us.

00:03:58.000 Well, let's be real about this.

00:03:59.000 We have the leverage over China.

00:04:02.000 Again, Chinese oil supply comes from the Middle East.

00:04:06.000 54% of their entire importation of oil comes from the Middle East.

00:04:09.000 Right now, that number is basically zero.

00:04:13.000 They were getting 3% to 5% of their oil supply from Venezuela.

00:04:15.000 Right now, that number is zero.

00:04:17.000 Their Belt and Road Initiative, as we explained earlier this week, has collapsed.

00:04:21.000 Their debt is 300% of their GDP.

00:04:25.000 They have massive problems in China. 0.80

00:04:28.000 Basically, the only thing they can do is occasionally threaten Taiwan.

00:04:32.000 A small island nation off their coast. 0.84

00:04:34.000 That's it.

00:04:34.000 That's the whole thing.

00:04:36.000 I know there's this idea that China is a rising power.

00:04:38.000 That is wrong.

00:04:39.000 China was a rising power 10 years ago.

00:04:41.000 Xi Jinping has been one of the worst leaders of China in recent history.

00:04:45.000 Probably the worst leader.

00:04:47.000 He has not tried to integrate China into world markets, he's drawn them away from world markets.

00:04:52.000 He has not attempted to strengthen China by making it economically stronger. 0.93

00:04:57.000 He has tried to distance China from the rest of the world and essentially become autarkic, which is why China. 0.59

00:05:02.000 Has a massive problem. 0.81

00:05:03.000 They're actually a declining power trying to stave off the darkness through IP theft, regional intimidation, and a lot of bluster.

00:05:10.000 All right, coming up, we'll get to what the president and Xi Jinping are actually talking about in China. 1.00

00:05:14.000 Plus, we'll get to the people who seem to want to hand global power to the Chinese either out of malice or stupidity. 0.97

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00:06:37.000 So, how are things actually going in China?

00:06:38.000 Well, the president arrived in China and was met by flag waving students.

00:06:42.000 Here's what it looked like. 0.99

00:06:53.000 And this is what the Chinese do, by the way, to their intimidation tactic what if we have gigantic numbers of people who basically act like robots? 0.99

00:07:00.000 You remember they did this at the Olympics, the Beijing Olympics, a few cycles back. 1.00

00:07:05.000 And color me unimpressed with all of this.

00:07:08.000 Then kids were cheering for Trump and Xi on the red carpet.

00:07:20.000 Honest to God, what a creepy country.

00:07:21.000 I mean, like, the government is so creepy.

00:07:24.000 I'm sorry.

00:07:25.000 Like, forcing small children to jump up and down and wave flags and flowers with troops in the background who are all of the exact same height.

00:07:34.000 I understand that we're supposed to find this intimidating.

00:07:37.000 I do not find it intimidating.

00:07:38.000 I find it strange.

00:07:40.000 Is it like, what, first child who stops jumping up and down gets shot?

00:07:45.000 Is that how it works over in China?

00:07:47.000 It's weird.

00:07:48.000 I'm sorry, it's weird.

00:07:49.000 It just is.

00:07:50.000 It's not just weird, it is testament to the tyrannical nature of the government.

00:07:55.000 Meanwhile, President Xi, when he first greeted Trump, he did so in Tiananmen Square, which, of course, is the place famous for Chinese tanks rolling over protesters.

00:08:03.000 As I said before, China is not a geopolitical opponent. 0.52

00:08:05.000 They are a geopolitical enemy, and we ought to recognize that.

00:08:08.000 Here was Xi greeting Trump.

00:08:22.000 Okay, there are.

00:08:23.000 Now, President Trump is doing his usual thing.

00:08:24.000 This is the longest handshake in human history.

00:08:26.000 Xi is standing there, Winnie the Pooh over there, trying to establish some sort of physical dominance, but President Trump not really having it.

00:08:33.000 Xi also awkwardly shook hands with President Trump's cabinet and advisors, particularly awkward with the Secretary of State, who is banned from visiting China.

00:08:40.000 They literally had to change his name on his input documents in order so he could enter the country because of the sanctions on him from when he was a senator.

00:08:48.000 Here is Xi awkwardly shaking hands with everybody.

00:08:50.000 You can see the Americans not particularly pleased with Xi.

00:09:00.000 Okay, so you're shaking hands there with the Secretary of State.

00:09:05.000 Does not look like the Secretary of State has much time for Xi Jinping.

00:09:08.000 And then you see him shaking hands with Scott Besant.

00:09:11.000 Pete Hegseth, again, not looking particularly pleased to be there with Xi Jinping.

00:09:18.000 Again, it is funny.

00:09:21.000 I mean, you can see that the people trying to make all of this happen are hoping that it'll be more enthusiastic.

00:09:26.000 Not a ton of enthusiasm happening from the Trump administration here, which, again, perfectly merited because this regime is awful.

00:09:33.000 President Trump put out a truth explaining his goal, which was to ask China to open up China for business.

00:09:39.000 The idea here is that China has exported tremendous amounts of product to our markets, but we have not actually been able to open their markets.

00:09:47.000 Quote, CNBC incorrectly reported the great Jensen Huang of Nvidia was not invited to the incredible gathering of the world's greatest businessmen and women proudly going to China.

00:09:55.000 In actuality, Jensen is currently on Air Force One, and unless I ask him to leave, which is highly unlikely, CNBC's reporting is incorrect, or as they say in politics, fake news.

00:10:03.000 It is an honor to have Jensen, Elon, Tim Apple, maybe Tim Cook of Apple, Tim Apple, Larry Fink, Stephen Schwartzman, Kelly Ortberg of Boeing, Brian Sykes of Cargill, Jane Frazier of City, Larry Culp of GE Aerospace, David Salmon, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, and many others journeying to the great country of China, where I will be asking President Xi, a leader of extraordinary distinction, to open up China so these brilliant people can work their magic and help bring the People's Republic to an even higher level.

00:10:26.000 In fact, I promise when we are together, which will be in a matter of hours, I will make sure that my very first request is this.

00:10:32.000 I have never seen or heard of any idea that would be more beneficial to our incredible countries, would be them opening up.

00:10:38.000 Well, again, China is quite unlikely to open up.

00:10:41.000 Secretary of State Rubio, and he's on Air Force One.

00:10:43.000 I have to say, this image is pretty fantastic.

00:10:45.000 He donned the Nicolas Maduro Nike sweatsuit, which, again, high level trollery there from the Secretary of State, who, by the way, is gaining in the Republican primary polls.

00:10:54.000 There was a Republican primary poll that came out just this week showing him ahead of the Vice President, JD Vance.

00:10:59.000 There's a reason for that.

00:11:02.000 Again, Rubio could only enter the country because China changed his name in the documents.

00:11:08.000 In order to allow him in, because there are still sanctions on Rubio for their criticism of the CCP.

00:11:14.000 The Secretary of State said that China is a foe.

00:11:16.000 We also have to manage the relationship.

00:11:18.000 Here he was on Air Force One.

00:11:21.000 You view China as our top geopolitical foe. 0.85

00:11:25.000 Yeah, it's both our top political challenge geopolitically, and it's also the most important relationship for us to manage.

00:11:31.000 I mean, it's a big, powerful country.

00:11:33.000 It's going to continue to grow, but we're going to have interests of ours that are going to be in conflict with interests of theirs.

00:11:39.000 And to avoid wars and maintain peace and stability in the world, we're going to have to manage those. 0.97

00:11:46.000 Now, one of the things that the United States is trying to make clear to the Chinese is that they should get off the Iran train. 0.97

00:11:51.000 Because China, of course, they have been the biggest backers of Iran. 0.85

00:11:56.000 They've been shipping military weaponry into Iran.

00:11:58.000 They have a tacit agreement with Iran.

00:12:01.000 Iran provides them oil, they provide Iran with upgraded ballistic missile components and all the rest of it.

00:12:07.000 Well, the problem right now is that Iran, its economy is in tatters.

00:12:10.000 Its oil supply is on the verge of basically shutting down because they're going to have to cap their wells.

00:12:14.000 They don't have any export capacity, thanks to the embargo of the United States. 0.71

00:12:19.000 Marco Rubio, Secretary of State, he says there are a lot of reasons why China should have an interest in joining us in confronting Iran.

00:12:25.000 Look, there's three things.

00:12:27.000 The Chinese have ships stuck in the Persian Gulf because setting up a system that says we're going to let certain ships through but others not, it's easier said than done.

00:12:35.000 And you saw a Chinese, not Chinese flag vessel, but it was Chinese cargo, got hit over the weekend. 0.98

00:12:41.000 I'm sure Iran didn't do it deliberately, but they did it. 0.96

00:12:43.000 It happened. 0.98

00:12:44.000 And so that's why these Chinese ships are stuck in there.

00:12:46.000 The second is, I don't think that China is a huge source of instability.

00:12:51.000 Threatens to destabilize Asia more than any other part of the world because it's heavily reliant on the Straits for energy.

00:12:57.000 And the third reason is because China's economy is export driven, meaning their economy is fueled not by what they consume domestically, but by what they make and sell to other countries.

00:13:08.000 Well, if all the countries of the world's economies are melting down because of this crisis in the Straits, they're going to be buying less Chinese product and the Chinese exports are going to drop precipitously.

00:13:19.000 Again, the Iran war has hurt China way more than it's hurt the United States. 0.68

00:13:22.000 This is one of the reasons why. 0.99

00:13:24.000 All of the analysis so far has been total crap. 0.94

00:13:26.000 The idea that the Iran war has provided China with an upper hand, in what way precisely? 0.98

00:13:30.000 Their economy is weaker.

00:13:31.000 They're having to beg the Pakistanis to act as go betweens to stave off the complete destruction of the rest of the Iranian regime.

00:13:39.000 No, China is not in a strong position. 0.97

00:13:41.000 All right, coming up, more on China, on Iran, on the people who seem to want to give China more power, either because they are being dumb or because they are being malicious.

00:13:48.000 First, people spend a ton of time talking about bringing manufacturing back to America, which is great.

00:13:54.000 But it's also worth noticing that many industries never actually left.

00:13:57.000 in the first place.

00:13:58.000 One example would be America's beverage companies.

00:14:01.000 The drinks people have grown up with for generations, sodas, sparkling waters, teas, sports drinks, the companies behind them have continued making those products here in the United States this entire time.

00:14:11.000 And behind all of that are 275,000 men and women across all 50 states showing up every day doing real work.

00:14:17.000 These are good paying jobs, distribution, manufacturing, trucking, production, the kind of jobs that support families and local communities.

00:14:24.000 For more than a century, America's beverage companies have continued investing here, building here, employing American workers in American hometowns.

00:14:30.000 And in an economy where so many industries moved operations overseas, that actually does matter.

00:14:35.000 Learn more about how they're keeping America strong at We Deliver for America.org.

00:14:40.000 Again, that's We Deliver for America.org to learn more about America's beverage companies, how they're keeping jobs here, and keeping America stronger at We Deliver for America.org.

00:14:48.000 That's We Deliver for America.org.

00:14:50.000 President Xi, over in China, the dictator, he has an interest in pretending that China is a rising power when, in fact, they are in a secular decline.

00:14:59.000 At the actual summit, Xi said we should be partners, not rivals.

00:15:02.000 Okay, you first, buddy.

00:15:05.000 We both believe that the China-US relationship is the most important bilateral relationship in the world.

00:15:13.000 We must make it work and never mess it up.

00:15:17.000 Both China and the United States stand to gain from cooperation and lose from confrontation.

00:15:24.000 Our two countries should be partners rather than rivals.

00:15:29.000 President Trump and I also agreed to build a constructive China-US relationship of strategic stability.

00:15:37.000 To promote the steady, sound, and sustainable development of China-US relations and bring more peace, prosperity, and progress to the world.

00:15:50.000 That sounds very nice.

00:15:51.000 I mean, it all sounds very nice.

00:15:52.000 And then Xi was urging mutual respect and peaceful coexistence, win-win cooperation.

00:15:57.000 Oh, well, that sounds nice.

00:15:58.000 Maybe he should do all those things.

00:16:01.000 Looking back at the course of China-US relations, whether or not we could have mutual respect, peaceful coexistence and win-win cooperation is the key to whether the relationship can advance steadily.

00:16:16.000 The world today is changing and turbulent.

00:16:20.000 China-US relations concern the well-being of the over 1.7 billion people of both countries and affect the interests of the over 8 billion people of the world.

00:16:33.000 Both sides should rise up to this historic responsibility and steer the giant ship Of China US relations forward, steadily, and in the right direction.

00:16:46.000 Oh, isn't that nice?

00:16:46.000 Well, then President Trump, of course, turned about his fair play.

00:16:49.000 The president then flattered Xi and talked about how wonderful China is.

00:16:53.000 Again, this is not rare.

00:16:55.000 Pretending that this is something unique to Trump, that he's going over there, he's flattering them. 0.89

00:16:58.000 I mean, again, Barack Obama flattered the Chinese. 0.72

00:17:00.000 Joe Biden certainly flattered the Chinese.

00:17:02.000 Here's President Trump, again, trying to massage some shoulders. 1.00

00:17:06.000 It was a fantastic day.

00:17:09.000 And in particular, I want to thank President Xi, my friend, for this magnificent welcome.

00:17:17.000 And it really was a magnificent welcome like none other.

00:17:21.000 and for so graciously hosting us on this very historic state visit.

00:17:27.000 We had extremely positive and productive conversations and meetings today with the Chinese delegation earlier, and this evening is another cherished opportunity to discuss among friends some of the things that we discussed today, all good for the United States and for China, and it was a great honor to be with you.

00:17:50.000 Please.

00:17:59.000 And then President Trump said that Benjamin Franklin published the sayings of Confucius.

00:18:03.000 All right, I mean, all right, whatever.

00:18:06.000 From the beginning, our citizens have shared a deep sense of mutual respect.

00:18:11.000 Founding father Benjamin Franklin published the sayings of Confucius in his colonial newspaper.

00:18:20.000 And today, sculpture recognizing that ancient Chinese sage is carved into the face of the United States Supreme Court very proudly.

00:18:31.000 Okay, so then Xi started talking about the things he actually cares about.

00:18:35.000 So Xi asked if we can avoid the so called Thucydides trap.

00:18:39.000 Here's what he had to say.

00:18:41.000 Currently, transformation not seen in a century is accelerating across the globe, and the international situation is fluid and turbulent.

00:18:51.000 The world has come to a new crossroads.

00:18:54.000 Can China and the United States overcome the Thucydides trap?

00:19:00.000 And create a new paradigm of major country relations?

00:19:07.000 Can we meet global challenges together and provide more stability for the world?

00:19:14.000 Okay, so the Thucydides trap is a term that was coined by a Harvard professor named Graham Allen.

00:19:20.000 And it essentially is a theory that when you have a rising power that threatens a global power, conflict generally follows.

00:19:30.000 The Thucydides model, because he was an ancient historian, would have been the rise of Athens, which threatened the regional domination of Sparta.

00:19:36.000 And so Sparta saw Athens rising, and so that made war inevitable, Sparta trying to shut down Athens to prevent them from overcoming them.

00:19:42.000 There's only one problem here China is not Athens, and we are not Sparta.

00:19:47.000 China is not, in fact, the rising power, and we are not the declining power.

00:19:51.000 Actually, if conflict arises in this moment, it would not be because of the so called Thucydides trap.

00:19:56.000 It would be much more in line with this sort of closing window theory.

00:20:00.000 That's the theory that sometimes a power sees its window closing because of self defeating policy and has to act aggressively because of the policy they've created for themselves.

00:20:08.000 The window is closing.

00:20:10.000 So, to take an example, Nazi Germany attacked the Soviet Union in 1941, largely because it saw its window of opportunity closing.

00:20:16.000 It had conquered Poland, it had conquered France, and it was dominant over the European continent, but it also was unable to conquer Britain.

00:20:24.000 It saw that Britain would likely survive, that Operation Sea Lion, which was its purported attempt to take over the British Isles, would probably fail.

00:20:32.000 They saw that the United States might get into the war, and they felt that the Soviets might attack first, and they needed a bunch of oil resources in the East and land in the East. 0.74

00:20:42.000 And so they decided to attack the Soviet Union. 0.60

00:20:44.000 The window, in other words, was closing.

00:20:46.000 By the way, this is one of the theories behind why Nazi Germany decided to initiate a bunch of foreign wars, was because actually all the talk about how the Nazis had revitalized the economy was nonsense.

00:20:57.000 They had created a kind of Chinese like economy in the sense it was heavily regulated, heavily subsidized, and heavily controlled.

00:21:04.000 Government down, massively debt written, and then they had to invade other countries for resources.

00:21:08.000 And that would be the real risk here China feels threatened, that Xi has actually put China's economy on a road to nowhere.

00:21:15.000 They have a demographic problem, they have a military problem, they have an economic problem.

00:21:19.000 And so China might lash out, knowing that their window is closing.

00:21:22.000 So, what can the United States do about that?

00:21:24.000 Well, we have to ease their transition back into second rate status, which means basically de escalation over things like Taiwan.

00:21:31.000 We don't want them attacking Taiwan because that's bad for them and it's bad for us. 0.94

00:21:35.000 And we have to box them in simultaneously, which is why I have been encouraging for literally decades at this point better trade relations with all of Eastern Asia. 0.96

00:21:44.000 We should be having better trade relations with Japan, better trade relations with South Korea, better trade relations with Australia. 1.00

00:21:50.000 We need to be boxing the Chinese in. 1.00

00:21:53.000 So, what exactly happened? 1.00

00:21:55.000 Okay, so again, we see Trump and Xi, and they're pretending to be friendly with one another.

00:21:59.000 What actually happened?

00:22:00.000 Well, we have two separate readouts from the meeting.

00:22:03.000 The American readout is pretty interesting.

00:22:07.000 According to the White House, quote, President Trump had a good meeting with President Xi of China.

00:22:11.000 The two sides discussed ways to enhance economic cooperation between our two countries, including expanding market access for American business into China and increasing Chinese investment into our industries.

00:22:20.000 Now, again, I'm not a big fan of the idea that Chinese investment should go into our industries, considering.

00:22:25.000 You know, that usually comes with strings attached, including IP theft.

00:22:28.000 Leaders from many of the United States' largest companies joined a portion of the meeting.

00:22:32.000 The president also highlighted the need to build on progress in ending the flow of fentanyl precursors in the United States, as well as increasing Chinese purchases of American agricultural products.

00:22:42.000 Now, here's the important part.

00:22:43.000 The two sides agree that the Strait of Hormuz must remain open to support the free flow of energy.

00:22:49.000 President Xi also made clear China's opposition to the militarization of the Strait and any effort to charge a toll for its use. 0.80

00:22:55.000 Hey, that'd be Iran doing that, right?

00:22:57.000 Iran wants to militarize the Strait and charge a toll.

00:23:00.000 And the White House is saying China opposes this.

00:23:04.000 And Xi expressed interest in purchasing more American oil to reduce Chinese dependence on the strait in the future.

00:23:10.000 So, in other words, they don't want to be as dependent on the Middle East and they don't want to be as dependent on Venezuela and they don't have a lot of choices.

00:23:16.000 And so, they'd like to buy more American oil.

00:23:18.000 Both countries agreed Iran can never have a nuclear weapon. 0.78

00:23:22.000 Okay, so that's a pretty good outcome.

00:23:28.000 An outcome in which the United States has China agreeing that the strait has to be open.

00:23:32.000 That Iran can't be charging tolls.

00:23:34.000 It can't militarily control the strait.

00:23:36.000 That it will buy more American oil.

00:23:38.000 And that Iran can never have a nuclear weapon.

00:23:40.000 And if China were to reverse sides in this particular conflict, if they were to say, listen, Iran isn't offering us anything.

00:23:45.000 What we need is an open strait.

00:23:47.000 We need Qatar and UAE and Iraq and Saudi to be able to ship their oil out to China. 0.93

00:23:53.000 And we need Iran not to get in the way.

00:23:55.000 And we also understand that Iran's facilities have been destroyed in large part. 0.93

00:24:00.000 And so we have no interest in using Iran as our cat's paw. 0.85

00:24:03.000 We just need our oil. 0.99

00:24:04.000 That is a big win.

00:24:06.000 China's version of the readout includes some material on Taiwan.

00:24:08.000 Notice the White House is not.

00:24:10.000 So the White House version does not say that President Trump made any concessions on Taiwan.

00:24:15.000 However, a spokesperson for the Chinese wrote, quote, President Xi stressed to President Trump that the Taiwan question is the most important issue in China-US relations.

00:24:23.000 If it is handled properly, the bilateral relationship will enjoy overall stability.

00:24:27.000 Otherwise, the two countries will have clashes and even conflicts, putting the entire relationship in great jeopardy.

00:24:32.000 Taiwan independence and cross-strait peace are as irreconcilable as fire and water.

00:24:36.000 Safeguarding peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait is the biggest common denominator between China and the United States.

00:24:40.000 Their entire readout is about Taiwan.

00:24:42.000 However, we have no news that the president has made any serious concessions with regard to Taiwan.

00:24:48.000 Again, the United States has taken a position of strategic ambiguity for decades with regard to Taiwan, where Taiwan is self governed, but we suggest that it isn't necessarily an independent country and all the rest.

00:24:59.000 Because if we do, then we have to defend it from a Chinese invasion.

00:25:02.000 That's the basic idea. 0.63

00:25:03.000 But if the idea is to maintain the status quo, continue to arm the Taiwanese in order to deter Chinese aggression, Box the Chinese in with better trade agreements, offer carrots, and also sticks in the form of control of global oil supplies, the Chinese are in a particularly weak position right now.

00:25:20.000 And again, just another reason why all of the headlines about how the Iran war is going are just wrong.

00:25:24.000 They are just incorrect.

00:25:26.000 And the real way that the Iran war is going is that the people being deprived of the oil predominantly are the Chinese.

00:25:32.000 They are countries in Asia.

00:25:34.000 It is the Chinese who are hardest hit here.

00:25:38.000 Not only that, if this war was supposed to Momentum against the United States in the region?

00:25:43.000 Why is every single country in the region on the side of the United States and against the Iranian regime?

00:25:50.000 So much so that apparently the Saudis actually participated in forward attacks in Iran, according to Reuters.

00:25:58.000 The Saudi strikes, according to Reuters, were carried out by Saudi Air Force fighter jets on Iran linked militia targets near the kingdom's northern border with Iraq, one Western official and the person briefed on the matter said.

00:26:08.000 The Western official said some strikes took place around the time of the April 7th U.S. Iran ceasefire.

00:26:14.000 Gulf countries are also arresting Iranian traitors.

00:26:18.000 In Kuwait, officials arrested six people they said were plotting to assassinate the country's leadership.

00:26:22.000 In the UAE, The authorities accused 27 men of belonging to a secretive terrorist organization in Bahrain.

00:26:28.000 The government has stripped dozens of their citizenship.

00:26:30.000 Again, I'm speaking to top officials in many of these governments.

00:26:33.000 And I'm just telling you, they want to align with the United States.

00:26:35.000 They increasingly want to align with Israel.

00:26:37.000 Some openly are aligning with Israel.

00:26:38.000 UAE is openly aligned with Israel.

00:26:40.000 The Saudis would like to openly align with the United States and Israel as well.

00:26:45.000 They just have to run the gauntlet of domestic opposition to recognition of Israel.

00:26:51.000 But Israel and the UAE, according to the Wall Street Journal, have coordinated operations around the war.

00:26:56.000 Israel's Mossad spy chief visited the UAE at least twice during the bombing campaign to coordinate operations.

00:27:02.000 Israel sends Iron Dome and Iron Beam to UAE.

00:27:06.000 And apparently, there are reports that the Prime Minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, secretly visited the UAE in the middle of the Iran war.

00:27:13.000 This was confirmed by the Prime Minister's official ex account.

00:27:18.000 In the midst of Operation Roaring Lion, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu secretly visited the UAE where he met with UAE President Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed.

00:27:25.000 Again, the alliance between those two countries is growing significantly stronger. 0.96

00:27:29.000 And this is why Iran has been forced into the position of attacking all surrounding countries. 0.97

00:27:33.000 Because all those, again, for those who don't know any history, I'd just like to reverse the clock back to the first Gulf War. 0.94

00:27:40.000 During the first Gulf War, the United States was so afraid of Israel being unable to work with the Arab states because the Arab states would not work with Israel that Israel took dozens of incoming scuds from Iraq in the middle of that war.

00:27:54.000 And the United States, under George H.W. Bush, told Israel they could not respond because H.W. was afraid it would break up the coalition. 0.54

00:28:00.000 Of the Saudis and the rest of the countries in the region.

00:28:03.000 Now, Israel is openly operating in coordination with all of those countries against Iran.

00:28:07.000 That's how far things have changed, which is why the foreign minister Abbasarraq knows Iran is now isolated.

00:28:14.000 According to the foreign minister, he put out a tweet basically threatening UAE, Bahrain, and all the rest.

00:28:22.000 Netanyahu has now publicly revealed what Iran's security services long ago conveyed to our leadership.

00:28:27.000 Enmity with the great people of Iran is a foolish gamble.

00:28:29.000 Collusion with Israel in doing so is unforgivable.

00:28:31.000 Those colluding with Israel to sow division will be held to account again.

00:28:34.000 Here is the thing.

00:28:35.000 The regimes in the Middle East who know what the future looks like, a future that is largely reliant on American technology and Israeli technology and American oil and Western economic development, it is not reliant on solidarity with a country in Iran that wishes to destroy them, a government in Iran that wishes to destroy them.

00:28:58.000 Again, this is why what has happened with oil is the single greatest untold story in modern American politics.

00:29:05.000 Back in the 1970s, in 1973 to be precise, there was the Yom Kippur War.

00:29:09.000 This is when Israel fought yet another war of near extermination, which Arab armies attacked Israel unprovoked, trying to destroy the state of Israel and wipe the Jews off the map. 0.57

00:29:21.000 They failed.

00:29:21.000 However, their failure led to the Saudi royal kingdom deciding to impose an oil embargo against the United States for the U.S.'s support for Israel in the late stages of the 1973 Yom Kippur War.

00:29:34.000 And that had significant economic impact on the United States for a full decade.

00:29:39.000 Well, things have radically changed.

00:29:40.000 And the reason they have radically changed is because America is now the leading producer of oil and liquefied natural gas on planet Earth.

00:29:49.000 On planet Earth, we control the means of production, we control the means of distribution.

00:29:55.000 We are in control of what is going out of the Strait of Hormuz via Iran, we are in control of what exits Venezuela.

00:30:02.000 This is a radical shift.

00:30:04.000 It's a radical shift.

00:30:05.000 The story of how America's drilling freed up our geopolitics is an amazing, amazing story.

00:30:12.000 The Wall Street Journal has an incredible piece today about how the United States became the world's greatest energy exporter.

00:30:20.000 Here's what they say LNG shipments from the lower 48 states began in 2016.

00:30:25.000 LNG is liquefied natural gas.

00:30:27.000 Began in 2016 from a Louisiana terminal initially built to receive imported gas.

00:30:31.000 Because gas compresses when cooled, large LNG tankers can hold enough energy to power 70,000 homes for a year.

00:30:37.000 Basically, you take the natural gas, which is a gas, and then you liquefy it, you turn it into liquid, and then you ship it, and then it is turned back into natural gas on the other end.

00:30:44.000 Well, within two years, from 2016 to 2018, U.S. LNG export volumes had more than quintupled, exceeding a trillion cubic feet.

00:30:52.000 The biggest buyers were South Korea, Japan, and Mexico.

00:30:55.000 Then Russia invaded Ukraine, and energy markets shifted because the Europeans wanted to get off of Russian gas.

00:31:02.000 France, UK, Spain, Netherlands, they all bid up prices for LNG cargoes to draw them away from Asia.

00:31:09.000 U.S. export capacity is ballooning.

00:31:11.000 The United States shipped more than 5 trillion cubic feet of LNG abroad last year.

00:31:16.000 Still feeding Europe and the Far East while getting market share in Turkey and Egypt.

00:31:20.000 And think about how crazy that is.

00:31:21.000 We're getting market share in Turkey and Egypt.

00:31:22.000 Look at a map.

00:31:23.000 What are Turkey and Egypt really, really close to?

00:31:26.000 All of the oil producing countries of the Middle East.

00:31:28.000 Instead, we are shipping LNG all the way from here to there.

00:31:31.000 That's how dominant the American oil and natural gas industry is.

00:31:36.000 U.S. output has helped keep global prices much steadier than in 2022, even despite the Hormuz closure.

00:31:43.000 South Korea, Spain, Italy, France each bought at least 50% more U.S. LNG in March than they did in February before fighting broke out in the Persian Gulf.

00:31:50.000 So, again, one of the things that's been happening is that as the Strait of Hormuz has been closed by Iranian terrorism and then by us blockading the Iranians, it turns out the U.S. crude oil exports have been rising precipitously because, again, we are the dominant producers.

00:32:06.000 And look at this this is U.S. crude oil exports weekly dating back to 2016.

00:32:12.000 We are almost up to 7 million barrels per day in crude exports.

00:32:16.000 We were at half a million in 2016.

00:32:19.000 We have totally shifted geopolitics because of.

00:32:22.000 Of our capacity to innovate because of our natural resources that we can access.

00:32:25.000 By the way, it is not just the presence of natural resources that makes a country rich.

00:32:30.000 Venezuela has the biggest oil reserves on planet Earth, but they've been barely able to produce 1.5 million barrels of crude per day because they nationalized their oil industry.

00:32:40.000 So here's the thing America is economically, in terms of natural resources, in terms of tech, blowing all of our opposition out of the water.

00:32:49.000 Yeah, we got lots of problems here, but we are blowing everybody out of the water, economically speaking. 0.63

00:32:54.000 If you've got a buck, you are not investing it in China.

00:32:56.000 You are not investing it in the Europeans.

00:32:59.000 You're not investing it in Japan.

00:33:00.000 You're investing it in the United States.

00:33:02.000 That is the reality.

00:33:04.000 And that is because of our free market system, because of the innovations, because of our private companies, which are unbelievably efficient. 0.98

00:33:12.000 The only thing that could threaten this is if dolts, economic dullards, decide that somehow all of this is bad. 0.76

00:33:20.000 And what really needs to happen is that we need to penalize companies for their success. 0.82

00:33:24.000 Again, we have totally shifted geopolitics.

00:33:26.000 China is weaker because of our oil industry.

00:33:29.000 The Middle East, we don't care about it as much because of our oil industry.

00:33:34.000 We need a better class of commentator who understands basic economics.

00:33:38.000 We just do.

00:33:40.000 Joe Rogan had on a person named Brendan Schaub to talk about oil markets.

00:33:46.000 It did not go amazing.

00:33:49.000 Here's what I don't understand Are we getting oil from Iran?

00:33:53.000 No.

00:33:54.000 That's what maybe 3% or 4% is from Iran.

00:33:59.000 So they just know, oh, Americans know if we go to war, we can increase the gas price. 0.87

00:34:03.000 So we all just go along with it.

00:34:04.000 Is that real?

00:34:05.000 Or is it global prices went up because some of the gas can't get to where it needs to go?

00:34:10.000 And so it.

00:34:12.000 They need to make that money. 1.00

00:34:13.000 So they just fk you. 0.99

00:34:15.000 Isn't it funny? 0.99

00:34:16.000 Like, they're like, we're going to make money no matter what.

00:34:18.000 The American people are going to lose money.

00:34:20.000 So we make the same amount of money. 1.00

00:34:22.000 And also, fk you. 0.99

00:34:23.000 You need oil. 0.99

00:34:25.000 But my whole thing is, even like when we go to war, people are like, yeah, they're just doing it for money.

00:34:29.000 It's like, how much fk money do they need?

00:34:31.000 They're all rich anyway. 0.97

00:34:34.000 Oh my God.

00:34:36.000 Yes, clearly the people we need discussing oil markets to legitimately tens of millions of people are.

00:34:42.000 A former professional MMA artist and stand up comedian, and another stand up comedian who comments on MMA.

00:34:49.000 Experts in oil markets.

00:34:50.000 The people who, here's the reason this matters is because this particular podcast ended with Joe Rogan calling to nationalize the oil industry.

00:34:58.000 So the United States oil industry is dominant, planetarily dominant.

00:35:02.000 The reason why prices have gone up is because Rogan himself said it.

00:35:06.000 Joe said it right there.

00:35:07.000 When supply is constrained and you're in a global market, prices rise.

00:35:11.000 It's not because of greed.

00:35:13.000 Did the oil company, were they less greedy like three weeks ago when the oil prices were lower?

00:35:17.000 Or were they the same greedy?

00:35:19.000 It turns out that self interest is always self interest.

00:35:22.000 But the solution to nationalize oil, it's legitimately insane, like truly crazy, truly crazy.

00:35:31.000 And then Rogan suggested that Trump can't fix the problem with the oil companies because they, unspecified, they might kill him.

00:35:38.000 What in the world?

00:35:39.000 What are we, what do you, what, what? 1.00

00:35:43.000 They're a bunch of crooks. 1.00

00:35:44.000 They're a bunch of crooks. 0.99

00:35:46.000 We should have a national oil company and only sell in America. 0.98

00:35:52.000 Keep it in house.

00:35:53.000 So no matter what foul we do outside the world, companies can still sell wherever they want.

00:35:59.000 Yeah.

00:36:00.000 Even though the U.S. is the world's largest oil producer, companies can sell oil on the global market to whoever pays the highest price.

00:36:06.000 No, it's us.

00:36:06.000 High world prices still translate into high domestic gas prices.

00:36:10.000 Hey, Mr. President, please fix that.

00:36:14.000 I don't know if he can do that. 0.98

00:36:15.000 They'll kill him. 1.00

00:36:16.000 They tried to kill him three times already. 0.98

00:36:18.000 You tried to with that oil money? 1.00

00:36:20.000 They'll kill him.

00:36:20.000 All of a sudden, President JD is crying on TV.

00:36:23.000 I'm going to miss Donald.

00:36:28.000 ExxonMobil is going to try to kill President Trump for nationalizing this.

00:36:31.000 What are you even talking about? 0.96

00:36:33.000 What is this nonsense? 0.58

00:36:34.000 What is this?

00:36:35.000 By the way, you want to know why the oil supply from the United States is up?

00:36:38.000 You want to know why it's up?

00:36:39.000 Because we are dominating global markets just like any other. 1.00

00:36:45.000 The stupidity, the utter stupidity. 1.00

00:36:45.000 I'm sorry. 1.00

00:36:47.000 This is low IQ insanity.

00:36:49.000 I'm sorry, it is.

00:36:51.000 I like Joe as a person. 1.00

00:36:52.000 This is retarded. 1.00

00:36:54.000 The reality is that if you want supply to go up, what you do is you create new markets and you broaden out the production to new markets. 0.99

00:37:04.000 You have an incentive structure for people to pump more.

00:37:08.000 The reason the United States is globally dominant, the reason why everybody else is having their oil prices doubled and our oil prices are up like 20% is because we are dominant.

00:37:18.000 Remove the profit margin, and what you'll get is an inefficient industry incapable of supplying oil even to the domestic population.

00:37:24.000 Take a look at countries that have done what Rogan is talking about.

00:37:29.000 It is deregulation in the oil industry that has led to our global dominance.

00:37:34.000 But this sort of conspiratorial nonsense, you know, you can just sit there and you'll solve the oil problems by having, yeah, government bureaucrats will do a great job.

00:37:40.000 Yeah, sure.

00:37:40.000 Bernie Sanders running the oil industry.

00:37:42.000 That'll go amazing.

00:37:43.000 That'll go just incredible. 0.97

00:37:45.000 Again, there is this completely idiotic idea that is predominant among people who never studied Econ 101 that the best way to relieve a pricing problem is to constrain supply. 0.97

00:37:59.000 The opposite of how you relieve a pricing problem. 0.99

00:38:03.000 Literally the opposite. 0.96

00:38:05.000 It's just ridiculous.

00:38:07.000 By the way, what you actually need to do is add refinery capacity, more deregulation, more private companies in the business.

00:38:16.000 One of the big problems that happens when the price is artificially depressed is that people stop drilling because it becomes more money to drill than it would to leave the oil where it is.

00:38:28.000 You think the government is going to make this stuff more efficient?

00:38:31.000 We spend the last couple of decades completely reshifting the entire geopolitics of planet Earth based on private industry in the United States doing things.

00:38:38.000 Like fracking, doing things like freeing up LNG.

00:38:43.000 And the solution is to nationalize the oil industry.

00:38:45.000 Again, this sort of stuff, it sounds funny and it sounds cute, but the reality is it destroys America's capacity to win.

00:38:54.000 This is not just true in oil, it is true in AI.

00:38:58.000 America right now is dominant in the AI industry.

00:39:00.000 It is.

00:39:01.000 NVIDIA is the world's most valuable company.

00:39:03.000 It is located in the United States.

00:39:05.000 It is run by an immigrant to the United States, Jensen Huang.

00:39:10.000 It is providing directly and indirectly hundreds of thousands of jobs. 0.80

00:39:15.000 AI is going to increase productivity at a scale never before seen.

00:39:20.000 That is going to mean better products and services, cheaper for you and your family. 1.00

00:39:25.000 The Chinese are pursuing it. 0.99

00:39:27.000 If they win, the Chinese will have a military advantage against the United States. 0.99

00:39:30.000 So we need to win. 1.00

00:39:32.000 We need to stop the Chinese from winning. 1.00

00:39:34.000 You know what you need in order to do that? 1.00

00:39:35.000 An enormous amount of what is called compute.

00:39:37.000 You need an enormous number.

00:39:40.000 Of data centers that are able to compute all the data and spit out answers for you.

00:39:44.000 And yet, there's been an ongoing effort in the United States to undermine the very thing that will allow us to dominate for the next century.

00:39:51.000 There's a brand new Gallup poll out, and it shows Overall, would you strongly favor, somewhat favor, somewhat oppose, or strongly oppose the construction of a data center in your area to support artificial intelligence or AI technology in the United States?

00:40:04.000 48% strongly oppose.

00:40:07.000 23% somewhat oppose.

00:40:10.000 Now, you know what the polling data shows here?

00:40:12.000 If you remove the word AI, Or the abbreviation AI from that polling question, then no one cares.

00:40:19.000 So if you're just building a normal data center or, say, a Costco warehouse near your community, no one cares.

00:40:25.000 But the minute you say AI data center, people freak out.

00:40:29.000 This is an op.

00:40:31.000 It is an op.

00:40:32.000 It is driven by a bunch of Luddites in the United States, people who think that if you break the machinery, somehow we all get richer.

00:40:38.000 And yes, foreign powers online are fostering this sort of stuff.

00:40:41.000 You know who doesn't care about building AI data centers? 0.99

00:40:43.000 The Chinese. 1.00

00:40:44.000 They don't care at all. 1.00

00:40:46.000 They are happy to outproduce us.

00:40:48.000 Meanwhile, Utah residents, according to CNN, want to vote in November to oppose a massive AI data center development, one that will provide tens of thousands of jobs, presumably.

00:40:59.000 The Utah project was approved by Box Elder County Commissioners on Monday, despite protests from community members.

00:41:06.000 Shark Tank investor Kevin O'Leary says the project will boost the local economy and that increasing America's computing and energy production capacity is crucial for national security.

00:41:14.000 He is right about this.

00:41:16.000 He is right about this.

00:41:17.000 So, Kevin O'Leary then decided to go on Tucker Carlson, the nation's leading Luddite, to talk about all of this.

00:41:25.000 And it went precisely how you would think it went.

00:41:29.000 2,000 jobs.

00:41:30.000 Okay.

00:41:31.000 So, relative to the size, the physical size of the project, which, as you noted, is multiple times the size of Manhattan, and the power draw at peak, this data center, your projections, will consume about as much energy as New York City does.

00:41:48.000 But New York City provides almost 5 million jobs.

00:41:52.000 And this project, by your own description, would provide about 2,000 jobs.

00:41:58.000 I don't see the trade off.

00:42:00.000 You definitely got that calculation wrong.

00:42:02.000 By building a data center that trains AI, that provides productivity to the entire nation, we create millions of jobs.

00:42:12.000 And Tucker Carlson saying that you create 2,000 jobs because it takes 2,000 people to build the data center.

00:42:17.000 That's not all the jobs that are created.

00:42:19.000 That is like saying that you found an internet company, like Amazon.

00:42:23.000 All the jobs created by Amazon are not relegated just to Amazon.

00:42:27.000 It is not just the people who built the data centers for Amazon or even the distribution centers for Amazon.

00:42:32.000 It's everybody who produces for distribution by Amazon. 1.00

00:42:36.000 This is such idiocy. 1.00

00:42:37.000 By the way, again, Tucker Carlson, economically illiterate. 1.00

00:42:42.000 Tucker citing the number of jobs in Manhattan.

00:42:44.000 This is the guy who rails against Wall Street.

00:42:46.000 How many jobs in Manhattan have been created by the very investment class that he derides consistently?

00:42:52.000 Not a lot of farms in Manhattan.

00:42:55.000 And the kind of jobs that Tucker is constantly talking about preserving, agricultural jobs, manufacturing jobs, are some of the least space efficient jobs in America.

00:43:06.000 And then Kevin O'Leary talked with Tucker about losing to China.

00:43:08.000 Tucker seems pretty blase about losing to China, as it turns out.

00:43:10.000 Shocker.

00:43:13.000 With all of the nefarious concerns about AI, which outcome do you prefer as an American for your family? 0.99

00:43:22.000 Would you prefer all of us that are developing these data centers put down our shovels and stop while the Chinese accelerate theirs? 0.98

00:43:33.000 Would you like that? 0.99

00:43:34.000 Well, I see a kind of a different question.

00:43:37.000 Question Do I want to be?

00:43:39.000 Let me answer your question in the following way. 0.85

00:43:41.000 Do I want to become like China in order that we can, quote, beat China? 0.84

00:43:46.000 Not at all. 0.52

00:43:47.000 The problem with China, from my perspective, is that it surveils its citizens and it limits their ability to say what they think and to oppose existing power.

00:43:57.000 So he wants to lose to them.

00:43:59.000 His solution is to lose to them by claiming that the United States, if we build data centers, will be just like China.

00:44:04.000 We will not be just like China.

00:44:05.000 That is nonsense. 0.99

00:44:06.000 It is absolute nonsense. 0.84

00:44:07.000 Tucker seems completely unbothered by actually losing.

00:44:10.000 To China, but he does say that data centers are a blot upon the earth.

00:44:13.000 They're a blot upon the earth.

00:44:16.000 Again, these are luxury beliefs.

00:44:18.000 Tucker can live in a cabin up in Maine that costs multi-millions of dollars, or he can live in a beautiful house in South Florida that also costs multi-million dollars.

00:44:27.000 But it turns out that there are lots of people all over the United States who need jobs and don't get to live in the forest and actually, you know, would like greater productivity and better products and cheaper products and better services.

00:44:38.000 But Tucker, sounding very much like Rachel Carson, says data centers are a scar upon the earth.

00:44:45.000 Literally, nobody has taken 20 minutes to explain how this is going to be great for you and me.

00:44:53.000 We're getting higher power costs, of course.

00:44:55.000 There's probably nothing uglier on planet Earth than a data center.

00:45:00.000 It's a physical atrocity.

00:45:02.000 It's an offense against God and nature.

00:45:04.000 Prima facie, look at it.

00:45:06.000 This is not the Parthenon.

00:45:07.000 This is the opposite.

00:45:09.000 This degrades the landscape, it is a scar upon the Earth.

00:45:14.000 No, it's no environmental groups seem upset about it.

00:45:16.000 I'm in Denver over here.

00:45:17.000 That wasn't an op or anything.

00:45:19.000 The environmental movement, where are they?

00:45:23.000 The environmental movement is very much opposed to the data centers because they believe that it is going to actually create energy facilities that must be created.

00:45:31.000 And Tucker Carlson, environmentalist, in the name of destroying America's technological future.

00:45:37.000 And of course, in the end, what it comes down to is everyone who Tucker disagrees with is a bad person.

00:45:37.000 Great.

00:45:42.000 Of course, of course.

00:45:45.000 Reflects the character and the predispositions, the biases of the people who made it.

00:45:51.000 So if this machine, this technology, AI, is being created by people like Sam Altman or the Google guys.

00:46:00.000 You can expect that, well, I don't know.

00:46:03.000 Programs built by some of the least trustworthy people in the world probably shouldn't be trusted.

00:46:09.000 So it's likely not a huge surprise that AI is often caught lying, manipulating results to hide the truth from people who use it, which itself is an indication of consciousness, is it not?

00:46:24.000 An indication of consciousness?

00:46:27.000 No, you just said that it's a programmed algorithm made by people you don't like.

00:46:31.000 But it's conscious.

00:46:32.000 So it's lying to you.

00:46:34.000 Again, it's all just nonsense. 0.99

00:46:35.000 And in the end, it is defeatist demoralization ops nonsense that puts America in a losing position vis a vis our chief geopolitical enemy, the Chinese. 0.96

00:46:43.000 The way that you lose to the Chinese is you destroy your energy capacity by doing things like nationalizing the oil industry, you regulate the crap out of the American economy, and you fight against every aspect of AI in order so that China will win. 0.95

00:46:55.000 That's how China wins. 0.97

00:46:56.000 It's the only way that China can win. 1.00

00:46:58.000 Fortunately for China, they have friends who will do that sort of work either through actual complicity or through just unbelievable stupidity. 0.98

00:47:05.000 Well, joining me on the line to discuss the negotiations currently happening between the United States and China is Christopher O'Day. 0.95

00:47:11.000 He's an adjunct fellow at the Hudson Institute, former international investment management executive, and authority on capital markets, political economy, and public finance, and the security implications of infrastructure finance and governance.

00:47:22.000 Christopher, thanks so much for taking the time.

00:47:23.000 Really appreciate it.

00:47:25.000 Well, thank you for having me. 0.90

00:47:27.000 Interesting to hear that lead in about ways to lose to China.

00:47:32.000 This is the topic I think we can discuss today for a few minutes. 0.98

00:47:35.000 Another way to lose to China. 0.97

00:47:37.000 Is one we're actually doing quite well at, and that's conceding the power of commercial shipping and commercial logistics infrastructure.

00:47:46.000 There's been a lot of news coverage over the last few years, particularly in policy and more technical publications, but it's starting to seep out into the broader press about how many seaports China is involved in.

00:48:02.000 And the involvement is typically owning and controlling terminals that load and unload containers.

00:48:10.000 From the massive container ships.

00:48:13.000 Typically, although it's presented in the press as China controlling ports, they don't really own the port and the land.

00:48:20.000 That's still part of the government that is hosting them.

00:48:24.000 But the thing that makes a port valuable and useful is being able to have containers moving in and out of it.

00:48:29.000 It hooks up your society.

00:48:31.000 If you're in the seat of, say, the politician running the port or the port authority, this hooks up your society to the flow of goods.

00:48:39.000 As you mentioned, people want jobs, they want to buy goods at reasonable prices.

00:48:44.000 And as we know, China has done a bang up job becoming a manufacturing platform for the world.

00:48:50.000 They also, in addition to that, I call it a one stop shopping strategy.

00:48:54.000 They had to learn for their own purposes, loading and unloading in China, how to build these massive container ports.

00:49:02.000 So they've done very well at that.

00:49:03.000 And now they go around and they offer this service to basically build your loading dock for you if you're a country.

00:49:11.000 That's achieved through what they call a concession.

00:49:15.000 And it always sounds Complicated, but it's really the same as buying a hot dog stand, a license to sell hot dogs at the beach.

00:49:22.000 You pay the government for a license, and that's basically what's happening with these concession agreements for ports.

00:49:28.000 So, when you read about this or people talk about it, don't be put off by all of the talk about the financing arrangements and involvement of all the big financial firms that get into these deals.

00:49:41.000 It's really a very simple thing where a government is cutting a deal and making what I believe is essentially a treaty, calling it a concession contract with the Chinese to come in and run their supply lines. 0.53

00:49:52.000 And that is a very, very powerful piece of leverage. 0.73

00:49:56.000 And for people who are familiar with local politics, for the local politician, it's a great deal because the core of these arrangements is revenue sharing on the container fees.

00:50:08.000 So before you had maybe no port or a very badly operating port.

00:50:13.000 After you have a state of the art seaport running, moving containers in and out, generating jobs, generating the need to hook up road and railroad networks.

00:50:24.000 And best of all, you're getting a revenue share, whereas before you didn't have any of that money.

00:50:30.000 So, this is a very, I think it's actually quite a clever strategy.

00:50:35.000 And the Chinese have been pursuing this through their state owned companies for really since the founding of the PRC in 1949.

00:50:44.000 They had to make all sorts of arrangements to get their own supplies.

00:50:48.000 And they first started with the old common turn countries in what's now called the global south.

00:50:54.000 They've kept a lot of those relationships and they've just learned how to build after the 1956 invention.

00:51:02.000 By an American, an impatient American truck driver, wanted to move his trucks, his containers on and off faster.

00:51:09.000 So that's the hallmark of America speed up the pace of commerce and revenue generation. 0.67

00:51:14.000 The Chinese took that technology and they ran with it because the need to have the ability to handle containers required just massive amounts of rebuilding of infrastructure or building of new infrastructure. 0.97

00:51:28.000 And that is what the Chinese have exploited. 0.97

00:51:30.000 So, in effect, we all hear about how they reverse engineered products, cars, solar panels, et cetera. 1.00

00:51:37.000 Really, what they've done is reverse engineer the whole concept of conquest. 0.77

00:51:41.000 And so now the Chinese are in a position in about 110 port sites around the world where they've achieved the kind of goals you would used to get from military conquest, which would really be in the areas of economic influencer control and political influencer control. 0.85

00:52:00.000 And they've done that through this infrastructure program, not the Belt and Road. 0.87

00:52:04.000 The Belt and Road is something somewhat different.

00:52:07.000 It factors into this, but they've been working on this commercial shipping tied to their manufacturing and export economy.

00:52:15.000 They've been working on that for decades, since the late 70s, early 1980s, long before Xi came on the scene with the BRI.

00:52:23.000 So they've basically now got the situation where they have all these long term seats at the table because these contracts run from 20 to 40 years.

00:52:32.000 And it's very difficult to get them out of there.

00:52:35.000 The US is starting to try to do that, but it's a real uphill battle. 1.00

00:52:39.000 So, the Chinese have basically installed what I call the operating system of the global economy.

00:52:45.000 All these containers and the ports and everything is running just like your smartphone.

00:52:49.000 It's running 24 7 and it's running in the background.

00:52:52.000 So, while they're in China and we're seeing all of the popping circumstance and the big meetings, and they're going to talk about chips and they're going to talk about tariff rates and things like that.

00:53:03.000 In the background, the real battle for control over the world is who's going to control.

00:53:10.000 All of this commercial shipping and logistics, really the supply line.

00:53:14.000 So it's not a matter of one supply chain for a particular product.

00:53:18.000 China basically has installed and runs the supply platform itself, and they're starting to use that power already.

00:53:26.000 So it's a very dangerous situation that the U.S. is in.

00:53:30.000 And I guess the military would call it kind of classic asymmetric warfare because we have a big, powerful navy, and we can use that in certain situations, but we're really, I don't think, going to go around and start invading or militarily taking over any seaport anywhere in the world, blowing up the infrastructure. 0.99

00:53:48.000 The Chinese are. 0.99

00:53:50.000 Already there installed, running this. 0.99

00:53:53.000 And any place where they're operating, it's very dangerous or impossible for the U.S. Navy to go dock there because of the digital and cyber surveillance risks.

00:54:01.000 So they're fighting at the level of kind of getting again the direct economic and political relationships. 0.99

00:54:10.000 It's very, very classically Chinese.

00:54:12.000 So I do want to ask you, you know, where you think the kind of state of conflict is. 1.00

00:54:16.000 Obviously, they have an advantage in the area that you're talking about.

00:54:19.000 I've been making the case that China is, to a certain extent, having to leverage power in this way.

00:54:25.000 Because they have enormous systemic problems as a top down centralized economy.

00:54:29.000 They have a huge debt problem.

00:54:30.000 They've been able to cram down on their own population and then hide on the balance sheet.

00:54:33.000 They have an enormous demographic problem.

00:54:35.000 Their military is well developed, but certainly not up to the pace of the United States military. 0.73

00:54:40.000 They're losing the AI war. 0.54

00:54:41.000 They have to import all of their oil.

00:54:43.000 And so they are sort of relegated to doing the thing you're talking about, which is to say that if the United States were bright, if we were to act in a self interested way, we would be trying to dismantle precisely this infrastructure that you're talking about.

00:54:56.000 And you've seen the Trump administration do some of that, most obviously in Panama.

00:54:59.000 Where there were concerns specifically about the Chinese companies controlling the in ways and out ways from the Panama Canal.

00:55:07.000 In other words, decline for the United States is a choice.

00:55:10.000 President Xi suggested that we are in a Thucydides trap where China is rising and the United States is falling.

00:55:15.000 And what I have suggested is that actually what we are watching right now is not a Thucydides trap. 0.86

00:55:20.000 We are watching a window closing for the Chinese because they have serious problems that are actually developing for them internally and externally. 0.53

00:55:28.000 And so the possibility of conflict is arising from.

00:55:32.000 Desperation on their part, increasing desperation, it is not arising from the idea that they're on the verge of overcoming the United States globally.

00:55:39.000 Well, I would agree with parts of that.

00:55:43.000 Certainly, this is a capability that they have that the U.S. does not possess that gives them a certain amount of advantages and influence with many, many countries around the world.

00:55:56.000 And I think looking forward, reasonably, you would expect that they would utilize that leverage to offset exactly the types of weaknesses that you've.

00:56:05.000 Pointed out.

00:56:07.000 To say that they have done a very good job building this network of highly influential port and terminal concessions is not to say that China has some sort of, as you, I guess, would gather from reading all the press coverage going into the summit meeting, that China is about to overtake the United States in any really substantive way.

00:56:32.000 It does give them the ability to, it's really, as I said, a capability to kind of.

00:56:38.000 Battle and fight the United States by turning a number of countries in their favor because of that kind of supply line and economic and job dependency.

00:56:50.000 Now, whether that does anything to relieve the deeper problems that they have, with about a third of their local governments are bankrupt, they have a terrible social or non existent almost social welfare system, they have a closed financial economy, basically controlling a currency manipulator.

00:57:11.000 People are starting to just openly.

00:57:13.000 call the China currency manipulator.

00:57:15.000 So, they do have all of those weaknesses.

00:57:18.000 How far that goes?

00:57:20.000 Does that topple the CCP regime?

00:57:24.000 I think that's probably an open question.

00:57:26.000 I think it's well known that they'll do almost anything and they'll subjugate any policy to the need to stay in power.

00:57:33.000 You've certainly covered that topic extensively.

00:57:36.000 So, I think what you've got here is something where you can fight these things to a standoff.

00:57:42.000 Well, that's Christopher O'Day.

00:57:44.000 He's an adjunct fellow at Hudson Institute.

00:57:45.000 You can go check out all of his work over there.

00:57:47.000 Christopher, thanks so much for the time and the insight.

00:57:50.000 Thanks for having me, Ben.

00:57:54.000 Meanwhile, over in Los Angeles, the Democrats have decided that Spencer Pratt is a real threat, clearly.

00:58:00.000 And they are trotting out as much propaganda as they possibly can.

00:58:05.000 So, LA mayoral candidate Nithya Raman, who is now trailing both Spencer Pratt and Karen Bass, it's unbelievable they might re elect Karen Bass as the LA mayor. 0.89

00:58:13.000 She's done such a horrible job.

00:58:14.000 She is currently the frontrunner.

00:58:15.000 Nithya Raman, there's a brief period in time in which it appeared she was going to be the frontrunner.

00:58:19.000 That is no longer the case. 0.80

00:58:21.000 She now says that Spencer Pratt is a fascist.

00:58:23.000 Here we go.

00:58:25.000 But I also think it's a very real thing that we should take seriously and we need to grapple with, and we need to offer it an honest response, a response that's rooted in actually solving these problems.

00:58:36.000 Otherwise, people will turn to fascism, to mini Trump, which is who I think Spencer Pratt really represents.

00:58:46.000 Fascism, mini Trump.

00:58:48.000 What exactly does Spencer Pratt say that is fascist?

00:58:50.000 He says that we should not allow crime to predominate in LA and that homeless people ought to be.

00:58:57.000 Put an involuntary commitment if they have serious mental illness.

00:59:00.000 They should not be allowed to just abuse drugs openly out on the street and all the rest of it.

00:59:03.000 TMZ put out a bit of a hit piece saying that actually Spencer Pratt is not living in a trailer where his house is burned down.

00:59:10.000 Actually, he's been staying at the Hotel Bel Air for more than a month, and his wife and kids are staying in Carpentaria, which is just north of LA.

00:59:17.000 Well, Spencer Pratt pointed out, Madhu, the reason that I have to live in a hotel is because my house burned down.

00:59:24.000 That would be the reason.

00:59:27.000 So, this idea that anyone's like, oh, he's at a hotel.

00:59:30.000 I'm at a hotel because these psychopaths are messaging me every day. 0.98

00:59:33.000 They're going to kill me because Nithya Raman is calling me a fascist because I don't want people to have their kids next to drug addicts at the park or stepping in human poop when you get your matcha. 0.99

00:59:46.000 I have common sense. 0.97

00:59:47.000 That's not fascism. 0.95

00:59:49.000 So these psychos here, I'm a fascist. 0.99

00:59:52.000 And then they literally, like, if you would like to see the death threats, I can send them all offline where people are like, I'm going to hire people to kill you. 0.98

01:00:01.000 So, yes, unfortunately, now I have a security team.

01:00:04.000 And they will not, even if I wanted to stay in the Airstream, would let me because there's 360 unobstructed views since there's no houses.

01:00:12.000 So you can literally snipe me out from any part from 300 yards away easily. 1.00

01:00:19.000 Yeah, meanwhile, Karen Bass, she is making compelling cases to why she should retain the mayoralty in Los Angeles. 1.00

01:00:25.000 Her case is you cannot succeed in life without teeth.

01:00:29.000 This is a thing that is happening right now in America.

01:00:33.000 How many people who are unhoused that you meet have no teeth at all?

01:00:37.000 They don't have teeth.

01:00:38.000 Why? 1.00

01:00:38.000 Because meth rots your teeth. 1.00

01:00:40.000 You can't succeed without teeth.

01:00:44.000 So there needs to be comprehensive health care provided to people.

01:00:50.000 So we're not going to stop them from taking the meth.

01:00:52.000 We'll just give them George Washington's teeth.

01:00:55.000 But classic political lines ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country.

01:01:01.000 And also, you cannot succeed in life without teeth.

01:01:06.000 Great job there by Karen Bash. 1.00

01:01:07.000 She's doing an amazing job.

01:01:08.000 I can see why Angelinos love her so.

01:01:10.000 She also says that she's very upset about Spencer Pratt's AI ads, in which she, for example, plays the Joker.

01:01:16.000 She's very upset about this.

01:01:17.000 She just can't deal with this.

01:01:19.000 It's too much.

01:01:22.000 What's worrying me now is that his social media is now taking on a violent turn.

01:01:28.000 And that worries me because when you do that and when your messages are so hateful or when you demonize people, then you do provoke people who are unstable and you can jeopardize people's safety.

01:01:44.000 Yeah, those ads, those AI ads, that's the real cause of violence in America today.

01:01:49.000 Not the Democratic Party that continues to cheer violence in America today.

01:01:52.000 All righty, coming up, we'll get into Sweden.

01:01:55.000 So, you know, you keep hearing over and over and over again that we need to be more like Europe. 0.92

01:01:59.000 The Europeans, they've got it right.

01:02:01.000 What we really need is to be democratic socialists, just like the Europeans.

01:02:05.000 Well, it turns out a lot of the European countries are like, yeah, we're not going to do that anymore.

01:02:08.000 You know what we like?

01:02:08.000 We like the capitalism.

01:02:09.000 We'll get to that in a moment first.

01:02:11.000 If you're not a member, you have to become a member to watch.

01:02:13.000 Use code Shapiro at checkout for two months free on all annual plans.

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The Ben Shapiro Show - May 14, 2026

EVERYBODY’S LYING: Trump Outplays China’s Xi!

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