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Summary
Trump is back in court in the New York civil fraud trial against the Trump Organization. President Trump is under a gag order, and will be joined by one of his attorneys, Alina Haba, on Sunday. China and the U.S. have been escalating tensions over disputed islands in the South China Sea.
Transcript
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Hello everybody. I'm Lou Dobbs and welcome to the Great America Show. It is great to have you with
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us. President Donald Trump back in court in the New York civil fraud trial against the Trump
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organization. The Trump legal team presented their last expert witness in the case, Eli Bartoff,
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a New York University accounting professor who testified about the role of property valuations
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and financial statements and how the Trump organization simply could not have overvalued
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the Trump properties. President Trump talked with the press briefly after a lunch break
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and said the trial is all about election interference and keeping him off the campaign trail.
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This is weaponization of justice. This is something that nobody's ever seen to this extent.
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It's called election interference. It's a sad day for our country that a thing like this can take
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place. I'm sitting in a courthouse instead of being in Iowa where I should be, even though I'm
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leading by about 40 points. Thank you very much.
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This was Trump's ninth time at the trial and reportedly he'll be back on December 11th to take the stand
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for a final time. The president facing an uphill battle as Trump sits before Marxist M. Judge Arthur
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Ingeron, who has gagged him and his attorneys this Sunday right here on The Great America Show. We're
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actually going to be joined by one of his attorneys, also under a gag order, attorney Alina Haba with a
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Sunday. We hope you won't miss that. We've been talking a lot this week about FISA and the 702 that
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expires at the end of this month. Speaker of the House Mike Johnson and other congressional leaders
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have agreed to put a short-term extension of Section 702 in the National Defense Authorization
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Act. That bill would extend Section 702 until April 19th. As of right now, it's unclear whether the NDAA
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will pass with the 702 extension in it, and it has some more conservative members of the conference
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simply furious with Speaker Johnson. Our guest today is national security and geopolitical expert
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Gordon Chang. And Gordon, it's great to have you with us. I know you and your wife Lydia have been
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traveling a great deal all around the world just back from Asia. Let's start with Beijing's accusations
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that a U.S. Navy destroyer violated Chinese sovereignty, as the Chinese put it, in disputed waters. That's
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peculiar timing, isn't it? And an awfully heated and unexpectedly heated statement by the Chinese,
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particularly just after the Xi-Biden summit. Yes, this comes right after the November 15th summit
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that Xi Jinping had with President Biden, where supposedly, according to Biden, things were going
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very well with China. What Beijing is referring to is the Gabriel Giffords, which is a U.S. Navy
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littoral combat ship, which sailed close to Second Thomas Shoal in the South China Sea. Second Thomas
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is part of the Philippines, clearly within the Philippines' exclusive economic zone, but China
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claims it. And around Second Thomas, over the last, let's say, two or three months, there have been
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extraordinary Chinese activity. And this has been dangerous. The United States has tried to warn China.
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It has slowly ramped up our military presence there. But obviously, our tactics are not working
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because China is moving very fast to take over Second Thomas and related shoals and reefs.
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And at this point, no administration has tried to stop them, certainly blocking their development of
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those islands and others in disputed territories in the South China Sea. Give us your sense of
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what this means. Have they selected a new strategy? Are they accelerating an old one? What is happening
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in the mines and in the halls of the capital of Beijing?
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Well, China has territorial claims on the South China Sea. They go back to 1947, which is when
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Chiang Kai-shek was ruling China. But clearly, Beijing has started to change tactics recently.
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So, for instance, they have switched away from Taiwan with these circumnavigation by ships and planes,
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and they've moved hard against Manila. And we have seen this at Scarborough Shoal,
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Second Thomas Shoal, and now Whitsun Reef. Basically, what's going on, and this is ominous,
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we don't have a legal obligation to defend Taiwan. But we do have a legal obligation to defend the
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Philippines, a 1951 mutual defense treaty. So what Beijing is basically doing is saying that
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they do not respect the United States. They don't respect Joe Biden. And so, therefore,
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And interestingly, is there really any real commitment on the part of this administration?
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This is an administration that doesn't honor the Constitution, doesn't follow law, is unlawful in most
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of it, seriously, in most of its activities and its initiatives. Would it be a surprise to anyone
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if Joe Biden decided not to honor a treaty of military support, requiring military support from
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the United States for the Philippines? At this point, you know, nothing's a surprise because the
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world is in turmoil and the United States has got to choose where we're going to defend.
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What's happened, Lou, if I can just back up a little bit to give some context. China was ramming
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Philippine vessels at Second Thomas Shoal in early October. President Biden actually gave an oral
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warning when the Australian prime minister visited the White House. And Biden said that the United States
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was prepared to use force to discharge our obligations to the Philippines under that mutual
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defense treaty. Well, the Chinese just ignored him because they then continued their course of
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provocative activities. They then started to use water cannon on Philippine boats. And now we see
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China swarming Whitsun Reef, which is not far by, also in the southern portion of the South China Sea.
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So clearly, Beijing is ignoring American warnings, which means deterrence has broken down.
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You know, we don't know what Biden's response will be. We have seen the U.S. Navy start to
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show the flag at Second Thomas. They did that with overflights of U.S. vessels during provocative
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Chinese activities. Now we've got that littoral combat ship that sailed close by. But we don't know
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what Biden would do. And the Chinese, I think, obviously feel that he's not going to do anything.
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So regardless of what we're going to do, the important thing is what the Chinese think we're
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not going to do. And that really is driving events. And the number of disputed islands and claims,
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whether it's Vietnam, whether it's the Philippines, there are a lot, there are lots of disputed
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islands in the sea. And China is simply doing nothing, disregarding all of it and moving straight
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ahead. There are no court proceedings that I'm aware of, international court proceedings.
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There is no effort to negotiate. This is bullheaded straight ahead. Take what you will.
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Yes. And, you know, this goes back to early 2012. And the reason I'd mentioned this is because Biden
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was vice president in the Obama administration, and he was considered to be the foreign policy
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advisor to the president. Well, in 2012, at Scarborough Show, also part of the Philippines, very close to the
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main Philippine island in Luzon and very far away from China. The Obama administration actually
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brokered a deal between Manila and Beijing for the Chinese to withdraw their craft from Scarborough
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Shoal. Now, this was a U.S. deal. The Chinese dishonored it. They kept their vessels there. The
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Philippines actually honored it. And that left China in possession of Scarborough. And the Obama
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administration refused to enforce that deal. And so I think China learned from that, that they could
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do what they want. And the reason why that's relevant today is because shortly after seizing
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Scarborough, they then started to fortify those islands in the Spratly chain, which is where
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Second Thomas is. They then ramped up pressure on Second Thomas Shoal, which is where there are
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problems today. And they started to go after the Japanese in the East China Sea at the Senkakus,
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which the Chinese claim as the Dao use. So China just went out and made the problem bigger. They
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got away with it in 2012. They obviously think they can get away with it in 2023.
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Obviously. And let's continue this on the other side of these quick words, folks. We'll be right
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back. We're talking with Gordon Chang about both Asia. And we're also going to bring up a little
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matter of what is happening in Tokyo, in the Philippines, and throughout the Indo-Pacific.
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And then we'll leap over to the Hamas war against Israel. We'll be right back.
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We're back with Gordon Chang. And we want to talk about now, Gordon, if we may, let's turn
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to what I think is a remarkable statement by the Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, in which
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publicly he admonished the Israelis for their war strategy and basically said that they had
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made mistakes. And I have never seen a Secretary of Defense treat an ally the way he did.
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Absolutely. And really what we're talking about here is a war which is existential for Israel.
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Israel is a friend. It's a democracy. It was attacked on October 7th.
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Iran has continued those attacks through Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthi militia.
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And this is a fight that we have to win. And I think it should be Israel that determines what
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they're going to do, because it's their country. The United States should support it. Unfortunately,
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we have a lot of pro-Iran elements in the State Department and in the National Security Council.
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So we have an administration that, from the very beginning, Lou, was off-key. Because if you
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remember, right after the attacks on the 7th of October, the reaction of the State Department was
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called for a ceasefire, which was absolutely wrong. You know, everybody wants peace, but the problem
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was that Israel was just attacked, brutally attacked. And Israel has got to eliminate Hamas
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if it's going to have peace. And so they were just the wrong instincts throughout this administration,
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whether we're talking Defense Department, State Department, NSC, or Oval Office.
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This administration, this regime, if you will, is befuddling in its ineptitude and its policies.
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To think that Lloyd Austin would say what he did, I just, he would never have said that about
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the Zelensky government. There's never been a statement, an analog of any kind to what he said.
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What is, what makes Israel different that they would condescend to our greatest ally in the Middle
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East in that fashion? I hate to say it, but the answer to your question is anti-Semitism.
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There is a large block of the Democratic Party coalition that is anti-Semitic. And this has been
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clear as we see the reactions of the administration to the attacks on Israel. That's the only explanation
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that I can come up with, because what Lloyd Austin said and what other administration officials said
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clearly could only have been motivated by a pro-Iranian government.
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I think you're exactly right. And Iran is just not mentioned in the calculus that is
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the Israel-Hamas war right now. Well, we know that they are driving the Hamas terrorist organization.
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They are financing it. They are moving the strategy daily, as well as the tactics.
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Why is Iran not even mentioned by this administration? Because if strategically,
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as Lloyd Austin likes to speak strategically, big thinkers, big words, strategically, one has to,
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I think, include the nation state for whom all of this is but proxy. Iran needs to be confronted
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and be dealt with on this issue. It seems to me there is no escaping that.
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You're absolutely right about that. And if we're going to think strategically and even with more
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context, we'd have to include China in that as well, because China has been supporting Iran
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diplomatically from a propaganda point of view and also from an economic financial lifeline point of
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view, which means that Iran could not support its proxies, the three terrorist groups,
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without the support from Beijing. Just to give you an example of this, in the first nine months of
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this year, China's purchases of Iran's oil was 60 percent above that in the comparable period in
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2017. 2017 is relevant because that is the last year before the Trump administration reimposed sanctions
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on Iranian oil, which means that China right now is violating sanctions. The Biden administration is not
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doing anything about it. Matter of fact, U.S. diplomats have been told not to mention Iran
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because there are Gulf Arab friends are just perplexed by this. But U.S. diplomats have been
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warned off of talking about this broader issue, which you're highlighting right now, which is Iran
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fueling the attacks. Mentioning Iran's interest in the Middle East, are we seeing a new level of
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expansionary ambitions in the Middle East on the part of China?
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Absolutely. We have seen, for instance, well, if I may go back, President Trump had the most successful
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Middle East policy of any American president after FDR who stitched together the deal with Saudi Arabia
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and created this friendship. The Abraham Accords are historic. They would have won an American president
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a Nobel Prize if his last name weren't Trump. And what Biden has done is taken down, basically undermined
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the Abraham Accords and supported Iran. China has seen this as an opportunity.
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They put together that temporary deal between Saudi Arabia and Iran, and they are now courting the Gulf Arab states,
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the other states of the Gulf Cooperation Council. So, yes, China believes it can take over the region
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to the exclusion of the United States. That's clear from what they're doing.
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And also, they're starting to elbow their friends Russia out of the region as well.
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It is remarkable what this administration, this regime is doing and where it leads. I don't think
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we can contemplate without thinking about serious, serious setbacks for the United States,
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not just in policy, but in terms of world standing. We're talking with Gordon Chang. We're coming right
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back. Please stay with us here on The Great America Show.
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We're back now with Gordon Chang. And Gordon, we were talking about President Biden, his policies,
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and his standing now where he has bollocksed up Asia, the Middle East, Ukraine. We're running out
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territory for him to foul. Your thoughts on his standing now globally.
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Well, there's been a collapse in America standing globally. President Trump left a world in peace.
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Biden inherited that when he took office. And since then, we have seen catastrophes.
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There was the catastrophic withdrawal from Afghanistan in August of 2021.
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That, I believe, convinced Putin that he could invade Ukraine. We have heard from the Arab leaders
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privately that the Biden administration's failure to deal with an Iranian attack on Bahrain forces
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about three weeks before the October 7th attack convinced Iran that now is the time to move.
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Because they saw the Biden administration not only failed to act when an Iranian proxy attacked Bahrain
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forces, but they also failed to say anything at all. So that's, you know, the October 7th war
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could have been avoided. And then another catastrophe is North Africa, where China and Russia are fueling
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insurgencies across North Africa that look like wars. So we have a world that is falling apart and it fell
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apart on Biden's watch due to Biden's policies. We're watching a 2,000 mile long border that's been
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handed over to the Mexican drug cartels, which means it's also being turned over to China, who are their
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strategic partners, both the government of Mexico and the cartels, their strategic partners and Venezuela now
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rearing its its ambitions and and being very threatening to Guyana. Give us give us your thinking on why
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there's no seemingly Biden policy for the Western Hemisphere.
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Yeah, this is this is where it hits home, Lou, on the first point you raised, which was our open southern border
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border. We're seeing coming across that border some very suspicious individuals. There are, for
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instance, packs of Chinese males in groups of five to 15 of military age traveling without family members
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pretending not to speak English. U.S. Border Patrol knows that some of these Chinese individuals have
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links to the Chinese military. And the question is, why are they coming here? And I'm worried that they are
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saboteurs. Remember that lab in Reedley, California, that secret Chinese biological weapons facility had at
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least 20 pathogens, according to the official count, and had almost a thousand mice that had been
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genetically engineered to spread disease. I can't believe that that's the only such facility in the U.S.
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And I think that the males that are coming across our border are going to link up with those facilities.
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We also know there are Syrians and Venezuelans coming across who appear to have very, very dangerous
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ties. So this is an open season on the United States. And just one more other thing about terrorists as a
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part of that September 11th deal that Biden had with Iran, where we released hostages and unfroze six
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billion dollars. As a part of that, Biden issued clemency to Iranian operatives who were not sent back
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to Iran. They were actually released into the United States. And this is important because there are
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actually low level Trump officials who still have Secret Service protection because there is a threat
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that Iran might assassinate them. So this is just there are no words to describe what's going on.
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With regard to Guiana and Venezuela, on Sunday, Venezuela held a referendum. About 95 percent of
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the people in Venezuela said that the government should annex two thirds of Guiana, their neighbor to
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the east. That's an oil rich, mineral rich area. The answer, the reason why this is important is not
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only because it's the Western Hemisphere, but it's also, I believe, another symptom of the collapse of
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Biden policy because Venezuela would not threaten to militarily invade a neighbor if it thought it
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could, you know, they wouldn't do this unless they thought they could get away with it. They couldn't
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get away with this under President Trump. But they're thinking that right now, American policy is in
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collapse. I hope Venezuela is just posturing. One can make an argument that this is just huff and puff.
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But the point is, they are threatening to invade their neighbor.
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And for what purpose? There just seems to be no strategic, logical, rational reason for them to
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Because they can, I suppose. I mean, there has been a territorial dispute between Guiana and Venezuela
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Venezuela that is, goes back more than 100 years, I think. And the question is, why is it becoming
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such an issue now? I think the answer is because they see American policy is in collapse. They don't
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believe the United States can maintain peace and stability around the world like we did up until
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Biden became president. And the world is now falling apart. You know, we've got wars and
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potential wars all over the place right now. And this reminds me of what happened in the 1930s,
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where, you know, we had separate wars that eventually merged into what we now know is
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the Second World War. Well, we've got the same situation right now. And I'm just concerned that
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these conflicts are going to merge into a much bigger global fight. So this is the Biden administration
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is not prepared. And Lloyd Austin is certainly not prepared to deal with this because he's much
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more worried about diversity and stuff like that. And one can say that, you know, issues of diversity
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are important. I don't. I think right now we have to emphasize unity because we have common enemies
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and those enemies mean us great harm. They mean to take away our country. And so we need to be united
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as a people to confront this. Well, Gordon, thank you for saying that. And I wholly support you in those
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sentiments and agree with you 100 percent. And as always, it's been an instructive discussion. We thank
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you so much for bringing your insight, your knowledge and your wisdom to to what is a lamentable
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American foreign policy at this this moment in history. Thanks, Gordon Chang. God bless you.
00:25:31.360
Thanks, Lou. And God bless you. Thanks, everybody, for being with us here today. Our guest here
00:25:36.700
tomorrow on The Great America Show is Kyle Rittenhouse on what life and politics have been
00:25:41.920
like for him. Well, over the past three years, since the 2020 summer of riots, murder protests
00:25:48.140
and arson all across the country. Kyle was 17 when he was forced to defend himself from armed attackers
00:25:56.020
in the midst of a Kenosha, Wisconsin riot. We'll let him tell you about the rest. Please join us each
00:26:02.280
and every day for The Great America Show. Thank you, everybody. God bless you. And may God bless America.