Popular Uprising in China: Zero Covid Exhaustion

 

The Chinese are Fed up with Lockdowns Finally

The Chinese are protesting in various cities against the zero Covid lockdowns. Whenever I read a story about the Chinese people it amazes me what they put up with. From the lack of press freedom to the social credit scores, they are constantly hounded by their oppressive CCP (Chinese Communist Party). Ever since Covid 19 escaped from one of their labs in Wuhan (I believe) the party has instituted a “Zero Covid” requirement on the public. Health officials in hazmat suits stand outside of apartment buildings testing and retesting citizens. No one who tests positive is allowed outside of their apartment. In some cases they are literally locked inside.

It's monstrous, and it’s been going on for too long. Maybe they’ve finally had enough. An apartment fire broke out in the city of Urumqi on November 24. Some reports said firetrucks weren’t able to get close due to blocked parking. 10 people were killed and 9 were taken to the hospital with smoke inhalation. The local officials issued some boilerplate statement about the building not being on lockdown. In other words, hey they weren’t under quarantine. They could leave whenever.

 Some residents apparently “lacked the knowledge or capability to rescue themselves”.

Ham fisted responses from officials, plus irritation from lockdowns is creating a backlash in major cities. It’s unclear how many of the demonstrations are due to the fire deaths and how many are Covid and lockdown related. Some protesters shout against the chairman (Xi Jinping) and the Communist Party, calling for his removal. From all the accounts I’ve read, there is an exhaustion with the loss of freedom. It’s not even the big ideological freedoms that westerners like, speech, press and religion. Losing the ability to walk to the market and buy groceries without being harassed is more to the point.

I’m surprised we haven’t seen this anger from the public on a massive scale. The Chinese put up with too much. The CCP is finding out how discontented people are being forced to stay home for months at a time. Has Xi Jinping overestimated his power or will this popular uprising fizzle out? China cracks down quickly on any form of dissent. During the 2011 Arab Spring when uprisings happened all over the Muslim world, China kept it from happening at home. I remember a few weak attempts by protestors to start shouting and marching in Shanghai against Communist rule. The government stopped it quickly by sending in goons and arresting the leaders. So this might be nothing.

But I like to think, hope, that this is the start of something big in that country. If the Tiananmen Square crackdown from 1989 tells us anything, it’s that Beijing doesn’t play around. That year was a rebellious year all over the country. University students engaged in marches and demands for much of the year. But unleashing the military on them at the most famous spot in all of China ended the rebellion. The fear of another big crackdown has kept the public in check for the most part.

But you can only push people so far. The best case scenario for the Chinese people is that the CCP gives up power completely and puts some form of democracy in place. This won’t happen easily and likely it will take long revolution, and lots of death. But how powerful is the Communist party anyway? I imagine in most cases the local functionaries won’t be able to do anything against an angry mob. Don’t forget how large of a country China is, 1.5 billion people. Violent protests in every major city across the country will force some kind of change.

The next best case is that XI Jinping has to step down and the rest of the government eases restrictions dramatically. This isn’t as good of a deal for the people of China because the same system that brought them zero Covid is still in place. But at least the arrogant Xi would be gone, as well as the lockdowns. I don’t think this is likely to happen however. Once the demonstrations prove useful the people will keep them going until the whole system collapses. But as a practical matter, having the government give up this medical tyranny would be better than what they have now.

Third, the government effectively stops this popular revolt and puts a chill on future revolts. That’s basically what the nineties looked like following the Tiananmen Square massacre. The security state got bigger and scarier. But they’ve gotten bigger and scarier since the lab leak at Wuhan so what’s the difference? That may be the conclusion the citizens eventually draw. We can suffer under this medical tyranny or we can fight to get back our basic rights. Either way, we aren’t going to live like this anymore.

I’m praying for the people of China.

King or Judge? Fix the Corruption First

 

I Samuel 8

I’m unfamiliar with large swathes of the Old Testament. Or if not unfamiliar, at least like a pond where the sediment needs to be stirred. A lot of it comes back to me when I start reading in I Samuel. It’s a famous passage where the children of Israel ask Samuel, the priest, for a king to rule over them. Samuel’s sons were judges in Beersheba but were known for their graft.  

“Then all the elders of Israel gathered together and came to Samuel at Ramah, and said to him, ‘Look, you are old, and your sons do not walk in your ways. Now make us king to judge us like all the nations”. (4-5)

When this story is told in Sunday school classes it’s usually accompanied by a warning to those ‘foolish’ Israelites. Samuel as well gives them a lecture about what’s to be expected when electing a king. He tries to talk them out of it. But I’m sympathetic to their concerns. Who wants to live under leaders that are knowingly corrupt? That’s why they started with a complaint about Samuel’s sons, the future judges of their country. And I can guarantee it wasn’t as clean as the text makes it sound. I think the people let him know that this was at least somewhat his fault.

That’s just me reading into this story.

It makes sense. Large companies run like this sometimes. A competent CEO prepares to step down and hand the business over to his son. The son’s always been someone who couldn’t organize a beer run for a tailgate party, let alone make consequential decisions. Nervousness sets in with the executives as they plead with the old man to consider an alternative. What they never say, but really could, is that this is kind of your fault sir.

But here is where the story takes a turn. Samuel hears their complaints and prays to God. “And the Lord said to Samuel, Heed the voice of the people in all that they say to you; for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected Me, that I should not reign over them.” (verse 7) We would expect God to say something to Samuel not raising up the next generation right. But God knew the heart of the matter was not corrupt leaders, it was a collective hardness of heart among His people that created selfish leaders.

Corruption grows in the soil that surrounds it. In other words, the same culture that rejected God’s commandments, permitted corrupt judges. This doesn’t let Samuel’s kids (Joel and Abijah) off for the hook. But it does point to a lack of the fear of the Lord in the hearts of the people.

 Samuel’s sons were not capable of judging righteously because they didn’t follow God. Samuel represented the last of the honest, God fearing servants in the land. He managed to paper over the cracks of his sons’ dishonesty while alive, but how long can that go on?

We all get disgusted by selfish people who take advantage of those they’re supposed to watch over. This is true in all areas of life, business, entertainment and nonprofits. But corrupt leaders don’t just fall out of the sky. There are warning signs at an earlier stage of development. Think of the talented football player that keeps getting off with a warning when the police arrest him for DUI or vandalism. Without accountability, anyone is a potential victim of their recklessness. They learn no lessons except that someone will handle it.

Individuals are responsible for their own behavior, always. But societies get more of what they permit in their leaders. It looks like Israel, in the time of Samuel, is no different. God tells him to explain to the people what having a king will mean.

“He will take your sons and appoint them for his own chariots and to be his horsemen, and some will run before his chariots, he will appoint captains over his thousands and captains over his fifties, will set some to plow his ground and reap his harvest, and some to make weapons of war and equipment for chariots. He will take your daughters to be perfumers, cooks, and bakers. And he will take the best of your fields, your vineyards, and your olive groves, and give them to his servants. (11-15)

It goes on like this for another 3 or 4 verses. This is God saying ‘you think you’ve got it bad now, just wait’. The crux of their problem with judges (God’s appointed rulers) is the lack of honesty they exhibit. But under a king, the people give up so much more. And, they get to pick a king from the same group of dishonest leaders. I love they respond though, essentially “We want a king like everyone else to fight our battles.”

It’s like when the contractor tells you that pool you want to build won’t work because your ground is too sandy. You say “So…when can you start?”

The short lesson is this, if you’re seeing rampant corruption in leaders you need to look deeper. Chances are the culture is rotten and permitting of it at multiple levels. This isn’t moral relativism, but it would help to root it out closer to home first. We don’t have a fear of God and it shows up in various ways when we let corruption slide.

The children of Israel never went back to the judges model. I’m sure they wished at times for a simpler, less invasive, style of government. But even in their ignorance He rescued them from total destruction and raised up Godly leaders.

 

 

 

Spying for the CCP: A New Era of Confrontation

 

Chinese Spy Sentenced in the US

A Chinese Intelligence officer was sentenced to 20 years for trying to steal proprietary information. It’s an important case because it’s the first time a Chinese citizen has been extradited to the US. I’m not sure how all the diplomatic/legal back and forth play out. 

Xu was convicted last year; this year we finally got the sentencing part of it. The FBI has been aware of his ‘fishing expeditions’ since 2013.

He was arrested in Belgium. The FBI had been monitoring his communications with a former GE employee. Xu wanted information on GE’s composite aircraft fan that no one has been able to replicate. That’s only his latest episode, the crime they actually got him for. Using various aliases, he sought out current and former employees of aviation companies and paid them to come to China for university talks. The junkets were paid for by Xu, with the intention of capturing as much technical information as possible.

The GE employee convinced him to come to Belgium for a trade show. It was here the illegal exchange happened, Xu asked for a digital company manual. 

He is set to do 20 years. How high up was this guy on a spy grade anyway?

If he’s a foot soldier it’s likely Beijing takes the loss and moves on. If he’s a high ranking official they’ll want him back and probably offer trades to get him. I wonder how it works on a diplomatic level though. Do we trade spies or offer up some other deal? Like waving certain legal cases currently on the docket at the WTO (World Trade Organization)? The US and China both sue each other all the time at the WTO. Part of signing the agreements to engage in trade requires recognizing the legitimacy of the court. But that’s small potatoes stuff, breaking tariff agreements and dumping complaints. Stealing technological trade secrets is serious business that requires old fashioned diplomacy.

Xu worked for the Ministry of State Security (MSS) which is responsible for foreign intelligence and counterintelligence. It will be interesting to see if Beijing arrests American foreigners for the similar crimes. It’s not unusual for them to do this anyway. Apparently the case against Xu is very strong. These cases are always so murky. When you extradite a foreign national you better have a damn good reason for it, especially one working for the government. Hopefully the blowback isn’t too severe on Americans living and working in China.

This story caught my eye because of the increasing amount of spying happening from the CCP every year. Americans are starting to get a sense for how the Chinese government operates but it’s taken a long time. I think we were all naïve in the late nineties about their goals. I certainly was. I believed prosperity through private business and foreign capital could raise the living standards. And, that prosperity would create an ownership society, laws to protect capital and free (ish) markets. It looks now like that was a ruse from Big Business to open factories and save money. No one believes the ‘wealth leads to freedom’ campaign anymore.

The problem is the US can’t just decouple in one swoop. At the very least, our federal and state laws need to take a skeptical approach to all Chinese investment. They don’t take our companies there without forcing local partners on them that steal their data and intellectual property. American companies with a presence in China will be expected to give up any useful, legally protected R&D. I’m not opposed to free markets either. But we should only be free with those countries that reciprocate.

No matter how many of these spy stories pop up our feeds I wonder how many people think it’s a big deal. Intellectual property theft between businesses in the same country is bad enough. But losing IP to a foreign country, especially one that sees itself as an enemy could be devastating. Not just devastating because our industries will no longer compete, cutting edge R&D often determines what kind of military your country will have. If we don’t stay on top and protect our critical industries, we will lose out to a more powerful China.

We are very close to being there. Our navy is getting chased out of the South China Sea. Beijing is collecting allies in the region and using ASEAN to support its claims about the ridiculous nine dash line. Eventually the US will get pushed out, unable to keep its hegemony in the region. But we can stop helping Beijing. 

Keep arresting spies, and make it as public as possible. 

David's Trust In God's Vision: Psalm 140

 

Psalm 140: We Don't Need the Big Picture In Life

Trust leads us forward toward the victory when all else seems lost. It hurts not being able to fight back when your enemy is cheating. David knows this feeling all too well. From court treachery to devious friends, the king is always at war. The Psalms prove this out. It takes practice to rest in God’s plan for our situation.

David lets God know about the evil men. He uses words like “scheme” and “snare” and “trap”. We can assume David knows where to look for the traps, otherwise he wouldn’t be able to sniff them out. But it must be exhausting not knowing who to trust, and assuming everyone is a potential traitor.  We learn one big lesson from David about desperation. God vision is perfect, and we can rest in His goodness; our vision is limited and we shouldn’t try to understand the full picture.

Why can't we have the full picture?

Without faith we can't please God; with faith comes trust. Handing someone a paint by numbers set to design great art, ruins the art. It's not original if someone helps you with every stroke. God designed us a certain way, with attitudes, skills and desires for a purpose. He gives us just enough of a vision of the future to keep us going. Joseph’s dreams about his brothers got him in trouble early in life. Anyone with a mouthy younger brother can relate to their frustration. We know of at least two dreams he shared with his older siblings. The theme in both cases, my station in life is significantly better than yours. Or at least he thought it would be. And for sure, God gave him these dreams as a picture of future events.

But we don’t see all the other times Joseph was insufferable. But he was young and adored by his father, another thorny reminder of his brothers’ lower station. But Joseph learned skills as an overseer at Potiphar’s home. He was in charge of food inventory and figured out what it took to feed large numbers of people. I’m sure he learned to read people as well. God gave him the ability to interpret dreams. Joseph likely didn’t think he'd ever be a high government official. God allowed him to see bits and pieces along the way. Eventually, he got an audience with the Pharoah to interpret the dream of the 7 years of plenty and 7 years of famine.

Why do our enemies keep winning?

David’s plea sounds like an ongoing problem for him. “They continually gather together for war. They sharpen their tongues like a serpent; the poison of asps is under their lips.” (2-3) He’s learned to trust God with the big picture and the small picture. He’s also learned not to try and understand all the ways in which evil men try to trick him. But David does know God’s goodness. “I said to the Lord: “You are my God; Hear the voice of my supplications, O Lord. O God the Lord, the strength of my salvation, You have covered my head in the day of battle…” (6-7)

Like Joseph’s learned skill in managing inventories, David has learned to read situations and people. How many times did he fall into a trap and regret it? Those in power are constantly under assault from all sides. The ones who survive know how to avoid traps and deal ruthlessly with their enemies. King David’s wisdom, and lasting success, comes from letting God handle the treacherous situations.

I’ve been watching the Arizona election drops for the 2022 race. The election was a week ago but, like any corrupt state, they’ve still got a handful of ballots to count. Elections are rife with corruption, that’s what 2020 taught me. I can’t say exactly how Arizona will try to steal this one for the Democrat candidate, but they will. There are too many ways to keep the election from being a straightforward vote and count system.  If there were ever a time to plead with God for a cleaning up of our institutions, this is it.

Conclusion

Arizona is the most egregious, and current, example because it’s essentially still a red state that’s at risk of turning blue. It serves as a model of how quickly, and easily, and state can become corrupted. Sadly, many of our American institutions (religious, cultural) are empty shells, existing like a vacant coastal city after a hurricane warning. Like much of the country, we are on borrowed time. Corruption is eating away at us. It’s time for a rebuild. Will we see a famine first?

 Like Joseph and David, I don’t need to see the full election picture to know that God is bigger and able to expose the fraud. The wicked are on a timetable, no one gets away with sin forever. “Let not a slanderer be established in the earth; let evil hunt the violent man to overthrow him.” (11).

Book Review: The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics

 

The Unity of the 1936 Rowing Team from Washington

When I first picked up the book I knew as much about rowing as I did logging in the Northwest. I suspect it’s this way for most people. There was a time, however, when rowing was the biggest collegiate sport in America, at least it was in certain parts of the country. In The Boys in the Boat: Nine American and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics, Daniel James Brown tells a Depression era story of working class kids overcoming great odds and winning it all. It takes a great writer to resurrect the past just enough, and make Americans wonder why we hadn’t heard this gem of a story before now.

Brown tells the story of the rowing crew through the person of Joe Rantz, a Washington native. It’s both heartbreaking and encouraging to understand how someone can struggle just to feed themselves, while working their way through college. Joe’s father, Harry, left Joe to care for himself, abandoning him at the behest of his second wife. She didn’t like Joe. He was from Harry’s previous marriage and therefore not welcome. Joe was still in high school. The grueling days living in cabin and scrounging up meals built a toughness in him that made rowing a perfect fit.

The ‘Boys in the Boat’ teaches us how rowing crews come together and why unity is essential for victory. The University of Washington’s coach, Al Ulbrickson, relied heavily on George Pocock for some of the technical aspects of rowing. Pocock, a Brit, set up a business building and selling racing shells out of the University years before. He understood rowing, its spiritual and physical characteristics. He wasn’t a coach but could diagnose a problem with a team from afar. As a result of his eye, Ulbrickson relied on him at times to work on the phycology of his athletes. Joe Rantz was the recipient of this expertise for a time.

 Rantz’s freshmen squad showed talent almost immediately. They Beat the University of California, a perennial rival, at the yearly regatta in Poughkeepsie in 1934.

Ulbrickson made wholesale changes from the time the freshman won their first major race to the Olympic victory in Berlin. By the time they became the varsity crew, they’d been changed out so many times that they never felt secure. Their inconsistency almost doomed them. Eventually though Ulbrickson settled on a team with a smart coxswain and a strong lead. The coxswain, Bobby Moch, figured the most efficient way to win was to get into rhythm as quick as possible and ramp it up near the end. The boys wasted less energy this way because they were able to move as quickly as crews with a faster tempo.

Their secret was unity. The more in tune rowers are with one another, the less wasted motion there is. It’s why a lot of signature wins from the Washington boys were come from behind attacks. Moch keep them at a slower rhythm relative to other teams. The Olympic victory played out a little differently. I won’t spoil it, but Brown doesn’t disappoint in his tense, excited description. The boys from Washington, now representing the United States, had a few staggering impediments on the final race. One was a sick rower and the other, an unfair lane assignment. Al Ulbrickson complained mercilessly to the committee about the lanes 6 and 7 with their heavy crosswinds.

While the story is the Boys, there is a fair bit of history about the Depression and the Nazi’s grand display in Berlin. It’s impossible to talk about 1936 without detailing Leni Riefenstahl’s big vision for the Olympics. Her ongoing fight with Joseph Goebbels plays out against the camaraderie of the US rowing team. More than anything, the story is best when talking about the hardships the team experienced, rowing in the cold and getting comfortable with pain. It’s why Brown focuses so heavily on Joe and his hard scrabble existence that followed him like a shadow. Money is nearly impossible to come by. He even gets beat up by a game warden who catches him fishing illegally and selling the bounty for cash.

What comes together at the end is a true American story of triumph and overcoming odds. One of my favorite passages is near the end. It perfectly sums up the feelings of the boys and how the team had replaced the individual.

 “All along Joe Rantz had figured that he was the weak link in the crew. He’d been added to the boat last, he’d often struggled to master the technical side of the sport, and he still tended to row erratically. Bu what Joe didn’t yet know—what he wouldn’t, in fact, fully realize until much later, when he and the other boys were becoming old men—was that every boy in the boat felt exactly the same that summer. Every one of them believed he was simply lucky to be rowing in the boat, that he didn’t really measure up to the obvious greatness of the other boys, and that he might fail the others at any moment. Every one of them was fiercely determined not to let that happen.” (page 326)

I’m impressed with author Daniel James Brown’s exhaustive research. Much of the story relies on historical records from over a hundred years ago. He must have poured over countless newspaper headlines from the Washington papers to recount the races, times and weather details. The personal stories are always the best though, and readers will get a hefty dose of human struggle and triumph. Highly recommend.

 

 

Doctor Phil's Blind Spot: Too Many Opinions

 

I heard Doctor Phil on Joe Rogan the other day. Rogan’s talkathon podcast is quickly becoming a fount of information for my constantly humming brain. Doctor Phil is a great source for information about drug abuse, and fentanyl’s debilitating effect on the country. On this particular episode they talked about the nastiness and discord in the country right today. Also discussed, the craziness of transgender bullies and the danger of social media. 

Doctor Phil's show is in a lot of ways a public service, but like other successful people he approaches all conflicts the same way. Get folks together and talk it out.

He thinks all problems can be solved by sitting down and hashing out differences. Or at the very least, gaining an appreciation for other points of view. It’s a tired view of conflict and whose time has come.

 Blame social media all you want for ramping up conflict, it doesn’t excuse the fact that one side wants to destroy the country as founded. All of his homespun examples of ‘gettin along’ sound like breaking up a fight between boys at recess. This is fundamentally misguided.

First, not all arguments are made in good faith. Did male swimmer Lia Thomas become a ‘woman’ because he always felt like a girl, or did he do it to dominate collegiate events? We all know the answer. Pretending Thomas’ transition is anything but a charade is phony.  

Second, some arguments are built on faulty logic, misinformation and attitude. The only way to un-wire some people is by ignoring them, or by physically stopping them. I put climate change doomsdayers in this camp. They do outrageous stunts for attention, hoping to disrupt the lives of commuters and cause them irritation. They shut down subways, roadways and destroy art. They’re destructive like children when you ignore them. They deserve a good punch to the face, hard.

The United States is under attack from a global communist cabal. It’s working hard to dismantle our strength and unity. It hates law and order. It hates capitalism. It hates Christianity and the message of salvation, dignity and grace. It wants to enslave humanity. It uses as many points of conflict as it can to create wedges of separation.  

This isn’t one of those times where you find out what the other side wants. We know what they want, chaos. They want a revolution in sexual pleasure, immediate gratification and a lack of accountability for all of it. What part of that does Doctor Phil want to negotiate with?

This whole attitude reminds me of screaming kids at Target. Parents learn to negotiate with kids here. When did children start getting everything they wanted? I’ll give you the toy if you promise not to scream. You can hear it in Doctor Phil’s wondering out loud, but some views are just warped. Some opinions are faulty, illogical. As if all our desires must be met on some level. As if all our opinions have weight.

There’s probably a close link between wealthy societies and decadence. Entitlement persists, it’s in the air. It’s a poison that affects rich and poor. Stomp your feet loud enough and someone will attend to you. Decadence is the stage right before societal collapse I imagine. Rogan mentioned those kids throwing soup on art to protest some climate nonsense. Camera crews stand around documenting their every halfwit proclamation. Daytime TV dopes try to get them in a room to talk about their very important protest.

Twenty years ago I would’ve given Doctor Phil a break. Society hadn’t degraded to the point where letting kids choose their gender was the stock and trade of the Democrat Party. But he’s seen too much. At some point he’ll have to recognize this two sides bullshit is for a previous age. This isn’t a Right versus Left thing anymore. That might explain his reluctance to be righteously indignant. You either believe that children are a precious gift and we owe it to future generations to tell them the truth, or you don’t.

What truth do we owe? The truth about good and evil, and the truth about sin and consequence. The universe was created in God’s image, as were people. We don’t get to decide which sex to become, or which sexual identity to put on like a pair of boots. Sin entered the world when Lucifer fell from heaven. Since then, he’s tried to destroy God’s creation and confuse humanity. The evil that exists in culture is a direct result of Lucifer’s war against the Creator. We have to start there.

We live in a time of great confusion around the world. The time for milquetoast responses is over. Kids are at risk in this world of lies if we don’t fight for them.  

 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because what may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has shown it to them

Romans 1:18-19