Deng Xiaoping, paramount leader of China into the 1990s, spelled out the wisdom of the East and the strategic course of the future, in his dictate of "24 Characters":
Observe calmly
secure our position
cope with affairs calmly
hide our capabilities and bide our time;
be good at maintaining a low profile;
never claim leadership.
Four more characters were added later:
...and make some contribution.
That was in the clinton Error, so nobody worried, and everyone was happy. History had Ended. The Millennium was imminent, and arrived, as obama proved. obama cured GLOBAL WARMING!!!! after all, until Trump ruined everything.
United States would have gotten better, not worse, if we had the wisdom to match our power. But as one declines, so does the other. I don't mean Chinese wisdom, because different circumstances require different responses. But analogous.
Alas, the bright American spirit has grown dull. Exponentially more unseriousness and irrational. The pragmatism of the hard-scrabble Yankee farmer has presented its backside for the pleasure of the ballroom popinjay -- is my metaphor inapt? Inept? I remember a Greek who once told me, “All American students want to do, is dance.” That, too, was in the 90s -- so we see the streams of history, albeit Ended.
America is still, somehow, first among nations, rudderless tramp steamer though it be. I used to think it was like having a dance-happy teenager make all the family decisions. How naive I was. "Dance happy." What a mild rebuke. Pansexual, now. No need to dance -- it might arouse a hormone other than the ones for being triggered. No teenagers now -- not even a gerontocracy. There must be a word for it, "government by the demented". Oh, yeah, heh heh. "The biden Admiseration".
So few leaders. Popularity polls to select politicians, and if you recall your teenager days, popular kids are not generally the smart ones.
Eight years as president may seem like a long time, enough for long-range planning. And there have been 13 presidents in my lifetime ... and I’m not 104. There is no ruling body of wise human persons, vested with promoting the interests not of some contributors list, but of the next generation, and the one after that. The wrongly-named Senate (supposed to indicate wisdom rather than mere age) -- the Senate OUGHT to fill that need, for sensible planning. But, everyone OUGHT to be happy and healthy.
That old fashioned idea of public office as a public trust, an almost sacred position that requires self-sacrifice. The idea is obsolete, disfavored, hateful, patriarchy cis race genital pronouns. Outre.
Societies move like pendulums, back and forth. But it's not vertical movement, upward progress. Experience shows, almost always, decadence, somehow. How is that possible. It's like fractals, like Mandelbrot sets -- however depraved things get, there are yet ever deeper hells.
Wouldn't it be grand, a noble spirit taking hold in American governance, and a generation that knows not Pharaoh rising up and casting down the idols, the lingam and yoni interchangeable fetishes, rising and plunging like maypoles and venuses. It has happened before, for all that depravity is a law, a subcorollary of entropy, just identified, by MEEEEEE!!!
It's mere wishing, though. The hard fact is, this scow of state has no direction, this ferry. The current feeble hand at the tiller is as likely to fall, lifeless, as to pilot. Captain? O captain, no captain!
Lower and lower in narrowing gyres, downward, drill baby drill, to hell. It's unseemly, is all. Unbefitting. Short-term goals, or rather, chaotic. Hatred of energy independence. Borders open to every criminal. Unwinnable wars. Generational blood enemies. I am too delicate to go on.
There is an irreparable and fatal flaw in our character. Dance baby dance.
We are a great people because of what we have been. Has been, a star on history's stage, getting the hook. Powerful, the way someone with really bad intestinal gas has power.
There is an understudy -- a rising star, rather.
China has ambition beyond Taiwan. What is the Chinese character, counterpart of the American? Well, simply, authoritarian. Of all national characters, American is most benevolent, albeit unseriousness. The world should fall on its face and thank whatever god it worships, for kindly stupid old Uncle Santa.
But these are serious times, yet another hinge of fate, like a trap door, or something aspirational. There is a checklist that would determine which -- a list of serious problems that need to be resolved.
The historian Arnold Toynbee wrote of challenges and responses. Well? Here we are. islamism is currently mostly Jew-hatred. Outspending and having a bigger military just seems like a waste of resources. Hardly even has any meaning. It's not working for Ukraine. Old solutions do not apply. What then?
Wisdom. A paradigm shift. Whatever. The most vapid of generalities. A stranger with his hand behind his back may be holding a club. Children will take it for a baseball bat. Can we learn a lesson without it being a 9/11? All we learned from that is surveillance.
Being the jolly fat guy at the party doesn’t make us loved. Love has nothing to do with it. China gets it right. Plan, plan, plan. And then plan again, and again, and once more. Then some more. Mao called us a paper tiger. He was wrong. We are a real tiger, but a tame one, spade or neutered.
Mao wasn't capable of understanding America. Tojo got it right -- a sleeping giant, dreaming, no higher cognitive functions. Dreams are not plans.
What then? Wisdom learns and adapts. So:
Observe calmly: let other people be distracted by emotion.
Secure our position: whether or not the ice is thin, it is slippery.
Cope with affairs calmly: we’ve been here before.
These are precepts we should hold. As for hiding our capabilities or biding our time or keeping a low profile or never claiming leadership -- these apply to someone else, who is very serious about following them, and who might gain the whole world for doing so. We shall see.
Mao was a venomous serpent, a dragon, a child of lies, and anything he ever uttered of truth he did so only by coincidence. Paper tiger? More and more.
As for that final precept, of always making a contribution? Well, that’s what tiggers have done best. Here, have some money, and citizenship.
And now, the punchline: China has an updated slogan, a fresh set of 24-characters, from Chairman Xi Jinping, for “national rejuvenation” by 2049.
Is Xi just a biden, stammering and muttering and blustering and wandering and stumbling? Peking is not Delaware. biden's policy is surely succinct -- indeed, only four characters ... maybe five: "Don't". Don't hurt me, please, sir. Don't take away my ice cream. Don't vote for Trump -- WE do all the voting around here.
As for China, observe:
沉着冷静 Chenzhuo Lengjing；
保持定力 Baochi Dingli；
稳中求进 Wenzhong Qiujin；
积极作为 Jiji Zuowei；
团结一致 Tuanjie Yizhi；
敢于斗争 Ganyu Douzheng.
In English:
Be calm;
keep determined;
seek progress and stability;
be proactive and go for achievements;
unite under the Communist Party;
dare to fight.
At the National People’s Congress … Xi used strong language against the US '[vowing] to modernise China’s military to make it a Great Wall of Steel, calling on the country to step up efforts to defend national security amid mounting tensions with the United States.' Xi demanded "greater self-reliance in science and technology, at a time when the US has blocked its access to … cutting-edge technologies". Xi said, “Led by the United States, the West has implemented all-round containment to suppress China, bringing unprecedented challenges to China’s development".
That's it then. For the past 30 years, China has been working according to a plan. Now the plan is updated, responding to a nominal challenge, but actually providing the challenge. I like China, and Chinese culture. It's just that they are, as much now as in the 1950s, the clear and present enemy. We are too busy dancing, with our arms above our heads, to notice. They're winning.
J
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