昨天半夜,川普實施了他幾天前承諾的,給予中國的關稅懲罰!這麼一個大手筆做出來,前無來者後無古人,估計他的感覺不錯,很可能還在那個歷史性的時刻大宴幕僚,大家吼叫着“萬歲萬歲萬萬歲”的不醉不歸。生活在這樣的時代,我們得以見識這樣的特殊戰爭,也是一種福分。繼續打下去,全世界最主要的是美國民眾,為此付出的代價,會不會高於那場讓全世界再次認識中國和中國領導者的朝鮮戰爭,只有事後經濟學家的深刻分析,才能回答。唯一可以肯定的是,這一次付出的生命代價遠低很多。但是在氣勢上,在對中國政府的居高臨下的態勢上,我看不出,美國這一次的領導者,真正的進步了多少。 兵慫慫一個,將慫慫一窩。一直以來以強勢著稱和自豪的川普總統,不慫。在霸氣上,估計不輸給楚霸王。他一直很享受自己擁有的權力,對於幕僚,說解僱就解僱,說讓你滾蛋就得立馬滾蛋。很多時候還是以羞辱對方的方式。如果再早幾年,很多人的人頭落地,恐怕也是經常看到的血景。在內心深處,他一方面指責習總有機會獲得獨裁權力(中國修改憲法的初衷,我懷疑真的像外界想的那麼邪惡!),同時,估計自己也暗中嫉妒:為什麼自己沒有那樣的命運? 於是乎,他就以世界國國王的姿態,一次次的居高臨下,用羞辱自己下屬的態勢,來命令和羞辱中國的領導者和中國人民!在背後殺氣騰騰之時,還做笑面虎,嘴裡有詞:我很欣賞,喜愛。言不由衷到了如此地步,我都覺得有點臉紅。 貿易戰,表面上的東西先不談,那些不着邊際,極度缺乏水準的理解,先放在一邊。說說從他幕僚嘴裡講出的赤裸裸的,必須懲罰中國政府的 深層次原因,也是覺得,這批人似乎真的還停留在百來年前對中國和世界的理解上。 這裡是前白宮軍師的分析,代表了川普喜愛的一批人的價值觀和世界觀。 中國是共產黨領導的,和美國的民主制度背道而馳,美國對抗的是一種制度,而不僅僅只是一個國家!消滅這個和自己差異極大的,讓自己很不喜歡的制度的最好辦法,就是釜底抽薪,將它賴以存在的經濟基礎摧毀掉!而對於中國共產黨,經濟基礎就是那些贏利能力很強的國營企業,也就是共產黨擁有的企業。同時,則指責中國政府在消滅異己上極不人道! 而消滅這些企業的最好辦法,就是逼着他們不再繼續享受特殊的權利,不再接受國家的補貼。同時,讓大門敞開,讓更多的外國企業進入市場參與競爭,將這些老帽慢慢的消滅掉。而美國自己,很多時候也會基於自己更加利益的需要做必須的補貼! 為了確保這種殲滅戰的徹底勝利,中國政府必須按照美國的要求來做,具體到執行的細節,都得接受美國政府的安排。而且,還必須由美國政府指派“黨代表”進駐監督,就像監督朝鮮和伊朗是不是旅行去核義務(!)一樣。結果,中國政府和重要的部門,實際上就成為美國政府的分支機構!我估計,美國聯邦政府,對於作為聯邦成員的州政府,也很難有這樣的權威!君不見,有多少次,來自聯邦政府的“指示”,都被州政府給踢回去! 況且,還有一項極為有趣的要求:如果你違規,我可以罰你,你卻不可以反擊!這一條與其說是協商的條款,還不如說就是直接對對方的羞辱:你就是奴才,我想怎麼罰你就罰你,你還不准反擊。這到底是在表現自己的實力,還是在顯示自己的不自信?國家和國家之間的協議,我不知道有多少,最終是不折不扣按照當初的意願執行的。形勢在變,力量在此消彼長,哪裡來的一輩子的優勢!對於這一條,如果中國政府真的答應了,中國國民會怎麼想?全世界會怎樣看中國?
再者,川普突然的大發火,像個極為任性的少年:半夜睡不着,突發奇想,就不能自主必須公告世界。對於他發火的原因,看了半天才感覺到:是因為,中國政府不答應改變法律條款,而只是想通過行政執行來實現談好的條款。 川普可能覺得,只有寫進法律,才是永久的保障!可是在中國,寫進法律的價值遠不如行政條款,這點中國特色,川普的團隊沒有人懂?再者,一直津津樂道法制和法治的美國總統,難道不明白,改變法律條款,需要很長的時間,不是政府幾個大佬幾天幾個星期就能搞掂的。即使是在美國,來自政府的涉及到巨大司法改變的事情,也需要參、眾議院研究批准。川普這是在確認中國政府的獨裁程度,還是在考驗中國政府的的獨裁效率? 經濟學家一直強調說:最好的契約,就是雙方都不太滿意,同時雙方都能接受的平衡狀態。估計讀書比較少的川普和他的團隊,沒有人能夠明白這個道理。一邊倒的一廂情願,即使寫下來,一方不服,又能夠持續多久?即使寫入法律甚至是憲法,歷史上不也是有很多的案例,後來者全盤推翻!川普的世界,只有以大欺小,恃強凌弱的狼性文化!這種文化,在現代文明社會,在兩個大國之間,是不可能行得通的! 我不想評價誰的要求合理誰的不合理,只是談談我覺得必須面對的現實。要求誰都可以提,夢想誰都可以做。至于堅持到什麼程度,應該頑固到何種地步,就是考驗智慧的事。如果只是賭一把,也沒有太大的問題。 問題是,川普的行為和強勢,在美國目前看來,已經獲得了很大的支持率。即使那些直接遭受貿易戰傷害的多數農民,也多數選擇支持川普的強勢,他們覺得,自己自身利益的短暫犧牲,對於人類文明的進步,對於“理想”的實現,值得! 這,是不是有點當初共產黨人為了主義,可以犧牲一切,包括生命的態勢? 這,才是可怕的地方! 但願,新時代的希特勒,不會就此產生和壯大。人類的和平,需要更多的包容和耐心。川普已經將愛面子的中國領導者逼得無路可退,最終的結果,大概率的是適得其反。 就像當年的朝鮮戰爭!溫和的中國人,一旦逼急了,也會變成吼獅。 當年的日本人吃了自大的虧,讓美國人變成吼獅。今天的川普團隊難道不明白歷史? 改變中國,需要時間,更需要策略和智慧,可惜,我看不到美國領導者的智慧! Steve Bannon: We’re in an economic war with China. It’s futile to compromise. By Stephen K. Bannon, May 6 Stephen K. Bannon served as chief strategist for President Trump from January 2017 to August 2017. Getting tough with China to bring manufacturing jobs back to the United States was the linchpin of President Trump’s electoral march through the Rust Belt during his 2016 victory. Today, the goal of the radical cadre running China — the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) — is to be the global hegemonic power. The president’s threatened tariffs on Sunday demonstrate the severity of this threat. But as Washington and Beijing wrap up months of negotiations on a trade deal this month, whatever emerges won’t be a trade deal. It will be a temporary truce in a years-long economic and strategic war with China. These are six “understandings” that highlight why it is futile to compromise with this regime. The first understanding: The CCP has been waging economic war against industrial democracies ever since China joined the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2001, and now China has emerged as the greatest economic and national security threat the United States has ever faced. As a framework for the current trade talks, China must agree to end forced technology transfers; intellectual property theft; cyberintrusions into business networks; currency manipulation; high tariff and nontariff barriers; and unfair subsidies to state-owned enterprises. However, if the CCP agrees to the United States’ demands in an enforceable manner, it would amount to a legal and regulatory dismantling of Chinese state capitalism. The second understanding: The trade deal under negotiation this month is not a deal between two similar systems seeking closer ties, as its cheerleaders on Wall Street and in the media and academia argue. Rather, this is a fundamental clash between two radically different economic models. The best U.S. result is a detailed document in which China renounces its predatory, confiscatory and mercantilist practices while providing ample means to monitor and promptly enforce the agreement. The best CCP result is to get the tariffs lifted by filing reams of paper with false, unenforceable promises that will allow it to run out the clock on the Trump administration and hope for a less antagonistic Democratic alternative. The third understanding: Chinese state capitalism is highly profitable for its owners — the members of the CCP. Stagnant state-owned enterprises gain a competitive edge through massive government subsidies and the cost savings won by stealing the intellectual property, technology and innovations of foreigners. If China halted such grand theft, its enterprises would be rapidly outcompeted by the Germans, South Koreans, Japanese and especially the United States. This fact explains much about internal Chinese politics today. President Xi Jinping faces a palace sharply divided between reformers led by chief trade negotiator Liu He and a swarm of hawks who have profited and gained power from the status quo. Within China itself, it is both gallows humor and even money as to whether Liu He will be celebrated as the next Deng Xiaoping or end up in a Chinese gulag. The fourth understanding: Certain Trump advisers inside and outside the White House are playing on the president’s well-earned pride in a rising stock market and a fear he might lose the Farm Belt to try to box him into a weak deal. But it is a decidedly false narrative that any failure to reach a deal will lead to a market meltdown and economic implosion. In fact, there is no better argument for Trump keeping his bold tariffs on China than the latest report that the U.S. economy grew at an annualized rate of 3.2 percent in the first quarter. Anything less than a great deal will subject the president to relentless criticism from the Charles E. Schumer and Bernie Sanders wings of the Democratic Party. In addition, Sens. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) might use it to get to the right of Trump on China — potentially setting up a later primary challenge. For these reasons, the president’s best political option is not to surrender, but rather to double down on the tariffs — they have been highly effective in pressuring the Chinese without harming the U.S. economy. The fifth understanding: Even the toughest agreement needs effective monitoring, which is difficult even with accommodating partners and perhaps impossible with China. The danger is for the president to sign what appears to be a reasonable deal and find out several years later that the United States was hoodwinked. The United States failed to adequately monitor China’s entry into the WTO in 2001. Instead of access to a billion Chinese consumers, the United States lost more than 5 million manufacturing jobs since 2000. The sixth understanding: The world now bears witness to a rapidly militarizing totalitarian state imprisoning millions in work camps; persecuting Uighurs, Christians and Buddhists; and spying on, and enslaving, its own population. This is history in real time; and the world is a house divided — half slave, half free. Trump and Xi are facing off to tip the scales in one direction or the other. One way leads to the benefits of freedom, democracy and free-market capitalism. The other leads to a totalitarian and mercantilist power run on state capitalism with Chinese characteristics. The United States’ fight is not with the Chinese people but with the CCP. The Chinese people are the first and continuous victims of this barbarous regime. The central issues that must be faced are China’s intentions on the world stage and what those ambitions mean for U.S. prosperity. With our country at a crossroads, it is more important than ever that Trump follow his instincts and not soften his stance against the greatest existential threat ever faced by the United States.
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