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Good Friday Morning! Except for the people who eat packing peanuts. Yes, it’s a real thing. And even more bizarre, it’s a trend.
As you might have guessed, this originated on TikTok. People are eating biodegradable packing peanuts – the things keeping your Amazon packages safe – as a “bedtime snack.”
On behalf of all millennials, I don’t want to hear anything more about our generation eating Tide Pods. One beauty product company, Lush, calls its packaging materials “eco-flo chips,” which are apparently good enough for some people to add some salsa and call it a day.
If you do eat packing peanuts, hopefully, they pair pleasantly with reading this newsletter. Speaking of, this week, I’m going to dive into how China is preparing for war and the United States response—links to follow.
Quick Hits:
- Market bounces is more about Biden than Trump. A lot of ink has been spilled over the bounces of the S&P500, DOW, and Nasdaq seesawing on Trump tariff announcements. That’s certainly part of it. However, the main problem is how Biden and Yellen goosed government spending for the election. Combine that with Yellen’s abysmal performance in the treasury (CNBC / Reason detailing her mismanagement of the treasury market), and you get this moment. Biden’s last-minute spending to goose the election is dying out, too. You can see that in the deficit data, which surged as Trump took office. The impacts from DOGE cuts haven’t shown up yet (no spikes in jobless benefits claims).
- Schumer and Senate Democrats cave on shutdown threat. Several Senators wanted a shutdown fight with the White House, but most in the party saw little point in fighting it. Schumer said he would vote for cloture to end the fight, and that ended the standoff. Trump would blame them for the shutdown, use the furloughs as a means to cut more federal workers and use the shutdown as even greater leverage over Democrats. They truly had no leverage in the situation.
- Ruy Teixeira continues sounding alarms for Democrats over working-class woes. He calls them a “Brahmin Left” party and says they need to change ASAP or face increasing irrelevance. His writing at the Liberal Patriot has been a must-read for over a year, and that’s continued post-election.
- The American Almanac has over 25,000 subscribers! I want to express my continuing thanks to those of you who subscribe, share, and help us grow. You can subscribe here for free.
Where you can find me this week
Please subscribe, rate, and review The Horse Race on YouTube — the reviews help listeners, and readers like you find me. Make sure to sign up for the Conservative Institute’s daily newsletter and The American Almanac.
Trump’s Trade War Is Really A Currency War – Conservative Institute
Trump Is Right To Try And Deport Hamas Supporters – Conservative Institute
Trump Drives Putin To The Negotiating Table – Conservative Institute
China Is Preparing For War
Conventional wisdom in DC is that the window for China to invade Taiwan opens in 2027 and runs through 2035. I don’t believe China will attempt an invasion with Trump in office, which would mean the 2028 election will determine much about what happens in the Pacific.
But back to the present, China’s goal is to build its capacity for war. Currently, it cannot wage a war of any kind. Invading Taiwan requires an active Navy, so Beijing has poured billions to build a fleet. The next step is creating a naval force because making ships is one thing; getting sailors on them is another.
My base view of China is that it’s largely a paper tiger with an untested military and a weaker economy than the United States. Furthermore, China is headed directly for a population crisis. The one-child policy is coming home to roost as the country’s population is headed for a collapse.
With the Soviets, we just had to wait for their economy to crash. While that could happen with China, it’s far more likely that if the United States can delay anything China does, we’ll push them into a population crisis and economic stagnation.
Interestingly, China’s population crisis also hits in the same timeframe as the war window. China’s population likely peaked in 2021, and aging will start hampering its growth capacity for the next few decades.
If you can force China into a situation where its population crisis outpaces its desire for war, the threat dies down.
But that all depends on the United States delaying China.
What changed this week is that China is explicitly building shipping barges aimed at taking over Taiwan. Naval News reports, “China is building at least five new special-purpose barges, which appear tailor-made for amphibious assault. The barges may provide the PRC (People’s Republic of China) with a unique way to offload large numbers of tanks directly onto Taiwanese roads.”
Naval News compares the landing barges to those used during the D-Day landings. These ships are unique because they’re longer and larger than anyone expected:
The traditional view is that there are only a small number of beaches on the main island of Taiwan which are suitable for amphibious landings. And these could be heavily defended. The PRC could seize fishing villages or a port for larger scale landings. But the view has been that any attempt to take the islands by force would mean landing in predictable places. These new barges change that.
The extreme reach of the Bailey Bridges means that the PRC could land at sites previously considered unsuitable. They can land across rocky, or soft, beaches, delivering the tanks directly to firmer ground or a coastal road. This allows China to pick new landing sites and complicate attempts to organize defences. Instead of relying on Taiwanese ports, China can now sail its own mobile port across the straits.
In other words, these are not just landing barges; they are invasion barges that specifically solve a problem China is facing with Taiwan.
Any Chinese invasion would have one goal: sweep in with an invasion so quickly that the United States couldn’t respond. The problem is that with modern technology, it’d be nearly impossible to hide an amphibious invasion force from the Chinese mainland to hit Taiwan.
We’d know.
For reference, Russia began its military buildup on the Ukraine border in March 2021. Russia did some backtracking and other work over the summer. Still, Russia was rapidly building up a military presence by the fall (and the aftermath of the Afghanistan withdrawal). The actual invasion didn’t start until February 24, 2022.
Russia had it easy. They could do almost everything on land and within its own borders. To invade Taiwan, China has to move everything over the ocean. Nothing in China’s history or current naval capacity says they can do that. But the buildup in their ports suggests they know the problems ahead of them and are working on solutions.
Where does that leave us? The immediate thing the United States needs is a naval buildup and the capacity to build ships. China builds 50+% of all global ships, while the United States constructs 0.1%. It’s not workable to resist China—or anyone—long term.
Trump’s executive order to make shipbuilding great again is a significant first step. But this isn’t a problem where throwing money at it will do the trick. We actually need to put steel in the water to combat China.
We do have time. China can’t do anything immediately, either. In my view, if we can push China to delay indefinitely, it’ll boost our odds of winning this buildup period.
Links of the week
How ‘no daylight’ from Biden crippled the Harris presidential campaign – The Hill
UN Judge, Onetime Columbia University Human Rights Fellow, Found Guilty of Slavery – Washington Free Beacon
Democratic Congressman Raul Grijalva dies as 77 – NYPost
Peter Beinart, Pundit (Declined): What makes the author’s campaign of self-promotion conspicuous—week after week, year after year—is his utter lack of inhibition. – Andrew Ferguson, The Free Press
Michelle Obama talks marriage rockiness with brother on podcast launch – The Sun
The Sorry State of U.S. Cities Is a Choice—A Really Bad One – The Liberal Patriot
$50K for DEI Trainings, $5 Mil for Graffiti Removal, and No Rail Line: How California’s High-Speed Rail Project Has Burned Through Taxpayer Cash – Washington Free Beacon
Vanessa Trump – Kai Trump’s mother – is dating Tiger Woods – Page Six
Alaska is on volcano watch as eruptions could occur near Anchorage – The Hill
X/Twitter Thread(s) of the week
Comparing Trump’s Tesla moment with past media coverage.
Satire of the week
Egg Companies Assure Customers Dozen Has Always Meant 9 – Onion
Liberals Defeat Nazis By Painting Swastikas Everywhere And Torching Immigrant Businesses – The Babylon Bee
Man Longs For Simpler Time When Games Were 2D And You Could Never Get Past The First Level – The Babylon Bee
Nice! This Woman Needs Every Single One of Her Senses to Be Distracted in Order to Think – Reductress
Trump Instructs New Secretary of Education to Shut Down “Abbott Elementary” on ABC – The Hard Times
Job Simulator 2 Canceled After Being Outsourced To AI – The Hard Drive
Journalist Shot Dead After Asking Why Putin Isn’t Wearing A Suit – Waterford Whispers News
Thanks for reading!