My Take | In US politics, the only unifying force is that Chinese bogeyman
- First televised debate of Republican primary brings out all the paranoia and cynical opportunism from the ‘China threat’ brainwashing cult
The first televised debate of the 2024 Republican primary this week was a lot like professional wrestlers trash-talking each other before a match.
You know it’s all fake, the moral outrage and holier-than-thou posturing are all rehearsed. And they all pretend to be much better and tougher than their opponents. Though never a fan of Donald Trump, who leads all of them by a great distance in the polls, I realised while watching how right he was not to waste time debating the pretenders.
Instead, he had a perfectly civilised online chat with Tucker Carlson, the one-time face of Fox News and currently America’s biggest conservative pundit. The former president may be a moral monstrosity, but at 77, he can still talk and think perfectly lucidly. That’s more than you can say about the current president.
So you have this cringeworthy statement from former UN ambassador Nikki Haley under Trump: “The American president needs to have moral clarity. They need to know the difference between right and wrong. They need to know the difference between good and evil.”
Was that why she decided to work for her former boss at the White House? Did she not blush saying that? Absolutely not. You need impenetrably thick skin to be where Haley is in America today.
But while the debaters bashed each other over almost everything else, they all agreed that China was America’s biggest threat. It’s extraordinary that in divided Washington today, “the China threat” unites everyone like a brainwashing cult.
“The real threat we face today is communist China and we are driving Russia further into China’s arms,” entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy said. “The Russia-China military alliance is the single greatest threat we face.”