As China Exploits Our Weaknesses, Biden Diminishes Our Strengths

As published in Newsmax.

April 20, 2021.

"China is going to eat our lunch? Cmon, man! I mean, you know, they’re not bad folks, folks. But guess what? They’re not competition for us."

If you laugh at this assessment, declared by then-presidential candidate Joe Biden, you wouldn’t be alone. Chinese President Xi Jinping got a real chuckle out of it, and Biden got Egg Foo Young on his face.

After the Chinese 16-minute dress-down of U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken at the March Anchorage, Alaska meeting, clearly Xi has decided that the extreme internal divisions within the U.S. — the months-long riots, the defund-the-police movement and the promotion of divisive racial policies — demonstrate weakness and offer opportunities to exploit.

An emboldened Xi believes the time is right to publicly challenge America’s status as the world’s superpower, promoting his own one-party authoritarian system as superior.

Xi, the master propagandist, understands how the current narrative of a racist, repressive and exploitative America can be used to question America’s fundamental justification for global leadership — that we were founded on universal principles of human freedom and dignity.

Recycling left-wing critical race theory talking points, Xi’s emissaries in Alaska lectured America about its "deep-seated" human-rights failures, even referencing Black Lives Matter (BLM). The video of the 16-minute Chinese rebuke, which denied that racist America has moral authority to criticize China, has gotten millions of views on media globally.

America’s advocacy of equity over merit furthers Beijing’s efforts to de-throne the U.S.

While we are busy demanding preferential academic treatment for "people of color," attacking mathematics as racist and eliminating advance-track programs and standardized testing because they supposedly promote racial inequity, the Chinese emphasize the importance of hard work, academic competition, and meritorious achievement.

In China, 10 million high-school students take the rigorous university entrance exam (Gaokao) every year.

The high scorers — only half will even pass the exam — will attend prestigious universities and secure the best paying jobs, while others will go to trade schools and lower paying employment.

Chinese students work much harder than their American counterparts. Smart students are treated as role models and teachers showcase their success.

There is no affirmative action, no grade inflation, no admissions or promotions based on attempts to achieve equity or diversity.

Beijing believes that meritocracy always wins.

In 2016, China graduated 4.7 million STEM (science, technology, engineering, mathematics) students, eight times as many as the U.S. American universities cannot even fill available slots for engineering students, due in part to our shoddy K-12 math and science instruction and student preferences for less demanding curricula.

The Chinese teach their children civic responsibility and national pride together with core socialist values. In America, we do the opposite, denying that our country is a land of freedom and opportunity and deriding free market capitalism, which has created unparalleled wealth, even among the poorest. American schools are tripping over themselves to use The New York Times' 1619 Project curriculum which portrays a racist America founded on a Constitution only intended for white people. Howard Zinn’s "A People's History of the United States," written 32 years ago, has become the textbook of choice to teach our 11th graders that America’s story is a litany of oppression, slavery, and exploitation.

China knows that our military has capitulated to the same progressive policies that now exist in our society at large.

Years ago, our armed forces began to drop physical fitness and academic recruiting standards for minority applicants for the purpose of increasing racial and gender diversity.

In October, the head of the Air Force recruiting office published the article, "86% of Air Force Pilots are White Men: Here’s Why This Needs to Change," in which increasing the number of "people of color," women and various gender identities is "a war-fighting imperative."

The Special Operations Command, which oversees complicated unconventional warfare by highly trained special forces, recently appointed a diversity and inclusion chief to promote equity of race, gender and sexual persuasion.

Emphasizing diversity goals rather than seeking applicants with the best aptitude and skills often results in lowering standards and sacrificing quality.

How is this policy compatible with the Special Forces pledge "to excel in every art and artifice of war"?

The mission of the military should be to deter war, and failing that, win it. Now West Point graduate and military veteran Rep. Mark Green, R-Tenn., worries, "Our military service academies seem to be more focused on teaching critical race theory than military strategy. This . . . is damaging to our readiness and our competitive advantage. . . . When it comes to training our nation’s future combat leaders, we need our service academies to train soldiers — not woke social justice warriors."

To train future officers, America’s military academies are using books on "systemic racism" and "white supremacy" by authors like Ibram X. Kendi who advocates for discrimination against whites and Robin DiAngelo who declares white people inherently racist.

A West Point diversity and inclusion plan indicates that inclusivity matters just as much as marksmanship.

Iraq and Afghanistan war veteran Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., very recently introduced a bill to prohibit the military from promoting race/identity ideology because these ideas foster divisiveness, "undermine our troops' faith in each other" and "erode their trust in our country’s guiding principles."

At a time when our national intelligence threat assessment paints Beijing as Washington’s top security threat, our military is intensely focused on race, gender and sexuality.

Fox News commentator Tucker Carlson aptly described the situation: "The Pentagon is now the Yale faculty lounge. . . with cruise missiles."

General Jack Keane (Ret.) has warned that in the Indo-Pacific our military is "outgunned" by the Chinese who have more ships, planes and offensive missiles and has acknowledged that there is no guarantee that we could win a war against China today.

China has launched a genocide in Xinjiang province, crushed Hong Kong’s autonomy, attacked India, intimidated its maritime neighbors in the South China Sea and threatens Taiwan with invasion without encountering a proportionate or effective U.S. response.

Now it has demonstrated in Anchorage that it considers itself more than America’s equal.

China won’t eat our lunch? Really?

President Xi already owns Nathan’s Famous Hot Dogs.

If we continue down the current path, there is a good chance we’ll end up celebrating Chun Jie — Chinese New Year — with a White House Egg Roll.