On Monday, the Trump administration <a href="https://public-inspection.federalregister.gov/2026-11571.pdf">set</a> the record straight on Chinese companies affiliated with Beijing’s military. Back in February, the Pentagon published, then quickly deleted, an updated version of its “1260H List,” a reference to the section of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) that requires the Department of War to publish lists of Chinese companies linked to the People’s Liberation Army (PLA). The list helps government contractors avoid national security threats and cautions private companies about the material and reputational risk of partnering with PLA-aligned actors.
The administration was right to reissue the list, and even more justified in new additions. Notable changes to the 1260H list were the re-addition of ChangXin Memory Technologies (CXMT) and Yangtze Memory Technologies Corp (YMTC). Both companies participate in the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) military-civil fusion strategy and present data security and espionage risks to U.S. defense supply chains. President Donald Trump is doing important work in decoupling America’s access to critical minerals from CCP-controlled supply chains. He has now taken a significant step toward doing the same for memory chips by preserving the Biden administration&#8217;s original judgment.
Memory chips play a supporting but critical role in the AI revolution. Unlike graphics processing units (GPUs), the compute devices that perform mathematical operations in AI models, memory chips store and ferry the data that GPUs process. Without them, the world’s most powerful AI chips sit underutilized. The AI boom has boosted the <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cnvp9dq0p3go">valuations</a> of memory chip companies like Samsung, SK Hynix, and Micron due to demand for memory chips. These “big three” companies <a href="https://dset.tw/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/The-Rise-of-CXMT-Inside-the-Hydra-like-Chinese-Memory-Sector-compressed-1.pdf">accounted</a> for 90% of the global market share for memory chips in 2025. But demand is outpacing supply, and multiple companies are <a href="https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/artificial-intelligence/samsung-and-sk-hynix-warn-ai-driven-memory-shortages-could-last-until-2027-and-beyond-as-hbm-demand-explodes-customers-already-reserving-supply-years-ahead-while-the-wider-dram-market-begins-to-tighten">warning</a> of prolonged shortages, with <a href="https://www.tomshardware.com/pc-components/ram/memory-prices-now-shifting-hourly-as-smaller-firms-fight-over-scraps">prices</a> trending upward.
Enter CXMT and YMTC. Last year, CXMT held <a href="https://dset.tw/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/The-Rise-of-CXMT-Inside-the-Hydra-like-Chinese-Memory-Sector-compressed-1.pdf">6%</a> global market share for DRAM chips, and YMTC <a href="https://counterpointresearch.com/en/insights/global-nand-memory-market-share">cornered</a> 11% of the market for NAND chips. Despite their small presence, both companies are capturing the attention of U.S. tech giants. According to the People&#8217;s Republic of China (PRC) media, Apple is<a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20260217152232/http://jiweipreview.laoyaoba.com/n/984427"> considering</a> purchasing memory chips from both CXMT and YMTC to defray rising costs from Japanese and American providers. Dell and HP are also<a href="https://asia.nikkei.com/spotlight/supply-chain/hp-dell-acer-and-asus-mull-using-chinese-memory-chips-amid-supply-crunch"> reportedly</a> turning to CXMT for cheaper chips. Notably, both Chinese companies are <a href="https://www.tomshardware.com/pc-components/ram/ymtc-partners-with-cxmt-for-hbm">reportedly collaborating</a> to develop high-bandwidth memory (HBM) chips, which would compete directly with cutting-edge products from Samsung, SK Hynix, and Micron.
The lure of cheap chips in a tight market is real. Beijing’s industrial strategy is primed to exploit these dynamics and gobble up market share, just as it has done in other critical industries. In 5G telecommunications, Huawei undercut global competition with below-market pricing to dominate markets in Europe, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia. Chinese display companies are doing the same with memory chip technology. As Micron officials recently <a href="https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/micron-pushes-us-congress-crack-down-chip-tool-sales-chinese-rivals-sources-say-2026-04-22/">warned</a> members of Congress, the same playbook that handed Beijing dominance over solar panels, lithium batteries, and rare earth refining could launch CXMT and YMTC from marginal players to global titans.
By some measures, their prices <a href="https://techwireasia.com/2026/04/chinese-memory-chips-ymtc-cxmt-nand-dram-expansion/">undercut</a> their competitors’ rates by 15%. According to a CCP united front <a href="https://www.chinausfocus.com/peace-security/chinas-strive-for-self-reliance-in-advanced-technology">source</a>, CXMT and YMTC both receive financial assistance from China’s Integrated Circuit Industry Investment Fund (colloquially called the “Big Fund”) and participate in China’s drive for semiconductor self-sufficiency. To wit: Beijing has apparently <a href="https://www.tomshardware.com/pc-components/ddr4/top-chinese-memory-maker-expected-to-abandon-ddr4-manufacturing-at-the-behest-of-beijing">directed</a> CXMT to phase out older consumer-grade memory products in favor of server and AI-focused chips. Meanwhile, YMTC is <a href="https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/semiconductors/ymtcs-third-wuhan-fab-clears-beijings-50-percent-domestic-tooling-threshold-as-two-more-are-planned">building</a> a third fab in Wuhan with more than half its equipment sourced domestically.
These companies are not competing on merit. They are state-subsidized national champions executing a deliberate industrial strategy designed and underwritten by the CCP. As such, policymakers should consider the national security risks if Washington does nothing to head off CXMT and YMTC’s global rise.
The most immediate concern is supply chain exposure. In 2010, Beijing halted rare earth exports to Japan over a territorial dispute. In 2025, it <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/china/china-suspends-ban-exports-gallium-germanium-antimony-us-2025-11-09/">imposed</a> export controls on gallium, germanium, and other defense-critical heavy minerals to the United States. Memory chips could be next in line. If America’s AI infrastructure relies on affordable memory chips from CXMT and YMTC, Beijing would have its thumb on the scale of U.S. computing. In such a world, private competitors in America, Japan, and elsewhere may not survive for long.
Moreover, several concerns arise from the chips themselves. Memory chips embedded in government systems and defense-adjacent infrastructure are not passive devices. They receive firmware updates that control and shape their operation. When manipulated by a foreign adversary, that firmware <a href="https://www.cisa.gov/news-events/alerts/2025/08/27/cisa-and-partners-release-joint-advisory-countering-chinese-state-sponsored-actors-compromise">presents</a> a potential attack vector. Policymakers cannot presume that chips from companies subject to PLA direction and CCP data-sharing requirements are reliable or safe. Congress recognized this in the FY2023 NDAA, which <a href="https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2026/02/17/2026-03065/federal-acquisition-regulation-prohibition-on-certain-semiconductor-products-and-services">restricted</a> the U.S. government from procuring components from PRC companies, including CXMT and YMTC. Compromised chips could also enable persistent access or data exfiltration that may be difficult to detect. In a crisis, Beijing could weaponize Chinese memory chips in U.S. systems to cut off supply or possibly sabotage American infrastructure. For all these reasons, policymakers on both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue should act now to hamstring Beijing’s gambit to dominate memory chips.
The Trump administration has done its part by reissuing the 1260H list and including CXMT and YMTC. Congress crafted this authority precisely to highlight risks from PRC entities that blur the line between commercial enterprise and the PLA. Moreover, Congress should also move to deny these companies the tools to compete globally. The bipartisan Multilateral Alignment of Technology Controls on Hardware (MATCH) Act would accomplish this objective, either by diplomacy or extraterritorial export controls. Washington has momentum now, and policymakers should seize this moment. America cannot win the AI race with U.S. data centers housed by CCP-controlled chips.
***
Michael Sobolik is a senior policy fellow at the Hudson Institute.

Flag of USA and China on a processor, CPU or GPU microchip on a motherboard. US companies have become the latest collateral damage in US – China tech war. US limits, restricts AI chips sales to China.

The Trump Administration Strikes A Big Blow To China’s Chip Chain And Its Spy Game

Communist China

Data Centers

DW Opinion

Memory Chips

Supply Chain

An American journalist pleaded guilty Thursday to working as an unregistered agent for China after prosecutors said he helped a Chinese intelligence officer try to steal classified information from the U.S. government. 
Thomas Pauken II, 50, admitted in a plea agreement with Justice Department prosecutors that he acted as an agent of China from 2019 to 2026. Prosecutors said Pauken worked for a member of the Chinese Ministry of State Security who sought sensitive information about the United States. 
“Pauken admitted to being part of a conspiracy to obtain sensitive information from the U.S. government for the PRC,” said Assistant Attorney General for National Security John Eisenberg. “His actions are a betrayal of this Nation and pose an unacceptable risk to our national security.”
Pauken has lived in China since 2010 and worked for the Chinese state media outlet Xinhua News. At the same time, prosecutors said, he was on the payroll of a member of the Chinese Ministry of State Security referred to in court documents as “Cathy.” 
According to prosecutors, Cathy directed Pauken to meet with human sources in the United States, provide those sources with laptops and cellphones, and send their reports back to China. 
In February 2026, Pauken was arrested after an <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/american-journalist-charged-in-anti-ccp-espionage-sting">apparent FBI sting</a> operation during a recorded meeting at a Washington, D.C. hotel.
At the meeting, Pauken met with an unidentified U.S. government employee who had sought a job in the Trump administration and whom Pauken had allegedly been attempting to recruit on Cathy&#8217;s behalf. Prosecutors said Cathy wanted the official to produce reports she claimed would make their way to Chinese President Xi Jinping and shape policy. 
Pauken offered to pay the government employee a $10,000 bonus and subsequent payments funneled through a bogus nonprofit, according to court documents.  
Court documents state that Pauken himself did not personally handle classified information, but acted as an “intermediary to recruit individuals to provide classified information to the Chinese.”
Pauken also sold multiple reports to a group of Chinese people from Wuhan, according to prosecutors. 
“PAUKEN’s Wuhan clients mainly sought information about technology and the U.S. Department of Justice,” a statement of facts compiled by prosecutors agreed to by Pauken said. “The Wuhan clients wanted PAUKEN to find an expert who would help them engage in cyber espionage.”
Pauken told the FBI he believed his work would deter a military conflict between the United States and China and that he would support greater religious freedom through his contacts in both countries. 
His sentencing is set for September 1, and he faces up to 10 years in prison.
“By his own admission, not only did Thomas Pauken attempt to infiltrate U.S. political circles at the direction of China’s Ministry of State Security,&#8221; said FBI official Roman Rozhavsky. &#8220;But he gathered intelligence on his American targets and reported it back to his Chinese intelligence handlers.&#8221;

U.S. Secretary Of State Antony Blinken Visits Shanghai

American Journalist Caught In FBI Sting Admits Working For China

Department of Justice

Espionage

A California museum dedicated to remembering the victims of communist China’s brutal Tiananmen Square massacre was vandalized just days ahead of the anniversary of the communist crackdown.
Displays and exhibits at the June Fourth Memorial Museum in El Monte, California, were spray-painted on Sunday in what museum officials believe to have been a targeted attack. The Los Angeles County museum tells the history of the June 4, 1989, massacre at Tiananmen Square, where soldiers killed up to 2,600 pro-democracy protesters. 
“The main part of the exhibition, including sections of the walls, was vandalized with spray paint, causing serious damage to the museum&#8217;s assets. The museum strongly condemns the perpetrators and those instigating the incident and will pursue legal action against them,” the museum said in a statement. 
The museum said it was working with the El Monte Police Department and had obtained certain leads and identified suspicious circumstances.” 
“We view this incident as yet another instance of ‘transnational repression’ and have reported the relevant details to the FBI and the appropriate committees of the U.S. Congress,” the museum said. 
El Monte police sergeant Andrew Mora <a href="https://dominotheory.com/tiananmen-square-memorial-museum-vandalized-ahead-of-anniversary/">told</a> Domino Theory that police were probing whether the incident was a hate crime and would report it to the FBI. 
Museum co-founder Wang Dan posted photos of some of the vandalism and said that surveillance cameras were destroyed, but that the footage was able to be recovered and sent to the police. 
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
已经到达现场，现场破坏严重。
作案者潜入纪念馆，并破坏了摄像镜头，然后才开始损毁动作。
现发布第一批照片。 <a href="https://t.co/hFn5RWYf1z">pic.twitter.com/hFn5RWYf1z</a>
— 王丹 (@wangdan1989) <a href="https://x.com/wangdan1989/status/2061098550482874779?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">May 31, 2026</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.x.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
“The June Fourth Memorial Hall will never cease operations due to such acts of destruction and threats. On the contrary, with the support of all sectors of society, we look forward to making the memorial hall even better!” Wang <a href="https://x.com/wangdan1989/status/2061126269182579003">said</a>. “No matter how fierce the storm, we will stand firm!”
Wang later spoke to the House Select Committee on China about the incident. The committee said the vandalism was “disturbing and sad.” 
“The museum will continue and all of us will never let the world forget about Tiananmen Square,” the committee added. 
The Congressional-Executive Commission on China also commented on the vandalism and called for the FBI to investigate. 
“Vandalism of a [Tiananmen Massacre] museum cannot erase the memory of what happened on June 4, 1989, or cover up the crimes committed by the [CCP] as it crushed peaceful demonstrations for freedom and democracy,” the commission said. “[The FBI Los Angeles] should investigate this as an act of [transnational repression].”

Protester Blocking Tanks Approaching Tiananmen Square

SEE IT: Memorial To Tiananmen Square Victims Vandalized Ahead Of Anniversary

California

Los Angeles County

Tiananmen Square

The FBI recently took out a massive internet scam network, arresting over 300 people, freeing over 2,000 people from human trafficking, and seizing over $8 billion in cryptocurrency. 
The FBI said last week that it primarily focused on taking down what it <a href="https://www.yahoo.com/news/us/articles/fbi-seizes-record-8-billion-182232782.html">calls</a> “scam compounds” in Asia, Africa, and the Middle East. The scam compounds are typically guarded and filled with trafficked workers who are forced to conduct romance scams and fake investment schemes that target many Americans. Over 2,000 people were freed from the compounds. 
The operation focused on Prince Holding Group, a company in Cambodia. Authorities also took out a criminal compound in Dubai, Myanmar, and Thailand. Altogether, the FBI seized over 127,000 bitcoin from the nine scam compounds, which is over $8 billion, making it the largest crypto seizure in human history.
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The United States worked with Dubai police to arrest 275 people, six of whom will be transported to the United States to face federal charges.
FBI Director Kash Patel, said the major crackdown gives a clear message to scammers across the world.
&#8220;If you target Americans, we will find you, disrupt your network, and bring every available tool of the federal government down on you,” Patel <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/us/fbi-seizes-record-setting-8-billion-cryptocurrency-amid-intercontinental-scam-compound-crackdown">told</a> Fox News. 

The FBI also took down the &#8220;Democratic Karen Benevolent Army,” an armed militia in Myanmar that has ties to Chinese mobsters and has been engaging in this criminal scam network..
The U.S. seized thousands of smartphones and other office equipment in Thailand, severely crippling the scam infrastructure there.
During the whole operation, the FBI <a href="https://x.com/jacobincambodia/status/2060184532104700246">worked</a> with the Royal Thai police, the Burmese army, Dubai’s police, and some Chinese investigators. The FBI also utilized Elon Musk’s Starlink to take down over 7,000 terminals in Myanmar that criminals were using to facilitate communications.
The FBI’s 2025 &#8220;Internet Crime Report&#8221; <a href="https://www.fbi.gov/news/press-releases/cryptocurrency-and-ai-scams-bilk-americans-of-billions">states</a> that Americans have been defrauded of $21 billion in cyber-related crimes, with AI and crypto-related scams being the costliest. 
 
Apprehending these con artists and hackers is difficult as the internet allows them to be scattered across the world, seemingly untouchable by American authorities.

FBI Makes Largest Crypto Seizure Ever In Global ‘Scam Compound’ Crackdown

Africa

Cambodia

China

Crime

Cryptocurrency

Cyberattack

Cybercrime

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fbi director

India

kash patel

Middle East

Myanmar

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scams

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Punch-Dr-Savage-2

Where Is God In The Machine?

Encyclical

Fertility crisis

Human Dignity

Weekend Punch

The idea of a “multipolar world,” where great powers can coexist within separate geopolitical spheres, is increasingly popular. But multipolarism, if it is embraced rather than resisted, will only end in Chinese Communist domination.
Multipolarity is innocent enough as a description of changing global trends. It is true that U.S. power has been waning even as China’s star has risen. But normative multipolarism, once isolated to the Left (former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton once <a href="https://2009-2017.state.gov/secretary/20092013clinton/rm/2010/05/142312.htm">promised</a> to “turn a multi-polar world into a multi-partner world”), is making new inroads on the Right. Republican “restrainers” are increasingly arguing that the emerging status quo is the natural state of affairs, and American hegemony an oddity.
According to the restrainers, the U.S. should normalize relations and continue to sweep tensions under the proverbial rug. Ironically, some of these same voices often object to U.S. support of Ukraine and U.S. action in Iran because the focus has shifted away from China, stating that the U.S. no longer has the strength to combat the CCP on top of Iran and Russia.
There is a temptation to sit back and allow the CCP to operate how it prefers in its hemisphere, even with an ongoing genocide and a surveillance state, as long as the U.S. is unbothered. But to assume that other global superpowers will respect U.S. hegemony once they have secured primacy in their sphere is woefully naïve.
The majority of people in the United States have never lived in a multipolar world. They have never witnessed a world in which the United States is not the global superpower, the enforcer of international law and free trade, and the credible deterrent to enemies of freedom. They see U.S. defense spending as excessive, especially when U.S. allies aren’t paying for their defense, remain inadequately armed, and refuse to decouple their economies from hostile powers. It is true that the NATO alliance must demonstrate to the U.S. (and to each other) that they are capable of defending their own countries and can adequately deter their enemy to the east, because they, too, have never lived in a world without the alliance deterring hostile powers.
The focus of the White House’s summit with China was largely on the economy, trade, and Iran, with Xi Jinping warning of a possible clash with the U.S. over Taiwan. There has been little reporting on President Donald Trump’s response to the question about Taiwan. It still has not been clarified what the U.S. response would be if the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) moved on Taiwan, and the U.S. has not widely discussed what exactly it would look like for the PLA to begin to take Taiwan, though we can assume it is a war game often played out in Sensitive Compartmented Information Facilities of the Pentagon.
It is no mystery what the isolationist Right’s views on Taiwan will be if the attack occurs. They will argue that Taiwan is very far away, that our men and women should not die for a foreign country, that Taiwan’s independence is not associated with American security, but they misunderstand China’s long-term goal. Isolationists in the U.S. will be content with a multipolar world, so long as they do not feel any major shifts to their day-to-day life, but the Chinese Communist Party will not be content with multipolarity.
The United States stands in sharp contrast to the communist hegemony, and in the long term, the CCP will not tolerate the U.S. as a rival power. If the U.S. shrinks into its role in a multipolar world, we will be weaker, freedom around the world will be feebler, and the U.S. economy will suffer. Eventually, all American citizens will feel the consequences if the U.S. is no longer the preeminent force on the world stage, and will hate it.
The Chinese Communist Party is hoping for that future, for a U.S. citizenry scrolling TikTok where they are told China was right to take Taiwan, and China’s internal affairs don’t concern the U.S. The CCP already executed a test run after October 7, and the U.S. is still having to sort fact from fiction amongst our population.
China will accept a multipolar world for a few years, but that will not satisfy them in the long run. The freedom of America is a thorn in the side of every communist nation, and in the end, China will prefer only one to stay standing. Multipolar worlds do not exist in the long term. China knows this; it is time America learns it, too.
***
Ali Holcomb is a National Security Fellow and Communications Advisor at Advancing American Freedom.

USA and China flag on world map

It’s Win Or Lose With China. There Is No Draw

Global Politics

Isolationists

The media are fully convinced that the best way for the United States to confront China and Iran is simply to do whatever they want.
President Donald Trump has been confronting both countries for two terms. And yet, according to The New York Times and The Washington Post, somehow China and Iran have the upper hand.
That&#8217;s a weird thing to say. Iran does not have a leadership class. They are all dead. Iran does not have forward military capacity. It&#8217;s been destroyed. Iran does not have a navy. They&#8217;re at the bottom of the Strait of Hormuz. They don&#8217;t have an air force. They can&#8217;t fly anything but low-level drones.
Iran doesn&#8217;t have a functioning economy, but somehow, Iran is winning?
Meanwhile, China, which has a massive debt problem, a massive demographic problem, and serious military issues — its military is wildly inferior to that of the United States — is also winning?
According to these media outlets, the best strategy is to make nice with the Chinese, to hug them, to give them everything they could possibly want; to go to the Iranians and cut a deal where we free up billions of dollars so they can rebuild their entire military machine.
<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/ben-shapiro-dubunking-nytimes-iran?elementPosition=0&amp;row=0&amp;rowHeadline=Recent+Episodes&amp;rowType=Horizontal+Show+Episodes+Carousel"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-981859" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/ben-banner.avif" alt="" width="1024" height="171" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/ben-banner.avif 1024w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/ben-banner-300x50.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/ben-banner-768x128.jpg 768w" sizes=" (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></a>
I&#8217;m not sure what else you&#8217;re supposed to gain from news analysis from The New York Times that says Iran gained leverage in the war, or this from The Washington Post: “China gains major edge on U.S. amid Iran war, intelligence report finds.”
China has no oil. It receives a majority of its oil from the Strait of Hormuz, which is closed. How is China trying to become magically stronger in some way? Iran has nothing functional in it. Yet somehow they are magically winning.
The media’s perspective is that China and Iran have gained leverage.
The Times reports, “Nearly three months into the conflict, the Iranian regime has succeeded in confounding U.S. and Israeli expectations for a speedy victory.”
Of course, all of this depends on your definition of victory. We have not had a victory on planet Earth in which one side gets on the deck of an aircraft carrier and signs a surrender document for roughly 80 years.
If by victory over the U.S. you mean Iran has no top-level military, their government is barely holding on to power, their economy is nonfunctional, and that they are, in desultory fashion, firing drones at shipping — that’s a pretty narrow definition of victory.
The Times writes: “The regime survived a wave of targeted killings early in the war. It then managed to turn the tables on its more powerful adversaries, introducing something of a stalemate. Since mid-March, Iran has maintained control over the Strait of Hormuz, an international waterway crucial to the world&#8217;s oil and gas trade. It has been able to limit U.S. and Israeli strikes on its energy industry. It even got President Donald Trump to rein in Israel&#8217;s war in Lebanon against Hezbollah and Iranian-backed militia.”
Most of these points are false. If Iran maintained control over the Strait of Hormuz, they would be able to ship their own oil out; they would be able to toll ships that were traveling.
They can’t.
Sure, President Trump is concerned about the spike in oil prices that would accompany an Iranian counter-fire against the UAE, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia. But as far as limiting U.S. and Israeli attacks on its energy industry, President Trump is not sure that he wants to do that, because he is not sure that he wants to destroy the lifeline of a future Iranian regime if they were too moderate. He&#8217;s concerned that hurting the energy supplies in Iran would hurt the Iranian people.
As far as the war in Lebanon, the Israelis are still pursuing military action in Lebanon, and they&#8217;re likely to pursue it further as time goes on because Hezbollah is not giving up the ghost.
Nonetheless, The New York Times did find “experts” to explain that Iran is winning. Nicole Grajewski, who teaches at the Center for International Studies at Sciences Po in France, said, “Iran definitely has the advantage here. The U.S. is just kind of flailing at the moment.”
In what sense do they have an advantage?
The idea here is that Iran is pressuring the UAE and Qatar, except the UAE wants the United States to go even further. Saudi Arabia may be lobbying the United States not to go further, but that&#8217;s only because the United States has not evidenced a willingness to go all the way. If the United States were to say to Saudi Arabia and the UAE, “We&#8217;re toppling the regime,” both of those states would be onside, but they don&#8217;t want half-measures.
Thus, the pressure is not on the United States in the sense that America is about to be damaged; the pressure is on Iran regarding whether the regime lasts.
Iran&#8217;s strategy, according to The New York Times, of targeting oil fields and surrounding countries, “has shifted much of the focus of the war to the crucial question of how to get the strait reopened —  and how to limit Iranian leverage over it in the future. Efforts to pressure Iran to reopen the crucial waterway have proved unsuccessful.”
There are options that President Trump does not want to use, but he certainly could. Nonetheless, according to the New York Times, “Iran, though deeply damaged by the war, is likely to emerge from it with a valuable new asset” — I assume this means shutting down the shipping in the Strait — “having at least partial control over the strait would not only be a source of revenue for the regime, but also a form of geopolitical strength.”
They could have done that before. That&#8217;s the whole point. Do you want a regime that could have shut the Strait at any point to have a ballistic missile umbrella and nuclear weapons?
The answer is no.
It is yet to be seen how the war ends, but to suggest that Iran is somehow stronger now than they were before the war is crazy.
They just did something that they had to do because they were basically on their last legs if they had not shut the Strait of Hormuz. That was their last point of leverage, which, by the way, puts them at odds with China, which needs that oil. If they had not closed the Strait of Hormuz, and if it were to reopen without their economy reopening, they would be in very, very serious trouble.
How about China? The Washington Post is trying to claim that China is benefiting from all this, which is hard to see since their economic growth has slowed and they&#8217;ve been relegated to stealing our tech.
Nonetheless, according to The Washington Post, “A confidential U.S. intelligence analysis details how China is exploiting the war in Iran to maximize its advantage over the United States across military, economic, diplomatic, and other fields &#8230; The assessment, the officials said, was produced this week for the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Dan Caine, and has raised alarm within the Pentagon about the geopolitical cost of Washington&#8217;s standoff with Tehran.”
We should be very clear. There are many intelligence reports presented to the military, so we don&#8217;t know how important this one was. Was it sort of a consensus? Unclear.
“Officials talked about the finding,” the Post continued. “China has sold weapons to Persian Gulf allies of the United States&#8230; Beijing has also assisted countries around the world struggling to meet their energy needs.”
That would be weird given that Beijing does not have access to oil and natural gas.
The reality is that the United States has become the chief exporter of oil and natural gas on Earth, thanks to developments in the Strait of Hormuz. You can see graphics showing the large number of ships leaving American shores with American LNG.
According to the Washington Post, “The war has also drained the U.S. with massive stocks of munitions that would be critical in a potential standoff with China over the fate of Taiwan. The Iran conflict &#8230; has allowed Beijing to observe how the U.S. fights war and learn how to plan its own future operations.”
Beijing would have learned that in any conflict anyway. As far as munitions stocks being short, the reality is that&#8217;s why we need to ramp it up. We should have been ramping it up beforehand. The fact that Joe Biden didn&#8217;t ramp it up, the fact that Barack Obama slashed our military by leaps and bounds, did not help.
“The report notes that Beijing has incorporated popular criticisms of the war into public messaging,” the Post writes.
Of course that&#8217;s true, but none of this is a surprise. China trying to take advantage of an international conflict is not a gigantic shock. But the notion that China is somehow better off when it can&#8217;t import oil from Iran or Qatar or UAE or Saudi Arabia, how?
This doesn&#8217;t mean China doesn&#8217;t have counter moves. Any country worth its salt has counter moves. The question is, are they better off now or were they better off five months ago? And the answer is China was a lot better off five months ago.
But don&#8217;t worry, you can always find an expert. Jacob Stokes, a senior fellow at the Center for a New American Security — a left-wing think tank — says, “On balance, the war in Iran is massively improving China&#8217;s geopolitical position.”
I have doubts that that is the case.
Nonetheless, there are people who are trying to pretend that Beijing is doing well, that Beijing is actually somehow making common cause with Japan and South Korea and Australia.
I don’t think so.
People who don&#8217;t like Trump are claiming that China is going to step in and win the moral party arguments.
I have a hard time believing that unless you&#8217;re an idiot.
Stokes says, “China has an opening to portray the United States as an aggressive, unilateralist power in decline because Washington cannot stop itself from getting embroiled in a bloody and costly Middle East wars.”
First, this is not a particularly bloody nor particularly costly Middle East war. Second, if you want to believe a Chinese attempt to portray us as an aggressive unilateralist power while they threaten Taiwan, eat Hong Kong, threaten Japan, and build bases in the middle of the ocean to attack the Philippines, you are simply stupid.
If you&#8217;re the kind of person who wants to believe that China can make a moral case on the world stage, I would suggest you need to get your brain checked because you have a serious disability of some kind.
But count on the media, in all circumstances, to take the side that says that America ought to be weaker in the world. That&#8217;s become a popular point of view on both the Left and the Woke Right.
The truth has always been that the world is a much better place when America is stronger.
President Trump understands that.

haters_gonna_hate

Haters Gonna Hate. What The Anti-America Crowd Is Lying About

Ben Shapiro

Iran

Media Bias

Opinion

An American journalist has been accused of working for a member of the Chinese intelligence service seeking to steal classified information from the United States government. 
The Justice Department charged Thomas Pauken II earlier this year with acting as a foreign agent for the government of China from 2019 to 2026 without notifying the attorney general. Pauken, who moved to China in 2010, is accused of aiding a member of China’s Ministry of State Security in a scheme to recruit a Trump administration employee, according to court documents. 
An affidavit from the FBI reveals that Pauken, who works for the Chinese state media outlet Xinhua News, was arrested after an apparent FBI sting operation in February. The affidavit says that Pauken met with an unidentified Trump administration employee on February 25, 2026, at a hotel in Washington, D.C. 
At this meeting, Pauken gave the employee a SIM card and offered to pay a $10,000 bonus if the person agreed to work for a Ministry of State Security agent named “Cathy,” according to the affidavit. The employee would be paid through a bogus nonprofit and would produce reports for Chinese President Xi Jinping that would shape policy. 
The FBI recorded the meeting, and Pauken allegedly said that he had been concerned he was being targeted in a “sting operation.” This fear stemmed from previous interviews in January 2025 with the FBI and Customs and Border Protection during another trip Pauken made to the United States. He was questioned about work for China during those interviews, but was told to continue his plans as scheduled. The FBI said it was concerned that Pauken would be endangered if he changed his plans. 
Pauken previously met with the unidentified official in the summer of 2023 when that person was preparing for a prospective job with a potential second Trump administration. That person “was not hired for the exact job he wanted in the administration but currently works for a U.S. government agency,” the FBI said. 
&#8220;Cathy paid Pauken for information about the meeting and was instructed to buy the person a phone and laptop,” the FBI said. Pauken told the FBI “he was 80% sure that Person 1 would provide classified information” to the Chinese if hired by the Trump administration, but advised against sharing the information, according to the affidavit. The unidentified person produced multiple reports for Pauken that he believed were for a client in China, unaffiliated with the government, according to the FBI. 
Charles Burnham, who is representing Pauken, noted in an email to The Daily Wire that he was not facing spying charges. 
“It’s critical to understand that Mr. Pauken is not charged with spying or mishandling classified information,” he told The Daily Wire. “The government’s complaint charges that Mr. Pauken did professional work for a foreign government without first completing certain required paperwork.  We look forward to responding to the government’s allegations in court.”
The case was first <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2026/05/25/american-journalist-unregistered-agent-china-00935518">reported</a> on by Politico. 
The FBI alleges that Pauken worked for the Chinese government from 2019 to February 2026 and received several tasks from Cathy, including meeting with potential human sources in the United States and producing reports, for which he was paid $100,000.
Pauken &#8220;admitted during a voluntary interview that his work with Cathy — as well as other individuals whom he admitted also worked for the PRC government — was part of a conspiracy to obtain classified information from the United States government,&#8221; the affidavit said. 
The FBI said that Pauken told them “all his Chinese associates were obsessed with obtaining information on” his father, also named Thomas Pauken. The elder Pauken worked in the Reagan administration and is a former chair of the Texas Republican Party.
Pauken used the alias Tom McGregor in China because his father “did not want to appear associated” with his “activities,” according to the FBI.

TOPSHOT-VIETNAM-CHINA-DIPLOMACY-POLITICS

American Journalist Charged In Anti-CCP Espionage ‘Sting’

Trump Administration

In the high-stakes race for AI supremacy, America cannot afford to be outmaneuvered. The threat posed by China&#8217;s <a href="https://hai.stanford.edu/ai-index/2026-ai-index-report/technical-performance?utm_source=chatgpt.com">accelerating AI capabilities</a> demands a holistic, robust strategic response.
The question is not whether America should beat China, but whether it should adopt a strategy of diffusion, abundance, and national strength, or outsource that strategy to a single company. Demanding that we trust Anthropic’s judgment, adopt their safety regime, and treat their corporate interests as synonymous with the national interest is as narrow as it is undemocratic.
Anthropic&#8217;s latest policy paper, cloaked in the guise of national security analysis, does exactly this, revealing a self-serving agenda: manipulating genuine geopolitical risks to justify regulations that would cement the company&#8217;s own market dominance.
The company’s core bet is that the United States must first establish a strong domestic AI safety regime, then, on that basis, negotiate against China. In this telling, America wins through frontier AI being governed through strict regulatory red tape. This isn’t just hypothetical; we have seen this in their own lobbying at the <a href="https://www.wsj.com/opinion/trumps-road-to-war-with-anthropic-e536f669">state</a> and <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/petercohan/2023/11/02/bidens-executive-order-on-ai-could-help-25-billion-startup-anthropic/">federal level</a> for testing mandates, compute controls, reporting requirements, and institutionalized oversight. In their playbook, once the U.S. builds this regulatory thicket that only Anthropic can navigate, Anthropic…I mean, America, will be in a position to stand up to China.
This Anthropic playbook frames the U.S.-China AI competition across four fronts — intelligence, domestic adoption, global distribution, and resilience. They declare that intelligence is the decisive factor. This framing is no neutral assessment. It is a calculated effort to elevate the very capabilities that Anthropic already claims to excel in: closed, frontier systems powered by massive compute clusters and proprietary safety processes. The company conveniently ignores that China is rapidly closing the gap with recent breakthroughs, or that <a href="https://finance.yahoo.com/news/nvidia-ceo-jensen-huang-sounds-035916833.html">half of the world’s AI researchers</a> are in China.
The underlying logic is clear: if intelligence is supreme, then the ones building the most advanced closed models become the globe’s indispensable champions, requiring protection and deferential regulation. Yet their own analysis undermines this premise. A few lines later, they admit, “intelligence alone is not sufficient.” China can overcome an intelligence deficit through faster, cheaper, and more globally distributed deployment of &#8220;good enough” AI.
The problem is that most enterprises don&#8217;t need the absolute cutting edge; they need solutions that solve their problems at a price they can afford, with the flexibility to customize and deploy as needed. A model delivering 80% of frontier capability at 20% of the cost will capture far more market share than one offering marginal improvements at premium prices.
This is the genuine Chinese threat, not surpassing America at the bleeding edge, but flooding global markets with &#8220;good enough&#8221; AI that becomes the default choice for businesses, developers, and governments worldwide. Anthropic&#8217;s dismissal of China&#8217;s open-weight models as currently lagging in adoption reveals a dangerous blindness to the dynamics of market disruption.
Yes, American closed frontier models lead today. Enterprises are paying real money for our leading systems. But corporate leaders are already looking at their AI bills and asking hard questions. The value is real, but so is the cost. If an enterprise can get much of the same value from an open model at a fraction of the price, that option becomes attractive very quickly.
The company’s treatment of open-source AI development reveals its true agenda. They warn that Chinese labs release dual-use capable models as open weights, allowing users to strip away safety guardrails. This concern has merit, but Anthropic’s implied solution is to<a href="https://www.cato.org/blog/ai-pre-approval-proposal-could-hand-washington-kill-switch-over-speech-innovation?utm_source=chatgpt.com"> restrict</a> open-source AI development broadly. This would devastate American startups, universities, and small businesses while conveniently protecting their market position.
Anthropic uses export controls as a rhetorical cudgel to justify a broader regulatory framework that would entrench its own position. The same pattern appears in Anthropic’s solutions. Close loopholes in export controls? Fine. Strengthen enforcement against chip smuggling, foreign data center workarounds, and unlawful diversion? Yes. Defend American models from distillation attacks? Absolutely. However, what American policymaker or serious U.S. lab is “allowing” China to steal capabilities?
Export controls and anti-distillation defenses can be tools, not a full strategy. They may slow China in the short term, but, as we have seen in the telecommunications industry, they alone cannot make the world dependent on American technology. These controls will not create global developer loyalty. They cannot ensure that enterprises, governments, and startups choose American AI over cheaper Chinese alternatives.
In the long term, if we follow Anthropic’s prescription, this approach can backfire. Accelerating China’s drive for self-sufficiency, inspiring a parallel chip ecosystem, and pushing global markets toward non-American alternatives. The goal should be for American models and our <a href="https://www.rand.org/pubs/commentary/2025/05/chinas-ai-models-are-closing-the-gap-but-americas-real.html?utm_source=chatgpt.com">computing capacity advantage</a> to become the global standard. A policy that walls off markets without an affirmative diffusion strategy will enable our adversaries to fill the vacuum, and the U.S. will lose influence over critical infrastructure.
Maybe that is what Anthropic wants.
The stakes in the AI race are too high for such transparent self-interest. Policymakers must look past the veneer of national security analysis and scrutinize whose interests are truly being served. The future of American innovation and global competitiveness hangs in the balance. Allowing one company’s corporate strategy to define the rules of the game would be a strategic catastrophe.
***
Nathan Leamer is the executive director of Build American AI and a former policy advisor to FCC Chairman Ajit Pai.

Anthropic AI – Photo Illustration

The High-Stakes AI Race Between The World’s Global Superpowers

Anthropic

At the recent summit with President Donald Trump in Beijing, Chinese President Xi Jinping invoked the fifth-century B.C. Greek historian Thucydides in his opening remarks, saying: “The world has come to a new crossroads. Can China and the United States transcend the so-called ‘Thucydides Trap’ and forge a new paradigm for major-power relations?”
Cue the predictable, breathless coverage from the mainstream media, which has rushed to take Xi’s remarks at face value and eagerly embraced the Chinese Communist Party’s framing, a narrative that aligns perfectly with the elite talking point popularized by Harvard’s Graham Allison in his 2017 book &#8220;Destined for War.&#8221; In it, Allison argued that a rising power (China as Athens) must inevitably clash with an established hegemon (America as Sparta) unless “cooler heads prevail.” For nearly a decade, this thesis has been treated as an unassailable truth in think tanks, Wall Street boardrooms, and foreign-policy circles. The deeper implication is that America should step aside gracefully, accommodate China’s “peaceful rise,” and accept managed decline so the benevolent dragon can assume its rightful place as the world’s new leading power.
Unfortunately for our elites, it turns out that the Thucydides Trap is fake and gay.
Fake, because it is nothing more than pop-political science masquerading as profound historical destiny. Gay, because, well… it’s ancient Greece and the Peloponnesian War basically involved Sparta and Athens arguing over who got to be the top in the Mediterranean. And it’s both fake and gay because most of the commentariat has read Xi Jinping’s condescending history lesson to Donald Trump completely backward and missed the real signal.
Let me explain.
Graham Allison’s Destined for War hit bookshelves in 2017, just months after Donald Trump’s shocking 2016 victory. It was the first time since Nixon that a U.S. presidential candidate had openly rejected the bipartisan elite consensus on China, as evidenced by Trump hammering China on its currency manipulation, massive trade surpluses, IP theft, and hollowing out of American manufacturing while on the campaign trail. His promise to America was a total “America First” reset by slapping tariffs and decoupling from China.
The foreign policy and business establishments were in full panic mode. For decades, they were drunk on the Kool-Aid that economic liberalization inevitably leads to political liberalization, as they pushed for China’s entry into the WTO in 2001. Of course, we know now that it never panned out as Beijing failed to blossom into a “responsible stakeholder,” nor did it have any desire to embrace Western norms.
Allison’s book arrived as the perfect intellectual counterweight to President Trump’s new agenda. Suddenly, every think tank panel, Davos dinner, and editorial board had a shiny new framework to wield: You can’t get tough on Beijing — that’s Sparta panicking and triggering the Thucydides Trap. It reframed Trump’s hawkishness as dangerous and historically illiterate brinkmanship that risked catastrophic war. The message to policymakers, CEOs, and pundits was to push for continued “strategic engagement,”  i.e., keep the money flowing, keep the technology transferring, and don’t let this populist disruptor upset the profitable status quo. The business elite lapped it up because it gave them the perfect intellectual cover to keep doing what they already wanted and were incentivized to do: make obscene amounts of money in China, while pretending it was sound political strategy. In other words, Thucydides was a rhetorical weapon deployed to neuter the first serious challenger to the China engagement consensus in two generations.
Putting aside his distinguished record in political science and international relations, in this particular work on China and the Thucydides Trap, Allison commits a fundamental error. The bulk of the historical evidence shows that, contrary to his thesis, status quo powers have rarely launched preventive wars against perceived future rivals. In reality, it is the rising powers that usually strike first when they sense opportunity and weakness because established ones have far too much to lose — wealth, prestige, stability, and hard-won power.
For example, it was Imperial Japan, the ascending challenger in 1904, that launched a surprise attack on the long-established Russian Empire. Later in the 1930s, a recovering and resurgent Germany faced no preemptive assault from Britain, France, or the Soviet Union; the established powers dithered and appeased until the revisionist forced their hand. Even the Peloponnesian War, the supposed origin story for this historical analogy, does not fit the script Allison assigns it. Thucydides, an Athenian general writing after his own side’s catastrophic defeat, portrayed Sparta’s fear of Athenian growth as the “truest cause.” Yet the historical record reveals an aggressive, expansionist Athens provoking a reluctant Sparta through a series of calculated affronts. The vanquished, not the victors, shaped the narrative that has endured for 2,400 years.
Allison rests his entire thesis on 16 historical cases of rising versus ruling powers. Critics have dismantled this dataset for cherry-picking, miscoding, and ignoring critical variables such as agency, ideology, and revisionist behavior. In at least 14 of the 16 examples, the historical record simply does not support the core claim that fearful status quo powers preemptively attack rising challengers. Many of the wars were instead initiated by aggressive rising states, not paranoid incumbents.
Nowhere is this clearer than in the U.S.-China relationship itself. After emerging from World War II as the undisputed superpower, America did not crush Mao’s revolutionary regime despite Chinese forces killing tens of thousands of American soldiers in the Korean War. Nor did America retaliate against the Chinese for providing massive, sustained aid to North Vietnam throughout the Vietnam War. Instead, the United States opened diplomatic relations in the 1970s, integrated China into the global trading system, and, through investment, technology transfer, and market access, engineered the greatest economic lift in human history. So not only was Beijing’s rise never thwarted by Washington, it was actively aided and abetted by America.
Fast-forward to 2026, and the picture looks far less rosy for Graham Allison and his fellow elites who once eagerly proclaimed the dawn of the “Asian Century.” The structural headwinds they long downplayed have now become impossible to ignore. A collapsing property sector, demographic freefall, crushing local government debt, chronically weak domestic consumption, and tightening U.S. export controls have collectively shattered the narrative of China’s inevitable overtake of the United States. Recent projections show the nominal GDP gap between the U.S. and China actually widening by 2030.
So what is the signal that most of the mainstream media missed? Back in 2015, at the peak of China’s swagger, Xi Jinping had declared: “There is no such thing as the so-called Thucydides Trap.” At the time, Beijing was surging with double-digit growth (on paper), the Belt and Road Initiative was rolling out to great fanfare, island building in the South China Sea was barely met with any Western response (thanks, Obama), and the American president was still preaching “strategic patience.”
Why would the man who had only a decade ago dismissed the concept as non-existent, now suddenly treat the Thucydides Trap as the central dogma defining the U.S.-China relationship?
To answer this, one must read between the lines. The difference in what Xi said in 2015 vs. 2026 is what, in poker, you would call “a tell.”  In “The Art of War,” Sun Tzu teaches to “appear weak when you are strong, and strong when you are weak.” When China appeared unstoppable, Xi pretended there was no trap at all in order to lull America into complacency. Now that China is visibly weakening, he suddenly discovers the Thucydides Trap and warns of looming danger — projecting strength and issuing veiled threats to deter pushback.
This seminal text is a window into the operational doctrine of how the Chinese Communist Party thinks and acts. The mainstream media, predictably, has missed it entirely. What they hail as “statesmanship” is in reality a desperate tactical feint from a revisionist power whose “century of rejuvenation” has slammed into harsh headwinds. Xi invoked the phrase to ostensibly warn Trump against “disrupting the relationship.” In reality, he was making a veiled threat: Don’t contain us. Don’t push back too hard. Keep the one-way transfer of wealth, technology, and power flowing, or you’ll be the paranoid Sparta that starts the war.
The Thucydides Trap was always a strategically convenient fiction, weaponized to keep America passive while its rival rose. Xi is not educating Trump on ancient Greek history; he is testing him. Rising challengers press their advantage until they meet credible resistance. Xi’s blatant flip-flop is proof that the balance of power is tilting back toward American strength. America should reject Xi’s premise and continue to maintain unrelenting pressure across every domain — economic, technological, military, and diplomatic — to force Beijing to choose between genuine internal reform and managed decline on far less favorable terms.
Americans should see Xi’s sudden rediscovery of the Thucydides Trap as a clear sign that their country is not in inexorable decline, no matter how loudly the usual chorus of influencers, podcasters, and legacy media insists otherwise. Ignore the usual suspects shilling for managed decline. What we are witnessing is a weakening rival’s desperate plea for America to once again choose self-delusion over self-defense.
***

Multiple Mao

The Thucydides Trap Is Fake And Gay

Global power

History

Thucydides Trap

A Chinese immigrant escapes one of history&#8217;s most brutal communist regimes, crosses the Pacific, lands in America, collects a multi-million dollar net worth, and then steps in front of a red carpet microphone to <a href="https://x.com/EndWokeness/status/2056115103926252025">declare</a> that capitalism is &#8220;the greatest evil in the world.&#8221;
That is exactly what Hacks star and professional they/them progressive Poppy Liu said at a recent premiere, before adding, generously, that she would &#8220;be okay with [capitalism]&#8221; if fewer people lived under oppression. A noble sentiment. A historically illiterate one (because capitalism leads to <a href="https://www.cato.org/commentary/capitalisms-triumph">less oppression</a>) and coming from her specifically, one of the most spectacular acts of self-unawareness in Hollywood this week.
How do we know? Because last year, Poppy sat down with the L.A. Times to <a href="https://www.latimes.com/travel/story/2025-02-21/sunday-funday-poppy-liu-best-things-to-do-los-angeles">share</a> her ideal Los Angeles Sunday. The schedule: 10:30 a.m personal training session. 11:30 acupuncture recovery. A quick bite at Amara Cafe. An afternoon trek to Koreatown for fresh fruit. Dinner at Levant Bistro. Movie night. And then, naturally, some late-night TikTok couch rot to wind down, after she put “they” to sleep. (The toddler is <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/Cus5xghr8PN/">nongender</a>.)
Every single stop on that itinerary was brought to her by the economic system she&#8217;d like to dismantle.
The irony is again richer than a 12-course tasting menu.
Let&#8217;s briefly audit what capitalism actually provided for Poppy&#8217;s American dream. The personal trainer hustling clients in a free market. The acupuncturist running a private practice. The cafe, the restaurant, the movie theater: all private enterprises, all paying wages, all generating profit, all apparently evil. The phone she used to post about it all? Designed by a company, assembled across a global supply chain, powered by semiconductors and lithium batteries that exist because competitive markets incentivized someone to invent them.
Her career? Funded by capitalist studios and streaming giants. Her designer wardrobe and <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/DYWgo0vgQ0Z/?hl=en">thousand</a>-dollar couture dress? It operates through international trade and global capitalist markets. Her immigration story? The electric car with GPS and safety features that brought her to the vanity show? All market-driven. All only possible because she landed in a country built on economic freedom rather than state control.
China, where she spent much of her youth, tried the alternative. It killed tens of millions of people through the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution, and fostered state-managed famine on an industrial scale.
She made it out, made it to America, made millions, and her takeaway is that capitalism is the problem.
This deranged mentality that she and other elites are projecting is going to slowly kill America, if we let it.
It’s nothing new, however. Hating the merchant class is one of the oldest political tricks in human history. <a href="https://heartland.org/opinion/economic-ideas-plato-aristotle-and-the-ancient-greeks-part-2/">Ancient</a> Greeks viewed private trade as disruptive. Medieval Europeans were <a href="https://www.worldhistory.org/article/1301/trade-in-medieval-europe/">suspicious</a> of commerce. For centuries, aristocrats <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bourgeoisie">rallied</a> against anyone who threatened the established order of wealth. The resentment predates Marx by millennia. He just gave it a pamphlet.
What <a href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/marx-exploitation-abc-unequal-world/">Marx</a> actually did was shift the target. Before Marx, people resented wealth. After Marx, they were taught to resent the wealthy. To hate the person, not just the gap. To see every successful entrepreneur as a thief, every profit as exploitation, every billionaire as a threat to democracy. Modern progressives didn’t invent this; they just introduced it to the youth on TikTok.
And it’s working. Only 54% of Americans now view capitalism <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/694835/image-capitalism-slips.aspx">positively</a>. The lowest number in 15 years. This ought to terrify you.
As I “Sunday Scrolled” on Instagram, I came across a viral <a href="https://www.instagram.com/reels/DWjaRWeiF5X/">video</a> that inaccurately reframed the entire economic debate between Capitalism and communism as a father asking his daughter: if another kid doesn’t have a lunch, do you share yours? She says yes. Dad says, “Then you’re a little commie.” The implication was that capitalism means hoarding your sandwich while your classmate starves. It was emotional, clever, and completely wrong.
A child voluntarily sharing her lunch is not communism. That’s private property plus individual charity. Americans donate over $590 billion <a href="https://www.google.com/search?q=Americans+donate+over+%24500+billion+annually%2C&amp;oq=Americans+donate+over+%24500+billion+annually%2C&amp;gs_lcrp=EgZjaHJvbWUyBggAEEUYOdIBBzcwOWowajeoAgCwAgA&amp;sourceid=chrome&amp;ie=UTF-8">annually</a>, the highest charitable giving rate on earth. Communism isn&#8217;t the sweet kid at the lunch table. Communism is the government seizing the cafeteria, mismanaging the food supply, and leaving everyone hungry. Ask Venezuela. Ask the Soviet Union. Ask the 45 <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Leap_Forward">million</a> people who died in Mao&#8217;s Great Leap Forward.
The video had 5.6 million views. The comments had a collective IQ of 80. The indoctrination is working.
Nobody is arguing that capitalism is perfect. It is flawed, but obviously the best option we’ve got. Under it, global extreme poverty cratered from 42% to under 9% since 1990. Lifespans doubled over the last century. The smartphone in your pocket contains more computing power than NASA used to land astronauts on the moon, and you can buy one for a few hundred dollars. This happened because markets reward innovation, competition drives down costs, and human ingenuity is allowed to function.
Every alternative has delivered something else. Stagnation. Poverty. Body Counts.
Even <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/ben-shapiro-ep-2426-memberblock">Sweden</a>, long the Left’s favorite argument for socialism, is embracing capitalism wholesale: free markets, private enterprise, lower taxes, and strong property rights. And of course, it’s working. The country has seen massive increases in innovation and Initial Public Offerings, so much so that the small country of 11 million is far outpacing Germany, France, and the Netherlands.
What the Poppys of the world are selling is not a better system. It is envy dressed in the language of compassion, packaged by people wealthy enough to never feel the consequences of the ideas they promote. They hate billionaires from their million-dollar homes. They hate corporations on the devices that those corporations made. They perform poverty from penthouses and call it solidarity. They fight “oppression” over oat-milk matchas.
Poppy Liu immigrated from a country that starved its own people in the name of economic equality, built a career in a country that rewards talent and ambition, accumulated real wealth, and concluded that the problem is capitalism.
She is welcome to her opinion. She is welcome to donate her sequined couture, her L.A. restaurant tabs, her streaming residuals, and her personal training sessions to the revolution. We&#8217;ll take the million-dollar home too, since she&#8217;s offering.
For the rest of us: you are not a bad person for believing in free markets. You are not greedy for wanting to keep what you earn. You are not heartless for understanding that a system rewarding innovation and competition has done more to lift human beings out of poverty than any government program in history.
The greatest evil of all time did not build the modern world. Capitalism did.
Don&#8217;t let the millionaire tell you otherwise.

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