Joe Will Force the U.S. into The Great Reset, Beware

We will be forced to change our behavior and every day common things around us that we rely on will fade away. Biden will put the United States back into the Paris Accord….but read on…

Read the website.

For decades, progressives have attempted to use climate change to justify liberal policy changes. But their latest attempt – a new proposal called the “Great Reset” – is the most ambitious and radical plan the world has seen in more than a generation.

At a virtual meeting earlier in June hosted by the World Economic Forum, some of the planet’s most powerful business leaders, government officials and activists announced a proposal to “reset” the global economy. Instead of traditional capitalism, the high-profile group said the world should adopt more socialistic policies, such as wealth taxes, additional regulations and massive Green New Deal-like government programs.

“Every country, from the United States to China, must participate, and every industry, from oil and gas to tech, must be transformed,” wrote Klaus Schwab, the founder and executive chairman of the World Economic Forum, in an article published on WEF’s website. “In short, we need a ‘Great Reset’ of capitalism.”

Schwab also said that “all aspects of our societies and economies” must be “revamped,” “from education to social contracts and working conditions.”

Joining Schwab at the WEF event was Prince Charles, one of the primary proponents of the Great Reset; Gina Gopinath, the chief economist at the International Monetary Fund; António Guterres, the secretary-general of the United Nations; and CEOs and presidents of major international corporations, such as Microsoft and BP.

Activists from groups such as Greenpeace International and a variety of academics also attended the event or have expressed their support for the Great Reset.

Although many details about the Great Reset won’t be rolled out until the World Economic Forum meets in Davos in January 2021, the general principles of the plan are clear: The world needs massive new government programs and far-reaching policies comparable to those offered by American socialists such as Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) in their Green New Deal plan.

Or, put another way, we need a form of socialism — a word the World Economic Forum has deliberately avoided using, all while calling for countless socialist and progressive plans.

“We need to design policies to align with investment in people and the environment,” said the general secretary of the International Trade Union Confederation, Sharan Burrow. “But above all, the longer-term perspective is about rebalancing economies.”

One of the main themes of the June meeting was that the coronavirus pandemic has created an important “opportunity” for many of the World Economic Forum’s members to enact their radical transformation of capitalism, which they acknowledged would likely not have been made possible without the pandemic.

“We have a golden opportunity to seize something good from this crisis — its unprecedented shockwaves may well make people more receptive to big visions of change,” said Prince Charles at the meeting, adding later, “It is an opportunity we have never had before and may never have again.”

You might be wondering how these leaders plan to convince the world to completely alter its economy over the long run, since the COVID-19 pandemic most assuredly won’t remain a crisis forever. The answer is that they’ve already identified another “crisis” that will require expansive government intervention: Climate change.

“The threat of climate change has been more gradual [than COVID-19]—but its devastating reality for many people and their livelihoods around the world, and its ever greater potential to disrupt, surpasses even that of Covid-19,” Prince Charles said.

Of course, these government officials, activists and influencers can’t impose a systemic change of this size on their own. Which is why they have already started to activate vast networks of left-wing activists from around the world, who will throughout 2021 demand changes in line with the Great Reset.

According to the World Economic Forum, its 2021 Davos summit will include thousands of members of the Global Shapers Community, youth activists located in 400 cities across the planet.

The Global Shapers program was involved in the widespread “climate strikes” of 2019, and more than 1,300 have already been trained by the Climate Reality Project, the highly influential, well-funded climate activist organization run by former Vice President Al Gore, who serves on the World Economic Forum’s Board of Trustees.

For those of us who support free markets, the Great Reset is nothing short of terrifying. Our current crony capitalist system has many flaws, to be sure, but granting more power to the government agents who created that crony system and eroding property rights is not the best way forward. America is the world’s most powerful, prosperous nation precisely because of the very market principles the Great Reset supporters loathe, not in spite of them.

Making matters worse, the left has already proven throughout the COVID-19 pandemic that it can radically transform political realities in the midst of a crisis, so it’s not hard to see how the Great Reset could eventually come to fruition.

China to Sanction U.S. Defense Contractors over Taiwan

The One China Policy supported by previous administrations has been earnestly challenged by the Trump administration and rightly so. China has forcefully held dominion over Taiwan, an independent nation and since the Trump administration has approved arm sales to Taiwan, the tensions have increased substantially.

Context:

Jamestown: Events throughout 2020 have seen a measured but steady increase in tensions surrounding Taiwan. The government of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) continues to deny any legitimacy to the democratically-elected government of the Republic of China (ROC) in Taiwan. The PRC also continues to make menacing insistence upon unification on Beijing’s terms, in language that has grown more strident throughout the tenure of Chinese Communist Party (CCP) General Secretary Xi Jinping (China Brief, February 15, 2019; China Brief, November 1, 2019).

Against this background, the PRC has reacted with both harsh rhetoric and saber rattling to enhanced U.S.-Taiwan diplomatic contacts in August and September, as well as a reported further round of impending U.S.-Taiwan arms sales (see discussion further below). One PRC English-language outlet opined in late September that “The U.S. has been releasing all kinds of supportive signals to Taiwan this year, with the level and frequency of their so-called interactions flagrantly enhanced… While [some in Taiwan] jump at such signals, they’d better think long and hard whether the signals are sweet poisons from the U.S. for Taiwan” (PLA Daily, September 25).

U.S. Diplomatic Visits to Taiwan

Recent years have seen a noteworthy increase in official and semi-official U.S.-Taiwan diplomatic exchanges. In March 2018 the Taiwan Travel Act (TTA) was signed into U.S. law, providing a statement of support for increased travel by high-level Taiwan officials to the United States. This was followed by unofficial “transit stop” visits in the United States by ROC President Tsai Ying-Wen (蔡英文) in 2018 and 2019, and a May 2019 meeting between U.S. National Security Advisor John Bolton and his ROC counterpart David Lee (李大維) (China Brief, July 31, 2019). In early February this year ROC Vice President-elect Lai Ching-te (賴清德) traveled to the United States, where he met with senior U.S. political figures and attended the annual National Prayer Breakfast in Washington D.C. (Taiwan News, February 4). Although Lai had not yet assumed office at the time, and therefore visited in an unofficial role, the trip produced harsh condemnations in PRC state press (Xinhua, February 6). All of these visits by Taiwan officials have drawn similarly negative reactions from the PRC Foreign Ministry and state media, as with the “stern representations” presented over President Tsai’s stop in Hawaii in March 2019 (Xinhua, March 21, 2019).

These visits were reciprocated in summer and autumn this year by two visits made by U.S. officials to Taiwan. U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Alex Azar conducted a visit to Taiwan from August 9-12, described by his department as “the highest-level visit by a U.S. Cabinet official since 1979,” and “part of America’s policy of sending high-level U.S. officials to Taiwan to reaffirm the U.S.-Taiwan friendship” (HHS, August 4). Secretary Azar’s activities included a meeting with President Tsai; a visit to Taiwan’s Central Epidemic Command Center; and a speech at National Taiwan University (HHS, August 10; August 11; August 12). This trip was followed in mid-September by a visit from U.S. Under Secretary of State for Economic Growth, Energy, and the Environment Keith Krach, who traveled to Taiwan to attend a memorial service for former ROC President Lee Teng-hui (U.S. State Department, September 16).

***  Pentagon Approves $500 Million Taiwan F-16 Support Program ...

Bloomberg:

China will impose unspecified sanctions on the defense unit of Boeing Co., Lockheed Martin Corp., and Raytheon Technologies Corp. after the U.S. approved $1.8 billion in arms sales to Taiwan last week.

The sanctions will be imposed “in order to uphold national interests,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian told reporters Monday in Beijing. “Boeing Defense” would be among those sanctioned, he said.

The State Department last week approved $1.8 billion in new weapons for Taiwan and submitted the package to Congress for a final review. The submission comes two months after the U.S. and Taiwan completed the sale of 66 new model F-16 Block 70 aircraft from Lockheed, and as tensions between the two superpowers continue to escalate ahead of the American election.

Boeing Defense is one of the broader company’s three business units, according to its website. Shares in Boeing, down almost 50% this year, dropped as much as 2.2% in U.S. pre-market trading.

A spokesperson for Boeing emphasized the firm’s relationship with China in the aviation space. Boeing has “worked together successfully with the aviation community in China for almost 50 years to support Chinese efforts to ensure a safe, efficient and profitable aviation system to keep pace with the country’s rapid economic growth.”

“It’s been a partnership with long-term benefits and one that Boeing remains committed to,” the spokesperson said in the emailed statement.

One China Principle

Representatives from Raytheon weren’t immediately available for comment outside of normal U.S. business hours.

Zhao condemned Lockheed’s F-16 Block 70 sale at the time, saying it violates the One China principle, interferes in China’s internal affairs and will have a “major impact” on U.S.-China relations. Taiwan’s presidential office thanked the U.S for the sale. In July, China — which considers Taiwan part of its territory and resists any recognition of its de facto independence — had announced sanctions on Lockheed Martin for a previous arms sale to the island.

U.S. arms manufacturers face strict limitations on what kind of business they can do with countries deemed by Washington to be strategic rivals, such as China. Lockheed generated 9.7% of its revenue in the Asia-Pacific region last year, according to data compiled by Bloomberg, though that’s not broken down by individual countries.

China has previously threatened to sanction U.S. companies, including General Dynamics Corp. and Honeywell International Inc., on numerous occasions over arms sales to Taiwan. It also warned it could blacklist FedEx Corp., while Ford Motor Co.’s main joint venture partner in China was fined 162.8 million yuan ($24.3 million) last year, days after the U.S. put a ban on doing business with Huawei Technologies Co.

While China has often invoked the threat of putting U.S. companies on a blacklist — or list of “unreliable entities” — in response to various actions by U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration over the past year, it has yet to name any, at least publicly.

Delicate Time

For Boeing, China’s action comes at a delicate time. The company, reeling from the hit to air travel from the coronavirus pandemic, is trying to get its besieged 737 Max plane back into the air after two fatal crashes saw it grounded around the world. China was the first place to ground the plane, and also has the world’s biggest 737 Max fleet.

Europe’s top aviation regulator said earlier this month the plane will be safe enough to fly again before the end of this year, while U.S. Federal Aviation Administration chief Steve Dickson flew the Max in September and said the controls were “very comfortable.” More detail here.

He Sought the ‘Big Guy’s’ Advise on All Foreign Deals

The Post reported about the May 13, 2017 email regarding a business agreement with CEFC, a Chinese energy company that was owned by Ye Jianming, a Chinese entrepreneur who has links to the People’s Liberation Army.

The email, from businessman James Gilliar, discusses “remuneration packages” and equity shares for members of the business consortium.

Hunter Biden is identified in the email as “Chair / Vice Chair depending on agreement with CEFC,” with an allotted payment of $850,000. More here from Daily Caller.

 

Reference

Hunter biz partner confirms e-mail, details Joe Biden's ... Hunter Biden's ex-business partner says Joe Biden talked ...

“My name is Tony Bobulinski. The facts set forth below are true and accurate; they are not any form of domestic or foreign disinformation. Any suggestion to the contrary is false and offensive. I am the recipient of the email published seven days ago by the New York Post which showed a copy to Hunter Biden and Rob Walker. That email is genuine.
This afternoon I received a request from the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Government Affairs and the Senate Committee on Finance requesting all documents relating to my business affairs with the Biden family as well as various foreign entities and individuals. I have extensive relevant records and communications and I intend to produce those items to both Committees in the immediate future.
I am the grandson of a 37 year Army Intelligence officer, the son of a 20+ year career Naval Officer and the brother of a 28 year career Naval Flight Officer. I myself served our country for 4 years and left the Navy as LT Bobulinski. I held a high level security clearance and was an instructor and then CTO for Naval Nuclear Power Training Command. I take great pride in the time my family and I served this country. I am also not a political person. What few campaign contributions I have made in my life were to Democrats.
If the media and big tech companies had done their jobs over the past several weeks I would be irrelevant in this story. Given my long standing service and devotion to this great country, I could no longer allow my family’s name to be associated or tied to Russian disinformation or implied lies and false narratives dominating the media right now.
After leaving the military I became an institutional investor investing extensively around the world and on every continent. I have traveled to over 50 countries. I believe, hands down, we live in the greatest country in the world.
What I am outlining is fact. I know it is fact because I lived it. I am the CEO of Sinohawk Holdings which was a partnership between the Chinese operating through CEFC/Chairman Ye and the Biden family. I was brought into the company to be the CEO by James Gilliar and Hunter Biden. The reference to “the Big Guy” in the much publicized May 13, 2017 email is in fact a reference to Joe Biden. The other “JB” referenced in that email is Jim Biden, Joe’s brother.
Hunter Biden called his dad ‘the Big Guy’ or ‘my Chairman,’ and frequently referenced asking him for his sign-off or advice on various potential deals that we were discussing. I’ve seen Vice President Biden saying he never talked to Hunter about his business. I’ve seen firsthand that that’s not true, because it wasn’t just Hunter’s business, they said they were putting the Biden family name and its legacy on the line.
I realized the Chinese were not really focused on a healthy financial ROI. They were looking at this as a political or influence investment. Once I realized that Hunter wanted to use the company as his personal piggy bank by just taking money out of it as soon as it came from the Chinese, I took steps to prevent that from happening.
The Johnson Report connected some dots in a way that shocked me — it made me realize the Bidens had gone behind my back and gotten paid millions of dollars by the Chinese, even though they told me they hadn’t and wouldn’t do that to their partners.
I would ask the Biden family to address the American people and outline the facts so I can go back to being irrelevant — and so I am not put in a position to have to answer those questions for them.
I don’t have a political ax to grind; I just saw behind the Biden curtain and I grew concerned with what I saw. The Biden family aggressively leveraged the Biden family name to make millions of dollars from foreign entities even though some were from communist controlled China.”

Former Astronaut Mark Kelly, AZ Democratic Senate Candidate and China

Primer: With U.S.-China relations taking on increasing importance in all spheres of life — economic, geopolitical, cultural — it becomes vital to enhance the dialogue between our countries and build lasting, direct, and informative ties between our peoples. The Young Leaders Forum (YLF), now in its second decade, does just that.

Each year, YLF holds a four-day retreat to which a select group of exceptional American and Chinese young professionals are invited. Together, participants explore substantive issues, identify commonalities, and develop enduring friendships and partnerships in a casual, intimate environment.

Comprised of influencers and change-makers, the accomplished group of YLF fellows works in a variety of fields. Fellows include government officials and politicians, authors, university leaders, entrepreneurs, and musicians and artists. Attention is given to geographic, gender, and ethnic diversity. An alphabetical listing of all YLF participants since the program’s inception has been posted on the right side of this page.

The Forum’s location alternates each year between the United States and China. Each Forum is packed with interesting, provocative cross-cultural conversation and activity.

The National Committee, the Chinese People’s Institute of Foreign Affairs (CPIFA), and the Forum’s U.S. sponsors—led in 2019 by Chubb and Xcoal—cover all lodging, food, and program costs of the YLF retreat for the first two years of our fellows’ participation, allowing them to attend one Forum in the United States and one in China. Participants are asked to pay their own travel expenses to and from the venue, but some full or partial subsidies are available.

And maybe there are some others that we need to question on membership or participation:

George Stephanopoulos moderates a national webcast discussion on U.S.-China relations with experts Stephen Orlins, Melanie Hart, Yasheng Huang, and Ely Ratner. The panelists address a range of current topics, from the trade war to protests in Hong Kong, from visa restrictions to the NBA. This webcast is part of the thirteenth annual CHINA Town Hall, held at 80+ venues across the United States and China on November 18, 2019.

(someone be sure that the Republican Senator Martha McSally knows the details)

Gabby Giffords and Mark Kelly

Yuichiro Kakutani – September 28, 2020 5:00 AM

FB: The Chinese government invited then-astronaut Mark Kelly, now an Arizona Democratic Senate candidate, to an all-expenses-paid retreat at a countryside resort in 2003. He left China five days later not only with a future spouse, former Rep. Gabby Giffords (D., Ariz.), but also with lucrative regime business contacts.

Kelly attended the annual Young Leaders Forum, a five-day junket cohosted by the Chinese People’s Institute of Foreign Affairs, which is “under the leadership of the Communist Party of China.” The conference allowed Kelly an opportunity to mingle with high-profile Communist Party officials and rising stars in Chinese society. Attendees included Cui Tiankai, now Chinese ambassador to the United States; Fang Xinghai, former director of the CCP’s top committee on the economy; and Zhou Mingwei, the party’s former top foreign propaganda honcho.

China analyst Gordon G. Chang said that party connections—such as those Kelly fostered—are “absolutely essential” for securing Chinese business deals.

“The Communist Party tries to control everything, whether it’s a state enterprise or a private company,” he said. “And so it’s extremely important to have Communist Party contacts [to do business].”

Kelly has also had extensive ties with China since becoming a civilian. World View Enterprise, an aerospace company he cofounded and in which he still holds investments, received funding from Chinese tech giant Tencent, which censors the internet for Beijing. As the Washington Free Beacon reported, he also held a financial stake in a Colorado company that courted investments from a Chinese state-funded tech enterprise.

He now has assets worth up to $27 million, according to his financial disclosure.

A Kelly campaign spokesman said that the former aviator’s participation was “coordinated by NASA,” but did not answer questions about whether the Democrat used any of the contacts he met on the YLF trip for his business ventures. Instead, the campaign said that prominent Republicans also participated in the campaign.

Kelly and Giffords told multiple media outlets that they met during the Young Leaders Forum, without mentioning the Chinese People’s Institute of Foreign Affairs. The retreat took place in a luxury hotel in the scenic Chinese countryside, where attendees went on pleasure cruise rides in between their panel discussions. Kelly gave a one-hour speech about his space experience, while Giffords participated in a panel discussion with Chinese politicos.

Kelly would participate in the 2004 and 2005 conferences as well. He called the experience “one of the absolute highlights of my life, second only to flying in space,” and even took a Forum banner into space in 2006.

Kelly’s campaign has been trying to deflect concerns about the candidate’s business ties by emphasizing his military service and calling China a “threat to American interests.” Nevertheless, they have remained contentious in the race, with Republicans spending millions on ads accusing him of dependence on China. He holds a 5.5 point lead against Republican incumbent Martha McSally, according to RealClearPolitics.

Chinese Embassy in NY is a Spy Hub, so is the UN

Primer:

January of 2020, a reported United Nations hacked revealed the infiltration of spies.
A New York City police officer

charged with acting as an agent for China  

has been denied bail by a US federal judge in New York. And in January of 2020

  NYPD Officer Allegedly Acted as Agent for Chinese ...

Prosecutors pointed to Baimadajie Angwang’s financial records showing “unusually large” wire transfers to and from China and the possibility that the 33-year-old defendant – a naturalised US citizen who is accused of spying on fellow ethnic Tibetans – might flee to China’s consulate in New York.

Magistrate Judge Roanne Mann of the US Justice Department’s Eastern District of New York granted the request for continued detention on Monday because “no credible sureties” were offered to assure that Angwang would appear for court proceedings. Angwang is a community affairs police officer in the borough of Queens as well as a US Army reservist stationed at Fort Dix in New Jersey. The indictment against Angwang highlighted his familial and financial ties to China, noting that his brother was a reservist in the People’s Liberation Army. Wire transfers from China to accounts with Angwang’s name in the US in 2014 and 2016 amounted to nearly US$120,000, including one US$49,985 transfer from his brother, prosecutors said. He faces up to 55 years in prison if convicted.

NR: Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said that the Chinese consulate in New York City is a center for espionage, in comments to the New York Post on Thursday.

Pompeo’s remarks came after the Justice Department charged an NYPD officer on Monday with spying for China. The officer, Baimadajie Angwang, is accused of arranging invitations for Chinese officials to NYPD events, in order to gain access to senior ranks of the NYPD.  Angwang is an ethnic Tibetan who also gathered information for China on Tibetans in the city.

The Justice Department alleged that Angwang was in contact with at least two consulate officials. Pompeo said there would likely be additional arrests of agents connected with the consulate.

Officials in the consulate are “engaged in activities where they’re crossing the line from normal diplomacy to the kinds of things that would be more akin to what spies are doing,” Pompeo told the Post.

In addition to the New York consulate, Pompeo warned that China’s spying efforts may extend to its United Nations personnel.

“Remember, not only do we have Chinese consulates here, but there’s a UN facility, too,” Pompeo said. “So if we’re talking about New York, we not only have the Chinese Consulate in New York — that is the bilateral consulate — they also have a large contingent of Chinese diplomats here for United Nations work.”

China has attempted to influence state and local politics in the U.S. through its consular missions, across various locations. National Review has reported that the wife of the Chinese Consulate-General in Chicago sent emails to Wisconsin’s State Senate President Roger Roth in February, asking Roth to “consider adopting a resolution expressing solidarity with the Chinese people in fighting the coronavirus.”

The U.S. ordered the closure of China’s consulate in Houston on July 22, citing unspecified “massive illegal spying and influence operations” emanating in part from the consulate. Nearby residents called the fire department after consulate workers began burning piles of documents in the courtyard of the complex.