It may be too strong to say that China and the United States are engaged in “germ warfare,” but the Chinese propaganda effort, aided by our own irrepressible fifth column in the media that seems to want to take China’s side against the U.S., reveals that the COVID-19 episode may prove an inflection point—a crisis for the Chinese regime akin to the Chernobyl disaster in the Soviet Union—that results in some fundamental re-orderings of our globalized world in fairly short order.

The Chinese government hasn’t exactly distinguished itself from the very start, a point made by our guest for this special mid-week episode, the Hoover Institution’s Michael Auslin. Michael has a long must-read article up this morning at RealClearPoltitcs entitled “Beijing Fears COVID-19Is Turning Point for China, Globalization,” and we review its main arguments in this conversation, but also go beyond it to ask some fundamental questions about whether China can become more transparent and truly liberalize in any meaningful way. You’ll just have to listen for our answer.

Amazon isn’t shipping books at the moment apparently, but when they do, you might want to order up one of Michael’s best-sellers, The End of the Asian Century: War, Stagnation, and the Risks to the World’s Most Dynamic Region.

Subscribe to Power Line in Apple Podcasts (and leave a 5-star review, please!), or by RSS feed. For all our podcasts in one place, subscribe to the Ricochet Audio Network Superfeed in Apple Podcasts or by RSS feed.

Published in: Foreign Policy

There are 5 comments.

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  1. colleenb Member
    colleenb
    @colleenb

    By the way Mr. Hayward I really enjoyed your pictures of the trains near your home from the other day. Looks like a great place to do ‘trainspotting’!

    • #1
  2. Steven Hayward Member
    Steven Hayward
    @StevenHayward

    colleenb (View Comment):

    By the way Mr. Hayward I really enjoyed your pictures of the trains near your home from the other day. Looks like a great place to do ‘trainspotting’!

    Then you’ll like this one from yesterday.

    • #2
  3. colleenb Member
    colleenb
    @colleenb

    Steven Hayward (View Comment):

    colleenb (View Comment):

    By the way Mr. Hayward I really enjoyed your pictures of the trains near your home from the other day. Looks like a great place to do ‘trainspotting’!

    Then you’ll like this one from yesterday.

    Beautiful. That is one of the things even the leftist can’t take from California. At least I think they can’t.

    • #3
  4. Steven Hayward Member
    Steven Hayward
    @StevenHayward

    colleenb (View Comment):

    Steven Hayward (View Comment):

    colleenb (View Comment):

    By the way Mr. Hayward I really enjoyed your pictures of the trains near your home from the other day. Looks like a great place to do ‘trainspotting’!

    Then you’ll like this one from yesterday.

    Beautiful. That is one of the things even the leftist can’t take from California. At least I think they can’t.

    Well, they are trying to build that stupid high-speed rail in the central valley. . .

    • #4
  5. colleenb Member
    colleenb
    @colleenb

    I finally got to listen to the whole podcast and enjoyed it very much. Packed full of information. For others on Ricochet I also recommend the interview with Helen Raleigh on the Acton Line and, of course, Mr. Auslin’s podcast with our own McRib loving John Yoo.

    • #5
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