 Let's see, we're gonna go here. So somebody sent me this video about this analyst talking about China as a security threat. I thought it would be good to analyze how today we are looking at threats and what constitutes threat. I also think this is interesting in terms of, it doesn't make itself esteem. Since I'm American confidence, I think the story of the last 20 years, the story of America over the last 20 years, if you wanna think of the historical arc of the last 20 years, and it's not an arc because that has enclosed it, but the direction in which the American culture has been heading over the last 20 years. I think the theme is the loss of American exceptionalism. The loss of American confidence, the loss of American self-esteem. You could start that with 9-11, and you can carry it forward to today. We don't believe in ourselves. We don't believe in our value. This is true throughout the Trump presidency. America is not exceptional. America is not special. Tucker Carlson, America is a great country because that great scenery. It's just a beautiful country. That's what makes it great, right? I did a show on that. We've lost what it means to say America's exceptional. We've lost what it means to say we can do anything. We've lost what it means we can achieve all. We are the leader of the world. We're ahead of everybody else. All that, all that is gone. And it's gone because of the mixed economy. More than just economy. Because of the mixed economy philosophy that we live under. The United States now, when the Chinese accuse us, as they did a week ago, of being a racist country, our diplomats can't defend themselves. Can't defend themselves. Can't stand up for America. Nobody stands up for America. Presidents can't. So I think since 9-11, America's in decline internally in a sense of our own sense about ourselves. And it's on the left, and it's on the right. It's on both sides, right? The right can't define what makes America America. So it can't defend it. So it can't view it as exceptional, because it doesn't know. That's a good question, Andrew, we'll get to it. All right, so let's look at this to some extent from the perspective of that question of American confidence. Let's see, oh no, proceed to the wrong button. There we go. Huawei and US tech firms want to bring in someone who's been very outspoken about the security issues posed by the Chinese tech giant, Robert Spalding, senior fellow at the Hudson Institute joins us this morning. It is great to see you again, Rob. You just heard the report from Elon, and you think what? Well, I think one of the things that we found in the national security strategy is that the way you look at national security in the globalized internet-powered world is that militaries were designed to protect the population from undue influence from foreign bodies. No, militaries was not designed to protect the population from undue influence from foreign bodies. This is the slippery slope. This is super dangerous. Militaries are not there to protect you from undue influence. What does that even mean, undue influence? Militaries are there to protect you from violations of your rights. Violations of your right means a threat to your life or to your property. Restricting your ability to move. Restricting your freedom. Not undue influence. Militaries don't get involved in influence. Militaries are involved in blowing stuff up and killing people and protecting the population from other people doing it to you. So framing the enemy as somebody that's gonna inflict undue influence on you means that you have the right to use force against them. Means the First Amendment is out the window. It's gone. Elizabeth Warren just won the battle. So you have to frame things accurately. You have to think about these things objectively. I saw, especially after the 2016 election of the Russians were able to use big data analysis, artificial intelligence, and social media networks to create protests in the United States. They didn't create protests in the United States. They provided misinformation. But who created the protest? The people who read it, the people who believed it, the people who didn't fact check, the people who rushed to action without thinking. You are responsible for the information you consume, for the actions you take based on the information you consume. If you act rashly on false information without checking it, it's your responsibility. Yes, the Russians try to influence the US election in 2016 and 2020, and they probably did to some extent. But that's our fault. Is the American military now gonna protect us from people with bad ideas, with bad information? Type of behavior is accelerating. So when you combine the might of Huawei with Chinese large tech companies that are starting to really grow, especially when you look at the stock rises with the new bang market up today, there's a big challenge with preventing undue influence of your society using these technologies and these business models. So we shouldn't worry about the Chinese military and the military threat to Chinese post. What we really should be worried about is the technological threat that companies might unduly influence what we do. The devil's advocate position, only at least to have this debate, which is to say, you look at what's happening in the United States with tech companies in America and their role with the military. And there's lots of people who've come out and said that Google and Amazon and others aren't being patriotic enough because they're not participating with the US government. And yet, there are also all sorts of programs that have been going on for the past century, frankly, between US companies and the US government. So he is making a model equivalency between US government and Chinese government. Well, our businesses cooperate with the government. Why shouldn't Chinese businesses work with the Chinese military? That's a bogus argument. Well, I think what's different today is if you look just at the market in China, for instance, you see no major telecom providers. Of course, there is no major equipment manufacturers that are American anymore. You see none of the major tech companies able to even operate in China. And so what happens is China basically creates a fortress to grow their companies, to create market dominance with their own country, and then uses subsidies, basically non-market-based activity to allow them to gain global dominance. So here's the point, right? If you believe in markets, if you believe in capitalism, if you believe in competition, does building a fortress, protecting your country's companies from competition, subsidizing them, is that gonna create the best companies in the world? Is that gonna create market dominance? If so, then why don't we all do it? If so, why are we advocating for capitalism? If Chinese companies are the best technologically, because the government supports them, because they get subsidies, because they're protected from competition, then shouldn't we do the same thing? Surely we need to defend ourselves against the Chinese government. But are we worried about Chinese companies being better than American companies because they get subsidies? I believe in markets. The Chinese want to subsidize their companies, it probably means that they can't compete. The subsidies are gonna be used inefficiently, and they're gonna create competitors that are not as efficient or productive, particularly in tech, which requires the freedom to innovate, to think out of the box. So, and this leads to conservatives wanting the United States to adopt Chinese industrial policy, because they believe that it works in China. The Chinese better than us. The China's more successful than us. The Chinese companies are gonna be and defeat us. If Huawei is putting up equipment in the United States that is being used for Chinese spying, then of course that should be stopped. Who would object to that? And if they are caught actually doing that, they should be banned from ever doing business in the United States or anywhere in the Western world. But this wishy washy we're afraid of Chinese technology companies because China's so good. Really? It shows how weak we are. Our technology companies are better, more innovative, more productive, we're afraid of some competition. Again, caught spying off with their heads. Then what is it about? If it's not about spying and it's not about Chinese companies being better, then what is it about? I don't want subsidies, but I can't control China not providing subsidies. And what about American companies getting subsidies? What about European companies getting subsidies? Canadian companies, every country in the world gives subsidies. Or they've got files on American personnel because they hacked the US systems because America doesn't protect its systems well enough. Not because we use Chinese equipment. If a country doesn't attack us, it's not an enemy. Government has no business in telling you you can't trade with them. They're not creating global champions. Okay, but... They're gonna create global champions by subsidizing them in a competitive, innovative market. Is that what we believe? Is that what American capitalism has come to? We're so confident in our system. We're so confident in America that we think a bunch of Chinese bureaucrats are gonna make better companies than we have. If the CCP has attacked us, then we should attack them back. I've said we should withdraw our embassy from China. We should bring our diplomats home and we should attack them using cyber technology and crush them. Fine. It's not what he's talking about. We're talking about what he's talking about. That's an economic argument, right? I could make the economic argument that what you wanna do is slow our way down to give some room for US companies who may actually be behind to the degree you believe it. Really? So again, this is the argument. They subsidize or we'll subsidize. They subsidize or we'll slow them down so we can catch up because we're so terrible. So terrible. How can a big percentage of what they do be subsidized? Where do they get the money for that? Chinese economy is smaller than the US economy. They have a lot more people on a per capita GDP. Their economy is puny as compared to ours. Where do they get the money to subsidize? The companies have to actually make a profit so that they can tax it so that the government has any money. If they operate on a loss, then where is the profit that allows where the tax money? Where's the money that allows China to subsidize? The money has to come from somewhere. Did the Chinese companies run at a loss? Chinese tech companies? Really? Are you sure of that? How many, yeah, I know the Chinese are suffering. But really the Chinese suffer relative to how they used to live. Have you ever been to Shanghai? Have you ever been to Dongguan or Guangzhou or Shenzhen? Really? You guys should travel a little bit and see the world. By the way, I'll tell you, the 18Ts and Verizon's of the world will tell you that they are not. But to the degree that that's the argument, that's an economic one, it's not a national security one. I agree with it. Now we're back to this whole dispute around trade, which is, is Huawei a national security threat or is this just a pawn in some trade negotiation? Well, that's a point that I'm trying to make is economics are tied with national security. No, they're not. You can't confuse the two. And what you do when you do that, what happens when you confuse economics and national security is that it's an excuse for the nationals on the right to get involved in economics for national security reason. Why do we have tariffs on steel for national security reasons? Why, I mean, Trump was considering putting tariffs on European cars for national security reasons. Conflating economics with national security is an unmitigated disaster, should never be done. What we need today, what I called a new intellectual would be any man or woman who is willing to think. Meaning any man or woman who knows that man's life must be guided by reason, by the intellect, not by feelings, wishes, wins or mystic revelations. Any man or woman who values his life and who does not want to give in to today's cult of despair, cynicism and impotence and does not intend to give up the world to the dark ages and to the role of the collectivist roads. All right, before we go on, reminder, please like the show. We've got 163 live listeners right now, 30 likes, that should be at least 100. I figure at least 100 of you actually like the show. Maybe they're like 60 of the Matthews out there who hate it, but at least the people who are liking it, you know, I wanna see a thumbs up, there you go. Start liking it, I wanna see that go to 100. All it takes is a click of a thing, whether you're looking at this, and you know the likes matter. It's not an issue of my ego, it's an issue of the algorithm. The more you like something, the more the algorithm likes it. 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