U.S. and China leaders challenged by domestic political and economic crises—and each other
By Ng Weng Hoong
The world’s two most powerful politicians are facing a coincidental surge in inner-circle discontent amid their countries’ respective mounting economic and geopolitical challenges.
U.S. President Donald Trump is accused by his own supporters of covering up his ties to a dead paedophile (1), dragging the country into a new foreign war, and setting the stage for stagflation’s return to wreck the economy.
China’s supreme leader, Xi Jinping, is struggling to contain the infighting within the country’s ruling Communist party while presiding over a stuttering, debt-fuelled economy and Beijing’s uneasy relations with its Asian neighbours and the West.
With the rapid crumbling of the United States-led global liberal order, the fates of the two men will be pivotal to their countries’ role in the re-shaping of the world’s political and economic landscape.
For now, Xi is the weaker of the duo as he has performed poorly since ascending to the country’s top job in November 2012. For more on Xi’s dismal record, please see part 1 (2) of this commentary.
But Trump himself is already besieged months into his second term, despite scoring recent apparent victories in his tariff wars against the rest of the world and attempts to end the Russia-Ukraine war. Both men have a legion of domestic enemies who believe the moment for a revolt is approaching. Who will be the last man standing?
Xi Jinping now a ‘nominal leader’, says China watcher
The general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has been reduced to “a nominal leader” amid an intensifying internal power struggle that he seems to be losing, according to a long-time China watcher.
Once China’s most powerful leader, Xi Jinping is gradually ceding ground to his critics and enemies within the party and the military, said Willy Wo-Lap Lam, a senior fellow at the Jamestown Foundation in Washington, D.C. Until about two years ago, the 72-year-old strongman could claim full control of the military, the party, and China’s US$19-trillion economy, surpassing even the reach of the CCP’s and the country’s founder, Mao Zedong.
But of late, Xi has been on the defensive as his policies are deemed to have seriously damaged China’s interest. Shortly after taking power, he delivered a lofty speech that China would help the world build a “community of common destiny” (3). Instead, he has overseen China’s devolution into an angry, inward-looking nation that has become more repressive and intolerant. His nationalistic policies have been blamed for causing the country’s rapid economic slowdown, worsening ties with its Asian neighbours, and fuelling tensions with the West, particularly the United States.
Lam, who began writing about China as a journalist in the 1980s, said Xi’s credibility has been undermined and his power base weakened by the recent purges of key allies in the military. Among them are General He Weidong (4) and Admiral Miao Hua (5) who both held senior positions in the Central Military Commission (CMC), China’s top military body which directly controls the People’s Liberation Army (PLA). They abruptly “disappeared” over the last few months. In China’s opaque political scene where rumours of intrigues often contain some truth, General He and another general are said to have died (6).
An earlier wave of dismissals brought down two of his handpicked defence ministers, Li Shangfu (7), and Wei Fenghe (8), the former foreign minister Qin Gang (9), and at least 16 senior military officers (10) including generals (11). Almost all were arrested or dismissed on accusations of corruption and bribery. More arrests and purges are likely to follow, suggesting the cull is far from over.
Over two recent interviews in Vancouver, Lam said younger leaders with the support of General Zhang Youxia, the CMC’s de facto leader, have begun challenging Xi’s stranglehold on power. The emerging players have the blessings of the party’s elders including Hu Jintao (Xi’s predecessor) and former premier Wen Jiabao, both seen as advocates of political reform. Zhang, the CMC’s vice chairman who reports to Xi as the CMC chairman, has thrown his support behind the reformist camp.
“They are alarmed by his moves to centralize power and create a personality cult around himself that is reminiscent of Mao,” said Lam.
Xi is an admirer of Mao who ruled China with an iron fist from its founding in 1949 to his death in 1976. On the back of his fanatical supporters, Mao launched a reign of terror that caused the death of between 30 million and 45 million (13) of his own people through starvation, disease, and political persecution.
Xi’s desperate gamble
Last year, Xi made a bizarre decision that might have triggered a pivotal backlash against his rule. He appointed his wife, Peng Liyuan (14), to a key position in the CMC’s Cadre Assessment Committee, presumably to monitor and judge the loyalty of senior officers.
The move seemed desperate, coming just before the June 2024 expulsion (15) of the two disgraced former defence ministers, Li and Wei, from the party. It laid bare the extent of Xi’s alienation from the military, despite it being under his full command packed with officers that he had personally chosen and promoted.
Peng’s appointment backfired. Predictably and spectacularly.
While Peng is a senior PLA officer in her own right as a major general, she has little soldier experience. Her talent is in music and drama, where she had risen to become a national celebrity long before she met Xi. Her success as a propagandist earned her the position of president of the PLA’s Academy of Art.
“Peng is a very smart woman with an IQ much higher than that of her husband, but her involvement in PLA affairs was barely tolerated by the top brass,” said Lam. It raised suspicion among the officers corp that she was appointed to spy on them. Furthermore, her presence as a woman in a secretive committee that determined the careers of ambitious men was an affront to the PLA’s masculine culture.
Lam mocks the notion that Xi might have considered Peng for political office, which makes his decision to put her in a high-profile hot seat even more puzzling. Why make such a risky move that would expose him to the dreaded accusations of nepotism and, worse, corruption? Peng is not known to have political ambition and has little in common with Jiang Qing, the wife of Mao Zedong, who revelled in organising and leading his revolutionary campaigns during the Cultural Revolution from 1966 to 1976, and after his death.
Is Xi stronger or weaker now?
An Australian think tank sees the recent purges as Xi exercising and strengthening his power over both the government the military.
“Rather than being challenged, China’s leader is wielding his power,” according to Michael Dugan and Jade Guan writing for the Lowy Institute’s The Interpreter (16).
Lam dismisses their interpretation as “very amateurish”.
He sees the continuing infighting and upheavals in the military as clear “indicators of Xi’s loss of power”, not signs of his authority over the organization. If a leader is compelled to regularly replace key people to make his mark, it exposes both his poor judgement and the lack of mutual trust inside the organization.
The ouster of his two proteges, General He and Admiral Miao, were not Xi’s decisions, but the work of his enemies, said Lam, who reported on China from Beijing for the now defunct Asiaweek magazine from 1986. In 1989, he became the China editor for the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post and was an adjunct professor on China studies at the Chinese University of Hong Kong from 2007 to 2022.
Lam, who is also an associate at the Centre for Asia-Pacific Initiatives at British Columbia’s University of Victoria, was the first China watcher to call out Xi’s totalitarian ambition. In 2015, he wrote about Xi’s plan (17) to break with the party’s limit on the general secretary’s two-term stay in office in the post-Mao era. Although Xi’s predecessors observed that rule by stepping down after completing 10 years of service, the two-term tenure was never set in stone in China’s constitution. Xi exploited that weakness to extend his stay in power.
Events have borne out Lam’s reading.
But he doesn’t think Xi will have Mao’s fortitude to remain in office for life.
After months of reports about Beijing’s internal power struggles, the rumour mill (18) cranked up a notch when Xi did not appear in public for 14 days from May 20 to June 3, 2025. This is an unusually long period of absence for a Communist state that expects its top leader to remind everyone that he is still in charge. Xi re-appeared on June 4 to greet Belarus’s visiting President Alexander Lukashenko (19) in a rather subdued meeting.
Trump to the rescue
Despite the party’s growing infighting and Xi’s rumoured weak health, Lam expects the supreme leader to see out his current third term ending 2027.
“Thanks to Donald Trump, Xi is able to hang on to his job,” said Lam.
The U.S. president has provoked intense nationalism throughout China as he steps up his anti-Beijing politics since returning to office for a second time in January 2025. Inadvertently, he has given Xi a new lease of life and role for standing up to the Americans.
Lam said the CCP will not risk removing Xi now for fear it will weaken Beijing’s position in dealing with the Trump administration.
“He will remain the leader of China and CCP, but he won’t be as powerful as before,” said Lam. “I call him the nominal leader.”
A group of renowned anti-China hawks was more forceful in its recent assessment of Xi and the CCP. On July 16, they gathered at the Washington, D.C.-based Hudson Institute to discuss “post-Communist China”.
The institute’s president, John P. Walters, led the forum (20) to prepare the United States for what it sees will be a chaotic, divided, and dangerous China after the CCP’s predicted collapse. The speakers (21) included noted China critics Miles Yu (22), Gordon G. Chang, Randall Schriver, Rick Fisher, Piero Tozzi, William Nee, Nina Shea, and Donald Clarke.
Other experts weigh in
“I think he’s probably fine,” said Joseph Torigian, a U.S. expert on Chinese politics, who is much less pessimistic about Xi’s prospects.
Torigian holds simultaneous research and academic positions at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, the School of International Service at American University in Washington, D.C., and the Lieberthal-Rogel Center for Chinese Studies at the University of Michigan.
Speaking at the Simon Fraser University campus in Vancouver on June 24, he suggested that reports and rumours of Xi being sidelined are likely to be exaggerated.
“So, there’s a lot of rumors about Xi. He disappears for a couple weeks, and then he’s (supposedly) dead or there’s a power struggle, or something like that,” said Torigian, the author of a new book on Xi’s father and his influence on China’s current top leader.
Published by Stanford University Press, The Party’s Interests Come First: The Life of Xi Zhongxun, Father of Xi Jinping has received positive reviews (23) from China scholars (24) and experts (25).
The recent surge in reports and rumours about Xi’s political decline are “coming against the background of a leader who has an extraordinary political toolkit to stay in power,” said Torigian, who specializes in the politics of authoritarian regimes and elite power struggles.
“People who don’t like him…are so limited in what they can do, so they make things up,” he said in reply to a question about Xi’s alleged struggles as reported on YouTube channels and the mainstream media.
“They lie. These rumors spread, because people want them to be true, because there’s no way of proving they are not true. You get clicks, you get more viewership if you make up those kinds of claims.”
Another China watcher, David Bandurski (26), shares Torigian’s general assessment that Xi remains in charge.
“Xi Jinping still strong in the headlines,” Bandurski commented in a recent analysis for the China Media Project.
The Angry White Man
China watchers struggling to read Xi will be consoled by how almost everyone (27), including U.S. experts and India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi, have been caught out by the extreme actions and policy shifts of Trump 2.0.
Since retaking the White House on January 20, 2025, Trump has intensified and expanded his range of hostile actions (28) against America’s allies (29) as well as the individuals and organizations that have crossed his path. While still an unpredictable character, he is now more predictable and open with his revenge-seeking to settle past grievances (30). This could be the path to his downfall.
The 47th president believes that he (31), his tribe (32), and his nation (33) have been egregiously exploited, persecuted, and under-appreciated by everyone, especially those claiming to be his friends and America’s allies.
“From trade deals to NATO security procedures, Trump has claimed that the U.S. has been given less return value, resources and, ultimately, respect for the amount of money, political will power and other resources that America has given the world,” observed ABC News (34).
“Donald J. Trump is feeling aggrieved, unappreciated by donors and fenced in by security concerns in the final stretch of the race,” reported the New York Times (35).
“There is a bitterness around him and a quickness to anger. He was always pretty quick to anger, but it’s gotten more intense,” said New York Times political journalist Maggie Haberman (36) in 2022 shortly after the publication of her best-selling book on Trump.
This forms part of the Trump Paradox (37) in which he treats adversaries with caution and respect while friends are deemed to be disposable resources who cannot be trusted or loved (38). Why befriend important people and powerful nations, except to leech off their wealth and influence? Perversely, adversaries are deemed more trustworthy because they are open with their intention to compete against, if not, to destroy you.
Operating on this philosophy, Trump has turned a long and growing list of allies (39), staff (40), and supporters (41) into bitter enemies.
Trump is also aggrieved by the “woke” movement which he savaged on his first day in office with an executive order to end all government-linked Diversity Equity and Inclusion (DEI) (42) initiatives. His election as the 47th president of the United States marked a high point (43) in the war against DEI, which his supporters claim is an ideology against white people.
This is another aspect of the Trump Paradox in which he believes he is the “least racist” (44) person while he openly and freely espouses racist views against Black (45), Jewish (46), Muslim (47), Latino (48), and Asian (49) people.
Trump knows well that racism is exploited by both the left and the right. But it’s always someone else, not him, who is engaged in racist behaviour. In both his victories in the 2016 and 2024 presidential races, he represented the revenge of the Angry White Man (AWM) (50) standing against the tide of a multipolar and increasingly multicultural world. He exploited the anxieties of white voters (51) about their economic prospects (52), the raging culture war (53), and the threat of displacement by people of colour. For Trump, white people cannot compete because they are being treated unfairly.
But for the “others”, his line of attack is that they are incompetent and inferior. These are the losers and the lefties. They complain about racism (or sexism or whatever is in woke) for the purpose of lobbying the government to intervene on their behalf.
Since everyone (friends, allies, bystanders, minorities, etc) is “taking advantage” (54) of America, it is imperative to strike first and hard. This Darwinian mindset yields an endless supply of grievances that feeds into the Trumpian cycle of anger, suspicion and exploitation.
It led to his outpouring of contempt for Canada which he frequently insults as the 51st state (55) and the public humiliation of Ukraine’s president (56) on live television. India thought Prime Minister Modi’s personal bond with the president gave it AWM immunity until Trump delivered the backstab (57) with a 50 percent tariff (58) on Indian exports to the U.S. Ever-pliant Japan (59) is pounded with increasing contempt the more it acts as America’s doormat. Singapore (60), with the rare distinction of buying more from the U.S. than it sells, was also tariffed to Prime Minister Lawrence Wong’s consternation that “these are not actions one does to a friend”.
Trump’s minefields
Trump passed his first 200 days in triumphant mood (61). As possibly the most consequential U.S. president since the Second World War, he has already upended the global liberal order that 13 of his predecessors since Franklin Roosevelt had painstakingly put together over the past 80 years. He boasts of scoring tariff victories against other nations, securing “trillions of dollars” worth of investments into the United States, arm-twisting allies into boosting defence spendings, and advancing the cause of peace in Ukraine and the Middle East. On the home front, he has launched campaigns to reduce the size of government, centralize power in the presidency, and started taking revenge against many powerful Americans who have crossed his path including former presidents Joe Biden, Barack Obama, and Bill Clinton.
What or who could possibly derail the Trump presidency?
1. Jeffrey Epstein
If the living can’t stop the Trump juggernaut, maybe the dead can.
That possibility, while remote, exists amid allegations (62) that the president is covering up details of his long-standing relationship with Jeffrey Epstein, a convicted sex offender and paedophile who died in mysterious circumstances in a New York jail in 2019. The Department of Justice is refusing to release some 100,000 pages of files containing interviews, material and documents obtained from its multi-year investigation into Epstein’s activities that may have enmeshed many important people.
Another pivotal figure, Virginia Giuffre, a victim who blew the whistle on the former financier and his friends, died by suicide earlier this year.
The two men were allegedly close friends (63) with a colourful relationship (64) that is now threatening to entangle the First Lady (65). CNN has published a detailed timeline (66) of the two men’s long friendship, from 1987 to 2000, that suggests Trump (67) might have, at the least, known about the nefarious activities of “this creep” (68).
Journalist Michael Wolff (69), who has the unique distinction of having interviewed both men at length, has written and spoken about their close relationship. He has written several best-selling books on Trump (70) and has provided material to the Department of Justice as part of its investigations into Epstein’s activities.
Trump’s Make America Great Again (MAGA) base is split (71) over the issue. Some members have started to waver (72) under the onslaught of media reports about his past behaviour. What secrets might be hidden inside the Epstein files (73) that the Trump team is trying so hard to protect (74)?
Vice President JD Vance failed (75) to offer clear support for his embattled boss in a recent interview. His ambivalence was duly noted by conservative commentators (76). Vance’s loyalty has always been in doubt as he had previously pressed for the release (77) of the Epstein files, described Trump as “America’s Hitler” (78) and denounced the economic policies of his first term as president.
In June, Trump’s previous ally, Elon Musk, broke spectacularly with the president with a threatening tweet (79) that he has since deleted:
“@RealDonaldTrump is in the Epstein files. That is the real reason they have not been made public.”
As Trump is finding out, the dead may no longer talk but they can still do serious damage to the living.
2. The U.S. war on Iran
On June 22, the anti-war president (80) plunged the U.S. into war.
On his orders, U.S. planes bombed Iran’s nuclear enrichment sites over the following 12 days in support of Israel’s war against the Islamic republic. The decision represented a 180-degree shift in his long-stated opposition to U.S. involvement in wars on foreign soil. It was a shift that possibly no one, especially the Iranians, expected and it drew immediate criticism (81) from some of his supporters.
Steve Bannon gave a reminder of a core principle of the MAGA movement (82): “No forever wars”.
Trump’s war changes everything. Defence spending will increase, with the U.S. military budget set to hit a record US$1 trillion (83) in the coming year. This will threaten his other MAGA agenda to reduce the government’s debt and spending that will anger a wider group of his conservative supporters. If Trump is unable to contain the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East, the budget deficit is more likely to increase than shrink.
The combined U.S.-Israel attacks destroyed some of Iran’s nuclear facilities and killed dozens of senior Iranian military leaders and scientists, but they did not wipe out the country’s enrichment capability for military use. The massive damage inflicted on the country also failed to effect regime change, and instead, has strengthened the Iranian government’s grip on power.
The combined financial losses for both Israel and Iran for the short war could run as high as US$52 billion, according to the Turkish media TRT Global (84). For the U.S., it was at least US$2.35 billion for the more than 150 of its costly anti-ballistic missile interceptors fired to defend Israel, according to Military Watch (85) magazine citing the Wall Street Journal. The cost will be higher once the bombing missions are included in the final calculation.
Iran has vowed revenge while Israel is determined to wipe out its enemy’s nuclear military threat. This sets the stage for a bigger war as both sides reload for the next round.
“The next Israel-Iran war is coming,” predicts Iran expert Trita Parsi (86). “Both countries’ strategic calculus suggests it will be even more violent.”
And potentially a lot more costly than the estimated US$55 billion borne by the three countries. A cornered Iran might play its ace: blockading the Strait of Hormuz, which it threatened to but did not follow through during the June war. Around 20 percent of the world’s oil (87) and liquefied natural gas (LNG) (88) flow through the narrow strait that can easily be cut off by Iran.
While neighbouring oil producers have long planned for this war scenario, the alternative routes using pipelines and overland deliveries will not be sufficient to offset the sudden loss of so much supply. Iran will have little left to lose if it faces a crushing defeat.
Are Trump and his supporters prepared for the political and financial fallout from another potential forever war? He was a fierce critic of President George W. Bush’s disastrous wars in Iraq (2003) and Afghanistan (2001) which cost the U.S. at least US$6 trillion (89), contributed to the global financial crisis of 2008, escalated a global terror threat, and destabilized large parts of the Middle East and Central Asia.
The U.S. has already given a substantial amount of military, intelligence, logistical and financial resources to support Israel’s war that started with Hamas’s terror attack on Israeli civilians on October 7, 2023. The bombing of Iran now places the U.S. and its people in the direct line of fire.
Parsi issued this warning: “If U.S. President Donald Trump caves to Israeli pressure again and joins the fight, the United States could face a full-blown war with Iran that will make Iraq look easy by comparison.”
3. Israel’s forever wars
Israel’s difficult existence has reached a new level of pain.
Surrounded by hostile countries that want it wiped off the map, the 77-year-old Jewish state has given up on the proposed two-state co-existence with the Palestinians as a path to peace. Instead, it has plunged into its own forever wars (90) to take on all of its enemies all at once. And it expects the U.S. to provide the support.
Israel is rapidly losing support (91) around the world, particularly for its campaign to drive out more than two million Palestinians from Gaza. Both Palestinians and Jews have long shared their ancient homeland, but Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu now wants it all for Israel. Trump’s greatest concern will be Americans’ rising negativity (92) towards the Jewish state while he continues to support Netanyahu’s far right government.
In July, Marjorie Taylor Greene (93) became the first Republican Party representative in Congress to accuse Israel of committing genocide in Gaza. The MAGA loyalist made her comment in the wake of reports by two Israel-based human rights groups, B’Tselem (94) and Physicians for Human Rights-Israel (95), which concluded that “Israel is committing genocide (96) in the Gaza Strip.” Earlier, Omer Bartov (97), a professor of Holocaust and genocide studies at Brown University, wrote in the New York Times: “Israel is committing genocide against the Palestinian people.”
The influential American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) has not directly addressed the genocide charge, but it has slammed Greene for her “betrayal of American values” (98). On its website, AIPAC (99) said the term “is now being perversely weaponized to attack Israel in the aftermath of the deadliest assault on Jews since the Holocaust.”
The American Jewish Committee (100) said Israel is not committing genocide as its campaign in Gaza is an act of self-defence against Hamas, which it calls “a terror group that states its intent to destroy the state of Israel in its founding charter.”
As if to appease some of his supporters, Trump took a rare swipe at Netanyahu by stating that there was “real starvation” (101) in Gaza after the Israeli leader had insisted that “there is no starvation in Gaza”. Netanyahu had accused international aid agencies and the media of reporting a “bold-faced lie” (102).
Trump is at a crossroads.
How much more should he commit to enabling Netanyahu’s expansionist ambitions that even the Israeli military (103) is questioning? As the genocide debate intensifies while the possibility of a larger second Israel-Iran war looms large, Trump risks losing more than just his reputation as an America First defender. Would his supporters and mainstream America allow him to take the U.S. into a new, and possibly more destructive and costly, war in the Middle East?
4. Stagflation fears
A trio of July data has provided the first tangible signs that Trump’s trade war is bad news for the U.S. economy.
Year-on-year, the Consumer Price Index (CPI) (104), minus the volatile food and energy components, rose 3.1 percent while the Producer Price Index (PPI) (105) was up 3.3 percent. Both came in above economists’ expectations, pointing to the feared inflationary impact of the tariffs on imports that Trump announced on April 2. Those tariffs have been gradually implemented over the past few months and are finally showing up in the price tags on a wide range of goods.
“U.S. employers added just 73,000 jobs last month as labour market weakens (106) in face of Trump trade wars,” was the Associate Press headline for the U.S. jobs situation. This was well short of the 115,000 new jobs that economists had expected as “Trump’s erratic and radical trade policies” paralyzed businesses from investing and hiring.
The U.S. budget deficit (107) worsened in July to US$291 billion as government spending continued to overwhelm revenue. The US$20.6 billion revenue derived from Trump’s import tariffs was impressive on its own, but it was obliterated by the government’s US$630 billion spending for the month.
Trump (108) and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick (109) have been leading the propaganda charge that foreign companies will pay for the tariffs, potentially to the tune of US$300 billion (110) to the U.S. government this year.
This narrative is false. Tariffs are a form of consumption tax imposed on the American consumer that will be mostly paid for by the American consumer.
The pro-Trump Wall Street Journal (111) puts it starkly: “Americans will pay a big chunk of the tariff bill, either directly via higher consumer prices or indirectly via less business investment in productivity growth to increase wages.”
The net result of Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariffs and his government’s arrest and deportation of large numbers of immigrant workers is higher inflation. The tariffs hurt not only consumers (112), but also the companies that rely on a wide range of intermediate industrial products used in American factories that must be imported, most notably from China (113).
“Tariff policy is a mess,” wrote economist David Scissors (114) at the conservative think tank American Enterprise Institute (AEI).
“The trade deficit is probably going to end higher this year, and it’s the Trump administration’s own fault.”
Inflation is only the appetiser. The main course, to be served shortly, will likely be stagflation (115). Last seen in the U.S. economy in the 1970s, stagflation (116) combines some of the worst features of a full-blown economic crisis: surging inflation, high unemployment, and negative-to-no growth for the economy. Nobel Prize economist Paul Krugman (117) and Goldman Sachs (118) concur that Trump’s policies are enabling the return of stagflation.
Additionally, his well-telegraphed intention to weaken the dollar (119) combined with his erratic policy moves are undermining global confidence (120) in the value and stability of U.S. assets. A weaker dollar plus Trump’s persistent demands for lower interest rates will be inflationary for the U.S economy.
His economic agenda is meeting stiff resistance, both from within and outside the U.S.
For now, the Federal Reserve Board is standing firm against his calls for interest rate cuts, especially in the face of rising inflation. His tariff policy faces legal challenges and may yet be struck down by the U.S. courts (121), which will wreak havoc on the government’s finances. In spite of their father (or because of him?), Lutnick’s sons (122) are betting Trump’s tariff policy will fail and that the U.S. government will have to refund the billions of dollars that it has already collected.
Even before Trump’s return to the White House, the U.S. was already facing blowback from China, India, Brazil, Russia, and other Global South countries who want to pare down their holdings of the dollar and U.S. treasuries. They want to reduce their dependence on the dollar in response to America’s weaponization of the global financial system to serve its foreign policy objectives.
Whatever the outcome of the clash between the U.S. versus its western allies and the Global South, the breakdown of the global trading system is well underway and irreversible. The key players no longer trust each other. The rise of protectionism will pile inflationary pressures onto the global production and movement of goods and services.
Trump versus Xi in 2026
The U.S. mid-term elections (123) to be held in less than 15 months from now will serve as a referendum on Trump’s policies. All 435 seats in the House of Representatives and 35 of the 100 seats in the Senate will be contested to determine the 120th Congress of the United States.
The world will be different by then, just as it was different 15 months ago when most people thought the 2024 presidential would be a straight, tough fight between then incumbent Joe Biden and challenger Trump. Six months later, on November 5, it was Kamala Harris who led the Democratic Party and was soundly beaten in a contest that was nowhere as close as even the best expert had predicted (124).
As the final quarter of 2025 approaches, Trump appears to have the momentum over a somewhat subdued Xi amid continuing rumours (125) about his eroding powers and factional infighting inside the CCP.
If peace does break out in Ukraine over the next 15 months, Trump will have a new ally in Russia and together with Putin will vassalize Europe. If the U.S. is not sucked into another war and Iran collapses, he will go on to collect the Nobel Peace Prize. If Israel takes over all of Palestine and finishes off Hamas and Hezbollah, the world’s tallest Trump Tower will rise over the Riveria of the Middle East. If Canada, Panama, and Greenland fall in line to become the 51st, 52nd, and 53rd states, all will hail Trump as the emperor of Greater USA. If there is no inflation and the Treasury Department collects trillions of dollars in tariff revenues, the Global South will fold.
If all this happens, Xi will vanish and the CCP will be consigned to the rubbish heap of history. But as it stands, Trump has probably prolonged the survival of America’s greatest strategic challenger. With an enemy like Trump, does Xi even need friends?
Part 1 of this commentary: Xi Jinping, Not Trump, Will Stop China’s Rise
-END-
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10. https://www.strategicstudyindia.com/2024/12/why-is-china-purging-some-of-its-most.html
Jon Herskovitz and Josh Xiao, Bloomberg, December 5, 2024. Why is China purging some of its most senior military leaders?
11. https://asiasociety.org/policy-institute/xi-jinpings-purges-have-escalated-heres-why-they-are-unlikely-stop
Guoguang Wu, Asia Society, February 26, 2025. Xi Jinping’s purges have escalated. Here’s why they are unlikely to stop
12. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-06-18/chinese-president-xi-jinping-purges-ally-what-does-it-mean/105426566
Bang Xiao, ABC News Australia, June 17, 2025. Top China military official disappears in latest purge under Xi Jinping amid rising factional politics
13. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jan/01/china-great-famine-book-tombstone
Tania Branigan, The Guardian, January 1, 2013. China’s Great Famine. The famine that killed up to 45 million people remains a taboo subject in China 50 years on.
14. https://jamestown.org/program/peng-liyuan-rises-up-the-ranks-implications-for-xis-despotic-rule
Willy Wo-Lap Lam, Jamestown Foundation, May 24, 2024. Peng Liyuan rises up the ranks: implications for Xi’s despotic rule
15. https://apnews.com/article/china-li-shangfu-defense-minister-expelled-communist-party-5bc8bf0f8ebc89b9db02a06b511e5a42
AP, June 27, 2024. China expels two former defense ministers from its ruling communist party over graft allegations
16. https://www.lowyinstitute.org/the-interpreter/explaining-xi-s-pla-purges
Michael Clarke and Jade Guan, April 30, 2025. Explaining Xi’s PLA purges
17. https://foreignpolicy.com/2015/04/01/xi-jinping-forever-china-president-term-limits
Willy Lam, Foreign Policy, April 1, 2015. Xi Jinping Forever. Is China’s increasingly powerful president angling to break tradition and extend his rule indefinitely?
18. https://www.epochtimes.com/gb/25/6/3/n14523170.htm
Ning Haizhong and Luo Ya, Epoch Times, June 3, 2025. Xi has not appeared in public for 14 days
19. https://english.news.cn/20250604/83f19cf79dd94cbcb9506417f33ca99c/c.html
Xinhua, June 4, 2025. Xi meets Belarusian president
20. youtube.com/watch?v=Y22xe-9Thh0
Hudson Institute, Youtube, July 16, 2025. After the Fall: planning for a post-communist China
21. https://www.hudson.org/events/after-fall-planning-post-communist-china
Hudson Institute, July 16, 2025. After the Fall: Planning for a Post-Communist China
22. https://www.hudson.org/politics-government/china-after-communism-preparing-post-ccp-china-miles-yu
Miles Yu, Hudson Institute, July 16, 2025. China after Communism: Preparing for a Post-CCP China
23. https://www.npr.org/2025/05/28/g-s1-68411/in-the-partys-interests-come-first-joseph-torigian-tries-to-understand-xi-jinping-through-his-father
Emily Feng, May 28, 2025. In ‘The Party’s Interests Come First,’ Joseph Torigian tries to understand Xi Jinping through his father
24. https://chinabooksreview.com/2025/06/17/torigian-xi-zhongxun
China Books Review, June 17, 2025. Joseph Torigian discusses his new biography of Xi Zhongxun, father of Xi Jinping, and the hidden history of the Chinese Communist Party
25. https://www.wsj.com/arts-culture/books/the-partys-interests-comes-first-review-first-generation-revolutionary-5ad3ebb7
Robert B. Zoellick, Wall Street Journal, June 27, 2025. Joseph Torigian has written a masterly biography of Xi Zhongxun
26. https://chinamediaproject.org/2025/07/31/xi-jinping-still-strong-in-the-headlines
David Bandurski, July 31, 2025. Xi Jinping still strong in the headlines.
27. https://wengcouver.substack.com/p/xi-jinping-not-trump-will-stop-chinas
NOTE: Part 1 of my commentary on January 6, 2025 assumed (wrongly as it turned out) that Trump would cooperate with America’s allies to confront China and Russia. Trump has surprised everybody with his ferocious attacks on America’s allies and declaration of a tariff war on the rest of the world.
28. https://www.lemonde.fr/en/opinion/article/2025/07/10/trump-treats-his-allies-in-asia-like-those-in-europe-with-intimidation-and-blackmail-the-result-is-the-same-trust-breaks-down_6743222_23.html
Sylvie Kaufamann, Le Monde, July 10, 2025. ‘Trump treats his allies in Asia like those in Europe, with intimidation and blackmail. The result is the same: Trust breaks down’
29. https://ecfr.eu/publication/maga-goes-global-trumps-plan-for-europe
Célia Belin, ECFR Senior Policy Fellow, May 7, 2025. MAGA goes global: Trump’s plan for Europe
30. https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/theyre-ripping-us-off-trumps-long-standing-grievance/story?id=120447216
Ivan Pereira, ABC News, April 3, 2025. ‘They’re ripping us off’: Trump’s long-standing grievance driving his risky tariffs
31. https://theconversation.com/why-trumps-rage-defies-historical-and-literary-comparisons-according-to-a-classics-expert-248510
Rachel Hadas, Rutgers University (Newark), February 5, 2025. Why Trump’s rage defies historical and literary comparisons, according to a classics expert
32. https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2016/11/11/trump-tribe-portrait-of-the-new-americans
James Bruce, November 11, 2026. Trump Tribe: Portrait of the New Americans. The documentary is available on Vimeo.
33. https://tvpworld.com/83295959/us-elections-trump-calls-allies-worse-than-enemies
Ammar Anwer, TV Poland, November 3, 2024. Trump claims US is being exploited by allies, calls them ‘worse than enemies’
35. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/12/us/politics/trump-gop-donors.html
Jonathan Swan, Maggie Haberman and Shane Goldmacher, New York Ttimes, October 12, 2024. A Frustrated Trump lashes out behind closed doors over money
36. youtube.com/watch?v=8GH7RJgfkzw
NBC News, October 9, 2022. ‘There is a bitterness around [Trump] and a quickness to anger’: Maggie Haberman
37. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/11/us/politics/trump-nato.html
Peter Baker, New York Times, February 11, 2024. Favouring foes over friends, Trump threatens to upend international order
38. https://theweek.com/speedreads/617343/donald-trump-turned-back-closest-friend-when-heard-aids
Jeva Lange, The Week, April 8, 2016. Donald Trump turned his back on his closest friend when he heard he had AIDS
39. https://globalnews.ca/news/4409392/donald-trumps-bad-week-allies-turn-against-him
Jill Colvin and Catherine Lucey, The Associated Press, August 25, 2018. Donald Trump’s bruising week: A growing list of allies turn against him
40. https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/former-trump-officials-are-among-the-most-vocal-opponents-of-returning-him-to-the-white-house
Michelle L. Price, Associated Press, April 5, 2024. Former Trump officials are among the most vocal opponents of returning him to the White House
41. https://www.cnn.com/2023/10/03/politics/donald-trump-former-allies-what-matters
Zachary B. Wolf, CNN, October 3, 2023. 24 former Trump allies and aides who turned against him
42. https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/ending-radical-and-wasteful-government-dei-programs-and-preferencing
The White House, January 20, 2025. Ending radical and wasteful government DEI programs and preferencing
43. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/05/21/us/politics/trump-race-south-africa.html
Zolan Kanno-Youngs, New York Times, May 21, 2025. Trump casts himself as a protector of persecuted white people
44. https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/watch-trump-says-he-is-the-least-racist-person-in-the-world
PBS, July 30, 2019. Trump says he is ‘the least racist person’ in the world
45. https://progressivereform.org/cpr-blog/trump-administration-actions-against-black-americans-have-deep-historical-roots
Catalina Gonzalez and Rachel Mayo, Center for Progressive Reform, March 6, 2025. Trump Administration actions against black Americans have deep historical roots
46. https://jewishdems.org/donald-trumps-antisemitic-record
Jewish Democratic Council of America, July 29, 2025. Donald Trump’s record on anti-Semitism
47. https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/islamophobic-administration.
Faiza Patel and Rachel Levinson-Waldman, Brennan Center for Justic, April 19, 2017. The Islamophobic Administration
48. https://votolatino.org/media/press-releases/trump-rally-unleashes-racist-degenerate-and-dangerous-attacks-on-latinos
Diana Castaneda, Voto Latino, October 27, 2024. Trump rally unleashes racist, degenerate, and dangerous attacks on Latinos
John Bowden, The Independent, November 18, 2022. Trump’s racist rhetoric was blamed for a 145% rise in hate crimes against Asian Americans. Now he’s at it again.
50. https://edition.cnn.com/2021/11/20/us/angry-white-men-trials-blake-cec
John Blake, CNN, November 21, 2021. There’s nothing more frightening in America today than an angry white man
Srijana Mitra Das, Economic Times, January 18, 2024. Once an unquestioned majority, many Americans now feel insecure about non-Whites seeking more power — this boosts Donald Trump: Matthew Baum
52. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10455752.2017.1279867
Daniel Faber and others, January 31, 2017. Trump’s Electoral Triumph: Class, race, gender, and the hegemony of the polluter-industrial complex
53. https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2024/12/4/trump-has-won-the-culture-war
Vito Laterza and Louis Philippe Romer, December 4, 2024. Trump has won the culture war
54. youtube.com/watch?v=RbzyujcnQ4U&ab_channel=ForbesBreakingNews
Forbes, October 15, 2024. Trump: Our allies have taken advantage of us more so than our enemies
55. youtube.com/watch?v=kBqkM5eFKn4&ab_channel=CTVNews
CTV News, June 29, 2025. Donald Trump makes more remarks about Canada being the 51st state
56. youtube.com/watch?v=YkXWNiTQbV0&ab_channel=AFPNewsAgency
AFP, February 28, 2025. Trump and Zelensky in extraordinary Oval Office shouting match
57. https://www.hindustantimes.com/opinion/trump-tantrums-complicate-india-s-strategic-challenges-101754062975661.html
Barkha Dutt, Hindustan Times, August 1, 2025. Trump tantrums complicate India’s strategic challenges
58. https://thehill.com/homenews/5437533-india-china-us-trade-tensions
Laura Kelly and Alex Gangitano, the Hill, August 6, 2025. Trump-Modi bromance sours over trade talks, Russian oil
59. https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/fantastic-spoiled-how-japans-trade-effort-woo-trump-backfired-2025-07-08
Tamiyuki Kihara, Makiko Yamazaki and Yoshifumi Takemoto, Reuters, July 8, 2025. From ‘fantastic’ to ‘spoiled’: How Japan’s trade effort to woo Trump backfired
60. https://fortune.com/asia/2025/04/08/singapore-disappointed-trump-tariffs-not-actions-done-to-a-friend
AFP, April 8, 2025. Singapore says it’s ‘disappointed’ by Trump’s tariffs: ‘These are not actions one does to a friend’
61. www.youtube.com/watch?v=xAZUT2QJMb8&ab_channel=TheWhiteHouse
The White House, August 7, 2025. 200 photos, 200 days, and countless wins
62. https://ca.news.yahoo.com/trump-lashes-nemesis-bringing-epstein-093038435.html
Janna Brancolini, The DailyBeast, August 15, 2025. Trump lashes out at his nemesis bringing Epstein victims to the capitol
63. https://docs.house.gov/meetings/JU/JU08/20250227/117951/HHRG-119-JU08-20250227-SD006-U6.pdf
U.S. House of Representatives, Document Repository, May 22, 2025. The Jeffrey Epstein Tapes: ‘I was Donald Trump’s closest friend’
64. https://nymag.com/nymetro/news/people/n_7912
Landon Thomas Jr., New York Magazine, October 28, 2002. Jeffrey Epstein: International Moneyman of Mystery “Terrific guy,” Donald Trump booms from a speakerphone. “He’s a lot of fun to be with.”
65. https://www.newsweek.com/melania-trump-lawsuit-threat-hunter-biden-legal-analysts-2113708
Andrew Stanton, Newsweek, August 14, 2025. Does Melania Trump’s $1b lawsuit threat against Hunter Biden have merit?
66. https://www.cnn.com/2025/08/12/politics/trump-epstein-relationship-timeline-invs-vis
CNN, August 12, 2025. Donald Trump and Jeffrey Epstein’s relationship: A visual timeline
67. https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/watch-trump-says-he-ended-friendship-with-epstein-because-he-stole-people-that-worked-for-me
Darlene Superville, Associated Press, July 28, 2025. Trump says he ended friendship with Epstein because he ‘stole people that worked for me’
68. youtube.com/watch?v=pE-b4_QkF64
FOX 4 Dallas-Fort Worth, July 8, 2025. Trump on Epstein: ‘Are people still talking about this creep?’
69. youtube.com/watch?v=XSNHRBeMFd8&ab_channel=TheDailyBeast
The Daily Beast, August 14, 2025. Why Trump and Epstein competed to sleep with Princess Diana: Michael Wolff
70. https://www.goodreads.com/series/320636-the-trump-trilogy
Books by Michael Wolf on Donald Trump
Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House (2018)
Siege: Trump Under Fie (2019)
Landslide: The Final Days of the Trump Presidency (2021)
All or Nothing: How Trump Recaptured America (2025)
71. https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cdx5xzy8kn1o
Mike Wendling, BBC, 25 July 2025. How Epstein case is tearing apart Maga’s online conspiracy wing
72. https://www.newsweek.com/maga-influencers-trump-epstein-backlash-2103693
Andrew Stanton, Newsweek, July 24, 2025. Full list of MAGA influencers at odds with Trump admin over Epstein files
73. https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c20r07dg6kro
Tom Geoghegan and James FitzGerald, BBC News, 24 July 2025. What do we know about the Epstein files?
74. https://thehill.com/homenews/house/5451154-epstein-files-congress-clash
Emily Brooks and Mike Lillis, The Hill, August 14, 2025. Jeffrey Epstein battle set to reignite in Congress
75. youtube.com/watch?v=bVR4pSn7Hhc&ab_channel=FoxNews
Fox News, Aug 10, 2025. Vance sets the record straight on Epstein report, addresses Clinton subpoenas
76. youtube.com/watch?v=Bbk0S-AO31I
The Bulwark Podcast, August 11, 2025. Is JD Vance knifing Trump in broad daylight? (with Bill Kristol)
77. https://ca.news.yahoo.com/jd-vance-old-tweets-show-233459539.html
John Bowden, The Independent, July 9, 2025. JD Vance’s old tweets show why the ‘Epstein client list’ is becoming such a problem for Trump
78. www.youtube.com/watch?v=IuK5v8taTfA
CBS News, October 1, 2024. J.D. Vance responds to past comments likening Trump to Hitler, criticism of past policies
79. https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1930703865801810022
Elon Musk, June 5, 2025 @realDonaldTrump is in the Epstein files. That is the real reason they have not been made public.
80. youtube.com/shorts/HVc5ThyyEv0
Erick Erickson @ewerickson, August 19, 2025. “He really does not like war”. Even Bill Maher admits that Trump is ending wars around the world
81. https://www.politico.com/news/2025/06/18/trump-iran-conservatives-maga-00413634
Giselle Ruhiyyih Ewing, Politico, June 18, 2025. MAGA allies deride attacking Iran — but won’t criticize Trump directly
82. https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/trumps-decision-to-strike-iran-may-draw-more-criticism-from-maga-anti-interventionists
Meg Kinnard, Associated Press, June 21, 2025. Trump’s decision to strike Iran may draw more criticism from MAGA anti-interventionists
83. https://www.militarytimes.com/news/pentagon-congress/2025/04/08/trump-promises-1-trillion-in-defense-spending-for-next-year
Leo Shane III, Military Times, April 8, 2025. Trump promises $1 trillion in defense spending for next year
84. https://trt.global/world/article/334e2e1ae7a3
Murat Sofuoglu, TRT Global, June 25, 2025. How much did the 12-day war cost the US, Israel and Iran
85. https://militarywatchmagazine.com/article/us-army-2billion-defending-israel-thaad
MilitaryWatch Magazine, July 25, 2025. U.S. army spent over $2 billion defending Israel with THAAD Systems: More than 25 percent of the global arsenal used up in 11 days
86. https://foreignpolicy.com/2025/08/11/israel-iran-war-trump-nuclear-august-december
Trita Parsi, Foreign Policy magazine, August 11, 2025. The next Israel-Iran war is coming
87. https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=65504
U.S. Department of Energy’s EIA, June 16, 2025. Amid regional conflict, the Strait of Hormuz remains critical oil chokepoint
88. https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=65584
U.S. Department of Energy’s EIA, June 24, 2025. About one-fifth of global liquefied natural gas trade flows through the Strait of Hormuz
89. https://theconversation.com/iraq-and-afghanistan-the-us-6-trillion-bill-for-americas-longest-war-is-unpaid-78241
Linda J. Bilmes, Harvard Kennedy School, May 25, 2017. Iraq and Afghanistan: The US$6 trillion bill for America’s longest war is unpaid
90. https://www.foreignaffairs.com/israel/israels-dangerous-escalation-gaza
Assaf Orion, Foreign Affairs, June 3, 2025. Israel’s dangerous escalation in Gaza. How politics and ideology are sidelining national security and creating a forever war
91. https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2025/06/03/most-people-across-24-surveyed-countries-have-negative-views-of-israel-and-netanyahu
Laura Silver, PEW Research Center, June 3, 2025. Most people across 24 surveyed countries have negative views of Israel and Netanyahu
92. https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2025/08/16/israel-criticism-americans-gaza-shift-00506649
Daniel W. Drezner, Politico, August 16, 2025. Americans are changing their views of Israel. Eventually Israel could find it has a lot in common with apartheid-era South Africa.
93. https://news.antiwar.com/2025/07/29/rep-marjorie-taylor-greene-becomes-first-republican-in-congress-to-label-israels-actions-in-gaza-a-genocide
Dave DeCamp, AntiWar.com, July 29, 2025. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene becomes first Republican in congress to label Israel’s actions in Gaza a genocide
94. https://www.btselem.org/publications/202507_our_genocide
B’Tselem, July 27, 2025. Our Genocide
95. https://www.phr.org.il/en/genocide-in-gaza-eng
Physicians for Human Rights Israel, July 28, 2025. Genocide in Gaza
96. https://www.btselem.org/press_releases/20250728_our_genocide
B’Tselem and Physicians for Human Rights Israel, July 28, 2025. Israel is committing genocide in the Gaza Strip
97. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/07/15/opinion/israel-gaza-holocaust-genocide-palestinians.html
Omer Bartov, July 15, 2025. I’m a genocide scholar. i know it when i see it.
98. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/8/7/aipac-slams-trump-ally-marjorie-taylor-greene-over-gaza-genocide-remark
Ali Harb, August 7, 2025. AIPAC slams Trump ally Marjorie Taylor Greene over Gaza genocide remark
99. https://www.aipac.org/gaza-war-faqs
100. https://www.ajc.org/news/israel-is-not-committing-genocide
American Jewish Committee, August 13, 2025. Israel is not committing genocide
101. https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c62nr9rglm9o
David Gritten and Graeme Baker, BBC News, 28 July 2025. Gaza experiencing ‘real starvation’, Trump says
102. youtube.com/watch?v=XZ5HHMxXXhA&ab_channel=AssociatedPress
Associated Press, July 27, 2025. Netanyahu denies reports of starvation in Gaza, blames Hamas for stealing aid
103. https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/netanyahu-gaza-takeover-plan-military-opposition-israel-1.7602358
Reuters, August 6, 2025. Pressure on Netanyahu intensifies as Israeli military chief opposes Gaza war expansion
104. https://finance.yahoo.com/news/cpi-report-core-inflation-rises-by-most-in-six-months-stoking-tariff-driven-price-concerns-153654897.html
Allie Canal, Yahoo, August 12, 2025. CPI report: Core inflation rises by most in six months, stoking tariff-driven price concerns
105. https://finance.yahoo.com/news/ppi-inflation-shock-core-producer-prices-hit-3-year-high-in-july-in-head-scratching-inflation-surge-123743902.html
Myles Udland, Yahoo, August 14, 2025. PPI inflation shock: Core producer prices hit 3-year high in July in ‘head-scratching’ inflation surge
106. https://www.pbs.org/newshour/economy/u-s-employers-added-just-73000-jobs-last-month-as-labor-market-weakens-in-face-of-trump-trade-wars
AP, August 1, 2025. U.S. employers added just 73,000 jobs last month as labor market weakens in face of Trump trade wars
107. https://www.cnbc.com/2025/08/12/us-deficit-grows-to-291-billion-in-july-despite-tariff-revenue-surge.html
Reuters, August 12 2025. U.S. deficit grows to $291 billion in July despite tariff revenue surge
108. https://www.politico.com/live-updates/2025/01/14/congress/trump-to-create-external-revenue-service-for-tariffs-00198155
Ari Hawkins, January 14, 2025. Trump vows to create ‘External Revenue Service’ to gather tariff income
109. https://www.wsj.com/livecoverage/trump-inauguration-president-2025/card/trump-commerce-secretary-pick-howard-lutnick-gives-preview-of-tariff-plans-khaE4dGCqWV1ybonyi4E?mod=author_content_page_14_pos_8
Brian Schwartz, WSJ, January 20, 2025. Trump Commerce Secretary pick Howard Lutnick gives preview of tariff plans
110. https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-could-collect-300-billion-tariff-revenue-this-year-treasury-chief-says-2025-07-0
Andrea Shalal and David Lawder, Reuters, July 8, 2025. U.S. could collect $300 billion in tariff revenue this year, Treasury chief says
111. https://www.wsj.com/opinion/now-we-know-whos-paying-the-tariffs-081f461d
WSJ’s Editorial Board, Aug. 14, 2025. Now we know who’s paying the tariffs. Producer prices surge, and real wages still aren’t rising fast enough.
112. https://www.ctvnews.ca/business/article/they-tried-made-in-the-usa-it-was-too-expensive-for-their-customers
Reuters, July 2, 2025. They tried Made in the USA – it was too expensive for their customers
113. https://theconversation.com/in-trade-war-with-the-us-china-holds-a-lot-more-cards-than-trump-may-think-in-fact-it-might-have-a-winning-hand-254173
Linggong Kong, The Conversation, April 11, 2025. In trade war with the US, China holds a lot more cards than Trump may think − in fact, it might have a winning hand
114. https://www.aei.org/foreign-and-defense-policy/first-half-trade-was-calm-before-storm
Derek Scissors, AEI, August 5, 2025. First-half trade was calm before storm
115. https://now.tufts.edu/2025/07/02/could-we-see-return-stagflation
Taylor McNeil, July 2, 2025. Could we see a return of stagflation?
116. https://www.wealthprofessional.ca/news/industry-news/investors-ask-if-the-us-is-sleepwalking-into-stagflation/390015
Freschia Gonzales, August 19, 2025, Investors ask if the US is sleepwalking into stagflation
117. paulkrugman.substack.com/p/its-beginning-to-smell-a-lot-like
Paul Krugman, August 8, 2025. It’s beginning to smell a lot like stagflation. And it’s all about Trumponomics
118. youtube.com/watch?v=xnMPY-iZAW8
Goldman Sachs, May 2, 2025. Stagflation and the Fed’s next move
119. https://www.brookings.edu/articles/worrying-signs-for-the-us-dollar
Robin Brooks, Brookings Institution, July 3, 2025. Worrying signs for the US dollar
120. https://archive.ph/ATb2B
https://financialpost.com/financial-times/big-investors-shift-away-us-markets
Financial Times, June 5, 2025. Big investors shift away from U.S. markets. Donald Trump’s trade war and rapidly mounting government debt have shaken confidence in American assets
121. https://fortune.com/2025/07/25/trump-trade-deals-illegal-piper-sandler-tariffs-supreme-court
Nick Lichtenberg, Fortune, July 25, 2025. Trump’s trade deals are illegal, Piper Sandler warns, predicting a Supreme Court smackdown by June 2026
122. https://www.wired.com/story/cantor-fitzgerald-trump-tariff-refunds
Louise Matsakis and Zoë Schiffer, WIRED, July 21, 2025. Trump’s commerce secretary loves tariffs. His former investment bank is taking bets against them.
123. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_United_States_elections
Wikipedia. The 2026 U.S. mid-term elections
124 https://www.cbc.ca/radio/asithappens/allan-litchman-election-prediction-1.7318889
Sheena Goodyear, CBC Radio, September 10, 2024. Kamala Harris will win, says man with near-perfect record of predicting U.S. elections
125. youtube.com/watch?v=8I07pSoxaRc&ab_channel=Lei%27sRealTalk
Lei’s Real Talk, August 18, 2025. Factions, guns, and the fight to end Xi’s rule
Ng Weng Hoong is a Vancouver journalist focused on China and Chinese issues. This article originally appeared on his Wengcouver Substack page. Learn more about diverse communities from the Toronto Spark website. Follow the Toronto Spark on X @TOSparkOfficial and Bluesky @torontospark.bsky.social.
