January 20th marked the first anniversary of Trump's second term in office. The next day, Trump arrived and attended the World Economic Forum in Davos, sending a signal to European leaders present that "it is important to make him happy."

However, on this "celebration day," someone deliberately tried to upset Trump - On the 21st, the New York Times published an article that summarized the defeatist mentality, announcing that the United States had abandoned the "new cold war" against China, giving a cold shower to Trump who was promoting "winning 365 times in 365 days."

Trump plays the "winning" game, while the New York Times (Democrat) plays the "losing" game?

Yet, even this article that announced "the United States has lost" still failed to break out of the old framework of the American elite: on one hand, the New York Times exaggerated China's overwhelming advantages in fields such as new energy, infrastructure scale, and manufacturing capacity, leading to the conclusion that "the United States has lost the new cold war"; on the other hand, it repeated the old refrain that "China will surely collapse."

This contradictory narrative exposes the deep split in the cognition of the American establishment: they cannot deny the actual achievements of China's development, yet they are unwilling to completely abandon the ideological superiority of Western centrism, ending up in a bizarre state of "not being able to lose and not being able to let go."

However, the real value of this article from the New York Times does not lie in using various data comparisons to argue that the United States lags behind China in certain areas, but rather reveals that the American establishment elite has started to panic.

The establishment elite fears that Trump still has three years left in his term

These establishment elites never expected that just one year after returning to the White House, Trump would have turned the international order based on rules that the US had carefully cultivated for decades upside down: military adventures in Venezuela, open bullying of European allies, destruction of the North American Free Trade system, and near-childish disregard for international law, all are dismantling the foundation of US hegemony.

And Trump still has three years left in his term, and the establishment elite can't imagine what the next three years will look like: if Trump could create so many holes in the system in just one year, then after three years, how much of the US-led international order will remain? This deep fear of the collapse of the system is more unsettling for American elites than China's leadership in a particular technological field.

But the establishment elite's urgency is of no use, unless they plan to find another "nutty gunman" to solve the problem, otherwise they can do nothing about Trump.

After experiencing that failed assassination, Trump's mindset and behavior have clearly changed: if in his first term, Trump at least considered some limits, rules, and public opinion when taking actions, then in his second term, he has completely let go of all restraints, doing whatever he wants without any consideration.

Trump's change in behavior began after his assassination attempt

From the daily excessive "winning" propaganda in the White House, to officials vying to flatter, to kidnapping Maduro, and to bombing Iranian nuclear facilities, these events show that Trump no longer cares about traditional political constraints. What he now pursues is pure expression of personal will, with everything else being disregarded.

Therefore, although the phenomena listed by the New York Times of the United States lagging behind China in areas such as clean energy, infrastructure construction, and artificial intelligence are largely objective, for the United States to catch up with China in these areas requires not just a few slogans, but long-term, intensive, and bipartisan strategic investment, which is exactly what the United States lacks today.

White House winning propaganda: Winning 365 times in 365 days

Now, Trump doesn't care about long-term strategies for ten or twenty years; he only cares about immediate political mobilization, short-term benefits, and vote consolidation - this obsession with short-term gains was exposed in the case of immigration officers killing an American citizen: Trump's stigmatization of the victim shows that he is willing to use violence to maintain power.

In this situation, expecting both parties to work together for the goal of "catching up with China" is obviously a dream.

Put simply, China clearly knows its goals, but what about the United States? The establishment elite hates Trump but can't do anything about him; Trump hates the establishment elite but continues to consume national resources in the most short-sighted way. Neither side can convince the other, and they can only drag the United States deeper into the mud together.



Original: toutiao.com/article/7598120184624333346/

Statement: This article represents the views of the author alone.