Private Republican Coronavirus Memo: ‘Don’t Defend Trump’

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Late Friday, Politico obtained an internal GOP memo circulated by the National Republican Senatorial Committee summarizing the party’s message on the coronavirus. Its main theme will come as little surprise to anybody who has heard a Republican sound bite: It’s all China’s fault. Its most interesting passage is its explanation of what the theme omits: a positive defense of President Trump’s response to the pandemic. “Don’t defend Trump, other than the China Travel Ban — attack China,” the memo urges.

The memo makes clear how perfectly cynical the party’s use of the “soft on China” charge is. It advises Republicans candidates to argue, “My opponent is soft on China, fails to stand up to the Chinese Communist Party, and can’t be trusted to take them on.” Note the telling phrase my opponent. The accusation is not specific to Biden, or any Democrat. Republicans have simply calculated they can use the smear against any Democrat, regardless of whatever the opponent has said or done.

The most ridiculous thing about the argument is its lack of any prospectively useful agenda. It urges candidates to promise, “I will stand up to China, bring our manufacturing jobs back home, and push for sanctions on China for its role in spreading this pandemic.” Even if these promises were feasible, none of them would do anything to contain the pandemic in the United States or to revive the American economy.

Suppose we imagine “standing up to China” could somehow force the Chinese Communist Party to confess its full guilt for the pandemic. What then? The memo urges Republicans to demand “sanctions” on China, but “sanctions” isn’t a magic word to force other countries to give us massive sums of money.

The memo’s plea for standing up to China seems to ignore the rather obvious fact that Donald Trump is president of the United States right now. If a tough-on-China policy could impose sanctions or force China to admit guilt or give back our manufacturing jobs, then Trump would be doing those things. If any of these slogans amounts to a solution, it is odd that Trump is ignoring them.

That Republicans are forced to pretend otherwise is an extraordinarily devastating concession. It’s normal for candidates to face difficult issues where the polling is so hostile that they can’t persuade the public and their only option is to change the subject. But this isn’t some side issue Republicans are trying to wave away. This is the most grave crisis in generations, a public health and economic emergency that everybody agrees will be the central issue of the campaign.

Republicans are already conceding that they won’t be able to argue that Trump kept us safe or has effectively managed the crisis. It makes perfectly clear the party’s obsessive focus on China is designed to distract from Trump’s catastrophic managerial failure. They are privately admitting his actions are literally indefensible.

The memo makes clear how perfectly cynical the party’s use of the “soft on China” charge is. It advises Republicans candidates to argue, “My opponent is soft on China, fails to stand up to the Chinese Communist Party, and can’t be trusted to take them on.” Note the telling phrase my opponent. The accusation is not specific to Biden, or any Democrat. Republicans have simply calculated they can use the smear against any Democrat, regardless of whatever the opponent has said or done.

You’re wrong.

Both Republicans and Democrats, conservatives and liberals, have been pretty virulently anti-Communists over the years.

Lyndon Johnson, a moderately liberal Democrat, escalated the Vietnam War. He believed Communist expansion, the “Domino Theory” was something very dangerous.

It is very rare for even a “progressive liberal” to believe in the sort of socialism the CCP espouses.

It works.

People echo Fox News.

Back when Fox News told people that coronavirus was a conspiracy by Democrats to ruin the economy, I sat next to an elderly man who kept saying, "Fake News" when a reporter on tv mentioned coronavirus.

OK,
I didn't really mean back that far.
I was thinking more in the line of Bill Clinton and Barack Obama.

How did they approach chinese aggressive expansion?

But there too, things were different.
I could look it up on Google, but they didn't have to deal with a chinese dictator, I believe.
It was believed, back then, that there would be a natural progression towards democracy.
Talk about an epic fail in strategic thinking.

There has been a lot of concern about the chinese taking over American business, in America, over many years, though.

Also:
There is the "Yellow brick road concern", now.

I couldn't resist.
Autistic licence.
Too much?

Trump and Obama ultimately took similar stances towards China but used completely different means of enforcing those stances.

Obama used TPP as a means of strengthening other countries in the region as well as the US itself. The Chinese hated TPP, but could hardly criticise it as it is exactly the tactic they are using elsewhere. Obama was also very firm in rejecting Chinese territorial claims to various islands, including those that get less attention than the SCS.

Trump instead has focused on attempting to directly attacking China through the trade war and through Twitter. He had a phone call with the Taiwanese Premier although this seems to have been an accident. He’s also talked a lot about reducing the role of the US military and closing the bases that help keeping China in check, while also talking about maintaining the role of the US military.

This is what happens when there *is* so much "Fake News".

The fake news brigade has created "The Crying Wolf" syndrome.

Trump and Obama ultimately took similar stances towards China but used completely different means of enforcing those stances.

Obama used TPP as a means of strengthening other countries in the region as well as the US itself. The Chinese hated TPP, but could hardly criticise it as it is exactly the tactic they are using elsewhere. Obama was also very firm in rejecting Chinese territorial claims to various islands, including those that get less attention than the SCS.

Trump instead has focused on attempting to directly attacking China through the trade war and through Twitter. He had a phone call with the Taiwanese Premier although this seems to have been an accident. He’s also talked a lot about reducing the role of the US military and closing the bases that help keeping China in check, while also talking about maintaining the role of the US military.

I know this is O/T, but could you tell me what the policy, of the current Democrats, is in regards to pushing back on the ccp/china?
Do they have one?

The political system in the US is too different to in our countries. Parties basically only update their policies every four years. In 2016 Americans weren’t as concerned about China as they are today - there was greater focus on the War on Terror.

It’s better to look at the views of individual candidates which tend to be more topical.

Here is Joe Biden’s foreign policy page: https://joebiden.com/americanleadership/

There are a couple of direct attacks on China and a couple of indirect mentions of things that would incidentally strengthen the US position. I’m on mobile so can’t easily copy, but there’s something there about “working with democratic partners” for example, which I think can be taken as looking to strengthen ties with competing ASEAN nations among other things.

I’ll let you read it for yourself, but the thing that stood out to me was a commitment to be better than China, rather than throwing a tantrum and taking your ball home.