Friedrich Hayek has actually made the best description I have read so far, in his book Road to Serfdom.

A lot of internal resentment

I am not sure how the party leaders were selected previously, but I'm not sure it makes that much of a difference.

The natives want their country independent and their own again but China will quite literally wipe out everything alive on that island if they do.

If you have on leader for life that the party wants, or a bunch of leaders, each selected by the party.

/shrugs

The ethnic Chinese maintain that they are the rightful rulers of all China.

That fiction keeps the balance,

I mean, if the American government was thrown off the mainland and forced to go to Hawaii, they'd still say they're the rightful government too.

Well, either way, it seems we can all agree on the general trend.

@GingaBomber , I'm honestly not sure the Chinese were ready for democracy. Not even the Russians were and they had more connections to Europe.

Actually, I am really interested in that.

The couple of Taiwanese I've met always insisted they be called Chinese, and never confused with the mainlanders

Remember back to the Mandate of Heaven

Why do some people develop democracies and others don't?

China MUST remain cohesive to keep order

Otherwise you have civil war, famine, and destruction

Oh no, not famine.

5000 years of histiory

That wouldn't happen under a one party state.

Look at how much of a mess they were in the 1920's

Warlords

Actually, with such a large country, I am more surprised that their system is not more federalistic in nature.

the Chinese themselves don;t want a return of that

I know that there are different levels of government, though.

Yes, and some parallel between the Party and the state

Anyway, China is perhaps where I disagree the most the the Democrats in international affairs. It's where I hoped Trump would get it right. Handle China transactionally and don't meddle in internal affairs. Hold them accountable outside their borders.

Unfortunately we ended up in a trade war 😕

I’m surprised the trade war isn’t getting much coverage

It's having an impact but it's rather diluted by the strength of the overall economy. I will say if there was a time for a trade war by the US now is likely the time

Still I'm not sure either the President or the American people are prepared for the downside. I don't see this as being a painless victory.

The US has not stuck to a fight all the way to victory since WWII

It'll be interesting to see if the American people are willing to be personally inconvenienced and stick it through

If it happens, and if we actually get the win we defined was the goal at the start of the conflict and not some bs that Trump calls a win but isn't, then I'll agree that Pres Trump is on the upper end of American Presidents

That would be an amazing landing to stick

So far the jury is still very much out

I'm not sure if the trade war is so unjustified.

I'm not saying it is or is not justified. China has been abusing their WTO privileges.

China has received many trade benefits that were meant for 3d/2nd world countries. As their economy matured, it might be justified to change that balance.

Right.

Agreed

That said, wars have casualties