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Hello and welcome to the DSR Daily. I'm David Rothkuff. I'm joined by Riley Fessler and Minestine. We're here to talk about the world. President of the United States is on the other side of the world.
It's kind of interesting. Different. I could get used to it. How about you guys? Yeah, I'm feeling great.
“Yeah, there's a sense of freedom of the lightness.”
Even though I drove by the reflecting pool downtown, it just doesn't realize what he's doing. It doesn't realize that if you painted blue, it doesn't reflect any more. But, you know, it's a suitable monument to our times. Tell us about his trip to China.
Please. Well, President, she greeted Donald Trump with a quote, " Magnificent welcome like no other in Beijing."
And I've never in 5,000 years of Chinese history.
Nope, never, not once. Marking a potential shift in ties just a few years after Trump claimed China has, quote, ripped off of the United States like no one has ever done before. But I guess we're forgetting about that. Well, he's forgetting about a lot these days.
Trump appraised. She as a great leader and characterized the diplomatic meetings as a cherished opportunity for both nations. The summer concluded with an agreement to maintain a quote, "constructive, strategic, and stable relationship
as she suggested that the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation and Maga could successfully go hand in hand." You know, you know, you know, I have feelings. I fit, let me show my feelings. Let me unburden myself.
First of all, you know, she has turned Trump into the first
sock bucket puppet with cancels. You know, I mean, Trump is just doing whatever she wants here. He is, you know, clearly she is in charge. Clearly she is dictating the tone. Clearly she has choreographed this whole thing.
Clearly the Americans are under prepared for it. Despite the, you know, enthusiastic, you know, Instagram pictures, you know, that we're getting from our delegates like Lara, Trump, and Eric Trump. And, you know, Trump has not done anything to upset the tone,
challenge. She, the closest he came was that on the flight over there, Marco Rubio, the Secretary of State said, "Well, the U.S. is going to be asking China for help with Iran." You know, this is kind of extraordinary.
“And I think we should, you know, factor it in.”
Iran has actually been benefiting from the assistance of China, in terms of weapons, in terms of intelligence, in other words, if the Chinese are actually helping Iran in ways that could lead to death damage destruction for our own troops or our allies.
And yet that's not a bone of contention here. And I think that should tell you a lot about how much Donald Trump wanted this visit to go well. And that's the vibe we're getting. Trump wants it to go well.
And you know, she is the one doing lecturing. He is given, you know, like a tough talk to Trump about, you know, back off, don't screw up on Taiwan. That could be a point of issue for us. You're not getting that bad from Trump, from Trump in any way.
But I said, I had feelings. What I meant was I've conflicted feelings. Because for all of that, it's kind of refreshing to see a United States president going to China and talking about cooperation.
Trump talked about a special relationship with China that goes all the way back to Benjamin Franklin
Who was translating Confucius for the American people.
And, you know, involved, I think he made a reference
to there being more Chinese restaurants in America than certain fast food places. I mean, that's kind of like window dressing. But, you know, acknowledging the importance of the interdependence between the worlds two leading powers
as opposed to playing up conflict and a cold war division between them. That's pretty healthy. Is the right kind of tone somewhere in the middle where the United States can acknowledge
what we have in common and what our shared goals
“are at the same time as we acknowledge our differences?”
Well, yeah, that would be a healthy relationship. But having said that, I appreciate that Trump can do it.
I also think we need to understand
how confident she appears in this moment. How his rhetoric about this being a historical changing point, turning point, with the reassension of China is to sort of the world scene right now.
He began, by the way, with a reference to our friend Graham Allison, Harvard Professor Graham Allison's book in which he posits a something called a "fucidity" strap. And she mentioned the "fucidity" strap,
which I'm sure was very gratifying to Graham who was there just recently. But I think, you know, American commentators didn't really note
“that the "fucidity" strap is the potential for conflict”
between rising nations
and established powers or falling powers.
It very clearly in this incarnation puts China in the role of the rising nation. And the United States and the role of the established and potentially falling power. And it was a very deft move by Xi Jinping
to bring up this reference to historical trend and positive by an American academic to frame this moment in a way that certainly makes it look like China's got the momentum. And we're just going to have to deal with it.
And that, by the way, has been the message of the entire trip so far? Well, back here in America, where, unfortunately, we still have people like Mike Johnson, we don't get a break.
“J.D. Vance and Mike Johnson spent yesterday”
attempting to clean up Trump's recent remarks that he does not consider America's financial Americans financial situation when negotiating and end to the war with Iran. Vance admitted the administration has,
quote, a lot of work to do on the economy as gas prices exceed $4.51 per gallon. And inflation reaches its highest level since 2023. Also, I will note that the Americans
who's financial situation, Trump is not considering 70% of them disapprove of his economic handling. I don't know if that's your biggest thing to say. What, by Trump?
Because everything has this smart, so this was a real surprise. Now, he's the seized much smarter than all of us, but this is going to haunt him. This clip is going to be played over and over
and over in this campaign season, probably in the next campaign season. Vance obviously wants to participate in the next campaign season. In 2028, he needs to clean it up.
Mike Johnson, I don't know, he got a memo from, you know, the all the White House staff that's in Beijing and said, "Dear Mr. Keibler, "elf, time to leave your hollow tree
"and say something to defend the president "clean up behind him." So he actually knowledge this usually says, "I don't know what's going on." But, you know, they say the Vice Presidency,
former Vice Presidency once said, "The job was not worth a bucket of warm spit "and JD Vance has live in that reality. "Every day, having to do clean up, "I'll Trump."
And I suspect, given the rapid mental decline
Of our president,
there will be more of that.
JD Vance is going to be like,
“"Well, don't pay attention to Uncle Kuku over here.”
"He didn't really mean what he said. "That's going to become a bigger part of his job "going forward at that." Well, more terrible redistricting news, which is maybe unsurprising.
Governor Henry and McMaster is calling it for a special session of the South Carolina Legislature to redraw congressional maps. An effort that would potentially eliminate the state's only democratic district.
Great, amazing. That's America, that's America for you. Democracy, not so much. You know, and you know,
the Supreme Court has given states a tool
in order to create congressional districts where they can engineer that certain voters notably democratic voters, notably voters of color. Their votes don't count anymore.
You know, combine this with, you know, giving billionaires more vote by
“not being able to limit the amount of money”
that they spend, you know, getting rid of the voting rights act. Trump just, before he left for China, said he wouldn't hesitate to send in ice or troops around voting places if he had to.
And it's feeling a lot. It's feeling a lot like, you know, authoritarianism is settling into America. And that makes finding a way to win the election. That much more important.
Because the United States Congress has got to pass a law banning this kind of jury mandate. It's insane. It's anti-democratic. And it has to be prohibited.
You know, districts need to be drawn differently. I, of course, I think the United States also needs to make the district to combat a state.
“It needs to take the two decoders and make them one state,”
kind of ridiculous that there are two states. Maybe it makes Puerto Rico a state, maybe it turns California into two states. Let's make representation in the Senate and in the electoral college a little bit more reflective
of the way the population of the United States is divided up and a little bit less reflective of the agricultural realities of the 18th century, which is what's driving a lot of the sort of baked in the cake anti-democratic qualities of our not quite democracy at the moment.
Well, both of my stories today are about JD events. So you love JD events. By the middle. Rough start to my day. You have a big JD events poster in your house and you light a candle
every morning. Her favorite movie is actually Hillbilly L.A.J. for dogs and home. She loves it. She's actually the Ellen person who saw it. She tried to start a Hillbilly L.A.J. book club with us.
And I thought it was weird at the time. But just the idea of the book. The idea of a book club with just one book. Yeah, that's, that is a little weird meta. It's a little.
But look, if you like him and you admire his Hillbilly story, his rags. It's just, sorry. Well, you know, you're entitled. We're diverse politically here.
We cover the rage of political opinions from far left to pretty far left. Anyway, go on. I'm the architect of my own misery. Well, as are we all meta and it's good of you to.
Because I chose the story. Okay, so what's the story? Judy Vance announced yesterday at the Trump administration
is deferring $1.3 billion in Medicaid reimbursement
to California, accusing the state of failing to address systemic hospice care fraud. The move coincides. That's, you know, you know, you know, he took what cleaning up on the ultra.
Think about this as a political move. Let's take the money away from people who are in the places where they go to die. In the worst moments of their family's existence. Let's turn off the funding.
That'll teach them those people grappling with their last days of existence. I mean, as was said, often during Trump's first term,
A cruelty is the point.
I'm sorry. Did I interrupt you?
“Did you have more you wanted to say about this, Minna?”
Just that unsurprisingly, Dr. Oz has his hands all in this.
Of course. And he's doing an investigation into quote unquote bad actors. And that's, you know, the reason why all this is happening. And of course, what you said really. It's really, it's really bullshit.
You know, there are a lot of things that people say we should do once Democrats get control if we ever get control again. There are other things that can be done now. There are people in the Trump administration who can and should be disbarred.
But while we're at it, maybe some medical boards can look away and look take away the license of fraud doctors like Dr. Oz, you know, who's going out and representing himself as a medical profession.
And then violating the first line of the Hippocratic oath every time he speaks,
which is, you know, first do know are. Ugh. Thursday. I was vaguely optimistic.
“We might make it through the week without my having an aneurysm.”
Um, okay, but I don't know. Maybe that's not going to happen, Riley. Well, I'm taking us outside of the US to the UK. We were outside of the US already. Do we really okay?
Take us there. I'm taking us away from he who must not be named. The only one. Yes. Health Minister at West Streeting resigned on Thursday to call
for a leadership contest against Prime Minister Kier Starmer, accusing the PM of overseeing a political drift and forcing others to take the blame for government failings. Streeting refrain from triggering an immediate formal leadership contest, but his exit intensifies the pressure on Starmer following local
“election results and emboldening potential successors like Angela”
Rainer and Andy Burnham. It's got a bunch of melodies, non entities, weaklings. Uh, the UK deserves to have strong leadership.
It doesn't always have strong leadership in fact during my lifetime.
It has seldom had strong effective leadership. Occasionally rarely it has had strong leaders, but they have not been terribly effective or in fact have done damage. But recently they are on a big losing streak. It does not look hopeful that that is going to change anytime soon.
And indeed, it is going to get worse. So maybe American listeners, you will comfort yourself and saying, well, we're not the only ones having to go through difficult times politically. Or maybe you will comfort yourself by going outside
because it's May smelling the flowers, feeling the grass under your feet as the expression goes these days, having a bit of a life and not getting caught up in this nonsense. Or maybe you'll focus on bigger issues. Family, philosophy.
Big changes happening in the world technologically. I wrote about that in my sub-stack. You might want to go and take a look at it. Uh, the sub-stack is entitled something along the lines. I mean, it's our need to know sub-stack,
but it isn't titled something along the lines of objects in your social feed are smaller than they appear. A comment suggesting we could all use some perspective. So go get some perspective. We'll offer you some perspective a little bit later today
with our words matter podcasts with the great wise and very men's sheet, norm or instinct. So join us for that. Or go listen to yesterday's deep-saint radio or listen to Silicantiousness from earlier in the week.
Or listen to the daily blast that newer public show that we do each day. We give you a lot of options. Enjoy them. Enjoy the day. We'll be back tomorrow for more of DSR's daily.
Until then, thank you, Riley. Thank you, Mina. Bye. [Music]
