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The U.S. Department of the Treasury in Washington D.C., U.S., January 20, 2023. \/Xinhua<\/p>\n
The U.S. Department of the Treasury in Washington D.C., U.S., January 20, 2023. \/Xinhua<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
Editor’s note:\u00a0<\/strong>Azhar Azam works in a private organization as a market and business analyst and writes about geopolitical issues and regional conflicts. The article reflects the author’s opinions and not necessarily those of CGTN.<\/i><\/p>\n Under former U.S. President\u00a0Donald Trump,\u00a0the U.S.\u00a0Department of Justice in\u00a0November 2018\u00a0launched the racist China Initiative to persecute and crack down on Chinese scientists\u00a0and researchers. The prejudiced program was shuttered last\u00a0February\u00a0after several failed prosecutions on alleged Chinese government-linked economic and intellectual property espionage; as envisaged, its backwash effects are being\u00a0felt.<\/p>\n The establishment of the newly-formed “Select Committee on the Strategic Competition between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party” on January 10 in the U.S.\u00a0House of Representatives is again arousing concerns within the country’s lawmakers that it will fuel anti-Chinese xenophobia and “endanger” Chinese Americans and people of Asian descent living in the U.S.<\/p>\n Even House lawmakers, who voted for its\u00a0creation, have a sour view of the select committee, admitting many Asian Americans see\u00a0it\u00a0as a new\u00a0“witch hunt.”\u00a0The crew is the\u00a0brainstorm\u00a0of new Republican House Speaker Kevin McCarthy,\u00a0gambles\u00a0on the botched China Initiative and wants to beat the wind\u00a0by trying to block China’s economic and technological advancement.\u00a0<\/p>\n Mike Gallagher,\u00a0former\u00a0counterintelligence\u00a0officer of the U.S.\u00a0Marine Corps \u2013 the greatest “propaganda\u00a0organization in human history” \u2013 is tasked with uniting the\u00a0“divided government”\u00a0against China.\u00a0The Republican duo labels China\u00a0as the\u00a0“greatest threat”\u00a0to the U.S.\u00a0and seeks to begin a “new Cold War” with China, exposing their true ominous intentions.\u00a0<\/p>\n The committee is\u00a0sheerly\u00a0dominated\u00a0by Republicans; it doesn’t have any legislative power. Two years ago, Democrats declined to join the\u00a0China Task Force\u00a0and they are\u00a0yet to\u00a0announce\u00a0their members for the select committee on China.\u00a0As McCarthy has\u00a0denied\u00a0two Democrats of\u00a0seats on the House Intelligence Committee and lacks “political vengeance” for some of them,\u00a0it seems unlikely the party of\u00a0“chaos and catastrophe,”\u00a0akin to the prior initiatives, will deliver much to obstruct Beijing’s\u00a0“economic, technological and security progress.”<\/p>\n Another turmoil is in the making after McCarthy on January 25 appointed\u00a0a dozen of the House lawmakers\u00a0to the select committee on the weaponization of the federal government. The\u00a0“tinfoil hat”\u00a0panel \u2013\u00a0solely authorized with Republican support\u00a0to\u00a0investigate\u00a0the nexus among the Justice Department, the Federal Bureau of Intelligence and other law enforcement agencies \u2013 Democrats worry, will pursue conspiracy theories in addition widening political gulf as it\u00a0empowers\u00a0the Republicans to investigate the January 6 attacks on the Capitol Hill and last year’s raid at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence.<\/p>\n A growing “extremist politics” threatens to invade the U.S. justice and intelligence system, dislosing the country’s governance system is being challenged from within and that the Communist Party of China (CPC) poses no threat to American democracy and leadership. China’s “exponential” farmland purchase in the U.S. is touted as one of the factor’s behind this “great power struggle.” However, the U.S’s own congressmen defy this false narrative, saying Beijing own just 192,000 acres of the total 35 million acres of farmland owned by foreign countries.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n U.S. Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy (C) speaks to reporters in Statuary Hall after being elected Speaker in the House at the U.S. Capitol in Washington D.C., U.S., January 7, 2023. \/CFP<\/p>\n U.S. Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy (C) speaks to reporters in Statuary Hall after being elected Speaker in the House at the U.S. Capitol in Washington D.C., U.S., January 7, 2023. \/CFP<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n By building on the\u00a0Cold War-inspired initiatives, showing animosity toward China’s\u00a0peaceful\u00a0rise and laying focus on bringing back\u00a0jobs\u00a0to the U.S., the Republicans just want to tame\u00a0the CPC? Obviously, their only objective is China’s containment. The other goal is to put deep-seated rifts within the GOP\u00a0\u2013 as evidenced by McCarthy’s rise to speakership that took an unprecedented\u00a015 rounds\u00a0of voting although Republicans had the majority in the lower chamber \u2013 in abeyance and trot out the same old mantra of the China threat to bunch the party together.<\/p>\n Not just the Republicans are divided; the country’s entire political leadership\u00a0is in a whirl. The Democrat President Joe Biden “absolutely” believes there will not be a new Cold War. Still, the U.S.\u00a0Department of State has unveiled its own China House to “responsibly\u00a0manage” competition with China and “successfully” implement U.S. policy and strategy toward “the most complex and consequential geopolitical challenge.”<\/p>\n Both Democrats and Republicans are itching to declare a new Cold War against China, knowing the domestic polarization and\u00a0national debt\u00a0represent real long-term challenges for the U.S. On January 19, the country’s statutory debt ceiling hit the\u00a0$31.4 trillion borrowing cap, sparking risks of fiscal crisis in the next few months, as leaders of two parties continue to be at loggerheads on spending cuts.<\/p>\n Since\u00a02001\u00a0when the U.S.\u00a0launched the global war on terror to September 2022, America’s federal dept had surged from 55 percent\u00a0to 128 percent\u00a0of the GDP, according to the U.S.\u00a0Treasury Department. Twenty years later, the U.S. needs to reassess how severely and adversely this aggressive and meddlesome approach has stolen taxpayers’ money and damaged the economy and is leading to suspension of pension and welfare funds for ordinary Americans.<\/p>\n The U.S.\u00a0national debt now stands at\u00a0$31.45 trillion. For more than a decade, treasury secretaries almost every year were forced to write a debt limit letter to the Congress to avoid “catastrophic” economic consequences. The row around suspending or increasing debt is spookily identical to that of Republicans’ Tea Party campaign, which was\u00a0founded and funded\u00a0by elites and 10 years ago brought the U.S.\u00a0appallingly close to the\u00a0default\u00a0with the nation suffering its first ever credit downgrade.<\/p>\n So far in January alone, the U.S.\u00a0Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has\u00a0given\u00a0an unprecedented three warnings to McCarthy, notifying him of taking “extraordinary measures” to prevent the U.S. from “defaulting”\u00a0on its obligations and protect America’s\u00a0“full faith and credit.”\u00a0These preventive actions will allow the government to operate\u00a0by June 5 when the cap should need an increase\u00a0to circumvent a devastating economic and international credibility damage\u00a0to the U.S.\u00a0and American working\u00a0families.<\/p>\n At this critical moment, the China hawks on both sides of the aisle, in the newly-installed Republican-controlled U.S.\u00a0House and Democrat-majority Senate, are more keen to start and\u00a0win\u00a0a new Cold War for fear of falling behind Beijing in economy, technology and other areas or by coercing the world into swallowing their\u00a0vision.<\/p>\n This misguided belief steers clear of the very fact the greatest U.S. challenge to America and the Americans is national debt, which can’t be overwhelmed by severing relations with China \u2013 but only through enhanced communication and cooperation between Beijing and Washington on economy, trade, investment and climate change for the benefit for the benefit of the people in both countries and sustainable development of the rest of the world.<\/p>\n (If you want to contribute and have specific expertise, please contact us at opinions@cgtn.com. Follow\u00a0<\/i>@thouse_opinions <\/i><\/a>on Twitter to discover the latest commentaries in the CGTN Opinion Section.)<\/i><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n![\"U.S.](\"https:\/\/news.cgtn.com\/news\/2023-01-29\/America-s-greatest-challenge-China-or-national-debt--1gYYHznGq0o\/img\/562e9f08fe7b486e82a73a287b02cafe\/562e9f08fe7b486e82a73a287b02cafe.png\")
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