RUTHFULLY YOURS

Back in February, the government of Romania adopted a memorandum that would exclude Chinese firms from public contracts for highway or rail projects. This comes at a time when Romania “desperately needs to start infrastructure works,” according to deputy prime minister Dan Barna, concerned about companies that “do not live up to European standards.”

As Barna and leaders around the world should know, Chinese infrastructure also falls short of American standards. Should that be doubted, consider the new span of the Bay Bridge from San Francisco to Oakland, California.

California Democrats could have tapped federal money for the infrastructure project, but that would have required the use of American steel. California Democrats preferred Chinese steel and Chinese labor, and both fell short of American standards.

California selected the state-owned Shanghai Zhenhua Heavy Industries Company, which at the time had no experience building bridges. Zhenhua’s 3,000 employees on the project included steel-cutters, welders, polishers and engineers. The bridge decks and materials were to be constructed in China, which left American workers with only assembly, concrete pouring and such.

In 2007, fissures began appearing in bars of Chinese steel. In 2009, the company shipped from China the main bridge tower and 28 bridge decks. Engineers found hundreds of cracks in the welds, and every one of the 750 panels had to be repaired. In 2013, dozens of the long metal rods on the project snapped, and during storms critical parts of the bridge filled with water.

The bridge came in ten years late, $5 billion over budget, and riddled with safety issues. Then-governor Jerry Brown, a three-time Democrat presidential contender, shrugged it off with “shit happens,” and when whistleblowers called for a criminal investigation, attorney general Kamala Harris ignored them. UC Berkeley engineering professor Abolhasaan Astaneh-Asi, a critic of the design, declines to use the bridge, warning that, “If a single component fails, the whole thing comes down.”

Romanian leaders were doubtless aware of the project, but they had other reasons to be wary of China. Like millions of other Europeans, the Romanians lived under the yoke of Communism from 1947 to 1989. By then it was time for a change and the Romanians knew what to do. The tyrant Nikolae Ceaucescu and his loathsome wife Elena attempted to flee, but the army, now on the people’s side, captured the pair and charged them with crimes against humanity.

On December 25, 1989, a Romanian firing squad executed Ceaucescu and Elena. Five years later, Romanians believed the summary execution was fully justified. More than 30 years later, Romanians seem aware that China’s “belt and road” initiative leads to substandard infrastructure and dangerous entanglements with a totalitarian regime.

China now functions as the Communist International (Comintern), which the Soviets set up to control the national Communist parties. With the ChiComintern, Democrats are particularly compliant.

For 20 years, California Democrat Diane Feinstein employed a Chinese spy who functioned as her office manager. When Missouri takes China to court over the pandemic, Feinstein takes China’s side, and like other Democrats she parrots Chinese propaganda.

California Democrat Eric Swalwell fell for Chinese spy Fang Fang, also known as PoonFang. She helped Swalwell with his campaign and placed an intern in his office. The FBI announced no investigation and House Democrats keep Swalwell on the intelligence committee.

For Joe Biden, the Chinese Communists are “not bad folks,” and not competition for us. “Big Guy” Joe is on China’s gravy train through son Hunter, but for the U.S. intelligence community and compliant media, that is Russian disinformation.

During the 2020 campaign, Joe Biden told reporters he would bar Chinese companies from building critical infrastructure in the United States. The Delaware Democrat seemed unaware that Chinese companies were already doing just that.

Joe Biden is now touting California as an example for the nation. As Californians already know, compliance with the ChiComintern has consequences.