RUTHFULLY YOURS

“In vivid detail… examines the little-known history of two extraordinary dynasties.”–The Boston Globe

“Not just a brilliant, well-researched, and highly readable book about China’s past, it also reveals the contingencies and ironic twists of fate in China’s modern history.”–LA Review of Books

An epic, multigenerational story of two rival dynasties who flourished in Shanghai and Hong Kong as twentieth-century China surged into the modern era, from the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist

The Sassoons and the Kadoories stood astride Chinese business and politics for more than one hundred seventy-five years, profiting from the Opium Wars; surviving Japanese occupation; courting Chiang Kai-shek; and nearly losing everything as the Communists swept into power. Jonathan Kaufman tells the remarkable history of how these families ignited an economic boom and opened China to the world, but remained blind to the country’s deep inequality and to the political turmoil on their doorsteps. In a story stretching from Baghdad to Hong Kong to Shanghai to London, Kaufman enters the lives and minds of these ambitious men and women to forge a tale of opium smuggling, family rivalry, political intrigue, and survival.

https://amgreatness.com/2022/07/14/how-mattis-betrayed-his-fellow-marines-at-the-behest-of-the-deep-state/

My new book, A Few Bad Men, details the mendacity and mad dishonesty of retired Marine General James “Mad Dog” Mattis. The fact that it was written by a Marine once under his command, whom he betrayed for the sake of politics and getting to slap on another star, says volumes about this once-lionized figure.

It all goes back to an incident in Afghanistan in 2007, and the Court of Inquiry trial of innocent Marines that followed, which Mattis himself instigated.

Lt. Colonel Steve Morgan, USMC (retired) and jury member of the 2008 Marine Special Operations Command’s Court of Inquiry says in the foreword to A Few Bad Men, “This is a case of a perfect storm of toxic leadership.” 

The most legendary Marine of all time, Lieutenant General John A. Lejeune, the 13th commandant of the Marine Corps, laid out clearly how to effectively nurture and lead Marines: “Make every effort by means of historical, educational, and patriotic addresses to cultivate in their hearts a deep abiding love of the Corps and Country” and “the key to combat effectiveness is unity and esprit that characterizes itself in complete irrevocable mutual trust.” 

If only General Mattis had taken this to heart.

On February 3, 2005, when Lieutenant General Mattis was attending the Armed Forces Communications and Electronic Associations forum in San Diego, he said: “You go into Afghanistan, you got guys who slap women around for five years because they didn’t wear a veil. You know, guys like that ain’t got no manhood left anyway. So it’s a hell of a lot of fun to shoot them. It’s fun to shoot some people. I’ll be right up there with you. I like brawling.” 

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2022/07/agency-important-new-book-about-america-frontpagemagcom/

The Gallup polling organization seems to serve up endlessly bleak news about how Americans feel about God and country.

I wrote recently about their report of the historically low percentage of Americans that say they believe in God.

Now Gallup reports that a historically low number of Americans believe in ourselves and our country.

The percentage of Americans who now say, per Gallup, they are “extremely proud” of their country is at a historically low 38%.

And the average percentage, 27%, of Americans that have confidence in our major institutions is at an all-time low.

Inflation, slow growth and weekly reports about pointless violence do not inspire good feelings and confidence.

But the good news is we can still speak freely and express ourselves. Often, it takes courage to say publicly what you see and feel is wrong. But you can do it.

We have a wonderful example in a new book from American Enterprise Institute scholar Ian Rowe, “Agency: The Four Point Plan (F.R.E.E.) for All Children to Overcome the Victimhood Narrative and Discover Their Pathway to Power.”

Rowe is well positioned to speak about our country, what works and where the problems are, as the son of Jamaican immigrants who struggled so their sons would “make it” in America.

https://amgreatness.com/2022/07/08/well-be-back-but-will-trump/

EXCERPT:”We’ll Be Back: The Fall and Rise of America” by Kurt Schlichter 

There are a few things you can rely upon. The sun will come up in the east. You will be expected to pay taxes. The third season of a given Netflix or HBO series that began promisingly will suck, mostly because the plot will get woke. And Joe Biden will make Jimmy Carter look like Ronald Reagan. 

Biden has to fail. Besides being stupid, which probably gave him a solid head start on his senility, he adheres to an ideology that not only never succeeds in bringing prosperity or freedom but cannot do so if it wishes to continue. Things will get worse and worse, and all the legacy media tap-dancing in the world is never going to convince Americans that 20 percent inflation is a good thing and proof of a booming economy. He is going to screw it up, and there is going to be a huge opening for a Republican in 2024. And, hopefully, it will not be a terrible Republican. 

Sisters separated by war forge new identities as they are forced to choose between family, nation, and their own independence.

Jun and Hong were scions of a once great southern Chinese family. Each other’s best friend, they grew up in the 1930s during the final days of Old China before the tumult of the twentieth century brought political revolution, violence, and a fractured national identity. By a quirk of timing, at the end of the Chinese Civil War, Jun ended up on an island under Nationalist control, and then settled in Taiwan, married a Nationalist general, and lived among fellow exiles at odds with everything the new Communist regime stood for on the mainland. Hong found herself an ocean away on the mainland, forced to publicly disavow both her own family background and her sister’s decision to abandon the party. A doctor by training, to overcome the suspicion created by her family circumstances, Hong endured two waves of “re-education” and internal exile, forced to work in some of the most desperately poor, remote areas of the country.

Ambitious, determined, and resourceful, both women faced morally fraught decisions as they forged careers and families in the midst of political and social upheaval. Jun established one of U.S.-allied Taiwan’s most important trading companies. Hong became one of the most celebrated doctors in China, appearing on national media and honored for her dedication to medicine. Niece to both sisters, linguist and East Asian scholar Zhuqing Li tells her aunts’ story for the first time, honoring her family’s history with sympathy and grace. Daughters of the Flower Fragrant Garden is a window into the lives of women in twentieth-century China, a time of traumatic change and unparalleled resilience. In this riveting and deeply personal account, Li confronts the bitter political rivals of mainland China and Taiwan with elegance and unique insight, while celebrating her aunts’ remarkable legacies.

https://americanmind.org/salvo/this-is-war/

Free trade with a hostile nation is a losing game.

The following is an excerpt from Jonathan Pelson’s new book, Wireless Wars: China’s Dangerous Domination of 5G and How We’re Fighting Back.

Why didn’t the regulators and government authorities in the United States and Europe stop the damage from Huawei? Why did they allow the Chinese company to sell their gear in the U.S., and all over the world, at prices that were clearly below cost, low enough to take business from most competitors, and so low they destroyed the margins on competitors who had to slash their own prices to win the business? Shouldn’t countries prevent foreign companies from entering and dominating their markets, selling products below cost? And shouldn’t countries put up trade barriers to block foreigners if their home country doesn’t also open its markets to imports?

This is often the response from governments, whether in the Americas, Europe, or elsewhere. Leaders come to the aid of domestic industries, decrying unfair competition. Companies under threat try to position themselves as “strategic,” and warranting protection. Somehow, the truly strategic telecom sector failed to earn this designation. But should any sector block foreign suppliers, even if those suppliers are selling their products at unreasonably low prices?

There aren’t simple answers to these questions, says Mike Munger, an economist and former chair of the department of political science at Duke University, where he continues to teach political science, public policy, and economics. He argues that trade deficits aren’t a problem, and he makes the case for continuing to trade even when a partner subsidizes their products and puts up barriers to yours.

“My trade deficit with Kroger’s supermarkets is gigantic,” he deadpans. “I buy a ton of groceries from them and they never buy anything from me. The last time I tried to sell them some of my stuff, they called the cops.” Munger says that if one party has something of value and the other party has money they want to exchange for it, no voluntary exchange is bad.

https://amgreatness.com/2022/06/17/statesmen-at-the-helm/

A review of “The Statesman as Thinker: Portraits of Greatness, Courage, and Moderation”,
by Daniel J. Mahoney (Encounter, 242 pages , $30.99)

With epic understatement, James Madison wrote in 1787 that “Enlightened statesmen will not always be at the helm,” prophetically consoling his future countrymen for the catastrophic presidency of Joseph Robinette Biden, Jr. 

In his new book, The Statesman as Thinker: Portraits of Greatness, Courage, and Moderation, Daniel Mahoney writes not just about “enlightened statesmen” but about great-souled statesmen, with philosophic gifts and the full complement of cardinal virtues. Such men and women are not just unusual. They are rare—and indispensable: “On rare but vitally important occasions, democracies need such men of virtue and honorable ambition to preserve and perpetuate free and civilized human life.” 

Mahoney thinks Solon, Pericles, Cicero, and George Washington were such statesmen. Ronald Reagan, Margaret Thatcher, and Nelson Mandela, for all their gifts, virtues, and importance, were not. Daniel Mahoney takes seriously his highest duty as a student of politics—to remind himself and his readers of true greatness. He offers chapters on Edmund Burke, Alexis de Tocqueville, Abraham Lincoln, Winston Churchill, Charles De Gaulle, and Václav Havel, with helpful “Sources and Suggested Readings” at the end of each chapter. 

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2022/06/lockdown-socialist-plan-take-away-your-freedom-mark-tapson/

When COVID-19 first reared its ugly head a mere couple of years ago (seems like much longer, doesn’t it?), the Trump-hating Left recognized that here was a crisis too good to waste, to paraphrase Obama’s former Chief of Staff, Rahm Emanuel. As Cheryl Chumley observes in her new book Lockdown: The Socialist Plan to Take Away Your Freedom, “Democrats, progressives, globalists, collectivists, socialists, and Marxists saw opportunity to reshape an entire world.” Lockdown, from Humanix Books, is her damning overview of how the power-lusting Left manipulated and exploited the pandemic to kickstart their Great Socialist Reset.

Chumley is the online opinion editor for The Washington Times, an Army vet, a journalist, and author – most previously (2020) of Socialists Don’t Sleep: Christians Must Rise or America Will Fall. If you are unfamiliar with her writing, Ms. Chumley pulls no punches in her takedowns of the Left, and makes no apologies for her Christian perspective on political events. She is not reticent about identifying as “evil” the forces wreaking ruin in the world today; nor is she vague about their aim: leftists “want total and complete lockdowns of individual freedoms, individual rights, individually held liberties so they can stage their reset and reshape a new America, a new world, more in line with their collectivist and elitist beliefs. It’s called destroy, then rebuild. What they’re destroying is the Constitution; what they’re trying to rebuild is cultural Marxism and communist control.”

https://www.nationalreview.com/magazine/2022/06/27/the-crushing-of-tibet/?utm_source=recirc-desktop&utm_medium=homepage&utm_campaign=river&utm_content=featured-content-trending&utm_term=third

When the Iron Bird Flies: China’s Secret War in Tibet, by Jianglin Li (Stanford University Press, 576 pp., $35)

The recent depredations of the People’s Republic of China in East Turkestan/Xinjiang have had the unfortunate effect of obscuring and displacing a similar oppression that the Chinese perpetrated in another region: Tibet. More than half a century before it began persecuting the Uyghurs, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) engineered and executed a brutal, enduring domination of Tibet that persists today. But while the Tibetan cause enjoyed its heyday in the West in the 1990s, the region has largely faded from the headlines since.

Jianglin Li, a historian of Tibet, seeks to remedy this forgetfulness. In When the Iron Bird Flies, a masterly account of the CCP’s invasion and subjugation of the Tibetan regions in the 1950s, Li exhumes decades of archival Chinese records and interviews survivors of the onslaught. She tells the story through the eyes of the overwhelmed and ultimately defeated Tibetans, as well as from the point of view of the CCP officials who quelled their hard-fought rebellion.

While even the Chinese-nationalist government had sought to integrate Tibet into the Chinese body politic in the first half of the 20th century, the story truly begins with Mao Zedong’s rise to power. He was determined, no matter the cost, to swallow the Tibetan provinces of U-Tsang, Amdo, and Kham — which form more than a fifth of contemporary China by area. On January 2, 1950, Mao, visiting Moscow, cabled the CCP Central Committee, noting that “although the population of Tibet is not large, its international status is crucial. We must occupy Tibet and reform it into a people’s democracy.” Not for Mao the traditional religious and herding lifestyle of this peaceful people of the northwest steppe; they must be fundamentally remade in the image of Socialist Man.