Freedom House on Wednesday released the 2021 edition of its annual Freedom in the World report, charting an alarming “deterioration of democracy” around the world in 2020.
The report cited the “malign influence of the regime in China” as one of the most “profound” factors in the rising tide of authoritarianism.
Of course, the pandemic that swept out of China to destabilize the world was a major factor as well, and it was a powerful force multiplier for the identified malevolence of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). As the Freedom House report, subtitled Democracy Under Siege, put it:
Beijing ramped up its global disinformation and censorship campaign to counter the fallout from its cover-up of the initial coronavirus outbreak, which severely hampered a rapid global response in the pandemic’s early days. Its efforts also featured increased meddling in the domestic political discourse of foreign democracies, transnational extensions of rights abuses common in mainland China, and the demolition of Hong Kong’s liberties and legal autonomy. Meanwhile, the Chinese regime has gained clout in multilateral institutions such as the UN Human Rights Council, which the United States abandoned in 2018, as Beijing pushed a vision of so-called noninterference that allows abuses of democratic principles and human rights standards to go unpunished while the formation of autocratic alliances is promoted.
The spread of the Wuhan coronavirus was accompanied by a matching spread of “excessive surveillance, discriminatory restrictions on freedoms like movement and assembly, and arbitrary or violent enforcement of such restrictions by police and nonstate actors,” which is tantamount to saying the CCP’s worldview and ideology spread along with its virus. A growing number of ruling regimes took advantage of the coronavirus to “quash opposition and fortify their power,” and China is the world leader in exports for opposition-quashing tactics and technologies.
Freedom House contended that the global erosion of democracy had “tangible effects on human life and security, including the frequent resort to military force to resolve political disputes,” citing conflicts in Libya, Yemen, Ethiopia, and the Nagorno-Karabakh region. In each case, Freedom House pointed out that a powerful authoritarian government with little fear of pushback from the free nations of the world was involved in starting or escalating the conflicts.
Just a few days ago, Chinese state media argued the West should stop criticizing Beijing’s ruthless oppression of pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong because those demonstrators are criminals just like the January 6 Capitol Hill rioters. Freedom House lamented the situation in Hong Kong at length, without engaging the CCP’s claims that all of its abuses are positive features of its strong and stable authoritarianism:
In this climate of impunity, the CCP has run roughshod over Hong Kong’s democratic institutions and international legal agreements. The territory has suffered a massive decline in freedom since 2013, with an especially steep drop since mass pro-democracy demonstrations were suppressed in 2019 and Beijing tightened its grip in 2020. The central government’s imposition of the National Security Law in June erased almost overnight many of Hong Kong’s remaining liberties, bringing it into closer alignment with the system on the mainland. The Hong Kong government itself escalated its use of the law early in 2021 when more than 50 pro-democracy activists and politicians were arrested, essentially for holding a primary and attempting to win legislative elections that were ultimately postponed by a year; they face penalties of up to life in prison. In November the Beijing and Hong Kong governments had colluded to expel four pro-democracy members from the existing Legislative Council, prompting the remaining 15 to resign in protest. These developments reflect a dramatic increase in the cost of opposing the CCP in Hong Kong, and the narrowing of possibilities for turning back the authoritarian tide.
The CCP’s core argument is that all democracies are illegitimate because they have no foundation of authoritarian power to rest on; their people cry out for the kind of “justice” and “security” that only an undemocratic centralized state can deliver. The real threat to democracy around the world is that the political elites of free nations are beginning to agree with this argument, embracing a new vision of peripheral democracy with an authoritarian core — a foundation of power that is not subject to the will of voters in any meaningful way, to tackle “vital issues” that have been decided by a “consensus of experts” whose judgment should not be questioned by the common people.
That is the nature of the ideological virus spreading around the world in the wake of the Wuhan coronavirus, and it is a worldview embraced far more fervently by former President Donald Trump’s opponents than his allies. Democracy is nearing a crisis point where its very definition and nature will be questioned more vigorously than ever before, by forces both sincere and unprincipled, well-meaning and malevolent, internal and external. The ruthlessly exploited emergency powers accumulated during the pandemic, which Freedom House criticized through its 2021 report, will not dissipate until the definition of democracy is resolved.
THE BIDEN KLEPTOCRACY
American people deserve to know what China was up to with Joe Biden, especially when Beijing had already shelled out millions of dollars to Biden family members — including millions in set-asides for “the big guy.” What else is on that infamous Hunter Biden laptop? The conflicted Biden Justice Department cannot be trusted to engage in any meaningful oversight on this issue. We need a special counsel now. TOM FITTON - JUDICIAL WATCH
IMAGES OF JOE BIDEN’S MANSIONS:
https://www.townandcountrymag.com/leisure/real-estate/a33809100/joe-biden-real-estate-homes/
RIDING THE DRAGON: The Bidens' Chinese Secrets (Full Documentary)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JRmlcEBAiIs
Schweizer: ‘It’s Going to Be Business as Usual’ for Hunter’s Dealings
Video:
https://www.breitbart.com/clips/2021/01/20/schweizer-its-going-to-be-business-as-usual-for-hunters-dealings/
IAN HANCHETT
On Wednesday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “Hannity,” Breitbart News senior contributor Peter Schweizer said he reads President Biden’s statements about his son Hunter’s deals as a declaration that “it’s going to be business as usual in the Biden administration as far as these deals are concerned.”
Schweizer said, “Joe Biden has said there are going to be no sketchy overseas deals during his second term. Here’s the problem: He does not believe that the early deals that Hunter was involved in, the China deal, Burisma, he’s never described those as sketchy. So, I read that as saying, it’s going to be business as usual in the Biden administration as far as these deals are concerned.”
THE BANKSTER OLIGARCHY THAT DESTROYED AMERICA
COVERS THE FRADULENT 'POPULIST' HOAX STAGED BY OBAMA, CLINTON AND BIDEN EVEN AS THEY SERVED WALL STREET BANKSTERS AND THE SUPER RICH... AND FILLED THEIR POCKETS DOING SO.
Chris Hedges: How Republicans, Democrats, and the Media Have Weakened US Democracy
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2jyzp09_g8
Fitton: America Needs to Know the Truth About Biden Family’s Corruption
PAUL J. RICHARDS/AFP via Getty Images
TOM FITTON
3 Feb 2021262
4:51
The Biden scandals didn’t disappear when Joe Biden entered the Oval Office, as I wrote in this op-ed for The Washington Times:
A president takes office amidst charges of family corruption and shady business dealings with a country connected to interfering in the very election that put him in the White House. Sound familiar?
The false narrative that Democrats concocted to hobble the Trump administration four years ago is now the real deal with Joe Biden and his family. And unlike President Trump, who faced unprecedented institutional resistance and Deep State resistance, President Biden can likely count on the Justice Department and the media to allow him to escape meaningful scrutiny.
Judicial Watch recently started a petition at Change.org asking the Department of Justice immediately to appoint a special counsel to investigate Biden family dealings in China, Ukraine and other countries. There is substantial evidence, from documents and witness statements, that the Biden family, including President Joe Biden, may have been involved in criminal activity with foreign entities tied to Ukraine and China. In just a few days the petition has garnered nearly 200,000 signatures.
Judicial Watch uncovered documents that show even as far back as the Obama administration Russia-linked media in Ukraine were “trolling” Joe Biden over “his son’s business.” Mr. Biden’s son Hunter has acknowledged that he is the target of an FBI criminal investigation. Any investigation should involve alleged money laundering, influence peddling and tax violations among other shady activities.
A special counsel is required because the Justice Department and its FBI are conflicted in investigating any matters that could implicate the president and/or his immediate family in criminal activity. As Republican Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas said recently, “if there were ever circumstances that create a conflict of interest and call for a special counsel, that’s here.” Justice Department regulations that were abused to appoint a special counsel to harass then-President Trump actually do fairly apply to the Biden situation. A special counsel is required by Justice regulations when:
(a) That investigation or prosecution of that person or matter by a United States Attorney’s Office or litigating Division of the Department of Justice would present a conflict of interest for the Department or other extraordinary circumstances; and
(b) That under the circumstances, it would be in the public interest to appoint an outside Special Counsel to assume responsibility for the matter.
The matter is urgent. Americans just learned that communist China was actively involved in the 2020 presidential election. Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe, in a letter transmitted to Congress, concluded that “based on all available sources of intelligence, with definitions consistently applied, and reached independent of political considerations or undue pressure — that the People’s Republic of China sought to influence the 2020 U.S. federal elections.”
Chinese efforts to interfere in the 2020 election might have been better known before election days but for Deep State resistance. Intelligence Community Ombudsman Barry Zulauf found that CIA analysts were reluctant to reveal China’s malign actions because they were opposed to the Trump administration, and were “saying in effect, I don’t want our intelligence used to support those policies.” In fact, “strong efforts” were made last summer to suppress analysts who wanted to expose the full range of Chinese efforts to swing the election to Mr. Biden.
We are already seeing China indirectly benefitting from Biden policies. Cancelling the Keystone XL pipeline will divert Canadian oil west to the petroleum-hungry People’s Republic. Re-entering the Paris Climate Agreement gives political cover to China’s excessively polluting dirty coal industry, in which Hunter Biden is heavily invested. Mr. Biden’s State Department on Day One removed a page on its web site that contained a comprehensive assessment of the threats China poses to the U.S. and its allies, and an emboldened Beijing slapped outrageous sanctions on outgoing Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and 27 other former Trump officials. Does China have corrupt leverage over President Biden?
Given the years of investigations costing millions of dollars to delve into fake Russia collusion accusations against Trump world, the American people deserve to know what China was up to with Joe Biden, especially when Beijing had already shelled out millions of dollars to Biden family members — including millions in set-asides for “the big guy.” What else is on that infamous Hunter Biden laptop? The conflicted Biden Justice Department cannot be trusted to engage in any meaningful oversight on this issue. We need a special counsel now.
Exclusive — Sen. Bill Hagerty: ‘China Is Singing All the Way to the Bank’ Thanks to Joe Biden’s Policies
J. Scott Applewhite-Pool/Getty Images
MATTHEW BOYLE
3 Feb 2021Washington, DC1,751
8:52
Sen. Bill Hagerty (R-TN) told Breitbart News exclusively that the Chinese Communist Party is “singing all the way to the bank” thanks to President Joe Biden’s various policies in his first two weeks in office.
Hagerty, in an exclusive interview on Breitbart News Saturday on SiriusXM 125 the Patriot Channel, said that Biden’s orders closing down the Keystone XL pipeline and shutting down leases for drilling on federal lands embolden China and undermine the United States.
“Broadly look at what the Biden Administration is doing on energy,” Hagerty said. “By canceling the Keystone XL pipeline, Biden is giving a huge gift to China. Look at what it did to Canada. If Canada can’t move their oil through the XL pipeline, they’re going to sell it to China. Well, guess what? China now has a huge store of oil headed its way courtesy of the Biden administration. And this Paris Climate Accord that they want to get back into? That’s going to put an immediate burden on the U.S. economy. China is not going to have to comply anywhere in the near term. Theirs was the only economy that grew last year. Ours didn’t. They’re going to put more burden on us while China is singing all the way to the bank thanks to the Biden administration. So we have some real reasons to be concerned.”
The Chinese have another friend in Biden’s selection for U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Linda Thomas Greenfield, Hagerty said. A speech that Greenfield gave to a Confucius Institute event in 2019 that surfaced last week saw her praising the Chinese Communist Party’s Belt and Road Initiative in Africa. Hagerty argued that CCP Belt and Road efforts compromised the man who would become the Director General of the World Health Organization (WHO), Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, by trapping his native Ethiopia in debt.
“Look at this U.N. representative that they put forward, Linda Thomas Greenfield, she clearly doesn’t get it,” Hagerty said. “She’s praising China’s Belt and Road Initiative in Africa. Look no further than Ethiopia and what happened there with this Belt and Road Initiative. When Dr. Tedros was the health minister and the foreign minister, the Ethiopian government took billions of dollars in the Chinese Belt and Road Initiative. Then, when it was necessary, China had Dr. Tedros running the WHO and he stepped right up and parroted their line and helped cover up the pandemic when they wanted him to do it. This is textbook debt trap diplomacy, they’re using their influence for nefarious means, and I cannot imagine a U.N. representative who does not understand that.”
Asked about the speech and whether it could jeopardize Greenfield’s confirmation prospects in the U.S. Senate, where Democrats have a narrow majority in the 50-50 split chamber when Vice President Kamala Harris v0otes to break the tie, Hagerty said he thinks she could.
“I think this speech and that it’s come to light—given at a Confucius Institute no less, she was paid by the Chinese to give this speech—the naïveté that her position underscores is extremely disturbing and I think it’s going to make it very difficult for her to get confirmed,” Hagerty said. “If you think about 2019 as you mentioned, the whole world knew about China was doing with the Belt and Road. You and I talked about what they did in Sri Lanka with that deep water port. They put a tremendous amount of debt on a small country, Sri Lanka, built a second deep water port that the country didn’t need, they foreclosed on it before it was even finished and they never even moved the Chinese workers, they speak Chinese at that port right now, they operate under Chinese law, and it’s along one of the busiest most strategic shipping lanes in the world. They know what they’re doing. They’re going into these small countries and like I mentioned with Ethiopia and they’re pushing their influence. They’re putting a tremendous amount of debt, which gives them leverage. For her not to understand or see that is deeply concerning.”
While there are definitely policies, comments, and actions from Biden himself on down through several of his top administration officials signaling a softening towards Beijing, Hagerty did say there are some in the Biden administration, like Secretary of State Tony Blinken, who seem to understand the threat.
“It’s a mixed bag. I think Secretary Blinken does have a much more clear-eyed view about what’s happening than most members of the Biden administration,” Hagerty said. “He and I talked about this at length. He’s acknowledged Secretary Pompeo’s designation of the Chinese as committing genocide with the Uyghurs there. That’s correct. Secretary Blinken was right to acknowledge that. He was also right to acknowledge the Trump administration largely got it right on China. I was pleased at the inauguration, the Biden Administration invited the Taiwanese rep to come to the inauguration—that sent a strong message, even stronger frankly is sending the USS Teddy Roosevelt into the waters off of Taiwan to push back against Chinese military aggression there with the Taiwanese and that incredibly important ally there. But if you look at it more broadly, I don’t think Biden gets it. You look back to the campaign, he said ‘oh China is not our competition come on man!’”
Hagerty on Wednesday introduced a series of amendments to the budget resolution in the Senate, including some specifically targeting the CCP. He and his office are hoping for bipartisan support behind these measures, including ones that would “end the inappropriate classification of China by international organizations that gives China an advantage over America and enhance accountability at those organizations” and “ensure that the United States leads other nations in holding China accountable for engaging in genocide and crimes against humanity with respect to Uyghurs in the Xinjiang Province of China.” These are the first amendments Hagerty, a freshman senator just elected in November, has offered as a U.S. Senator. Others include protections for American workers from open borders and amnesty immigration policies, efforts to preserve former President Donald Trump’s wall along the U.S. border with Mexico, and support for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers.
In his interview on Breitbart News Saturday, Hagerty again ripped the Biden administration for its energy orders, saying that they will empower the Chinese Communist Party
“The first and the most immediate concern is the fact that Biden is killing jobs. He’s killing American jobs at a time when we’re trying to recover from a pandemic-driven recession,” he said. “Who would do this? He’s doing exactly that. Energy independence was one of the biggest strategic victories of the Trump administration. I worked very hard to get the Japanese to invest in infrastructure to become an importer of U.S. energy. We would certainly want our allies to be utilizing U.S. energy rather than Russian energy or energy from other nations that don’t have our best interests at heart. That was a very powerful strategic tool for us, a very powerful strategic step. Biden wants to make us now dependent on nations again that don’t have our best interests at heart. He wants to make us energy dependent on foreign countries and wants to get us the oil we would otherwise be doing business here lowering our costs of doing business, lowering our output costs, lowering the cost of gas at the pump for American citizens—he wants to raise that price and send the benefit to China because the Chinese are going to get the oil that the Canadians will no longer be selling to us. This is ludicrous. It’s killing American jobs. It’s damaging our economy. It’s strengthening our strategic competitors and weakening us in the process.”
Overall, Hagerty said, the Biden Administration policies amount to an effort by the Democrats to again silence the so-called “forgotten man” that led to former President Donald Trump’s rise in 2016.
“It is just amazing. That’s why the Trump administration and our policies toward places like China, toward security, toward things like immigration, resonated so much within America and certainly within my home state of Tennessee,” Hagerty said. “The forgotten man, forgotten woman, the forgotten citizen has been extremely concerned about this. This amnesty program, not only is it unfair to our workers, it’s only going to invite more and more illegal immigration because they’re moving the wrong direction on border security as well. They’re just going to invite more of this cheating and more downward pressure on the American worker. This is absolutely a wrongheaded policy and as you say we’ve got this COVID pandemic to put behind us yet they’re focused on all of these policies. By encouraging and even creating an incentive for more people to flood in across that border rather than securing it, we will have an even harder time combatting the pandemic and getting out of it.”
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