Wednesday, Fox News Channel’s Tucker Carlson warned that President-elect Joe Biden was promoting a U.S.-China relationship that was not necessarily in the American people’s best interest.
Carlson noted Biden’s reported consideration of Disney executive chairman Bob Iger to serve as U.S. ambassador to China. According to Carlson, Iger has been willing to kowtow to the Communist Chinese government for the sake of Disney’s bottom line.
Transcript as follows:
CARLSON: They called it the week that changed the world. That was Richard Nixon’s description of his visit to China in 1972. Nixon was the first American President to engage directly with China’s communist government, and he was right in the end, that visit changed everything.
For a while, they told us it would all be good for everyone. Relations with China would help every American. That’s what the experts said. Free trade would make us rich, and they continued to tell us that for decades, even after the evidence mounted it wasn’t true, even after China entered the World Trade Organization and immediately eliminated entire portions of our economy along with the millions of American jobs they sustained, most of which never returned.
The media mostly ignored that part. It didn’t affect them, and they weren’t interested. Factory workers could learn to code. And in fact, some workers may have learned to code, but then ironically, China began the wholesale theft of our country’s intellectual property, our coding, which was the only thing we had left once our hard industries died.
And the media stayed silent as this happened. They didn’t seem angry about it. They didn’t seem bothered at all by China’s relentless espionage campaign against the U.S. government, which was the biggest most successful spying operation since the Cold War.
Reporters didn’t find that interesting either. Instead, they screeched about Russia and George Floyd and hope that we wouldn’t notice any of it. The biggest stories of the decade, ignored. So why did they do that? Why the deception?
We can only speculate, but we can tell you that as so many Americans were being hurt by China, including hundreds of thousands of them killed in their prime from important Chinese narcotics, a small group of Americans was prospering.
In every age, there were a few who get rich from the China trade. In our time, most of these people have clustered around Joe Biden. He is their candidate.
We learned today that a man called Bob Iger may become America’s next Ambassador to the People’s Republic of China. Bob Iger runs The Walt Disney Company. Few have made more money from his connections to the Chinese government and fewer is openly grateful for it, as Bob Iger is, and that’s not slander. It’s true. Iger admits it. Watch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BOB IGER, EXECUTIVE CHAIRMAN, THE WALT DISNEY COMPANY: Today is a celebration of creativity and collaboration, commitment and patience, a triumph of imagination and innovation, and a testament to the strong partnership between Disney and China.
Together, we have created an extraordinary nation. Here, East meets West, the past meets the future, and anything is possible for those who believe.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CARLSON: “Anything is possible for those who believe,” Bob Iger said. That was 2016 at the opening of a new Disney theme park in Shanghai, but it took more than belief, more than faith to get that deal done.
Bob Iger didn’t explain what Disney had been willing to do to get the park opened in China. According to an account in “The New York Times,” Bob Iger met personally with China’s propaganda minister in 2010 and promised that he would use Disney’s global platform created by Walt Disney, a patriot, to quote, “introduce more about China to the world.”
In other words, Disney promised to spread Chinese government propaganda, and that’s what they did. Disney began working directly with the Ministry of Culture in China, and that partnership produced a film called “Born in China.” The movie promised to quote, “Showcase to the world the spectacular wildlife and natural beauty of China.”
Iger also granted the Chinese government a 30 percent share of the Disney management company that ran the Shanghai property, plus a 57 percent ownership stake in the Shanghai Resort including revenues from merchandise, restaurants and hotels.
Now put yourself in his position. You’ve watched for decades as the government of China has hurt your country, has hurt your fellow Americans. If you were a patriotic person, would you jump into business deals with the people who did that? Bob Iger did.
So if you’re starting to get the impression that Bob Iger will do anything for a buck, slow down for a minute, that’s not entirely true. He is not that guy. Bob Iger is a sensitive soul. He is a man of deep conviction in principle, at least for us here in America.
Just last year, Bob Iger announced that it would be quote, “difficult” for his company to film in the State of Georgia. Why? Because the State of Georgia was moving forward with a law that would ban abortions after doctors could detect a fetal heartbeat. Bob Iger was offended by that, he’d like more Americans to abort their children and he’s willing to pay the price for that high ideal.
But in China, there’s a separate slate of standards. China can throw ethnic minorities into concentration camps. China can weld coronavirus patients into their apartments until they starve to death and has. China can crush protesters with tanks on television. None of that bothers Bob Iger.
In fact, China has it right, he says, apparently including the forced abortions. Bob Iger loves China, and he is not shy about saying so.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
IGER: They welcomed us there and let us build Shanghai Disneyland. So we have a good relationship with the government of China and local governments in China, and our access has actually increased over time.
I generally, as at least as the CEO of The Walt Disney Company, look at China quite favorably.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CARLSON: Seems shocking now. How can that man be in the running? But you should know that Joe Biden isn’t thinking of nominating Bob Iger in spite of what you just heard him say, his praise for the communist government of China.
Biden may nominate Bob Iger because of what he said. Sucking up to China is the qualification. And actually Bob Iger is just following the lead of the Biden family.
Today, our reporter Brooke Singman, obtained a 2017 e-mail from Joe Biden’s son, Hunter to the chairman of the Chinese energy company, CEFC. That e-mail offers, quote, “Best wishes from the entire Biden family.” It goes on to urge CEFC’s Chairman to quickly send a $10 million wire to, quote, “Properly fund and operate the Biden family’s venture with the company.”
Now CEFC, you might remember is the company that offered Hunter Biden $30 million for, quote, “introductions alone.” Introductions to the people his father worked around, introductions to his father. The company also reserved a 10 percent equity stake for someone called the Big Guy. Who is the Big Guy? Well, according to Hunter Biden’s ex-business partner, the Big Guy was Joe Biden.
If all this seems a little too brazen to be real, consider that our media class and the Silicon companies they depend on for revenue operate in exactly the same way. It was just four years ago today, December 16, 2016 that our national news media was united on one point: nothing, they told us was a bigger threat to the safety of this democracy than foreign meddling in our politics.
It was happening before our eyes, we were told and our President-elect, Donald Trump was probably complicit in that meddling, not by China, but by Russia.
“The Boston Globe” ran an op-ed that began this way, quote, “A specter of treason hovers over Donald Trump.” That same day, December 16, 2016, “The Washington Post” owned by Jeff Bezos, China’s biggest front for retail sales in this country, published a piece with this headline, quote, “F.B.I. in agreement with C.I.A. that Russia aimed to help Trump win the White House.” And of course National Public Radio, CNN, NBC, every major news organization dashed off similar stories making precisely the same point.
And yet none of these outlets are saying word one, about the e-mails we just read you, the Biden family’s attempt to get money from our chief adversary on this globe, which is the government of China. They say nothing about Bob Iger’s propagandizing and profiteering in China. They celebrate the idea that he might be our country’s representative to the government of China.
Now, why is that? Because our media are dependent on China. They won’t let you view stories about Hunter Biden because those stories are really about China and negative stories about China are not allowed.
It’s becoming obvious. Just hours ago, a major digital storefront in the United States banned the sale of a video game because it mocked the appearance of the President of China, not of our President, but of the Chinese President, that’s not allowed.
And yet, in the face of this, Joe Biden is accelerating our sucking up to China, installing Chinese propagandists in the U.S. government to represent our interests in front of China.
This will continue to happen every day in this country, and if you try to say anything about it, your words might disappear, too.
Follow Jeff Poor on Twitter @jeff_poor
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