China’s state-run Global Times on Tuesday blamed former President Donald Trump’s “destructive influence” for setting the stage for his potential indictment, while simultaneously castigating Democrats for “weaponizing the judiciary” against Trump and other political opponents.
The Global Times blamed Trump for “muddying the waters” and pushing the “split of American society” by calling on his supporters to “protest to a potential arrest over an alleged hush-money payment to porn star Stormy Daniels during his 2016 campaign.”
The bulk of the article echoed U.S. legacy media anxiety that Trump would gin up a repeat performance of the January 6, 2021, riot on Capitol Hill, while also needling Trump for no longer being able to draw such crowds, judging by the modest demonstrations held over the weekend.
The Global Times warned that Trump might still have enough influence to launch a “vicious cycle” of political revenge if he gets indicted, in which “Democratic presidents will also be raked up for their or their families’ dubious deeds.”
The article delicately avoided naming any of these Democrat families or mentioning which hostile regimes they might have committed dubious deeds with. Instead, it plowed ahead to reiterate China’s favorite talking point that democracy now lacks all conviction, while authoritarianism is full of passionate intensity:
The political battle has made more Americans to become disillusioned with American democracy. An NPR/Ipsos poll in January 2022, one year after the Capitol riot, showed that 64 percent of Americans believe US democracy is “in crisis.”
The expert noted that if the Capitol riot demonstrated the dysfunction of the American democracy, the fiercer partisan fight in these years clearly showed politicians are unable to fix any of its chronic ills. However, amid mounting political stunt, the US is still keen on touting and exporting its democracy to the world, said [Tsinghua University fellow Sun Chenghao], noting about the upcoming Summit for Democracy.
Another Global Times editorial heaped opprobrium upon both Trump and his politicized prosecutors before concluding that the real villain is multi-party democracy:
Today, the US repeatedly tarnishes the word “democracy.” In a bid to gain more votes and win the election, the infighting within the two parties has brought disorders to American politics and policies, ranging from the deterioration of political violence, the unprecedented severity of political polarization, rampant money politics, to the freedom of speech being in name only.
Facts have proven that the maladies of American democracy have penetrated all aspects of politics and society, further reflecting the governance failure and institutional defects behind it. The greatest tragedy of American democracy is that it has lost the ability to reform and address major problems, and the US is running, but no one is truly responsible for solving problems.
Even so, the US is still obsessed with the narrative of “democracy versus authoritarianism,” using ideology and values as tools to suppress other countries and promote geopolitical strategies under the banner of democracy.
The Summit for Democracy that reduced Global Times writers to sputtering incoherence in both editorials is scheduled for March 28-30. Some of the events at the virtual summit are actually dedicated to addressing the sort of problems the Global Times harped on, but China hates the idea of anyone promoting representative government as a superior alternative to authoritarianism.
The Chinese might be exceptionally peeved because this year’s summit includes Taiwanese guests and will discuss the brutal attack launched on Ukraine by China’s close friend and partner, Russian leader Vladimir Putin.
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