Conservative: Beijing Wins in TikTok Deal
The new TikTok dealallows China’s ByteDance to keep 19.9% of the company, gripes National Review’s Jim Geraghty, a “complete violation of the law” that aimed to force a total sale.
This is “selling out American national security interests,” since it still lets Beijing use the app “to spread anti-American propaganda and suppress criticism of the regime in Beijing.”
Any “deal that merely has the U.S. ‘license’ the algorithm doesn’t address the heart of the problem,” as “licensing is not ownership and monitoring is not control.”
This deal “may sound like a compromise, but it is in fact a capitulation.”
It seems that, since President Trump “wants to be loved by the young Americans who use TikTok,” he “shoved through this deal which hand-waves away the national security concerns.”
Eye on Europe: Getting Snowed by China
“For years,” marvels Drew Allen at the American Spectator, “Europeans have been fed a story” that America “is reckless, declining, morally unserious” and “driven by crude nationalism,” while China is “pragmatic, inevitable, sophisticated.”
Remarkably, Europeans who call America “authoritarian” can’t “bring themselves to utter a harsh word” about the world’s “most powerful authoritarian regime.”
This is “is not ignorance. It is incentive,” as China “does not challenge Europe’s ruling class,” but “flatters” it.
America “does the opposite,” refusing to “submit quietly” to Europe’s supposed moral ‘authority”; that’s “intolerable” to continental elites who “are not acting in the interests of European citizens, but in their own.”
Beware, Europeans: It’s “very hard to regain freedom once lost.”
Liberal: Dems’ Culture-War Addiction
“Democrats, it turns out, just cannot resist the siren call of culture denialism,” snarks The Liberal Patriot’s Ruy Teixeira.
E.g., they still can’t say if “transgender youths under age 18 should be able to be placed on puberty blockers and hormones.”
It seems embedded into “Democrats’ DNA that cultural issues are not real issues”; rather than change their “cultural positions,” they’ll “talk a lot about affordability.”
Doing well this November will likely “reinforce the no-change dynamic.” But “things may change” in 2028, as the need to win “a high turnout presidential election may encourage grappling with underlying vulnerabilities.”
See if, “like Ulysses,” some “brave Democratic candidate will strap” him- or herself “to the mast so that he or she can resist the siren call of culture denialism.”
Campus watch: A Hate-America Discipline?
Many scholars who study America’s “extraordinary” 250-year-old story “fail to provide a balanced” account of it, thunder Richard D. Kahlenberg & Lief Lin at The Wall Street Journal.
Of 96 articles in the American Studies journal from 2022-’25, 80% were “critical of America,” 20% neutral and none positive.
The articles focused on racism, imperialism, etc.; not one noted, say, that America is “the most desirable destination for immigrants.”
And “this deeply pessimistic view of the U.S. has taken hold of many young people.”
Uh-oh: As Rep. Ritchie Torres notes: “A nation cannot endure if its children are taught to loathe it.”
From the right: Va. Dems Go Tax-Crazy
“It took Virginia Democrats exactly five days to look at a massive budget surplus and say, ‘You know what this state needs? Less money in the taxpayers’ pockets,’ ” snarks Joseph Curl at the Washington Times.
“Fresh off taking a government trifecta in November and newly installed in the statehouse and governor’s mansion, Democrats have hit the ground running — toward your bank account.”
Moments after being sworn in, Dem legislators “unleashed a torrent of more than 50 new tax proposals — and counting.”
Dare to buy a “firearm or ammunition,” seek “retail delivery” or “invest” your money, expect to pay a new tax. “Dog walking, dry cleaning and getting your car fixed are now luxury items worthy of taxation.”
“So welcome to the new Virginia. Hope you saved up.”
— Compiled by The Post Editorial Board
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