If you went to Hollywood and you look for a leader of China to play a role in a movie. Central casting. Central casting, you couldn't find a guy like him. Even his physical features, he's tall, very tall. And especially for this country, they tend to be a little bit shorter. [00:00:20] You look at the military, I the military today was incredible, that military marching was incredible. But no, if you went to Hollywood, wouldn't find that. You're not going to find a guy to play the role. [00:00:35] he gets back from China dealing with our chief rival potentially in the world or at least comparable to Putin and Russia. uh Their stock in the world has gone up as ours has dipped as we'll get into Iran is the situation with Iran is hurting us a ton. They're doing much [00:00:55] better. It's also let's not forget a dictatorship. So all that and what does he come back with? Oh my God, this guy broad shoulders, amazing hair, way taller than the rest of the shorties [00:01:10] in his country. And Sean Hannity has to just sit there and be like, central casting, let's talk more about how things look with what's left of our president. How does the leader look? How do the tanks look? Just tell me about your aesthetic evaluations of the world, dear [00:01:27] leader. And that is Trump. He used to do bad mouth China. He was tough. throwing jabs, kung flu, that sort of thing. And now it's just how hot Xi is, that's what we get. The issue is that the love fest is not mutual. They apparently increasingly in China, in their government, [00:01:46] view Trump's America as an empire in decline. China is not once a great empire that's fading, no, it's on the upswing and they might well surpass us. Chinese nationalists, state linked commentators say that they have Mr. Trump to thank. America under his rule validates Xi's [00:02:05] worldview centered on the rise of the East and the decline of the West. And this is becoming quite common. Back in January, Nationalistic Beijing Think Tank affiliated with Renmin University published a triumphant report about Mr. Trump's first year back in office. The report argued that his tariffs, his attacks on his allies, his anti-immigration policies, assaults on [00:02:23] the American political establishment have weakened the United States and they titled it. Thank Trump. Remember that when we get to Donald Trump's response. I would also say us ceding to China supremacy in the areas of EVs, renewable energy, all of that stuff. And all we focus [00:02:41] on building up here is AI. uh All of this is leading to us falling faster than rising higher. So this looks really bad, and it's becoming super common. So the use of terms related to American decline in official Chinese sources. nearly doubled in 2025 for obvious reasons. [00:02:59] This is before the war in Iran, by the way. So Trump hears all of this, sees the New York Times article, and runs to Truth Social to try to engage in some copium. Let's see if it's convincing. When President Xi very elegantly referred to the United States as perhaps being [00:03:15] a declining nation, he was referring to the tremendous damage we suffered during the four years of sleepy Joe Biden. And on that score, was 100 % correct. Our country suffered immeasurably with open borders, high taxes, transgender for everybody, men and women's sports. Let's pause [00:03:33] there for a second. Yeah, I'm sure that the Chinese government's like, finally, we can rise from the ashes because they let trans people play field hockey. Barely, there's really no trans athletes, but that's what's finally taking down America. But Trump goes on. President [00:03:52] Xi was not referring to the incredible rise of the United States as displayed in the world during the 16 spectacular months of the Trump administration. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Two years ago, we were in fact a nation in decline. On that I fully agree with [00:04:07] President Xi. Here's the thing. No, no, no, no, I'm not even going to point out all of the ways that we're doing measurably worse as a country than we were when President Biden was still in office. That's not what the Chinese are saying. They're very clearly talking about [00:04:25] your leadership. They're referencing specific things that you have done and they titled it, thanks Trump. Trump is not a strange nickname for Joe Biden, as you might believe for some reason. They mean you, you donkey brained moron. And this is just so sad. He can't take that [00:04:46] they're insulting him to his face. They're insulting his leadership. because he can't strike back against them because he doesn't have the capital to do so. He doesn't have the position, he doesn't have the leverage. So he has to take their putt, they open hand slap him across [00:05:03] the face. And he needs to be like, well, they were really slapping Joe Biden, I was just in the way. It's so sad, Brett, what do you think? It is his fault that so much is bad. And it's refreshing to a certain extent because so often you have to peel back the [00:05:24] layers of the onion to find out what's wrong. But here, they explicitly say, thank you so much, President Trump, for making your allies. Trump's complaint against Biden is he was doing too much of what his allies were saying. Trump was like, pay me more for NATO. I'm not [00:05:46] going to help you out even people that are like around the edges of NATO like the Ukraine. I'm not going to help you out as much. That's it. Abraham Accords even. We signed the Abraham Accords under his watch, right? Which we're supposed to like be chill with Israel and [00:06:04] the uh Arab states largely that are along the Strait of Hormuz and in the region. And they've gotten bombed since then. And the reason that they signed on is we were supposed to be the ones to protect them. And we haven't. Worse, we've signaled to the world that we can't [00:06:26] do it well. We can't defeat Iran. Now people, think a lot of folks just understand how the specter of war, the looming threats. That is a stasis that's the best you can hope for [00:06:41] in geopolitics. It's like, I don't want to attack you because you'll kill me and I'll kill you and let's not do it. Even if it's not nuclear, let's just not do this. And Trump violated that, got his bluff's call, thought he was stronger than he was. Why? Because [00:06:57] of the stuff in the clip we just saw. Because he filters so much through whether or not it fits with what would happen in a movie. In an American movie, the Americans always win. Yeah, but this isn't a movie. He's really tall for a China man, Yao Ming. And it's insane to [00:07:18] hear that. his chief criticisms of Joe Biden are criticisms to which he himself is very vulnerable, especially if he just mouth diarrhea is like that. And Hannity has to jump in to [00:07:34] say the word central casting, which Trump can't summon in the moment. Yeah, it would be sad if he could, but he can't even. And I'm horrible when I get back from Japan. I'm like, why can't this be like Japan? Why can't that be like Japan? But I'm talking about the things that Trump [00:07:51] should be talking about. In Eastern countries, have high speed rail. East Asian countries, have high speed rail that works very well. Bright and shiny buildings and infrastructure that isn't crumbling. Yeah. He's like, they all do choreographed marching. When I got off the [00:08:09] plane, the kids were waving flags at the same time. Why can't we have that? Jesus. That's what it is.