Las Vegas Review-Journal (Sunday)
Editorial Roundup
Recent editorials in newspapers in the United States and abroad:
The Japan News on President Donald Trump and military action in the South China Sea (May 30):
It can be said that the United States has sent a message calling for China to stop its militarization of the South China Sea.
The administration of U.S. President Donald Trump has withdrawn an invitation for China to take part in a multinational naval exercise known as Rim of the Pacific, or RimPac, set for this summer.
Washington called for the removal of military facilities on artificial islands in the South China Sea, stating that China has been destabilizing the region by heightening tensions there.
The U.S. Navy has also carried out its Freedom of Navigation Operation as a check on China by having its missile destroyers and other warships navigate around the man-made islands. The United States needs to continue its stance of not allowing China to change the status quo by force through its concrete actions.
RimPac is one of the world’s largest multinational naval exercises, hosted by the United States every two years off Hawaii.
The Chinese Navy was invited to RimPac for the first time in 2014. The administration of then-U.S. President Barack Obama aimed to encourage China to improve its compliance with international rules and transparency of military matters through its participation in the multinational naval exercise.
It is hard to say that these objectives have been achieved. During the exercises, China collected military information of the participating countries by dispatching a spy ship to areas around the waters where the exercise was conducted while only partially complying with disclosure of information on its own warships.
China’s State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi has denounced the United States withdrawal of the invitation as a “very nonconstructive move.” Wang also said China has been building necessary defense facilities on its own islands. This can only be called a self-centered assertion.
China has deployed anti-ship and ground-to-air missiles plus radio-jamming apparatus on the Spratly Islands. It has been revealed that China conducted for the first time takeoff and landing practice for its mainstay strategic bombers on Woody Island in the Paracels.
Chinese President Xi Jinping has announced that China will not “militarize” the South China Sea. China’s territorial claim has been totally rejected by the ruling of the Permanent Court of Arbitration. It cannot be overlooked that China has not stopped its hegemonic activities in the South China Sea.
The Trump administration had every reason to re-examine the conciliatory stance pursued by the previous U.S. administration toward Beijing. Under the new U.S. National Security Strategy, China along with Russia is regarded as a “revisionist power” that is challenging the United States.
In the Asia-Pacific region, the United States and China have been vying with each other in exerting military influence. If tensions between the two countries are heightened excessively, it will unavoidably have an adverse effect on the stability of Japan and the world.
While trying to avoid unexpected clashes, Washington and Beijing should make steady efforts to promote confidence-building through such occasions as mutual visits by high-ranking military officers and warships.
The Orange County Register says the United States should partner with other nations against power grabs (May 30):
China’s economic and military rise is now generally seen as hostile to the interests of the United States. The problem is complicated, however, by China’s clever exploitation of rising nationalist and anti-globalist sentiment in the United States.
While the Trump administration has worked to reverse former President Barack Obama’s internationalist institutional commitments, China has presented itself to nervous Western elites as the new guarantor of global commercial and environmental projects. The United States needs to oppose this powerful thrust.
Fortunately, the cornerstone of China’s bid to replace the United States as globalism’s indispensable nation is so big and risky that America’s challenging task is not insurmountable.
China’s wager is on its so-called Belt and Road Initiative — the largest international economic undertaking since the Marshall Plan. It will stretch networks (or tentacles) of trade and infrastructure out from China well beyond the Eurasian landmass and across oceans and seas.
And it will cost a pretty penny. Between now and 2050, if all goes to plan, some $8 trillion, for 7,000 projects in over 60 countries, is on the line. Then there are the environmental costs. Hundreds of endangered species and dozens of vulnerable ecological areas would be affected. The risks strongly suggest that, rather than “soft power” or “smart power” seeing China through the colossal expansion, much harder political power will have to do.
But that’s where China faces the stiffest opposition. Even the most Trump-resistant are already bristling at the way Beijing is throwing its strategic weight around.
“I have no objections to the fact that China wants to trade,” Germany’s Angela Merkel recently warned at a press conference. “We are committed to free trade.” But, she added, “economic relations being linked with political questions” would “not be in the spirit of free trade.” France’s Emmanuel Macron has objected that interest in Chinese investment is “sometimes at the expense of a European interest.”
These concerns will only strengthen as China’s influence sharpens and extends deeper into the West. Of course, free trade has always intersected with political matters. But Western political norms are being replaced with belated recognition of the nature of China’s bid for global power — not just economic power, but pronounced cultural, political and military influence. Westerners are right to worry that international commerce and financial activity might be pried away from free trade and turned into something more like an older form of a patronage network.
It’s not yet clear, however, who is best suited to lead the pushback. The Trump administration is not likely to mount a strong bid to reclaim the internationalist mantle. But relative to Europe, the United States is powerful and influential enough to hang back a bit longer. Nevertheless, U.S. nationalism should not get in the way of ceding global dominance to China. European efforts to check Beijing’s reach should be supported, and partnerships in Asia, especially with India and Japan, should work toward the same end.
The Washington Post on a recent statement by the U.S. Secretary of Education on schools reporting students living in the country without legal permission (May 29):
After the Supreme Court ruled, 36 years ago, that unauthorized children have a right to public education, some anti-immigrant officials tinkered with escape clauses, workarounds and other means of defying the law of the land. None went so far as Betsy DeVos, the secretary of education, who has doubled down by actively encouraging such lawlessness, declaring that individual schools and localities can decide whether teachers or principals can report students living in the country illegally to immigration authorities. In fact, they can’t.
In a recent appearance before Congress, DeVos suggested lawmakers enact legislation “where there is confusion around this.” The confusion, if any, is exclusively hers. In Plyler v. Doe, in 1982, the high court struck down laws in Texas authorizing local school districts to deny K-12 education to children who had entered the country illegally. Children living in the country without legal permission, as people “in any ordinary sense of the term,” are entitled to protection by the Constitution’s 14th Amendment — unless there is some countervailing state interest to justify discrimination against them, which the court said there is not.
That’s the rub for the Trump administration, which has shown by its actions, and words, that it doesn’t regard children who entered the country illegally as people “in any ordinary sense of the term.”
His administration has undertaken systematic efforts to separate migrant children, babies and toddlers included, from their parents who cross into the country without papers. The goal is to deter potential people illegally entering the country, regardless of the psychological damage that may be suffered by children. We repeat: children.
In the past, federal courts have struck down a proposition passed by California voters in the 1990s requiring schools to expel students living in the country illegally and report them to federal authorities, and blocked key parts of a 2011 Alabama law directing schools to ask students about their immigration status. The Obama administration, saying some school districts were trying to scare away unauthorized pupils, warned them against requiring documents, as a condition of enrollment, that people living in the country without legal permission would lack.
Heedless of that precedent, DeVos, asked whether teachers and principals were obliged to drop a dime on students living in the country without legal permission or their families, said flatly, “These issues are state and local issues to be addressed and dealt with.”
It’s hard to know whether the secretary, whose gauzy pronouncements on policy in the past have raised questions about the breadth of her expertise, is ignorant of the law or knows it but is loath to endorse it. Either way, the effect is the same for parents now afraid to send their children to school.
That’s senseless, given the cost identified by the Supreme Court in the Plyler ruling: “the creation and perpetuation of a subclass of illiterates within our boundaries, surely adding to the problems and costs of unemployment, welfare and crime.”
The Dallas Morning News on how immigrant children are dealt with in the United States (May 30):
“Probably” isn’t a word you want to use when talking about whether children are safe. But that is precisely the word that comes to mind as we review the recent controversy that erupted over whether the federal government “lost” 1,475 migrant children who had been placed in the homes of caregivers.
Here’s what we know: In April testimony to Congress, a Health and Human Services official revealed that the government didn’t have a good handle on nearly 1,500 kids it had placed with caregivers. That testimony resurfaced over the weekend when immigration activists fanned the public debate with a series of tweets linking these children to the Trump administration policy to separate families who attempt to enter the country illegally.
The reality is that the kids in question here are not a product of the administration’s new policy. In fact, they are kids who are enmeshed in a federal system that has long had to deal with the children of immigrants.
But these kids are connected to this debate. If the current system doesn’t do a good job of keeping track of children, why would a new approach that separates children from their unauthorized-immigrant parents as a matter of policy adequately handle the children in its care?
Regardless of whether we like it, children are part of the immigration debate. Some arrive with their parents. Others arrive seeking asylum.
For years, as unaccompanied minors arrived in the United States, border patrol or customs officials transferred them to the custody of HHS, which then placed them with a relative or sponsor.
HHS says the bulk of the sponsors are parents or immediate family members or others with whom the children had some previous relationship. But not all follow-up calls get returned, caregivers move and, in some cases, kids run away.
It is probable that most of these kids are in safe hands. But back in 2016, HHS was criticized for failing to protect unaccompanied minors from falling into the hands of human traffickers and other abusers. We understand that those reports prompted officials to conduct better background checks.
But we also understand that in an environment where immigrants are demonized, more people will live in the shadows of society, where they can be exploited. We believe in the rule of law, so we prefer policies and rhetoric that encourage people to live in the open.
Only then can our legal system better protect society from all levels of abuse. And, yes, that includes ensuring there is no “probably” attached to talk about the safety of children who pass through HHS.
The Sioux City Journal says a new policy by the National Football League regarding the national anthem has found a reasonable middle ground (May 30):
Because of a new rule adopted by team owners, the issue of protest by NFL players during the national anthem will be in the spotlight again this season.
Unanimously, owners approved a policy under which players will be required to stand if they are on the field during the anthem, but gives them the option to remain in the locker room if they prefer. The policy subjects teams to a fine if a player or any other team personnel do not demonstrate respect for the anthem on the field, such as sitting or taking a knee. Under the rule, teams will have the option to fine team personnel, including players, for an infraction.
“We want people to be respectful of the national anthem,” Commissioner Roger Goodell said. “We want people to stand — that’s all personnel — and make sure they treat this moment in a respectful fashion. That’s something we think we owe. (But) we were also very sensitive to give players choices.”
We see nothing wrong with this policy. The NFL anthem controversy began in 2016 when quarterback Colin Kaepernick, who played for the San Francisco 49ers, sat during the anthem before a preseason game between the 49ers and Green Bay Packers. His reason? Oppression of blacks and other Americans of color in our country.
As we said at the time, we respect Kaepernick’s opinion; in fact, we believe he makes points related to race and civil rights in need of examination and discussion. In our view, though, he chose the wrong way to send this message because the national anthem symbolizes something much bigger and deeper than any one single issue. As Americans, we can disagree with government decisions or embrace anger and frustration at societal wrongs within our country, but we should remain always respectful of our flag, what it represents and the men and women in uniform who defend it. We believe better ways exist for Kaepernick and other NFL players to use their stature as high-profile professional athletes and public figures to make their points and make a difference in this national conversation.
We aren’t alone. As evidenced by a Yahoo Sports/YouGov poll showing 53 percent of self-described NFL viewers support the new NFL anthem policy and 32 percent do not, a strong majority of football fans wants to see a demonstration of respect for the anthem on the field before games.
We see nothing wrong with the league establishing workforce policies governing behavior during the anthem in order to protect its brand and bottom line, both of which suffered as the anthem controversy grew. Yes, we Americans enjoy a constitutional right to freedom of speech, but we all work within rules of conduct established by our employers.
We view the new NFL rule as an acceptable middle ground on all of this.