Cotton’s bogeyman

Sen. Tom Cotton continues his efforts to help find a bogeyman for our current crisis. His new law and “surveys” on China, or defunding the WHO, are classic efforts to use nationalism to dodge our failures. Are we really going to defund the WHO in the middle of a worldwide pandemic?

Senator Cotton doesn’t help us defeat communism or China by scapegoating them for our own problems. He knows this, but he doesn’t care. It plays well.

The Economist magazine explained this well. “Clumsy despots use fear and coercion to keep foreign ideas at bay. Smart regimes know that nationalism is a more subtle tool. Bring a society to the right pitch of rage against foreign rivals, and people will scorn outside influences of their own accord.”

Where was Tom while our president praised his good friend Xi for his handling of the virus? When he congratulated Xi and the CCP on 70 years of rule while protesters were being shot? When people in Hong Kong rose to protest and demand democracy and our president went silent?

The WHO made mistakes, but it doesn’t have the world’s greatest intelligence agency to know the CCP was lying. We do! We also have the best medical and pandemic experts. We knew China locked down 50 million people. Our president ignored that, even thanking Xi for his transparency. The CCP deserves blame for hiding this, but how gullible are we for believing them? Are we going to disarm because they tell us their military is only defensive in nature?

Senator Cotton’s efforts only serve to deflect from our president’s refusal to acknowledge this virus and take the actions he should have earlier. It galvanizes the Chinese people against us, and pushes them to support their government. I believe the senator understands. He thinks you won’t. GREG ROUNTREE

Scott