Among political pundits, there are two stylistic categories of commentary. First, there are the day-to-day pundits — the folks who help us make sense of daily events. Rush Limbaugh was the all-time GOAT, but there are still plenty of able-bodied pundits of this ilk plying their trade: Ben Shapiro, Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham, Megyn Kelly, Bill O’Reilly, Mark Levin, Clay Travis, Buck Sexton, and Mike Gallagher.
With these guys, you already know what you’re gonna get. Take Shapiro, for instance: He’s a mainstream, buttoned-up, free trade Republican. That’s his worldview. So no wonder he’s been highly critical of Trump’s tariff policy:
TheWrap: Trump Tariffs Disturb His Own Supporters in Conservative Media: ‘Really Problematic’
AP News: Joe Rogan, Dave Portnoy and Ben Shapiro are among Trump backers now questioning tariffs
Wall Street Journal: Dave Portnoy, Ben Shapiro and Other Podcasters Criticize Trump’s Tariffs
The Independent: Even Ben Shapiro slams Trump over tariffs in new video
The Daily Beast: MAGA Star Ben Shapiro Turns on Trump Over His ‘Crazy’ Tariffs Plan
Daily Mail: MAGA ally Ben Shapiro turns on Trump with stinging tariff takedown
Media Matters: Ben Shapiro: Trump’s tariffs are “the single greatest increase in taxes — because tariffs are a tax — in modern American history”
Shapiro isn’t a cheerleader. (Frankly, he doesn’t have the legs for it.) He’s a day-to-day commentator: He views the world through a very rigid, very specific ideological prism, and his daily commentary reflects it.
Day-to-day political pundits usually have a good batting average. Their credibility is predicated on their accuracy, and that’s critical for the longevity of their careers: If someone like Shapiro continually describes a world that his audience flat-out doesn’t recognize, the audience will leave him.
The second class of political pundits has lousy batting averages. They’re wrong a lot! But they’re also home run hitters. Sure, they might lead the league in strikeouts, but every now and then they’ll blast a ball out of the park.
Unlike someone like Shapiro, these guys are penny stocks. Most of the time, their opinions are worthless — but when they’re right, it’s gonna be one helluva moon shot.
Alex Jones is the king of this category, but he’s not alone: Steve Bannon dabbles in it, and Glenn Beck has long kept an oar in apocalyptic waters.
Another one is Peter Zeihan, who focuses heavily on demographics, trade trends, and national resources.
He’s anti-Trump. (One of his big swings and misses was his guarantee that Trump had “no chance” of winning the presidency in 2024.) But sometimes he’s eerily prescient: A full decade before Russia invaded Ukraine, he argued that a Russia-Ukraine war was always inevitable, and for demographic reasons, it had to happen when it did.
(Perhaps more concerning, he’s equally adamant that Russia cannot — and will not — stop at Ukraine, and therefore a larger war with NATO is extremely likely.)
Zeihan’s opinions on China are just as striking: He predicted that China is on the verge of collapse and within 10 years will no longer even be a functioning country.
Clearly, this flies in the face of the long-established “conventional wisdom,” where China was the new global superpower — and the United States was the nation in decline.
As Zeihan describes it:
[T]he most recent full data to be released by the Chinese in the last two three months tell us that the birth rate has dropped in China by nearly 70% since 2017.
That’s the fastest drop in the historical record of China, of humanity throughout all of recorded history. And in that timeframe, if the Shanghai Academy of Sciences is right, they’ve all recounted their population made over 100 million people, all of whom would have been working age people under age 40, meaning that in the last five or six years they’ve had that just peak workforce and the last year peak workforce probably in the earlier part of that process.
And they just don’t have enough millennials to do consumption at all. And we’ve seen the cost of the workforce increase by a factor of 14 or 15 in the last 22 years. … And now it’s obvious that this system is breaking down. The demographic collapse is not correctable. There are not enough people under age 40 for them to even try…
His conversation with Joe Rogan explained things further:
ROGAN: So, when you’re saying that China has 10 years to go —
ZEIHAN: At most.
ROGAN: What do you mean by that?
ZEIHAN: Well, we now know they lied about their population statistics and overcounted their population by over 100 million people — all of whom would have been born since the one-child policy was adopted. This is [a country] where they’ve got more people in their 60s and their 50s and their 40s and their 30s and their 20s.
ROGAN: What was the logic behind the one-child — was it [the Chinese] were overpopulating?
ZEIHAN: Mao was concerned that as the country was modernizing, the birthrate wasn’t dropping fast enough and that the young generation was literally going to eat the country alive, so they went through a breakneck urbanization program which destroyed the birthrate. At the same time, they penalized anyone who wanted to have kids, and both of those at the same time have generated the demographic collapse we’re in now.
ROGAN: And the problem with that also was that they wanted male children.
ZEIHAN: Yeah, there’s a cultural aspect to that too, and obviously, men can’t have kids on their own.
ROGAN: And what’s the ratio of men and women, [for] younger people in China now?
ZEIHAN: Before the data revision… it was about one to 1.2. It was the most distorted in the world, even more than Sri Lanka, where there has been a civil war for 30 years. Since then… we don’t have [good data] but it’s undoubtedly worse.
In the 1970s, China’s median age was 18 years old. In 2020, it was 38.4. Today, it’s in the 40s.
Older populations consume less. (And older workers expect higher compensation. Trust me: I’m in my 50s.)
Meanwhile, just beyond our southern border is Mexico — a nation with much friendlier demographics. The media age in Mexico is still in the 20s! So if American industries are truly dependent on cheap labor, there’s no need to sail all the way to the Far East.
All we have to do is look south.
China still has a lot of factories, but it no longer has a monopoly on cheap labor. Instead, the opposite is true: China is a country of old people. Aside from the institutional momentum and sunken costs, it’s no longer an enticing option for Big Industry.
There aren't enough young workers!
But don’t tell that to the liberal media. CNN is already begging Trump to wave the white flag: “Trump’s tariff onslaught against China launches a battle the US may not be able to win.”
The first line said it all:
President Donald Trump just ignited a direct showdown with the one nation that might be able to beat the United States in a trade war.
Of course, there’s more:
China is showing every sign that it thinks it can outlast Trump in their clash, for which it has been preparing for years. And it’s not clear Trump and his top officials are fully prepared for the extent of China’s resilience or the pain it can impose on American consumers.
The ruthless Chinese leader presents himself as a historic catalyst of Chinese civilization’s rightful return to power and prestige. A capitulation to a tough-talking American president would therefore be unthinkable. Showing weakness to the United States would also undercut China’s own power and would be seen as a loss of face — especially within Asia.
China’s rhetoric, meanwhile, is peppered with assumptions that the US is trying to devastate its economy and political system. Liu Pengyu, spokesman for China’s embassy in Washington, for instance, condemned US tariffs on Tuesday as “abuse” and as an infringement of China’s “legitimate rights.”
In Beijing, as in Washington, hubris is stoking the antagonism.
China’s official media bristles with certainty that America is an empire in decline. Far from being a show of strength, Trump’s second presidency and the political chaos he incites are seen as symptoms of weakness.
The “surrender corner” is gaining lots of Democratic Party support. Only five days(!) after Trump announced his tariffs, the Democrats sent out a press release: “New Dem Chair Demands House Republicans Join Democrats to End Trump’s Trade War Chaos.”
As we noted yesterday:
In World War II, it took the Germans over six weeks (May 10 to June 25) to conquer France. Yet the Democratic Party, Never-Trump Republicans, and the mainstream media are pleading to surrender after less than a week?!
Who knew today’s Democrats had 1/6 the courage of the French?
China is quite literally a red flag. And today’s Democrats already want to wave a white one?
The PR war over “Liberation Day” will hinge on two things: The risk-reward calculation of the American people (which will take time to play out) and whether or not Americans believe Trump’s actions were justified.
“No one around the world will be able to say that what the president is doing is unfair in any way if they simply look at the chess board," Trump advisor Peter Navarro said. “What’s unfair is the status quo, and the countries out there that are cheating us are going to do everything to maintain the status quo. It’s unfortunate that a lot of the American media is going to try to help them do that just because they hate Donald Trump more than they love this country.”
Well said: Let the Democrats defend a status quo that’s decimated wages, destroyed upward mobility, stripped America of its manufacturing base, and placed affordable housing well beyond the reach of young people.
Meanwhile, Republicans will support the opposite: Total, complete victory.
And hopefully, this time, Peter Zeihan is actually right.
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