"'He is doing exactly what the administration brought him in to do as D.N.I.,' said Joseph Maguire, whom Mr. Trump dismissed as acting director of national intelligence in February..." Read the full article here: Full Article
"'Beijing’s strategy isn’t just based on undermining Taiwan’s resistance, it’s also a gamble on how the US will approach the cross-strait issue,' Daniel Russel, a former top State Department official under President Barack Obama, said in Taipei on Sept. 8. 'The strongest driver of increased Chinese assertiveness is the conviction that the Western system, and the US in particular, is in decay...'" Read the full article here: Full Article
"'This cannot be expected to bring the regime to its knees,' said Elizabeth Rosenberg, a former Treasury sanctions official now at the Center for a New American Security. 'Iranian leaders have been very clear that they will turn to barter and illegal arrangements than capitulate under economic pressure...'" Read the full article here: Full Article
"China is now the official 'pacing threat' for the U.S. armed forces. Simply put, the Pentagon considers the People’s Liberation Army its most serious competition. This is a major and vital shift. But competing with China is a tremendously broad concept that could take any number of forms, and the reality is that China is too powerful to permit the U.S. defense establishment to fritter away money. The Defense Department needs to focus. Most of all, it needs to be capable [...]
"One of the biggest infusions was $600-a-week in extra unemployment payments to more than 20 million jobless Americans. That expired in mid-summer, and the amount of cash going out to laid-off workers cratered, according to Jay Shambaugh, an economist at George Washington University. "'It fell from $110 [billion] in July to $34 billion in September,' he said. 'So there’s this massive drop-off to the economy and also to the most vulnerable households...'" Read the full article here: Full Article
"The United States is at an inflection point in an age of mounting transnational threats, unprecedented global interdependence, and resurgent great power competition. This moment is taking place in the context of a technological revolution that exacerbates the challenges we face while simultaneously offering potential solutions, providing breakthroughs in climate, medicine, communications, transportation, intelligence, and many other fields. Many of these breakthroughs will come through the exploitation of artificial intelligence (AI) and its related technologies—chief among them machine learning (ML). [...]
"The prospect of a contested presidential election, including premature claims of victory—or worse, one in which President Trump deliberately foils a clear outcome against him—rightly has people worried. It’s a reminder that some structural aspects of the U.S. presidential election system, like its decentralization and long transition period between election and inauguration, can be major liabilities. It’s also a reminder of how much the system depends on candidates’ commitment to certain principles and to the system itself..." Read the full article [...]
"'The Chinese have told themselves a story about why American attitudes have soured towards China,' said Daniel Russel, a former assistant secretary of state who advised the then President Barack Obama on East Asia issues. 'And in the story they tell themselves, it’s a function of things that have nothing to do with China...'" Read the full article here: Full Article
"Sen. Kelly Loeffler, a loyalist of President Donald Trump, was quick last week to add the presidential Covid-19 diagnosis to the long list of American grievances against China. Another Trump ally charged that the Chinese Communist Party 'has biologically attacked our president' and must be held accountable. Apparently, it is the Chinese Communist Party, not a disdain for masks or social distancing, that is to blame for the growing number of people in the White House who have contracted the virus..." [...]
"'We were already in a period, because of the election, that the country’s attention was so focused inward,' said Dan Shapiro, who served as U.S. ambassador to Israel in the Obama administration. 'Now you compound that with a president being less than fully healthy, even in some scenarios incapacitated, and you realize that the health of the president’s safety is a national security issue...'” Read the full article here: Full Article