Kyiv, Ukraine. The average age of the Verkhovna Rada, Ukraine’s 450-seat parliament, is 41. Only three of the elected representatives are older than 60, while 17 were under 30 at the time of their election.

This means that when Ukraine declared its independence, many of us were essentially children, and some weren’t yet born. What do we remember from Aug. 24, 1991?

I was 6. My memories of that day are of something profoundly significant. People didn’t go to work; they gathered in the city center, on what is now Hrushevsky Street, greeting each other in an atmosphere of incredible joy and uplift.

Now, in the 10th year of Russia’s war against Ukraine and 18 months into its full-scale phase, we are renewing our independence with an unquenchable passion to keep it.

[Few scholars know Chicom China better than Willy Wo-Lap Lam.  There is a lot to think about here – please consider reading it attentively-JW.]

After emerging as China’s “leader for life” and filling top party organs such as the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) Central Committee and the Politburo with members of his own faction, paramount leader Xi Jinping has been relentlessly buffeted by what he refers to as “high waves and dangerous winds” in his effort to keep the ship of state afloat (Radio Free Asia, May 30).

However, whether the supreme leader and his newly minted Politburo can acquit themselves of handling these challenges remains dubious.

The horrendous rain and flooding of Typhoon Doksuri (杜苏芮) earlier this month (August 2023) that have hit Hebei Province and Beijing itself, which resulted in the displacement of some 1 million people and an undisclosed number of deaths, has again illustrated the questionable governance ability of the Xi Jinping administration.

And Xi—who is General Secretary of the CCP and commander-in-chief—has neither visited the sites of devastation nor spelled out measures to help flood victims re-establish their livelihoods. He has instead gone to the nearby seaside resort of Beidaihe to chair a series of informal policy-making sessions with other Politburo members and top advisors (Australian Broadcasting Corp Chinese, August 10; Radio Free Asia, August 4).

Sounds just like Joe Biden and the horrific fire in Maui, doesn’t it?  The comparisons go far deeper.

What if American companies simply ignored Chinese copyrights and patents, and stole Chinese ideas, inventions, and intellectual property, as they pleased and with impunity?

How would Beijing respond if American biotech company warehouses were discovered in rural China with unsecured vials of deadly viruses and pathogens?

These “what-ifs” could be expanded endlessly. But they reflect well enough the great asymmetry in the bizarre Chinese-American relationship.

Obviously, China would not tolerate America treating it as it does the Americans.  Why then does the imbalance continue?

Everyone seems to have advice for the GOP candidates, so, what the heck, I’ll get in on the action too. Better yet, I’ll shamelessly plagiarize Ronald Reagan—with whom I collaborated on two winning presidential campaigns.

It so happens that the first Republican primary debate is on Aug. 23, the 39th anniversary of Reagan’s re-election acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention in Dallas.

The current cast of White House contenders are engaged in unconstructive outrage rather than offering a clarifying pathway to reclaiming our government. On that sultry night in Texas, Reagan charted the latter course. The president presented a crucial distinction:

The Democrat Party was marked by “pessimism, fear and limits,” whereas the Republican Party offered “hope, confidence and growth.”

Reagan’s words ring true today. He said the left “sees people only as members of groups,” always offering them grandiose—and unfulfilled—promises. Republicans serve “all the people of America as individuals” and “offer proven, workable answers.”

If Joe Biden is not the Democrat presidential candidate in 2024, will former first lady Michelle Obama take his place?

Some are betting that if the president is driven out of the race next year by corruption allegations, increasing signs of mental impairment and terrible approval ratings, only the former first lady has the name recognition and popularity to step in as a last-minute replacement.

Would, then, Mrs. Obama, allegedly one of the most admired people in the nation, have an excellent chance of winning?

For revelations about Hunter Biden’s influence-peddling and his father’s alleged complicity do not only taint Joe Biden’s presidency – they also cast a shadow on the Obama White House. To be sure, Michelle Obama was not the president, but it is her husband’s reputation and accomplishments that she would run on.

Quite soon, people will ask: what did President Obama know about Joe Biden’s evident corruption and when did he know it?