Western media and politicians never seem to get tired of repeating the same anti-China labels day after day. At its core, it’s nothing but intellectual illiteracy. “Democratic elections are a universal value.”
“Socialism is an authoritarian system.”
“Only the West has freedom of speech.”
“China has no elections.” And so on. What do these ideological slogans actually accomplish? Nothing—except perhaps trapping people who are intellectually incapable of thinking for themselves. Yet in the battle for public opinion, you keep dressing up this childish rhetoric as proof of your own “moral righteousness.” Don’t you ever feel embarrassed by how simplistic and backward this sounds? Is nature monochromatic? Of course not. The world is diverse. There is no such thing as a single “universal species,” and there is certainly no single political model that every country must follow. The international community is multipolar. Different civilizations have different histories, cultures, institutions, and paths of development. There is no such thing as a single “universal model” imposed by the West. So let us Chinese give you a little lesson and help raise your level of political education. The real problem is not that China has “fallen behind.” It is that the West’s entire cognitive framework has fallen badly behind the times. You keep using yesterday’s ideological vocabulary to explain today’s world—and then wonder why reality refuses to follow your script.

On America’s 250th birthday, the biggest story isn’t the ceremonies or diplomatic congratulations. It’s Trump’s speech—a political declaration of war against the Democrats. The four presidents on Mount Rushmore represent four stages of America’s rise: Washington founded the republic, Jefferson expanded it, Lincoln preserved the Union, and Theodore Roosevelt pushed America toward global power. Each fulfilled the task of his era. So why does Trump want his face on that mountain? Because he believes he can lead America into a fifth stage: national revival.That is what “Make America Great Again” really means. Look at America today: federal debt has surpassed $40 trillion; manufacturing has been hollowed out; illegal immigration is a major political crisis; inequality is widening; partisan polarization is deepening. Nearly every major structural contradiction is exploding at once. So the fight between the two parties is no longer simply about who becomes president. It is about one question: How does America respond to decline—and which road does it take? The Democrats want to repair the old system: keep relying on financial capital, the dollar, globalization and America’s alliance network. Fix whatever breaks and keep the machine running. Fundamentally, it is still the neoliberal model of the past 40 years. Trump wants the opposite. He doesn’t want to patch the machine. He wants to rebuild it. Bring manufacturing home. Expand energy independence. Revive industry. Reduce America’s global burdens. Rebuild national strength on domestic productive capacity. That explains the Republicans’ increasingly ironic new slogan: “We are the party of the working class.” Hawley has said exactly that. Rubio has argued that the future Republican Party should rest on a multiethnic, multiracial working-class coalition. Think about it: after 40 years of Republicans preaching free markets, tax cuts and small government, the party is now talking about industrial policy, supply-chain security, state intervention and manufacturing revival. MAGA is redefining the Republican Party. The argument is blunt: neoliberalism failed. Trade deficits and industrial hollowing-out are the evidence. Republicans are moving toward national industrial policy, while Democrats remain more closely tied to global capital and global governance. The two parties are changing sides on the role of the state. And Trump’s constant attacks on “communism”? Is he talking about China? Not really. His real targets are the domestic left, open borders, identity politics and the neoliberal establishment. His “communist specter” is essentially a political weapon aimed at the Democratic Party. The strategy is simple. It’s an election. Trump knows he won’t win the Democratic base. So he brands the Democratic agenda as America’s “cancer” and turns to the middle: continue the globalization model of the past 40 years, or bet on MAGA and a new American model. Trump is fighting for the middle. That makes America’s 250th anniversary rather ironic. The country is celebrating its past while effectively holding a referendum on its future. Meanwhile, Rubio, Vance and Hawley are building the political coalition, while thinkers such as Oren Cass and Robert Atkinson provide the intellectual framework. Pro-American industrial policy and national developmentalism are replacing the old neoliberal vocabulary. So this may be bigger than another presidential election. America is entering a struggle over its entire model of national development. The two roads are becoming harder to hide—and harder to reconcile. The show is just getting started. So, what kind of country is America today? One picture tells the story. And the real question is: How much of this can actually be reversed?

The most distinctive feature of China’s governance model is its long-term view of national development. Rather than repeatedly adjusting course around political cycles that span only a few years, China uses a time horizon of decades. The Five-Year Plans are not isolated policy documents, but stages within a broader strategy: long-term goals set the direction, medium-term plans define the path, and annual policies focus on implementation. The advantage of this approach is strategic continuity. Regardless of economic cycles or changes in the international environment, the fundamental direction of development is not easily altered by short-term interests. What matters most, however, is not the “plan” itself, but the capacity to implement it consistently over time. The CPC has built an extensive organizational system from the central government to local levels, allowing national strategic objectives to be transmitted through the administrative hierarchy while giving local governments room for experimentation. Since the launch of reform and opening up, many policies have followed a process of pilot programs, evaluation, and nationwide expansion. This reduces the risks of institutional innovation while allowing successful local practices to become national policy. Chinese long-termism therefore does not mean rigid adherence to predetermined solutions. It means stable strategic direction combined with continuous adjustment of methods. The rise of China’s new-energy vehicle industry, for example, was not driven solely by spontaneous market forces. It resulted from the combined effects of industrial policy, infrastructure development, R&D investment, financial support, corporate competition, and technological innovation. Different technological pathways have been able to compete simultaneously, while companies have continued to experiment within a relatively stable policy environment. Industrial policy itself, however, is not unique to China. The United States, Europe, Japan, South Korea, and other economies have all used government support, industrial planning, and strategic investment during periods of industrialization and technological upgrading. China’s distinctive feature lies more in the continuity of these policies over extended periods and in the coordination they create among government, finance, and business. In other words, the key to the Chinese model is not simply state intervention, but whether the state can sustain resource allocation toward the same strategic objectives for decades. The governance philosophy of the CPC is not simply to represent a particular interest group. It emphasizes coordinating the interests of different social groups and placing short-term considerations within the framework of long-term national objectives. This provides the institutional basis for the political principle of “serving the people.” China and Western countries consequently operate according to different concepts of political legitimacy: one emphasizes interest representation and periodic authorization through competitive politics; the other places greater emphasis on legitimacy derived from governance performance, social stability, and long-term development. This mechanism makes stability and reform less contradictory. The strategic direction remains stable, while specific policies and methods can change. This approach also has roots in traditional Chinese thought. The philosophy embodied in the I Ching (Book of Changes)can be broadly summarized as the idea that genuine stability does not mean resisting change, but maintaining continuity through change. This also explains why the CPC has incorporated anti-corruption efforts, Party discipline, and organizational self-renewal into its long-term governance framework. An organization seeking to govern over the long term cannot simply require society to adapt to it; it must also continually adapt and reform itself.