Speaker Johnson Says No Shutdown Over the Border, and It's Time to Talk About the Elephant in the Room

While speaking on "Face the Nation," Speaker Mike Johnson tells host Margaret Brennan that he will not wield the leverage of a government shutdown to try to force a deal that pushes for stricter enforcement.

That comes as illegal immigration continues to set new records, with over 302,000 encounters happening in the month of December alone. Estimates vary, but somewhere between six and eight million people have illegally crossed the Southern border since Joe Biden took office.

This latest move from Johnson does bring us back to the elephant in the room, which is what exactly was gained by the fight to oust Kevin McCarthy as Speaker? Has there been a distinct shift in governance? I would say, not really. We still ended up with a continuing resolution, and now we are getting the same strategy regarding avoiding a shutdown at all costs. Those were the two major issues that got McCarthy booted.

This is the problem with consistently underperforming in elections, which the GOP has done in the last four cycles. Perhaps we should all be more focused on fixing that issue at the ballot box rather than expecting Johnson to extract blood from a turnip. That may not be what some want to hear, but it may be the most realistic option.

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'Missiles Filled With Water Instead of Fuel': Xi Jinping Furiously Purges Military of Corruption

American foreign policy experts have long argued that China has been laying the groundwork for a permanent rise as a major global power, and U.S. politicians (particularly on the Republican side) have certainly counted the ways in which China is clearly our No. 1 geopolitical foe.

US intelligence indicates that President Xi Jinping’s sweeping military purge came after it emerged that widespread corruption undermined his efforts to modernize the armed forces and raised questions about China’s ability to fight a war, according to people familiar with the assessments.

The corruption inside China’s Rocket Force and throughout the nation’s defense industrial base is so extensive that US officials now believe Xi is less likely to contemplate major military action in the coming years than would otherwise have been the case, according to the people, who asked not to be named discussing intelligence.

According to U.S. intelligence, "corruption within the People’s Liberation Army has led to an erosion of confidence in its overall capabilities, particularly when it comes to the Rocket Force, and also set back some of Xi’s top modernization priorities."

U.S. think tanks and defense contractors believe that Xi aims to have a completely modernized military that is capable of taking on any global power by 2027. One such example is the rapid assembly of aircraft carriers and other naval vessels at a rate that far outpaces the U.S. Navy. But just because they can be rapidly assembled doesn't mean they're ready to go right away.

Other reports suggest China could have five aircraft carriers by 2030. However, some experts are skeptical that Beijing will use its aircraft carriers as intended for at least a decade. Instead, they think the vessels are more for propaganda purposes at this point.

There is a lot of reason to believe that China is a global adversary - they've said as much in response to U.S. actions over the years - and the question often seems to be less "if" we'll go to war with China and more "when."

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