Doesn't matter. The structural forces of capitalism are drawing the USA and China into competition and opposition, and China represents a rising threat to American global hegemony that cannot be ignored. The anti-China stance is a bipartisan consensus. Individuals in certain positions do not matter because the causes of this conflict are systemic.
Biden probably won't pursue silly protectionist policies like Trump, but will pursue regional free trade agreements aimed at containing China and stripping its economic options in the region as the TPP was an attempt at doing. Both will pursue policies aimed at banning threatening Chinese tech exports like Huawei's 5G.
China represents a rising threat to American global hegemony that cannot be ignored. The anti-China stance is a bipartisan consensus.
But the response from Biden vs Trump will have differences in strategy, which must be worth considering. Unless you believe them to be functionally identical.
It sounds like Trump's policies provoke China into a quicker adaptation against US retaliatory tariffs, while Biden's strategy might be more effective in slowing their progress internationally.
I think that the differences between their approaches are dwarfed by the internal instability caused by a slowly decaying capitalism. If the Dems "wise up" and run a Keynesian in the future, they could right the ship and pose an actual threat, but they won't.
Nah the Keynesian approach only worked because WWII opened up the world market and the military industrial complex so the US could utilize anti-cyclic inflationary policies to deal with crises and expand the labor aristocracy. Then stagflation happened so the neolibs gutted safety nets to counter balance the anti-cyclic inflationary effect of deficit spending through the military. Now we're kinda fucked in any direction, there's no unlimited market without endless war, and we don't produce enough Value domestically due to dependence on the global proletariat. A hard divergence from neoliberalism towards Keynesianism will probably cause hyperinflation, capital flight (unless we're the last neolibs in town), and mass proletarianization faster than the current course because they've stayed deficit spending for a long time and a mass increase in spending, which would have to be huge considering our history of deficit spending, in order to stimulate aggregate demand will certainly end up largely and quickly amortized in fixed capital for the economic behemoths and in general we see rising organic composition of Capital and shrinking transitory classes
Hey fair enough, but I gotta ask, do you think this all would have happened if Bernie would have won?
My instinct says "no cause the legislature is still almost entirely neolibs who wouldn't want to work with him" but I don't feel like that answers the whole thing
He'd forsure be neutered and cause capital flight. If he tried to implement a lot of what he promised he'd have to fight off the bourgeois pissed about falling profits and inflation. If he did get the new deal sort of stuff passed through political means without being able to control capital in any way, it would probably be ruinous and invite a lot of reaction imo. I mean the Neolibs are still fairly Keynesian in terms of deficit spending, the primary tool of Keynesianism, so really going even crazier with deficit spending relative to where we are now, even on good stuff like health care etc., seems like not an option. As much as MMT is supposedly voodoo witchcraft (and something I need to read about more), there is an assload of unrealized debt out there that is waiting to become a huge issue (it already is, look at the zombie firms). Unless by some miracle Bernie just went all Allende and ruled through executive decree and started nationalizing shit. Still that didn't end well for Allende
In general I agree with you though, the Neolibs would've gutted the shit out of anything he wanted. Plus it's not like I'm an expert on economics I'm just trying to use some of the shit I've read.
but Biden will likely work in tandem with China
Nah, you're buying the republican line on this one, notice how democrats aren't opposing trump on his china policy in any way. This has nothing to do with Biden or Trump, they haven't made this decision, it comes from the needs of the defence industry to keep revenue high, and the anxiety of the US capitalist class and political elite that the US is loosing (has lost?) hegemony and they have no way to reverse it.
I don't mean in some truly supportive role like Trump pushes Biden doing, but through policy a Biden admin would not be as isolationist as Trump, so will end up working more with China while still peddling an anti-Chinese sentiment on the national and world stage.
Trump will continue to dismantle the nation, but Biden will likely work in tandem with China, wondering what takes there are.
Biden will likely work in tandem with China
This seems rather unlikely to me.
Obama did not go fully isolationist against China like Trump has, why wouldn't we expect Biden to continue that strategy.
Perhaps I see more of a gradation in policy between "go fully isolationist against" and "work in tandem with". I don't think it's likely that Biden will do the second one.
That said, he has been joining in on the anti-China rhetoric with everyone else:
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/22/world/asia/biden-china-election-trump.html
https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2020/09/29/asia-pacific/politics-diplomacy-asia-pacific/joe-biden-china-policy-us/
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/would-biden-get-tough-china-n1239203
I'm going to play Devil's advocate here and tell you that Joe Biden is the better choice for China.
The US is going to continue to lose their position as the global hegemon to China, with the rate of profit continually falling and the contradictions inherent to Capitalism become more and more severe this century. The US will lose their status as global hegemon this decade either way.
The only wars which could address the scale of the crisis America is facing are wars with China, Russia, or Iran; which have begun cooperating in joint military operations and represent a united front against the US military globally.
The Trump administration has been itching for war for the entirety of the last 4 years: tearing up the Nuclear Deal with Iran, breaking Obama's redline on Russia, the Chinese trade war, a continuation of Obama's pivot to Asia, etc.
The US military has consistently stated that they cannot fight a war against China, Russia, and Iran. Trump represents a more volatile section of the bourgeoisie that sees victory only in war. In that way he is much more fascistic than the other imperialists. Hitler and Mussolini also assumed that only victory could await them in their wars. For this reason I worry that Trump and his ilk will bring down the rest of the world with the US this decade.
The Democratic Party and the imperialist bourgeoisie that back Joe Biden have a more long-term strategy. They want to slowly isolate China internationally through economic conflict like the TPP, while protecting their relationship with their European allies and seeking compromise with the Russian and Iranian bourgeoisie.
For this reason, I think that Joe Biden is a better choice for supporters of China. Yes, Joe Biden is a white supremacist just like Trump and Obama, but for his many many many many many faults he is NOT a fascist like Trump is. If you're in a swing state I think you should vote for him. If you're in a solid state then vote for whoever, or don't vote at all if you don't want.
The Trump administration has been itching for war for the entirety of the last 4 years
This I completely disagree with. You think Trump couldn't have gotten us into a war if he wanted? He may have been provoking countries for our own righteous war in defense, but if he wanted a war there would be one.
Joe Biden however will almost certainly engage in the same kind of US interventionism as Obama did. He does the same anti-China red baiting too.
The degradation of US influence in the world because of Trump has been a boon to China, isn't what you present under a Biden administration the potential opposite?