While America’s cities are decaying, the country’s ruling elite is in a Trump psychosis and a digitally hypnotised Woke West is discussing female penises. China is strengthening its global position both economically, militarily and diplomatically, states Douglas Murray in a column in The Telegraph on 7 April.

The British writer and journalist senses that the tectonic plates in geopolitics are moving, and what is going on is visible to all: the US is going down, and China is going up. The events of the last few weeks illustrate that, Murray believes.

The US power elite is very keen to get the country’s previous president out of the way under any pretext:

The United States has been single-mindedly focused on one story: the arraignment of a former president on charges cooked up by an ambitious Left-wing district attorney who wants to make his name by getting Donald Trump sent to jail. In Manhattan and Palm Beach, the media has paid for helicopters to capture every move of the former president. The streets have been packed with press photographers taking photos of other press photographers, all waiting for something to happen.

That America’s big cities are falling into disrepair is not so important – to the extent that the White House registers it at all:

Every day, America’s cities – from New York to San Francisco – are rotting from the centre out, with Leftist DAs allowing theft and even violent crime on a scale that has not existed in living memory. This is presided over by a president who everybody can see is half asleep on the job and a vice-president who is not as up to speed at all.

The USA is not the only important country in a West that has been hit hard by the woke virus, which does not have its priorities in order. Murray’s home country is also in a pitiful state: In Britain, we are currently debating whether women can have penises or how “racist” we are this week, he writes.

There is not much good to say about the Chinese Communist Party, which is the largest and most powerful criminal organisation on the planet. But its leadership does not engage in similar self-harm; people are mostly concerned with safeguarding their own interests, often at the expense of others, and strengthening their own global position – for example with international diplomacy:

In recent weeks, Chairman Xi popped up in the Middle East to broker a deal between the Saudis and the Iranians. The great divide in the Middle East between the Sunni bloc, dominated by Saudi Arabia, and the Shia bloc, led by Iran, suddenly appeared to reached harmonious relations.

Once the United States would have exercised its power and played the role of mediator in the Middle East, writes Murray. And this example is not unique:

It was the same at the end of last month when Xi turned up in Moscow to present the Chinese plan for ending the war in Ukraine. It would allow Russia to keep the territorial gains it has made during its war of aggression.

In that way, China posed as the protector of the international system, while others must adapt, Murray continues:

So it was inevitable that other world leaders would eventually come to the court of the new emperor and treat him in the way that he now expects to be treated. This week, Emmanuel Macron travelled to Beijing to pay homage.

The Chinese dictator did not bother to pretend that the meeting with the French president was particularly important:

For his part, a profoundly bored-looking Xi simply said that “China is willing to jointly appeal with France to the international community to remain rational and calm”. Yesterday they issued an ambiguously worded joint statement to that effect.

The Chinese economy and trade are just as important. Beijing has grossly exploited its membership of the World Trade Organization (WTO), notes Murray:

China’s top politicians and envoys are busily travelling the world making trade deals. Ever since Beijing was allowed into the World Trade Organisation in 2001 – a decision which already looks both world-historic and unwise – it has used its financial clout to simultaneously exploit the rules and break them.

Taking advantage of rules that serve you and breaking those that don’t should be enough to show that they are not worthy to be a member. But now China is too powerful:

Today, they don’t hide their desire to ensure Chinese economic dominance in the 21st century.

A long-term goal in China’s hybrid war against the West is to strip the dollar of its status as the world’s main currency, preferably with the help of the US’s neighbours:

Just this week, China was once again in America’s own backyard. After quick negotiations, a new agreement between China and Brazil was announced. The most salient factor: the deal completely bypasses the American dollar, which would once have been the standard for such negotiations.

This state of affairs is partly the United States’ own fault, Murray analysed. American monetary and fiscal policy has been irresponsible:

Because successive American governments – of all political stripes – have done a great deal in recent decades to diminish the standing of the US dollar. It doesn’t matter whether the president, House or Senate are Democrat or Republican, US government spending and debt just keep rocketing up and up.

The West doesn’t give a damn about holding China responsible for the Wuhan virus, but distracts itself with ridiculous inconsistencies, while China unchallenged continues to run its own race, notes Murray.

One of the worst means of distraction in the West is also significantly Chinese:

For instance, in the tech world it has been clear for years that the platform TikTok, a Chinese firm, is highly suspect. Indeed, it has long been accused of data harvesting. The platform has captivated children and teenagers in Britain and America, but it has not been allowed to trouble the youth of China.

While our children – and some adults – do the latest stupid dance for the platform, they don’t seem to have realised that they are not using a product. They are the product, their information is the key.

Neither Washington nor London are tackling the problems quickly enough, concludes Murray, who does not think highly of today’s Western society. Emperor Nero lingering while Rome burns was being responsible compared to our leaders today:

Our societies – and governments – have been doing silly little dances – sometimes on TikTok, sometimes, like Macron in Beijing – while the Chinese Communist Party moves the ground from under our dancing feet. If you take the long view, the things that our leaders have allowed, encouraged and been distracted by in the past 20 years make the Emperor Nero look like a model of responsibility.