This is Madrearer Rebels. I'm Ben Norton, and I'm here in Nicaragua right now,

and Max is in DC under quarantine, and we have the privilege of being joined by one of the best

geopolitical analysts today who's in Thailand. So we're all really in entirely different regions of the world,

and we're going to talk about something today that is affecting every region of the world, the coronavirus pandemic.

You know, people have really lost their minds, in some cases, rightfully, in some cases, in the case of the U.S.,

you have all these people for some reason

buying endless reams of toilet paper, but what's interesting is to see the responses of different

governments. The Chinese government, where it's suspected, or at least it originally was suspected,

that the coronavirus pandemic began, although actually there are reasons

to be suspicious of that narrative now.

The Chinese government has successfully contained the outbreak.

Meanwhile, in the U.S., which is now the United States is now really the heart of the outbreak,

and in New York the cases are doubling by the outbreak, and in New York, the cases are

doubling by the day, and the U.S. government has not really taken the aggressive measures

that China took.

So today, we're going to put particular emphasis on what the response of China was, what

the response of the U.S. and France and other countries has been,

and also how these countries, especially the U.S., are using this as a kind of geopolitical weapon.

And Pepe just published an amazing article, which will link to in the show notes for this episode,

at the Asia Times, it's called China Locked in Hybrid War with US.

So Pepe, thanks so much for joining us.

I'll cut to you now.

...