"Dogs and Cats living together, mass hysteria!"

I broke a pin on one of my guns the other day and had to get it fixed. The guy at the gunshop on Saturday said to me, "Coronavirus is almost as good for business as Obama was!"

Yup, the world is crazy and we're all going to die. Sorry. But, before you kick the bucket, here are some books and other readings that might be helpful in passing the time in quarantine.

All joking aside, please stay home, stay safe, and help others as generously and as often as you (safely) can. God Bless.

World War Z is a good book and very different from the movie.

The Book of Basketball is huge, and now that there are a season's worth of podcast updates, it's a good time to revisit it.

For the real China nerd, this article claims to be a look at the various annual budgets for China. But this is really just a quick overview of the financial situation in China, more of a Q&A than a deep-dive into the budgets.

This piece from Canada goes into the details of the Confucian Institute contracts that are, secretive, manipulative, support the CCP, decrease academic freedom and transparency in the West, and should have never been signed in the first place. But since universities are run like shit, they have doubled the admin, doubled down on PC and social sciences, and generally gone after money over integrity, it should be really no surprise that this is where we are in "higher" education. Enjoy!

This is a short article discussing containment vs constraint. I've noted before that I don't like the idea of "containing" or even constraining" China--mostly because of the difficulty in defining what and who that really includes. What is "China?" The people? The CCP? The economy (and which parts of the economy)? I'd love to see both more access and engagement with China (people and econ) but I 100% understand that that also supports and encourages the CCP. I'm not sure where the line is and I don't like the trade war currently being waged, but I'm willing to say that at least it's something, which is better than nothing.

Another thing I don't know is how much Coronavirus will really change our daily and working worlds. Sure, we'll get better at teleconferencing and there will likely be a ton of new podcasts (stay-tuned, as soon as I get my dissertation defended I'm starting one too). But are we going to stop shaking hands or flying or going out to crowded places? Doubt it. Here are some really high-level predictions, not saying much really, but interesting to see how people think that the immediate future will be different because of this.

There are way too many people with way too many opinions on the current state of what's going on that will all either be wrong or yelling about something else next week. So I'm not going to add much to the cacophony of hysteria.

What I will end on is this: please be mindful of the info that you do share--the CCP is actively trying to take credit for saving the world and blame the US in the process. And anyone that is anti-Trump and/or Anti-US is buying into much of it. You don't have to like Trump to recognize that the CCP is evil and correcting their propaganda is not the same as supporting Trump (or any other leader that you don't like). The CCP is NOT China, is not Chinese, is not Chineseness, etc.