4/27/2024

My Dear Friend & POTUS, JRB,

            I hope you enjoy tonight’s “glitz and gossip in celebration of the free press.” Do you have some jabs planned for Colin Jost?

            Please avoid making jokes about the student protests. The kiddos are serious! They know many eyes are on them & they’ve got the Presidents & Chancellors tied up in knots wondering whether to support their students or kowtow to alumni & boards.

            I like the idea of divesting in companies that sell weapons used against the people of Gaza so I’m quietly cheering for the protestors. I especially appreciated Avery Eddy’s quote in the G today that “the fight for a free Palestine is a fight for the imagination that other worlds are possible, & that injustice should not be accepted.”

            I respect the students’ right to break some rules to get their point across. I don’t approve of them actively harassing & threatening their peers but setting up tents to disrupt campus activities is what students have been doing for decades.

            Did you share my pleasure in seeing Sec. Blinken buying albums in Beijing? It’s great that he is modeling the power of people-to-people relations. I look forward to playing a Dou Wei tune in class next week to see how my Chinese students respond.

            Speaking of China, the execs at PowerChina must be nervous about the Arakan Army (AA) plans to take over Kyaukphyu. If the AA achieves their goal of regaining their ancestral lands, the pipelines that go from the Yunnan province to the Bay of Bengal will be up for grabs.           

VOA says that Kyaukphyu “gives China a way to import oil & gas that avoids the Malacca Strait between Malaysia & Indonesia, a potential chokepoint if a conflict were to break out between China & the US.” I found that last statement quite unsettling.

            Let’s keep up the people-to-people diplomacy with China to prevent armed conflict. WINTA!

            BYBS,