Xi’s The Main Man Darin

Writing this blog in Shanghai, after my discussions with friends and business associates, during and after the close of the 19th Communist Party Congress, there is only one conclusion I can reach. The power President Xi Jinping has amassed is unprecedented.

I can’t help think of Bobby Darin’s song Mack the Knife. Darin was a stage name Bobby adopted from the word Mandarin that was adorning a Chinese restaurant he saw with the letters Man on the neon sign malfunctioning.

Xi Jinping is definitely the man of the hour. The Mandarin Man whose one man show at the Congress, starting with his three hour opening speech, managed to avoid those who wanted to knife him politically, and metaphorically speaking — he knifed.

His opening remarks declared that China had entered a “new era” with the ambitious goal of becoming a “global leader” by mid-century — a subject I have written about extensively in my Custom Maid for New World Disorder trilogy and Feasting Dragon, Starving Eagle. Words President Trump must keep in mind when he meets Xi next month in Beijing.

Xi’s governing philosophy titled “Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a new Era,” was added to the party constitution. The 2,300 delegates approved the amendment carrying the name of the country’s “core” leader. Let’s not forget that politics associated with leaders’ names is not limited to China. Thatcherism, Reaganomics, Obamacare and Trump…?

His future in the New World Disorder as China’s Main Man — with the same political status as Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping — is constitutionally enshrined.

Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao, Xi’s predecessors, had their philosophies included in the constitution but without their names and only when they retired.

Xi also managed to get two of his cherished programs written into the constitution: an anti-corruption campaign that has brought down 1.5 million corrupt officials (many were political adversaries) since 2012 and the Belt and Road Initiative — the massive global trade infrastructure project intended to increase China’s influence abroad.

What is worrisome is that his unprecedented power making him “China’s Chairman of everything” — except the Communist Party where he is just the Secretary — is that he may have sidelined two very important party institutions. Its system of ensuring orderly power succession, as no heir apparent has emerged and the “collective leadership” which has underpinned China’s relative political stability and economic boom since 1989.

The unanimous conclusion of my discussions was that Xi will probably continue to rule after his second five-year term that ends in 2022. The only question is with what title. This will not only create political backlash from the different elite party factions — but the public.

China and its Main Man are definitely living and leading in “interesting times,” a Chinese expression Trump must keep in mind as U.S.-China relations are a major factor in regional and global stability in our era of New World Disorder.