Been watching Crash Course / playing it in the background recently. Just watched this one over dinner and I thought it was a good balanced view.
I certainly don't think of China as a paragon of virtue and if you ask me which country I may prefer for my country to associate with more closely, it will likely still be US over China.
But the US has been disappointing in many ways. I honestly think their politics is dysfunctional. I thought John Green put it accurately here - authoritarian states like China pander to the interest of the authoritarian, while democracies like the US pander to the needs of interest groups. And pandering to the needs of interest groups clearly can be just as much a problem if we look at the state of gun violence and influence of the National Rifle Association in US.
There are many problems with the US and we really shouldn't look to them as a model for what a country should be. While I'd prefer for us to associate more with the US than China, but I sooner rather our country be run like China than like the US. Preferably neither though. Something in between is good.
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