“The ‘West’s’ political economies are spent forces, incapable of either keeping up with China’s phenomenal domestic growth or of competing with China in what used to be called the Third World.”

December 23, 2018 "Information Clearing House" -    Donald Trump last week trotted out his war dog, National Security Advisor John Bolton, to growl and snarl  over China’s attempts to “gain a competitive advantage” in Africa through “predatory” practices that supposed include “bribes, opaque agreements, and the strategic use of debt to hold states in Africa captive” to Beijing’s global schemes.

Bolton gave his speech at the right-wing Heritage Foundation, a place that specializes in crafting social policies that appeal to white supremacist majorities within the U.S. domestic order. He could be confident that the Heritage audience knows little about the actual state of the world, holds facts in low regard, and gives less than a damn about Africa. There was no need for Bolton, the man with the comic mustache, to make sense with this crowd, so he didn’t even try.

The net effect of China’s investments in Africa, said the nonsensical Bolton, has been to “stunt” Africa’s economic growth. Only blocks away from the Heritage Foundation, in Washington, the staff and officers of the International Monetary Fund -- the guys that actually do hold much of Africa and the developing world “captive” with loan structures and political conditions that stunt the ability of governments to serve their people -- had quite a different assessment of China’s impact on the African continent, whose dramatic growth coincides with Beijing’s rise to number one investor.