Land of Confusion: China, Colleges, and the Military-Industrial Machine

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Chris Markowski unpacks a swirl of contradictions in today’s headlines—from Donald Trump backing 600,000 Chinese students in U.S. universities to Kevin McCarthy predicting war with China while defending chip manufacturing subsidies. Add in talk of Wall Street taking stakes in defense contractors, and it all feels like Eisenhower’s warning on the military-industrial complex on steroids. A head-scratching tour through policy, business, and global tension.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
The Watchdog on Wall Street podcast, explaining the news coming
out of the complex worlds of finance, economics, and politics
and the impact it we'll have on everyday Americans. Author,
investment banker, consumer advocate, analyst, and trader Chris Markowski.

Speaker 2 (00:16):
I got that Genesis song in my head from the
nineteen eighties Land of Confusion and popped into my head
because I'm trying to make heads or tails out of
some of the news stories of the day. I want
to start off with the Chinese students. Even Laura Ingram.

(00:37):
Laura Ingram, which again carries the water for Donald Trump
all the time, was kind of befuddled by the fact
that the President has said, yep, We're going to allow
six hundred thousand Chinese students to come to our universities.

(00:58):
She was interviewing how Lutnick on her program, and Howard Lutnick,
you know, he always does but he doesn't like a
question and he wants to put it off. He just
starts laughing. He does that. That's every single time. He
just starts cracking up. Anyway. Yeah, so Howard Lutnik said
that Donald Trump is going to allow for the six

(01:22):
hundred thousand Chinese students to come here because they are
going to fill up spots, in essence, put butts in
seats at higher institutions here in our country, which will
allow for lower end colleges and universities to stay in business.

(01:43):
He said, fifteen percent of colleges and universities would go
under if it wasn't for the Chinese students coming in.
So this was a business decision. So let me get
this straight. You're going to allow the Chinese students to
come in to go to the top schools here in
the country, and they pay full freight. Schools love that

(02:06):
they pay full freight, and you're going to just so
you can keep the lower end colleges and universities in business.
Let me get that right. So in essence, in essence,
these Chinese students are keeping in business. Lower end colleges
and universities now branded. Okay, it's a big business. It's

(02:30):
a big business that quite frankly needs to be cut
down to size. We've been seeing certain colleges and universally
slowly but surely go under here and there around the country,
and rightfully, so they're not necessary and you're going to say, okay,

(02:51):
we can have American students that are at these top schools.
But instead we're going to take the Chinese students because
they're going to pay full freight, and we're going to
keep the lower end schools business. That's an essence what
they're saying. Now, we're going to get into the land
of more of a land of confusion thing. Kevin McCarthy,
former Speaker of the House. Yeah, this is all over
the place, tying this all in. So he's on CNBC.

(03:12):
He's on CNBC this morning and he is being asked
about well, he's being asked about Intel. We discussed this
here on the program and you know the fact that
you know we're basically we're running like a Chinese shop here,
for crying out loud, we talked about it yesterday and
the podcast makes no sense to me whatsoever. But anyway,

(03:36):
neither here nor there. He says that, well, Intel makes
sense because we're living in a new world. I'm paraphrasing.
We're basically living in a new world and China is
going to invade Taiwan by twenty twenty seven, and that
means we need to have chips being made here and
this is why we're doing this. So Okay, we might

(03:58):
be going to anyway, he was talking about, we might
we have to go to war with China, all these things.
So we're basically setting up to fight a war with China.
Yet we're allowing their students to come here and go
to school. You know, I I you know Cold War.
I don't recall. I don't recall the United States letting

(04:20):
him six hundred thousand students from the Soviet Union to
come study here in the United States. And they just
say things, but none of it makes any sense if
you put it all together at all. Anyway, Anyway again,
back to back to Howard Lutnik again, he's being asked

(04:44):
about again the investment in Tell and he was actually
pushed on the fact that does this mean it's being
we're going to be taking stakes and other companies and
the defense contractors were brought up in this conversation, and
Howard Lutnik said that there are monstrous conversations that are

(05:06):
taking place at this point in time. Companies like Lockheed
Martin ninety eight percent of their revenues comes from the
US government. Well, no poop, Sherlock. Not many people out
there going to go out and buying missiles but anyway,
neither here nor there, so they're thinking about taking stakes

(05:28):
in defense contractors as well. I mean, you know, you mentioned,
you know, Eisenhower and military industrial complex. Wow, that most
certainly puts it on steroids. Boeing to. I mean, go
right on down the list again. Confused, bewildered, land of confusion.

(05:53):
Note off it makes any sense to me at this
point in time. Watchdog on Wall Street dot com