Negative views on China continue to grow in the US

From here. I guess the opposite is also true

I got to the Pew Poll above thanks to  “Welcome to Cold War II” in Quillette. Looks to me like “unprecedented”  would describe the animosity shown China in today’s America. Also note the swing up in “unfavourable” is from Xi Jinping taking power 2012…

Meantime the new Chinese ambassador to the US, Qin Gang, claims that “China is not the Soviet Union”. I agree; it’s not. It’s more dangerous.  

To be fair to China, its people are way better off than Soviet citizens ever were - speaking from personal experience. 

My meaning of “dangerous” here is that China is a vastly stronger and more wily adversary than the Soviet Union ever was. 

I wonder: is Ambassador Qin is reviving Deng Xiaoping’s advice to “hide your strength and bide your time” a policy that Xi Jinping ditched a few years ago? I doubt it. But Qin’s comment is certainly in that tradition; play weak, play dead. It’s worked so well in the WTO and WHO where China’s contributions are set at levels of the poorest of “developing countries”, absurdly, vanishingly small for its size. Also, saying “we’re not the Soviet Union” might fool old Joe; you never know. If he can be fooled then that’s all the less hassle for Beijing, the less they have to spend time looking over their shoulder at the US and the more time they can spend spreading their suzerainty over the region.