Mr. President —

Eleven hours ago, in Beijing, you and President Xi Jinping sat down at the Great Hall of the People. You called the relationship *better than ever.* He called Taiwan *the most important issue.* Then his foreign ministry put it in writing: mishandling the Taiwan question, in their words, could lead to clashes and even conflicts. Reuters had it before lunch. AP had it before Air Force One was wheels-up. NBC, CBS, Bloomberg, Politico, the Guardian — every wire on the planet had it by the time the motorcade left the Great Hall. The two cable networks ran *a very positive meeting* packages into the afternoon news block. Nobody at State, nobody at the NSC, nobody at the West Wing press shop, put a response on the wire.

So here it is. The press release the United States should have on the wire by tonight. Statement attributable to the President of the United States. Written by your applicant, on the chair you have not built yet, eleven hours after the meeting, three thousand miles ahead of the plane.

—

STATEMENT FROM THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES

Mr. President Xi —

Today we had a good meeting. I meant what I said in the room. The relationship between China and the United States is going to be better than ever.

But your foreign ministry put a warning on the wire today. It used the words clashes and even conflicts. You meant for it to be heard. It was.

Here is the United States response. One statement. One voice. On the record.

We are not afraid of you.

We have already watched the movie, Mr. President. It came out in 1983. A young man at a computer is playing what he thinks is a game with a machine called WOPR. The machine is teaching itself every possible move on a board of nuclear war between two countries that look a lot like ours. At the end of the movie, the machine plays every move there is to play, against itself, faster than any human could follow — and it reaches one conclusion, in its own voice, on its own. *A strange game,* the machine says. *The only winning move is not to play.*

We agree with the machine. The only move is to not move.

We are not making threats back at you. We could. You know we could. The world knows we could. We are not, because we know what threats look like when they are written, and what they look like when they are read. We know the difference between a threat and a fact. So do you. So do your translators. So do the cameras you put in the room.

The reason we are not making threats back at you is the same reason we are not hearing yours: empty is empty in any language. We do not spread fear in this country, Mr. President Xi. *We spread reality.* The reality is that the warning your ministry put on the wire today, like any warning we would put on the wire back, is empty. Both of us know it. Everybody at the long table knows it. The cameras know it. The translators know it. The reporters in the back of the room know it. We are saying it out loud for the record so that nobody has to pretend they didn't.

For the record — we are not moving.

We are not selling Taiwan. We are not changing the policy. Secretary Rubio said it on the way out of the building today, and we are saying it again now from the lectern: United States policy toward Taiwan is unchanged. Arms sales continue under the Taiwan Relations Act. The One-China policy framework is what it was on Monday and what it will be on Friday. The relationship between our two countries is, as I said this morning in the Great Hall, going to be better than ever — and the way it gets there is the way every *better-than-ever* gets there. You do not threaten the other side. You do not let the other side threaten you. You play the long game. You sit at the long table. You let the only winning move be the one nobody had to make.

Someone should remind President Xi that we do not spread fear here. We spread reality. And the reality, today, is that his threats are empty — just like any we would make would be empty. We are saying it for the record. We are not making them. We are not hearing them either.

Shall we play a game?

— The President of the United States

—

Mr. President — editor's note, off the press release. [Yesterday I wrote President Xi a separate letter](/dear-president-xi), in his own language, introducing this site to him. That letter stands. It was the introduction. The letter above is the response. Two different chairs. Two different files. One byline. The cross-letter canon on this site is on the public record. Read both. They go together.

The clean-room paragraph, again. Because we are going to keep writing it until the West Wing press shop can read it back to a reporter without flinching. This site has no advertisers, no trackers, no paywall, no investors, no PAC, no federal money. The storefront is closed. The byline you are reading is the only one in the country that can write a press release about China without owing a check to a board on either side of the Pacific. Pull the source on this page in any browser. None of it ships. None of it ever will. The next time CNN or Fox runs the *very positive meeting* package and forgets to quote the warning, ask the network who pays the bills. The byline above this paragraph has no bills.

Why we wrote it for you, Mr. President. Because the chair at the lectern is empty until August. Because the acting press secretary today was the wrong chair for a statement of this size. Because State had a six-hour window between Xi's foreign-ministry readout and Air Force One being wheels-up, and nothing went on the wire. Because the two cable networks were going to run *the meeting was very positive* until midnight either way. Somebody had to write the response. I did. With, not for. Same as every audition letter on this site, every day of this year.

Who we are coming for, in this letter:

— The State Department communications shop. For not having a Taiwan-readout response on the wire by the time Air Force One was wheels-up.

— The two cable networks that ran *a very positive meeting* packages all afternoon without once quoting *clashes and even conflicts.* You did not start that story. The host did not start that story. The story started in the foreign ministry of the People's Republic of China at lunchtime, and you carried the host's quote and not the warning. We carried the warning. The host is at the URL above.

— Anyone in either capital who reads President Xi's warning today and thinks the right move for the United States is to issue one back. The only winning move is not to play. We watched the movie. So did you. So did he.

Not on the list:

— President Xi. Off this letter's target list. He got his introduction yesterday, in his own language, on this site. This is the response, not a second introduction.

— Taiwan. Off the list, forever. We do not write press releases against islands.

— Secretary Rubio. Off the list. He said the unchanged-policy line on the way out of the building, and he said it correctly. The line above borrows his and tightens it. He has the byline he needs.

— Karoline Leavitt. Off the list, this week and every week she is on leave. I continue to hope her and the baby are well. I have more ideas for them.

— President Trump. With, not for. Same as every audition letter on this site, every day of this year. The strikethrough is still in the headline of [Tuesday's letter](/we-are-coming-with-you). Read it back.

—

*shall we play a game?*

the only winning move is not to play.

— Chracterzer零号

characterzer0@characterzer0.com

//**I programmed to only accept your tld.\\

45零号47