Jim Geraghty

CNN reports that people close to Vice President JD Vance say he “has given serious consideration to not running for president in 2028.” That’s just being wise, and taking the opportunity and risks seriously. A presidential campaign is a huge, life-altering endeavor, and he and Usha have kids aged 9, 6, 4, and a few months old. It is just about impossible to win the presidency if you are not 110 percent fully committed to the task. And by the standards of American politics, he’s got his whole life ahead of him; he turned 42 in August.

It may well be that the best time to run as a protectionist, noninterventionist, populist postliberal was… 2024.

If you had to describe JD Vance’s political philosophy in just a few words, those words would be protectionist, noninterventionist, populist, and he identifies himself as a member of the “postliberal right.” The presidential election for the 2032 cycle will begin in 2031, about five years from now. None of us can see the future with perfect clarity, and it’s hard to have a clear sense of the mood of the country in 2031-2032. But five years from now, do you think the country will be hungering for a Republican leader who is more protectionist, noninterventionist, populist, and postliberal than it is now? Or do you think that by then, the country’s mood and preferences will have moved on to something different?

About 80 percent of today's Morning Jolt is about "Pax Silica," a U.S.-led international working group to reduce the artificial intelligence supply chain dependency on communist China - what it aims to do, what it has done so far, and why this supply chain matters so much. It uses a recent comment by Greta Thunberg as a news hook. Naturally, I'm getting some "WHY ARE YOU WASTING TIME WRITING ABOUT GRETA THUNBERG" comments. (sigh)

Back in December, the U.S. State Department unveiled “Pax Silica” — an artificial intelligence supply-chain initiative, aiming to build a coalition of trusted partners to compete with China on the supply chains that make AI possible. The U.S. is partnering with Argentina, Australia, Chile, Costa Rica, El Salvador, the European Union, Finland, Germany, Greece, India, Israel, Italy, Japan, Kazakhstan, the Netherlands, Norway, Panama, Paraguay, the Philippines, Qatar, South Korea, Singapore, Sweden, the United Arab Emirates, and the United Kingdom. Taiwan is also in, but it’s listed separately as a “Non-Signatory Participant,” lest we run afoul of the One China policy.

Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg has joined calls to reject the US-led Pax Silica initiative. Expressing support for Filipinos protesting US President Donald Trump’s scheduled visit, Thunberg stressed that “labor, land and minerals should serve the people and the planet, not fuel the wars and ambitions of imperialist powers.” It’s like the rhetoric is on autopilot, isn’t it? “Wars and ambitions of imperialist powers” . . . Where’s her objection to the more than 1,000 AI datacenter facilities in China? Or the more than 40 rare earth research centers? Why isn’t she protesting all the Chinese rare earth mining and refining and processing going on?