The Gathering Storm Series: Part 9 – The Dragon’s Coin: Breaking the Dollar, Buying the World (750 words) by Michael Stevens
The Gathering Storm Series: Part 9 – The Dragon’s Coin: Breaking the Dollar, Buying the World Follow the Coin Empires do not rise with gunfire. They rise on coin. On trade. On control of what the world needs—and who gets it. That was the essence of mercantilism centuries ago. And…
The Gathering Storm Series: Part 8 – Rebuilding the Arsenal of Democracy (800 words) by Michael Stevens
The Gathering Storm Series: Part 8 – Rebuilding the Arsenal of DemocracyReading Time: 5–6 minutes A Time to Rebuild When tyrants rise, the free world must answer. In the 1940s, we rose from the shadows of a deep depression with a singular resolve: We turned our factories into fortresses and…
The Gathering Storm Series: Part 7 – The Dragon’s Fire: China’s Militarization and the New Pacific Front by Michael Stevens (750 words)
The Gathering Storm Series: Part 7 – The Dragon’s Fire: China’s Militarization and the New Pacific Front The Fire Ignites China no longer hides its ambitions behind trade deals or borrowed rhetoric. The dragon now breathes fire—across sea lanes, through satellites, and into sovereign airspace. What was once influence now…
The Gathering Storm Series: Part 6 – The Dragon’s Reach: China’s Global Coercion Tactics by Michael Stevens (825 words)
The Gathering Storm Series: Part 6 – The Dragon’s Reach: China’s Global Coercion Tactics Word Count: 800 | Reading Time: ~5 minutes Extending the Dragon’s Reach China’s grip no longer ends at its borders. It threads through embassies, satellite offices, academic exchanges, apps, and influence operations. Its ambition is global—not…
The Gathering Storm Series: Part 5 – The Dragon’s Mask by Michael Stevens (625 words)
The Gathering Storm Series: Part 5 – The Dragon’s Mask Word Count: 625| Reading Time: 4 minutes The Smile That Deceives China’s greatest export is not steel, nor silicon, nor clothing. Not even cheap items that many do not want or need, for that matter. Not to mention, the country…
The Gathering Storm Series: Part 4 – Digging Deeper into the Dragon’s Veins by Michael Stevens (950 words)
The Gathering Storm Series: Part 4 – Digging Deeper into the Dragon’s Veins Word Count: 900 | Reading Time: 5 minutes The Dragon Tightens Its Grip In April 2025, the Chinese Communist Party imposed export controls on seven rare earth elements. These materials—samarium, neodymium, dysprosium, and others—are unfamiliar to most…
The Gathering Storm Series: Part 3 – The Red Dragon’s Detour (460 words) by Michael Stevens (op ed)
The Gathering Storm Series: Part 3 – The Red Dragon’s Detour (Word Count: 445| Reading Time: 3 minutes) Beijing blinked. Tariffs are biting, and China is looking for a workaround. Not a trade deal. A disguise. As reported by The Wright Report, Chinese exporters are now offering licensing deals to…
“The Gathering Storm: Part 2 – China’s Economic Weakness Exposed & Why America Must Press On” by Michael Stevens (500 words)(op-ed)
The Gathering Storm: Part 2 – China’s Economic Weakness Exposed: Why America Must Press On by Michael Stevnes (Word Count: 501 | Estimated Reading Time: 2.5 minutes) The Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg are quietly reporting something extraordinary. Beijing has begun surveying its major companies with a simple but revealing…
The Gathering Storm: Part 1 – China, The Dragon in the Shadows (580 words) by Michael Stevens
At least 40 are dead and more than 1,000 injured after a catastrophic explosion at the port in Bandar Abbas, Iran—a violent flash in the night that too few will bother to connect to the larger threat building quietly across the globe. Reuters and The New York Times report that…
Bible Trundle: Jesus at Work: His Heavenly Ministry and Your Everyday Hope (900 words | 4 minute read)
Here is today’s Bible Trundle—a needed reminder that our salvation rests not on our grip on God, but on His unbreakable hold on us. The thoughts and Scripture references were drawn from today’s sermon by Pastor Barry Jeffries at Crestwood Baptist Church, for which I am deeply grateful. I have…