US and China Agree to Settle All Disputes via Gift Basket Diplomacy Going Forward
Trade, security and technology talks are shelved indefinitely in favor of a rotating schedule of increasingly large parcels.
Following a state dinner heavy on toasts and light on outcomes, aides from both delegations confirmed that the two governments have quietly agreed to stop discussing anything of substance and instead resolve their differences through a standing gift exchange, to be renewed indefinitely.
Under the new arrangement, disagreements over tariffs, chips, and shipping lanes will no longer be raised in formal talks at all. Instead, each side will simply send a nicer box than the one it received the previous quarter, with the relationship considered stable as long as neither box arrives late.
"We came together as one dinner, divided," said a junior protocol officer who declined to be named, before hurrying off to inventory a crate of commemorative dishware. "Substance was on the agenda, but we ran out of time after the toasts."
Officials on both sides described the arrangement as a resounding success, noting that it has already produced more agreement than several years of working groups, chiefly on the question of whose gift was nicer. Neither side would confirm whether the underlying disputes still exist, only that they have been rescheduled indefinitely pending the next parcel.
At press time, a joint communiqué was reportedly in the process of being wrapped, rather than drafted.