Trump 2.0 official thread

Wrought

Captain
Registered Member
View attachment 168009

Looking at ICE news made me wonder why does the average cop in the US look like this these days?

They dealing with mostly unarmed civilians and yet they are equipped with military gear designed to destroy an army.

Because it's legit military gear, the surplus of which was offloaded from GWOT to police departments.

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, such as the 1033 and 1122 programs, have provided billions of dollars in military equipment to police departments in the U.S. The 1033 program allows the Department of Defense to transfer military equipment to police for free. As of 2020, nearly 65% of the 18,000 law enforcement agencies have received equipment from this program. The 1122 program allows law enforcement to purchase military equipment with its “own funds” (taxpayers’ money) at the military discounted rate. Some of this equipment includes ammunition, weapons, and tactical armored vehicles.

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AlexYe

Junior Member
Registered Member
Looking at ICE news made me wonder why does the average cop in the US look like this these days?

They dealing with mostly unarmed civilians and yet they are equipped with military gear designed to destroy an army.
Its not a 'these days' thing, US has been a 'police state' since 2003, police/local enforcement budgets increased by 700-800%, Collectively US spends 450 billion a year on them, YES MORE THAN CHINA DOES on its entire defense budget, They have been buying all the surplus/extra military gear.
Meanwhile Crime has been low and trending lower since the historical high of late 80's-early 90's
Because it's legit military gear, the surplus of which was offloaded from GWOT to police departments.



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yes this
 

reservior dogs

Junior Member
Registered Member
I wanted to examine the real geopolitical impact of the Trump policy like kidnaping Maduro and taking Greenland.
All of this stem from the geopolitical competition with China. The reason that we have this competition in the first place is that the overall power of China has risen from insignificant outer fringe (think 1979) to parity with the U.S. Some would argue that China has already surpassed the U.S. in geopolitical power.

The reasons could be found both in China and in the U.S. Setting aside what the Chinese did right, the following are a few of the areas that I see the U.S. did wrong,

1. financialization of the economy means manufacturing is increasingly uncompetitive and drove out much of the manufacturing.
2. Allowing capital to dominate politics, which puts corporate interests ahead of national interests.
3. undisciplined native population that are increasingly unproductive due to the increasing wealth of the nation and a welfare system that did not hold recipients accountable.
4. Increasingly polarized politics that failed to compromise for the good of the country.
5. Politicians that will not do the right thing like balancing the budget.

So can any of these issues be addressed by Trump taking Greenland and kidnaping Maduro? For Latin America, the U.S. had a long history of meddling in their affairs back when we were a much stronger power. The end result is that we are still sending in troops in 2026. Many of these countries are corrupt and have very complicated political landscape. Unless we send in our troops to occupy the land, the vested interests of the ruling class will not budge much. Judging by the fact that Trump sent in Delta Forces in a grab and run operation, he had not intention of occupying the Venezuela. Add to the fact that no U.S. multinationals are willing to spend the money to go into Venezuela to get the oil, this operation has zero impact of geopolitical impact outside the election cycle.

For Greenland, many argued that there are minerals, key location etc. The fact is, it is a land covered by thick ice and likely remaining so for at least a decade, likely multiple decades. Given that in the most optimistic scenario, we are looking at someone can only start building ports and roads after a decade, there is no benefit to the U.S. for at least multiple decades.

Trump had squandered the goodwill of the U.S. for no real improvement of the U.S. strategic position, just to help himself with midterm election.

Despite all the slogans such as bringing back manufacturing to the U.S., I don't see any of the five structural issues I listed above being addressed by Trump in any meaningful way. In fact, it is getting worse under his watch(budget deficit, polarization, capital dominating politics). The Titanic is still headed to the iceberg. Trump, as all recent presidents before him, failed to address the key issues of our decline.
 

siegecrossbow

Field Marshall
Staff member
Super Moderator
I wanted to examine the real geopolitical impact of the Trump policy like kidnaping Maduro and taking Greenland.
All of this stem from the geopolitical competition with China. The reason that we have this competition in the first place is that the overall power of China has risen from insignificant outer fringe (think 1979) to parity with the U.S. Some would argue that China has already surpassed the U.S. in geopolitical power.

The reasons could be found both in China and in the U.S. Setting aside what the Chinese did right, the following are a few of the areas that I see the U.S. did wrong,

1. financialization of the economy means manufacturing is increasingly uncompetitive and drove out much of the manufacturing.
2. Allowing capital to dominate politics, which puts corporate interests ahead of national interests.
3. undisciplined native population that are increasingly unproductive due to the increasing wealth of the nation and a welfare system that did not hold recipients accountable.
4. Increasingly polarized politics that failed to compromise for the good of the country.
5. Politicians that will not do the right thing like balancing the budget.
By welfare system did you mean corporations/billionaires? Because if you are middle class or lower you can be one car accident away from the skidrow.
 

reservior dogs

Junior Member
Registered Member
By welfare system did you mean corporations/billionaires? Because if you are middle class or lower you can be one car accident away from the skidrow.
In general, I mean that people are not trying and are happy with doing nothing. Many of those born in rich and middle class families did less and less because they could (rich daddy). Those at the bottom of the ladder also failed to work because they did not have to (no accountability). As we speak, there are large number of young people in the rust belt and Appalachia that have become drug addicts right out of high school. The reason they can do that is because the welfare system provide help for those diagnosed with ADHD and pronounced as "handicapped" to the tune of $600 to $800 a month. By some informal survey, up to 50% of a give high school class in these heavily impacted areas are addicts.

Bath and Iron Works, one of our few shipyards that can make warships, are unable to replace their retiring skill labor like welders because the young are not stepping up to take their place. There are plenty of money to hire them, but they are not working.
 
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