Miscellaneous News

supercat said:

Actually, one third of Americans also want to live overseas, despite that the American society is far less competitive than China's, and it's far easier to get more prosperous materialistically, such as owning a house and a car, in the U.S.

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

It gives me the vibe of all those articles, or even books, that talk about how China would splinter into 5 or more pieces. It's just wishful thinking and daydreaming, not worth the time to read.

Click to expand...

By what sources is it less competitive in USA?

As far as I know, if you're born poor in US you're more likely to stay poor than if you were born poor in China.

Chinese are on average more likely to get jobs where they don't need to live paycheck to paycheck. They can actually build up wealth not just by generational inheritance but by just saving up wages.

I will certainly give you that for the ultra rich, China is indeed way more competitive because it has more legal barriers, more restraints on how you can use your wealth etc.

US has high gdp per capita due to how many billionaires they have. If you put in a room 9 people with 1 dollar and 1 millionaire, their gdp per capita will be many times higher than a room where there's 10 people all with 100 dollars each. But I'd rather "compete" in a society that's like the 100 dollar room than like the 1 dollar room, if I'm not the millionaire.

Biased exclusive article by the shitty SCMP
Actual interview transcripts

supercat said:

Actually, one third of Americans also want to live overseas, despite that the American society is far less competitive than China's, and it's far easier to get more prosperous materialistically, such as owning a house and a car, in the U.S.

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

It gives me the vibe of all those articles, or even books, that talk about how China would splinter into 5 or more pieces. It's just wishful thinking and daydreaming, not worth the time to read.

Click to expand...

The irony of ironies if the nation that wishes upon others to be split into pieces ends up itself being splintered into pieces and its ashes scattered into the winds

canonicalsadhu said:

Record inflation + recession + lack of access to cheap energy from Russia + energy crisis + Biden's IRA to steal European industries to US + Ukraine's bottomless money pit + migration crisis + EU debt problems + endless internal EU divisions. Did I miss anything? EU's prospects look very bleak.

Click to expand...

2 biggest losers of the war is Ukraine and EU. Without access to cheap Russian gas, European industries won’t be able to compete with China. What does EU have without its industries?

A weaker EU means a weaker Western alliance against China. This war has accelerated the geopolitical power shift from West to East quite dramatically. West pushed Russia into China’s arms to form a strong Russia-China alliance. China now gets cheap Russian energy and reduce effect of naval blockade. Russia is too powerful for the US to ignore and fully concentrate on China. Russia-Iran alliance is growing too. This is more trouble for the US as Iran is now a big player that can’t be ignored. All the while China is doing deals with the Arab world.

American empire is under severe stress from all directions and they know it more than anyone else.

MixedReality said:

2 biggest losers of the war is Ukraine and EU. Without access to cheap Russian gas, European industries won’t be able to compete with China. What does EU have without its industries?

A weaker EU means a weaker Western alliance against China. This war has accelerated the geopolitical power shift from West to East quite dramatically. West pushed Russia into China’s arms to form a strong Russia-China alliance. China now gets cheap Russian energy and reduce effect of naval blockade. Russia is too powerful for the US to ignore and fully concentrate on China. Russia-Iran alliance is growing too. This is more trouble for the US as Iran is now a big player that can’t be ignored. All the while China is doing deals with the Arab world.

American empire is under severe stress from all directions and they know it more than anyone else.

Click to expand...

Bro excellent analysis it all boils down to

the Western way ( or mostly American) = Individual exceptionalism (zero sum game)

VS

The Chinese way= Collectivism (win win)

It's not ideological war BUT more of a Civilization or Culture war.

Bellum_Romanum said:

To be fair, America is better at integrating immigrants into their country compared to a lot of European countries.

Click to expand...

If that were the case, Trumpism would've never become a thing in America and there wouldn't be a need for spaces like this.

Granted, compared to Europe theoretically it is easier for outsiders to integrate into the American identity, since the latter is a nation of outsiders. Its strange for a newly arrived immigrant in Paris to proclaim themselves as much of a Frenchman compared to their neighbor who could trace his/her lineage back to the days of Charlemagne, but everyone's ancestor in America was at some point on a ship from a foreign land hoping for a better life. So in principle, anyone regardless of background can be an American as long as they work hard and obey the law.

That's if we lived in a perfect world, we don't however and many Americans think the identity of the country is categorically European White. And thus modern America is a place where nobody is satisfied. African Americans complain about still being at the receiving end of unfair treatment after 400 years in the country, immigrants including their offspring complain about being perpetual foreigners, White Americans hold all the power and yet moan about how all the non-White faces on the street make them feel like foreigners in their own country. Because the econonomy is still stable and there's still money to made, most prefer to keep these prejudices to themselves. But things are already tense despite that and its foolish to think it won't be exacerbated in the future as America gets less White.

MixedReality said:

2 biggest losers of the war is Ukraine and EU. Without access to cheap Russian gas, European industries won’t be able to compete with China. What does EU have without its industries?

A weaker EU means a weaker Western alliance against China. This war has accelerated the geopolitical power shift from West to East quite dramatically. West pushed Russia into China’s arms to form a strong Russia-China alliance. China now gets cheap Russian energy and reduce effect of naval blockade. Russia is too powerful for the US to ignore and fully concentrate on China. Russia-Iran alliance is growing too. This is more trouble for the US as Iran is now a big player that can’t be ignored. All the while China is doing deals with the Arab world.

American empire is under severe stress from all directions and they know it more than anyone else.

Click to expand...

The worst part is for the USA is that due to how the USA used that whole subsidy bill to basically strip the EU of its industries, it also does a giant number US/EU relations to the point where anti-Americanism is sell to rise at a time when the USA needs all the support it can get to take on China, now Taiwan, the nation that the USA wants to get into a fight is much less likely to start in out of hand and has also compromised the position of there puppet there. Let’s not forget that with much of the global south turning in the US which helps to cut off much of the resources that the USA would want to use ti unleash on China full force to keep their hegemony intact, the USA isn’t quite as secure as it might have been before.
But the one thing that should concern the USA right now is their utter lack of diplomacy and their ability to reign in Their Neo cons, I mean bragging about the destruction of Russias pipeline, attacks in their territory and of course their end goal as per Lindsay Graham has ensured that the USA has an enemy that is on the look out for any weak points to exploit to bring down the enemy and also China being on board as well due to also being a target of said speech. Really, any normal country would have striped that fool of this senate seat and put him in prison for that idiotic statement of his, but the USA obvious doesn’t have a normal state of mind. Should the USA end up having a horrible year next year, they should expect minimal help from Russia and China and the rest of the global south and more importantly an angry EU that might use whatever means to take back whatever industry they have and look for whatever ways they have to twist the knife. The USA has played much of their cards but in 2023-2024, we might finally see Russia and China and other players finally play their hands, this time with the intention to show Mr Graham that a regime change isn’t something the USA is immune too and if they are not careful, the States might not be United anymore

solarz said:

Let's not be unrealistic. All those people protesting in Europe aren't doing so out of boredom. The cost of living has increased quite significantly as a result of the war. It doesn't mean European society is going to collapse, at least not yet.

The price cap is a face saving measure by the Europe in order to continue buying Russian gas. Consider that the cap was set at 60$, only a small fraction below the 67$ Russia was selling to China. Russia has no objection to offloading excess gas that it was flaring anyway.

The real kicker is that the EU can forget about it's ambitions of being a superpower. Instead, it has revealed itself to be a mere puppet of American imperialism.

Click to expand...

I agree with all of this. There are and will be economic problems, the price cap is a farce, and the EU is declining fast as a global political player.

What I say is, Russian energy blackmail was not a trump card. People were talking about how we would freeze in winter. That wasn't going to happen.

BoraTas said:

I agree with all of this. There are and will be economic problems, the price cap is a farce, and the EU is declining fast as a global political player.

Click to expand...

Sir, it sadden me because the EU had the capability to be a 3rd bloc, they have the the tech, scientific know how and the financial might like the Euro to thrive in this new multipolar world. Maybe the American primary aim is to weakened and destroy the EU and the Russian and the Chinese threat are use as a ruse.

ansy1968 said:

Maybe the American primary aim is to weakened and destroy the EU and the Russian and the Chinese threat are use as a ruse.

Click to expand...

More like the backup plan. The main goal was to conquer and divide Russia into a dozen states, which the neocons are not privately hiding it anymore and saying it publicly. Europe share would have been cheap energy or free energy (debt, reparations etc). It’s just that their economic shock and awe campaign turned out to be a complete dud.

Basically, “The risk I took was calculated, but man, am I bad at math.”