Should we be concerned for our future?
02-22-2022, 07:59 AM
#31
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: May 2021
Posts: 421
Originally Posted by rickair7777
It's not actually empire building, the idea is to maintain a world order that allows for economic freedom and prosperity. We have ideals about democracy and humanity too, but it's the economics that underpin that.
It's a legit debate as to whether we should save all that money, resign as global cop, let Europe and Asia fall to the usual suspects, and go full isolationist. Since we (second only to Australia) have the largest moat in the history of warfare we could be reasonably secure in fortress North America.
But the economic cost of isolation would actually be far more than the bill for global cop, and rather disruptive to many sectors of our economy too. That's why you don't see too many politicians trying to go there. They all understand that, even if many of their constituents don't. I do agree that many of our allies need to pony up their contractual share of the defense bill... we should stand with them, not prop them up.
But I think you'll get your wish with regard to UK... Uncle Vlad is smart enough to slow boil that problem without a 1939-style overt invasion and that will give western politicians just enough political wiggle room to avoid an armed confrontation. Note how he "recognized" the breakaway regionals... now that they're recognized independent states he can claim they have the authority to invite Russian forces in for "peacekeeping" purposes.
Also note how we've been pretty careful about which eastern states we let into NATO... that preserves Russia's ability to use force to influence their neighbors without triggering Article 5.
It's a legit debate as to whether we should save all that money, resign as global cop, let Europe and Asia fall to the usual suspects, and go full isolationist. Since we (second only to Australia) have the largest moat in the history of warfare we could be reasonably secure in fortress North America.
But the economic cost of isolation would actually be far more than the bill for global cop, and rather disruptive to many sectors of our economy too. That's why you don't see too many politicians trying to go there. They all understand that, even if many of their constituents don't. I do agree that many of our allies need to pony up their contractual share of the defense bill... we should stand with them, not prop them up.
But I think you'll get your wish with regard to UK... Uncle Vlad is smart enough to slow boil that problem without a 1939-style overt invasion and that will give western politicians just enough political wiggle room to avoid an armed confrontation. Note how he "recognized" the breakaway regionals... now that they're recognized independent states he can claim they have the authority to invite Russian forces in for "peacekeeping" purposes.
Also note how we've been pretty careful about which eastern states we let into NATO... that preserves Russia's ability to use force to influence their neighbors without triggering Article 5.
All the manufacturing the built up the middle class after WWII has been shipped to communist countries after we figured out, hey we can use slaves over there and just not say anything about it, so everything will be cheaper to make and we can sell it for more money. Now, all the people who would have had these manufacturing jobs that used to provide a comfortable middle class lifestyle with one person in the household working, are left with restaurant, grocery, housekeeping, etc industry jobs that don't pay enough to even rent an single apartment. To make things even better, the currency has been devalued to basically being worthless, and this inflation we're seeing now is probably just from the 20 years of war in the Middle East. The people who are going to deal with the covid inflation aren't even born yet. Unfortunately the part you make about ending the constant state of war being disruptive to the economy is accurate, and really sad that it's come down to that, and the endless defense spending is what's brought our currency down to the value of used toilet paper.
NATO is as good as dissolved, as it should be. The damn cold war ended over 30 years ago. The Europe needs the Russian gas, he'll just freeze them out in the winter if they want to fight. Vlad wins.
02-22-2022, 08:01 AM
#32
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Jul 2013
Posts: 10,067
Originally Posted by CincoDeMayo
Isolationism is a fun idea, until the problem shows up on your shores.
02-22-2022, 08:03 AM
#33
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Jul 2013
Posts: 10,067
Originally Posted by chihuahua
We can't even maintain order in our own country, look at the damn border. We played global cop in Vietnam to prevent the spread of communism, yet today, the communists exist in all of our major institutions, especially education, which is literally the worst outcome if you want to stop the spread of communism. And there are people who clearly support communist style policies to force those who disagree with them to acquiesce to whatever the party narrative at the time may be. Covid is the most obvious example of this. Funny how now that there is proof in data that all the covid dogma was mostly a lie, with the worst part being that we could have started treating people right away with cheap generic drugs given in the right doses, with doctors publishing specific protocols that they had used successfully, all the attention has suddenly been switched back to Russia Russia Russia.
All the manufacturing the built up the middle class after WWII has been shipped to communist countries after we figured out, hey we can use slaves over there and just not say anything about it, so everything will be cheaper to make and we can sell it for more money. Now, all the people who would have had these manufacturing jobs that used to provide a comfortable middle class lifestyle with one person in the household working, are left with restaurant, grocery, housekeeping, etc industry jobs that don't pay enough to even rent an single apartment. To make things even better, the currency has been devalued to basically being worthless, and this inflation we're seeing now is probably just from the 20 years of war in the Middle East. The people who are going to deal with the covid inflation aren't even born yet. Unfortunately the part you make about ending the constant state of war being disruptive to the economy is accurate, and really sad that it's come down to that, and the endless defense spending is what's brought our currency down to the value of used toilet paper.
NATO is as good as dissolved, as it should be. The damn cold war ended over 30 years ago. The Europe needs the Russian gas, he'll just freeze them out in the winter if they want to fight. Vlad wins.
All the manufacturing the built up the middle class after WWII has been shipped to communist countries after we figured out, hey we can use slaves over there and just not say anything about it, so everything will be cheaper to make and we can sell it for more money. Now, all the people who would have had these manufacturing jobs that used to provide a comfortable middle class lifestyle with one person in the household working, are left with restaurant, grocery, housekeeping, etc industry jobs that don't pay enough to even rent an single apartment. To make things even better, the currency has been devalued to basically being worthless, and this inflation we're seeing now is probably just from the 20 years of war in the Middle East. The people who are going to deal with the covid inflation aren't even born yet. Unfortunately the part you make about ending the constant state of war being disruptive to the economy is accurate, and really sad that it's come down to that, and the endless defense spending is what's brought our currency down to the value of used toilet paper.
NATO is as good as dissolved, as it should be. The damn cold war ended over 30 years ago. The Europe needs the Russian gas, he'll just freeze them out in the winter if they want to fight. Vlad wins.
02-22-2022, 08:07 AM
#34
Perennial Reserve
Joined APC: Jan 2018
Posts: 11,504
Originally Posted by CincoDeMayo
I do agree that Europe needs to do the heavy lifting on regional situations like this. The one thing that differs from 1940 is Europe has the power to squeeze financially without needing to use combat.
Germany, France, the UK, and Italy ALL have a higher GDP than Russia. H€||, Canada has a higher GDP than Russia. But Europe isn’t INTERESTED in paying the freight for their own defense when they’ve been able to get Uncle Sugar to do it for them for the last 75 years.
A few decades ago, France got 80% of their electric power from nuclear energy. Germany was something like 40%. Finances be damned, they are now energy dependent on Russia and wouldn’t get through next winter without it. And there aren’t enough LPG tankers in existence to replace the pipeline. Think we can supply Europe with coal by airlift ala The Berlin Airlift?
They made the CHOICE to become dependent on Russian natural gas, just like they made the choice to let their militaries wither away after the USSR dissolved. And the Ukraine started it’s independence with 170 ICBMs and 1700 nukes that they sold. You think that Russia would be threatening them now if they’d even kept a half dozen nukes?
Eventually we need to let the rest of the world take responsibility for the their own actions.
02-22-2022, 08:09 AM
#35
Strike averted!
Joined APC: Mar 2015
Position: B737
Posts: 3,645
How did the Germans invade Poland? They walked in backwards and said they were leaving.
Old joke, but it’s no joke when Russia suddenly may be knocking on Poland’s door. The next move is for Russia to state that Poland cannot be a member of NATO.
Poland is getting nervous.
Old joke, but it’s no joke when Russia suddenly may be knocking on Poland’s door. The next move is for Russia to state that Poland cannot be a member of NATO.
Poland is getting nervous.
02-22-2022, 08:18 AM
#36
It's 5 o'clock somewhere
Joined APC: Oct 2020
Posts: 1,853
Originally Posted by CBreezy
especially considering the interconnectedness of the global economy.
02-22-2022, 08:28 AM
#37
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: May 2021
Posts: 421
Originally Posted by Margaritaville
Have I accidentally flipped on NewsMax? Tucker? Is that you? Imaging flying a 4 day with this clown. Jesus.
It kills me how the right wing mass media has brainwashed my fellow conservatives into loving Russia and dictators like Putin. It's really too bad none of you lived through the Cold War and Reagan era. You'd realize Russia isn't our friend.
Have I accidentally flipped on NewsMax? Tucker? Is that you? Imaging flying a 4 day with this clown. Jesus.
It kills me how the right wing mass media has brainwashed my fellow conservatives into loving Russia and dictators like Putin. It's really too bad none of you lived through the Cold War and Reagan era. You'd realize Russia isn't our friend.
But instead of looking at Russia, lets look in the mirror for a second. Has the government, working with large corporations (fascism) not destroyed the lives of many Americans over the last two years over a virus that was was basically 100% survivable with mild symptoms, if you were anywhere close to healthy and forced people to take a pharmaceutical product that they may have not needed or wanted?
Did the government working with large corporations (fascism) not actively work to make the pandemic of that virus much worse by actively blocking cheap, generic treatments for covid that were actually used by doctors to treat those who did become very ill, and were given away for free in kits in many poor countries.
Did state and local tyrants around the country not violate the principles of due process and the Bill of Rights when they decided who should and shouldn't be able to make a living or even exercise their 1st Amendment rights to assembly?
You may not agree with me because you were afraid, but that doesn't make what I said un-true.
And then we have our friendly neighbors to the north whose legal system apparently allows them to freeze bank accounts of those who donated to a peaceful protest movement that burned down no buildings and destroyed no property, all without due process, all because the Prime Minister had the nasty blue collar folks that are in his servant class show up at this doorstep and demand to speak. That's ok I guess because that particular tyrant is "saving lives", just like Pfizer told him to.
We won't talk about the fact that the main reason that people should be forced to take Pfizers product is because it protects others, proved itself to be untrue basically right away (and the real scientists would tell you that this was never even something that could have been possible). It's all very Putinesqe, Stalinesque, Hitleresque, whoever you want to compare it to. They're all the same.
Maybe when we get our legal system and national conscience to say that everything that I stated above is not acceptable, then we can worry about democracy in other countries. But first, lets get our own house in order.
02-22-2022, 08:29 AM
#38
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Jul 2013
Posts: 10,067
Originally Posted by Excargodog
Except they’ve proven time and again that they won’t and after 30 years of underfunding their own military now can’t.
Germany, France, the UK, and Italy ALL have a higher GDP than Russia. H€||, Canada has a higher GDP than Russia. But Europe isn’t INTERESTED in paying the freight for their own defense when they’ve been able to get Uncle Sugar to do it for them for the last 75 years.
A few decades ago, France got 80% of their electric power from nuclear energy. Germany was something like 40%. Finances be damned, they are now energy dependent on Russia and wouldn’t get through next winter without it. And there aren’t enough LPG tankers in existence to replace the pipeline. Think we can supply Europe with coal by airlift ala The Berlin Airlift?
They made the CHOICE to become dependent on Russian natural gas, just like they made the choice to let their militaries wither away after the USSR dissolved. And the Ukraine started it’s independence with 170 ICBMs and 1700 nukes that they sold. You think that Russia would be threatening them now if they’d even kept a half dozen nukes?
Eventually we need to let the rest of the world take responsibility for the their own actions.
Germany, France, the UK, and Italy ALL have a higher GDP than Russia. H€||, Canada has a higher GDP than Russia. But Europe isn’t INTERESTED in paying the freight for their own defense when they’ve been able to get Uncle Sugar to do it for them for the last 75 years.
A few decades ago, France got 80% of their electric power from nuclear energy. Germany was something like 40%. Finances be damned, they are now energy dependent on Russia and wouldn’t get through next winter without it. And there aren’t enough LPG tankers in existence to replace the pipeline. Think we can supply Europe with coal by airlift ala The Berlin Airlift?
They made the CHOICE to become dependent on Russian natural gas, just like they made the choice to let their militaries wither away after the USSR dissolved. And the Ukraine started it’s independence with 170 ICBMs and 1700 nukes that they sold. You think that Russia would be threatening them now if they’d even kept a half dozen nukes?
Eventually we need to let the rest of the world take responsibility for the their own actions.
02-22-2022, 08:31 AM
#39
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Jul 2013
Posts: 10,067
Originally Posted by KirillTheThrill
I come back and it’s the Rachel Maddow’s vs the Tucker Carlson’s. Some of you are pushing the same junk you heard on MSNBC like puppets.
Jfc.
Jfc.
02-22-2022, 08:38 AM
#40
It's 5 o'clock somewhere
Joined APC: Oct 2020
Posts: 1,853
Originally Posted by chihuahua
We can't even maintain order in our own country, look at the damn border. We played global cop in Vietnam to prevent the spread of communism, yet today, the communists exist in all of our major institutions, especially education, which is literally the worst outcome if you want to stop the spread of communism. And there are people who clearly support communist style policies to force those who disagree with them to acquiesce to whatever the party narrative at the time may be. Covid is the most obvious example of this. Funny how now that there is proof in data that all the covid dogma was mostly a lie, with the worst part being that we could have started treating people right away with cheap generic drugs given in the right doses, with doctors publishing specific protocols that they had used successfully, all the attention has suddenly been switched back to Russia Russia Russia.
All the manufacturing the built up the middle class after WWII has been shipped to communist countries after we figured out, hey we can use slaves over there and just not say anything about it, so everything will be cheaper to make and we can sell it for more money. Now, all the people who would have had these manufacturing jobs that used to provide a comfortable middle class lifestyle with one person in the household working, are left with restaurant, grocery, housekeeping, etc industry jobs that don't pay enough to even rent an single apartment. To make things even better, the currency has been devalued to basically being worthless, and this inflation we're seeing now is probably just from the 20 years of war in the Middle East. The people who are going to deal with the covid inflation aren't even born yet. Unfortunately the part you make about ending the constant state of war being disruptive to the economy is accurate, and really sad that it's come down to that, and the endless defense spending is what's brought our currency down to the value of used toilet paper.
NATO is as good as dissolved, as it should be. The damn cold war ended over 30 years ago. The Europe needs the Russian gas, he'll just freeze them out in the winter if they want to fight. Vlad wins.
All the manufacturing the built up the middle class after WWII has been shipped to communist countries after we figured out, hey we can use slaves over there and just not say anything about it, so everything will be cheaper to make and we can sell it for more money. Now, all the people who would have had these manufacturing jobs that used to provide a comfortable middle class lifestyle with one person in the household working, are left with restaurant, grocery, housekeeping, etc industry jobs that don't pay enough to even rent an single apartment. To make things even better, the currency has been devalued to basically being worthless, and this inflation we're seeing now is probably just from the 20 years of war in the Middle East. The people who are going to deal with the covid inflation aren't even born yet. Unfortunately the part you make about ending the constant state of war being disruptive to the economy is accurate, and really sad that it's come down to that, and the endless defense spending is what's brought our currency down to the value of used toilet paper.
NATO is as good as dissolved, as it should be. The damn cold war ended over 30 years ago. The Europe needs the Russian gas, he'll just freeze them out in the winter if they want to fight. Vlad wins.
Originally Posted by chihuahua
I don't love Russia, or Putin. He is a tyrant.
But instead of looking at Russia, lets look in the mirror for a second. Has the government, working with large corporations (fascism) not destroyed the lives of many Americans over the last two years over a virus that was was basically 100% survivable with mild symptoms, if you were anywhere close to healthy and forced people to take a pharmaceutical product that they may have not needed or wanted?
Did the government working with large corporations (fascism) not actively work to make the pandemic of that virus much worse by actively blocking cheap, generic treatments for covid that were actually used by doctors to treat those who did become very ill, and were given away for free in kits in many poor countries.
Did state and local tyrants around the country not violate the principles of due process and the Bill of Rights when they decided who should and shouldn't be able to make a living or even exercise their 1st Amendment rights to assembly?
You may not agree with me because you were afraid, but that doesn't make what I said un-true.
And then we have our friendly neighbors to the north whose legal system apparently allows them to freeze bank accounts of those who donated to a peaceful protest movement that burned down no buildings and destroyed no property, all without due process, all because the Prime Minister had the nasty blue collar folks that are in his servant class show up at this doorstep and demand to speak. That's ok I guess because that particular tyrant is "saving lives", just like Pfizer told him to.
We won't talk about the fact that the main reason that people should be forced to take Pfizers product is because it protects others, proved itself to be untrue basically right away (and the real scientists would tell you that this was never even something that could have been possible). It's all very Putinesqe, Stalinesque, Hitleresque, whoever you want to compare it to. They're all the same.
Maybe when we get our legal system and national conscience to say that everything that I stated above is not acceptable, then we can worry about democracy in other countries. But first, lets get our own house in order.
But instead of looking at Russia, lets look in the mirror for a second. Has the government, working with large corporations (fascism) not destroyed the lives of many Americans over the last two years over a virus that was was basically 100% survivable with mild symptoms, if you were anywhere close to healthy and forced people to take a pharmaceutical product that they may have not needed or wanted?
Did the government working with large corporations (fascism) not actively work to make the pandemic of that virus much worse by actively blocking cheap, generic treatments for covid that were actually used by doctors to treat those who did become very ill, and were given away for free in kits in many poor countries.
Did state and local tyrants around the country not violate the principles of due process and the Bill of Rights when they decided who should and shouldn't be able to make a living or even exercise their 1st Amendment rights to assembly?
You may not agree with me because you were afraid, but that doesn't make what I said un-true.
And then we have our friendly neighbors to the north whose legal system apparently allows them to freeze bank accounts of those who donated to a peaceful protest movement that burned down no buildings and destroyed no property, all without due process, all because the Prime Minister had the nasty blue collar folks that are in his servant class show up at this doorstep and demand to speak. That's ok I guess because that particular tyrant is "saving lives", just like Pfizer told him to.
We won't talk about the fact that the main reason that people should be forced to take Pfizers product is because it protects others, proved itself to be untrue basically right away (and the real scientists would tell you that this was never even something that could have been possible). It's all very Putinesqe, Stalinesque, Hitleresque, whoever you want to compare it to. They're all the same.
Maybe when we get our legal system and national conscience to say that everything that I stated above is not acceptable, then we can worry about democracy in other countries. But first, lets get our own house in order.
Vietnam fell to commies but all of their surrounding countries except China and PRK did not. They would have. I'd call that a success even though the war itself was a failure.
There are many commies in the country. Mostly the younger Millennials and Zoomers who love AOC and Bernie and want free crap. They have absolutely no historical reference to what that means because they were coddled by their parents and went to schools that didn't have books. That generation is a problem and is going to willingly give away their freedom if they don't smarten up. hopefully they learn when they mature like the rest of us did. However with the exception of dingbat AOC and the squad, who are mostly ignored in Congress, they aren't in charge yet.
Covid wasn't fake. It was a real pandemic and a hell of a lot of people died. Stop with the conspiracy covid cures. Even ivermectin was shown to be internet quackery. The problem was we let it become a political battle that both sides dug in determined to win. It got sucked into the culture wars. The mask crap should have ended when the vaccines came out. Now they are legislating fear.Calling it communism is a stretch. What is communism is the fact that I can't go to the grocery store and buy what I want because they are out of things like coffee creamer. Reminds me of the bread lines in the late stage USSR. The government is constraining the supply chain now with the covid crap that should have ended last year.
Then you go off into a rant about offshoring. I somewhat agree with you but you act like that started when dems took over at Obama's election. Mills were closing in NC back in the 60s. What you're seeing with offshoring is unbridled capitalism at its finest. when you give mega corporations free rein to do whatever they want, they will screw the people over every time. They answer to their shareholders not the consumers to workers. There is an opposite extreme of communism and it's capitalism. And isms aren't good. None of that is germane to this discussion however. It has nothing to do with the Russia crisis. Fact is major oil companies quit fracking (domestic oil supply) because it's a very expensive way to get oil out of the ground and doesn't pay unless oil is above $100bbl. Watch those pumps start pumping again. We can definitely pump our way out of this oil crisis like we did in 2008.
NATO can't be dissolved. That's stupid. again, you have no historical reference. If there was no NATO the iron curtain would have been the western shore of Europe (do you even know what the Iron curtain is?). Even today it stands as a barrier to Russian aggression. It's a line in the sand not to cross. Putin isn't stupid and he doesn't want WWIII. NATO is the only thing preventing that. He knows if he invades a NATO country it's on like Donkey Kong (bet you're too young to know what that means too).
As for Canada I don't give a damn what they do. Its a free country and an ally. That's the Canadian people's problem. Good to see they are rising up.
I really think you need to turn off cable news and crack a book. You're embarrassing yourself and your embarrassing us, your fellow conservatives.
Thread
Thread Starter
Forum
Replies
Last Post
