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OT: American Politics

This really is the heart of the trade issue. The US wants to make all of our rules on everything. Any gross practice their corporate culture comes up with is to be forced on the rest of us or else there will be punishment. Fuck them.

Buy our chlorinated chicken if you want lower tariffs, Trump tells Britain

UK ban on American meat-processing practices accused of being part of ‘unfair treatment’
www.telegraph.co.uk

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CH1 said:
This is the Elon playbook.

If you’re not forced to immediately rehire 10% of those let go, you didn’t fire enough people
Click to expand...
It's another way to fire DEI hires and get more conservative white dudes cushy government jobs.
 
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From the Bulwark

We cannot overstate what has just happened. It took just 71 days for Donald Trump to wreck the American economy, mortally wound NATO, and destroy the American-led world order.

He did this with the enthusiastic support of the entire Republican party and conservative movement.

He did it with the support of a plurality of American voters.

He did not hide his intentions. He campaigned on them. He made them the central thrust of his election. He told Americans that he would betray our allies and give up our leadership position in the world.

There are only three possible explanations as to why Americans voted for this man:
  1. they wanted what he promised;
  2. they didn’t believe what he promised; or
  3. they didn’t understand what he promised.
Pick whichever rationale you want, because it doesn’t matter. Whatever the reason was, it exposed half of the electorate—the 77 million people who voted for Trump—as either fundamentally unserious, decadent, or weak.

And no empire can survive the degeneration of its people.
 
Also:

Vladimir Putin bet his life that American voters would be weak and decadent enough to return Donald Trump to the presidency. He was right.

Europeans are moving ahead with their own security plans because they realize, as a French minister put it, “We cannot leave the security of Europe in the hands of voters in Wisconsin every four years.” He was right.

The Canadian prime minister declared the age of American leadership over. He was right.

Instead of arguing with this reality, or denying it, we should face it.

It’s bad enough being a failing empire. Let’s not also be a delusional failing empire.
 
CH1 said:
From the Bulwark

We cannot overstate what has just happened. It took just 71 days for Donald Trump to wreck the American economy, mortally wound NATO, and destroy the American-led world order.

He did this with the enthusiastic support of the entire Republican party and conservative movement.

He did it with the support of a plurality of American voters.

He did not hide his intentions. He campaigned on them. He made them the central thrust of his election. He told Americans that he would betray our allies and give up our leadership position in the world.

There are only three possible explanations as to why Americans voted for this man:
  1. they wanted what he promised;
  2. they didn’t believe what he promised; or
  3. they didn’t understand what he promised.
Pick whichever rationale you want, because it doesn’t matter. Whatever the reason was, it exposed half of the electorate—the 77 million people who voted for Trump—as either fundamentally unserious, decadent, or weak.

And no empire can survive the degeneration of its people.
Click to expand...

100%

America as we've known it is cooked.
 
CH1 said:
Also:

Vladimir Putin bet his life that American voters would be weak and decadent enough to return Donald Trump to the presidency. He was right.

Europeans are moving ahead with their own security plans because they realize, as a French minister put it, “We cannot leave the security of Europe in the hands of voters in Wisconsin every four years.” He was right.

The Canadian prime minister declared the age of American leadership over. He was right.

Instead of arguing with this reality, or denying it, we should face it.

It’s bad enough being a failing empire. Let’s not also be a delusional failing empire.
Click to expand...

The key questions for me going forward, in order of importance are:

1) Is Europe up to the challenge of pulling the rest of the "western" world together in coalition. They also have a far right problem of their own, and I'd argue, politics that are more susceptible to bouts of temporary lunacy than the US system is. Are we going to be holding our breath every French and German election for the next forever? Russia is an animating existential threat now, but what about after it's collapse and defanging?

2) What actually is China, especially post Xi China? He's 71 yrs old, and despite his best efforts will not be here forever. Are they just a regional power whose expansionism is based solely on cultural factors? Or is the social cohesion stuff just cover fire for a military expansionist regime that hasn't stretched it's legs yet?

3) What does a Post Trump America look like? Has Trump let the authoritarian genie out of the bottle that the GOP has no interest in putting back in (I've argued for over a decade now that they've intended to move to a single party system like in China) or will this fuckshow wake enough of the country up that they're able to come back from the brink? Redemption tour America won't be blindly trusted the way Post WW2 America is, but it can still be a functioning western ally in most senses.
 
MindzEye said:
This really is the heart of the trade issue. The US wants to make all of our rules on everything. Any gross practice their corporate culture comes up with is to be forced on the rest of us or else there will be punishment. Fuck them.

Buy our chlorinated chicken if you want lower tariffs, Trump tells Britain

UK ban on American meat-processing practices accused of being part of ‘unfair treatment’
www.telegraph.co.uk

View attachment 25554
Click to expand...


Yep. In the same vein, something else that comes to mind is the Trump administration sending letters to companies throughout the EU demanding that they certify that they’ve scrapped any and all DEI initiatives.

There really is a subset of the absolute dumbest Americans who think that the rest of the world is obligated to follow whatever laws and regulations the USA comes up with. And are deeply offended when they find out that’s not the case.

Also like how Americans will often try to drive across the Canadian border carrying firearms, convinced that Canada must respect the 2nd amendment of the American constitution.
 
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