Generational Dynamics World View News

[Trevor]

Navigator, I disagree with the statement that Russia's still in a peacetime economy. Officially, they plan to spend 6.5% of GDP on the military this year, and between the security apparatus and unofficial spending, we're taking 10% of GDP or more. While Russia's not going full tilt like in the two world wars, they've at least partially geared their economy for war.

While I don't think Ukraine's going to win, they've done far better than was expected at the outset, when most analysts anticipated a Russian Desert Storm. The aid we gave then was geared toward and insurgency; on paper, that's exactly what should have happened. Instead, it's been almost two years and there's no end in sight. Contrary to hopes of Putin being replaced, the democratic opposition is mostly exiled, dead, or imprisoned. Despite the high chances of getting killed, there are still plenty of Russians in poverty willing to task the risk, not to mention conscripts that have no feasible way out.

How capable is China's military? Well, I don't think we're going to know for sure until the main event. I suspect their Navy isn't as impressive as it looks, and they lack the decades of experience on the seas that the US and our allies have; there's no shortcut for that. There's a difference between firing a ballistic missile on a "carrier" in the desert and hitting a moving target with ECM, multiple layers of missile defense, and aircraft to hunt down launchers.

The best way to cripple China, and what we'll probably do, is blockade them. This, more than anything else, finished Germany in the First World War. The CCP even refers to this as the "Malacca Dilemma." Look at how much damage the Houthis have done, with ships refusing to take the risk of sailing in the Red Sea. Between carriers, HIMARS rockets, and other methods, we'd cut them off from most of their oil, gas, and food.

Their only alternative would be Russia, and that swings the advantage in their partnership back. If I know you desperately need something, and have no other way to get it, this means I can gouge you as much as I want. I guarantee Putin will exploit that advantage any way he can. Even then, building the necessary infrastructure to replace all that oil and gas isn't a cheap or quick process. Given China's managed to turn almost all their neighbors into an enemy, XI isn't likely to have much choice.

[Guest]

How is the comment "obviously" commie agitprop?

DEI is a bigger threat to America's infrastructure than Chinese hackers. If power plants start exploding, it will more likely be the results of DEI than the mysterious hand of Beijing. Diversity is destroying us and depriving qualified Americans of jobs simply because they are white. DEI is destroying aviation and wrecking the airlines. When planes start falling out of the sky because their wings haven't been bolted on properly,. Will you blame China?Why must you see the hand of Moscow and Beijing everywhere?

So any pushback is directed by Beijing?

I can see attacking Cool Breeze and Butler, they are fundamentally anti-American (one being pro-Russian and pro-Putin, the other being a crazed SJW), but why is the previous poster a Chinese troll?

[FullMoon]

How is the comment "obviously" commie agitprop?

DEI is a bigger threat to America's infrastructure than Chinese hackers. If power plants start exploding, it will more likely be the results of DEI than the mysterious hand of Beijing. Diversity is destroying us and depriving qualified Americans of jobs simply because they are white. DEI is destroying aviation and wrecking the airlines. When planes start falling out of the sky because their wings haven't been bolted on properly,. Will you blame China?Why must you see the hand of Moscow and Beijing everywhere?

So any pushback is directed by Beijing?

I can see attacking Cool Breeze and Butler, they are fundamentally anti-American (one being pro-Russian and pro-Putin, the other being a crazed SJW), but why is the previous poster a Chinese troll?

As much as we might detest the current condition of our institutions, we're better off with something than nothing. I think the premise is that once a credible existential threat is recognized by everyone within the country, coalescence will occur in what has been termed regeneracy.

[FullMoon]

Their only alternative would be Russia, and that swings the advantage in their partnership back. If I know you desperately need something, and have no other way to get it, this means I can gouge you as much as I want. I guarantee Putin will exploit that advantage any way he can. Even then, building the necessary infrastructure to replace all that oil and gas isn't a cheap or quick process. Given China's managed to turn almost all their neighbors into an enemy, XI isn't likely to have much choice.

Unless he decides to take it rather than bargain for it. Maybe that's why he'd be happy to have Russia's arsenal depleted without sufficient rearmament. Gather strength before taking to the seas.

[Navigator]

Too bad there isn't any. Not even war with China would you unite us. The Latinos are a 5th column already. Don't believe me? Go on Telegram and read it for yourself.

Diversity interferes with ALL institutions doing their jobs. Instead of having the best firemen, brain surgeons, and pilots, we also need to worry about adding blacks and browns WHO WERE NOT HIRED WHEN COMPETENCE WAS THE ONLY CRITERION.

The big difference between the FBI and other jobs is that I want the FBI to be incompetent. The same is true of the social welfare bureaucracies, universities, and Left NGOs. I want those to be diverse to the point of collapse.

Laowhy on how the Commies are using social media and sites like these in the propaganda war. Because this comment is obviously Commie propaganda. Americans want an effective agency to fight against your Red asse(t)s.

https://youtu.be/ccDYvhVDCEQ?si=_k48dhz-ctqt4fpY

FBI has warned us that something is coming. They've already assigned blame and people will just assume who did it. This is probably a form of American propaganda but based upon facts. I hope the FBI can help us. God help us with what's coming.

https://apnews.com/article/fbi-china-es ... 2a34a99d4e
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/nation ... rcna136524
https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/chinas- ... =106815323
https://www.cnn.com/2024/01/31/politics ... index.html
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/chines ... ctor-warns

I appreciate having this kind of dialog again. For me, doing what I suggested about a week ago has made my experience here MUCH better. I log in right away and don't have to deal with the most outrageous stuff.

So a few notes here. I agree that hiring or promoting based on ANY criteria other than competence and accomplishment is a bad idea; whether it be based on race, elitism, cronyism, nepotism or whatever. ANYONE hired/promoted who isn't the most competent/skilled/accomplished is a bad idea. The environment dreamed of by MLK was one where race was not a factor. Having said that, the presumption that people ethnically different from ourselves are always less competent/accomplished is also wrong.

I do want the FBI and Law Enforcement to be effective. Even though plenty of people here say that "America is finished", that is far from the truth. The vast majority of us living here still enjoy the highest standards of life and liberty. Yes there are obvious cracks, and serious problems for the future, but the really bad stuff has not happened yet (it will eventually happen, just not yet).

Along the lines of China, I saw an interesting clip the other day of pro-Palestinian protesters hounding Nancy Pelosi. She told them to "go back to China" (or words to that effect). She is seeing the intel briefings. She, and the liberal left, know that most of the anti-US/Israel stuff is coming from China as a way to sow division in the USA. They know that Tik-Tok is basically a Chinese Propaganda weapon. Really scary in the Laowhy video is the high percentage of people now getting their news from TikTok.

[Navigator]

Navigator, I disagree with the statement that Russia's still in a peacetime economy. Officially, they plan to spend 6.5% of GDP on the military this year, and between the security apparatus and unofficial spending, we're taking 10% of GDP or more. While Russia's not going full tilt like in the two world wars, they've at least partially geared their economy for war.

While I don't think Ukraine's going to win, they've done far better than was expected at the outset, when most analysts anticipated a Russian Desert Storm. The aid we gave then was geared toward and insurgency; on paper, that's exactly what should have happened. Instead, it's been almost two years and there's no end in sight. Contrary to hopes of Putin being replaced, the democratic opposition is mostly exiled, dead, or imprisoned. Despite the high chances of getting killed, there are still plenty of Russians in poverty willing to task the risk, not to mention conscripts that have no feasible way out.

How capable is China's military? Well, I don't think we're going to know for sure until the main event. I suspect their Navy isn't as impressive as it looks, and they lack the decades of experience on the seas that the US and our allies have; there's no shortcut for that. There's a difference between firing a ballistic missile on a "carrier" in the desert and hitting a moving target with ECM, multiple layers of missile defense, and aircraft to hunt down launchers.

The best way to cripple China, and what we'll probably do, is blockade them. This, more than anything else, finished Germany in the First World War. The CCP even refers to this as the "Malacca Dilemma." Look at how much damage the Houthis have done, with ships refusing to take the risk of sailing in the Red Sea. Between carriers, HIMARS rockets, and other methods, we'd cut them off from most of their oil, gas, and food.

Their only alternative would be Russia, and that swings the advantage in their partnership back. If I know you desperately need something, and have no other way to get it, this means I can gouge you as much as I want. I guarantee Putin will exploit that advantage any way he can. Even then, building the necessary infrastructure to replace all that oil and gas isn't a cheap or quick process. Given China's managed to turn almost all their neighbors into an enemy, XI isn't likely to have much choice.

My point about Russia's economy is that I don't know why, given the situation they are in, that they have not FULLY (as in 1942 fully) converted to a wartime economy. Yes, they have drastically increased spending, but it hasn't been anywhere near enough.

I am glad Ukraine has done so well, but there are starting to be some serious problems. The infighting in the Ukraine leadership is worrisome (Zelensky about to fire his top General, who is well respected), as is the drop in Western support.

The Chinese military is not very good. It has no real operational experience, and has corruption problems. The problem for us is the mass numbers they will have, plus the industrial base that we built for them (while scrapping our own).

Yes, blockading China will have immediate impact, and will eventually doom them. But they will be betting that we will throw in the towel well before that causes internal revolution. As the FBI is warning, they are going to take down ALL of Western interconnected infrastructure in the hope that the West will give up when the encounter real life altering hardships.

Luckily for us, Russia built almost all the oil/gas pipelines to Europe rather than to China. But China will quickly end any and all civilian demands on such resources when they pull the trigger. Like 1917/18 Germany, it will take a couple of years of near starvation/deprivation for people to finally take matters into their own hands.

[DT Subscriber]

I do want the FBI and Law Enforcement to be effective. Even though plenty of people here say that "America is finished", that is far from the truth. The vast majority of us living here still enjoy the highest standards of life and liberty. Yes there are obvious cracks, and serious problems for the future, but the really bad stuff has not happened yet (it will eventually happen, just not yet).

Have to agree with you, Navigator on this point. America is faltering, but Europe, where I was born, is finished.

From the Daily Telegraph:

Europe is finished, condemned to death by its deluded, third-rate elites
The continent is incapable of recovering from its present economic, military and demographic crises

ALLISTER HEATH
31 January 2024 • 7:03pm

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, European Parliament President Roberta Metsola and France's President Emmanuel Macron
It’s time to mourn the demise of old Europe. The rot is too far gone, the decline too pronounced, the welfarism, decadence, pacifism and self-hatred too ingrained, the doom-loop unstoppable. Once the world’s richest, most advanced continent, Europe is finished, its humiliating fall all too obvious to the rest of the world, if not to deluded Europeans.

Its self-inflicted pathologies – catastrophic economic failure, near-total geopolitical irrelevance, a migration and integration crisis, and a gaping democratic deficit – have now metastasised. They have become too complex, too daunting for Europe’s third-rate elites even to consider tackling, and especially for the selfish, demagogic politicians who have presided with such insouciance over its social disintegration, “degrowth”, Potemkin militaries and appalling demographics. Germany, France, the Netherlands and elsewhere are on the brink of social explosion, with farmers the latest to have become radicalised.

Any young, ambitious European would be better off moving to America, especially anti-woke Florida or Texas. They will pay less tax. They will live better, happier, freer lives. They will be less likely to face total war. Their living standards will be drastically higher.

In the 248-year intra-Western contest between the US and Europe, there has been only one winner. America is also sick, as witnessed by its own social decay, the rise of the woke ideology and the preposterous rematch of the geriatrics between Donald Trump and Joe Biden. Yet unlike in Paris, Berlin, Rome or Brussels, enough remains of its capitalist spirit, its dynamism, its entrepreneurialism, its love of science, meritocracy and technology, to see it through its current troubles.

Europe’s greatest legacies to the world – capitalism, individual liberty, the rule of law and the “Western, Educated, Industrialised, Rich, and Democratic” (or “weird”) values so brilliantly described by Joseph Henrich of Harvard University – will live on in the US. But there is no way back for a European continent that has embraced nihilism, post-Christian paganism, illiberalism and the politics of envy, that believes that saving the planet requires shutting down successful industries and impoverishing its people, that cannot face down Islamist extremism and anti-Semitism, and that won’t reform its welfare state.

Even Brexit, the ultimate warning signal, failed to change anything. Europe’s ruling class dismissed the UK’s departure as an aberration, an own goal by self-harming British eccentrics, and doubled-down on its failed policies. It refused to listen to voters; no wonder their rage is becoming ever more combustible, inchoate and unfocused.

The EU population will peak at 453.3 million in two years’ time, then slump to 419.5 million by 2100, despite massive immigration, Eurostat predicts. The population will age drastically, driven by a collapse in the birth rate. Welfare states will implode, with taxes rocketing on the young to pay for healthcare and pensions for the old. The Euro-elites’ only answer, even more migration, will empower potentially dangerous extremists. In France, Germany, Belgium and elsewhere, the failure to integrate many recent migrants, and the ruling class’s answer – to lie that all is well – is paving the way for a cataclysm. The rise of Germany’s AfD should worry us all. The European elections will see gains for populists.

The gulf in living standards between America and Europe keeps on widening. In the final quarter of 2023, US GDP grew by an annualised 3.3 per cent; the Eurozone grew by zero per cent and the German economy shrank again. Putin’s invasion of Ukraine didn’t help, but Europe shouldn’t have become so dependent on Russian gas.

The continent’s high-tax, high regulation model has caused decades of under-performance, and now Emmanuel Macron, the EU and the Dutch and German governments are deliberately shutting down swathes of their agriculture to meet net-zero targets. The Germans are destroying their car industry, and Europe will import Chinese electric vehicles instead. Decades of “industrial strategy” and subsidies have failed to create a world-class European tech industry. The continent’s economic suicide is already triggering an exodus of the best and brightest.

Europe’s geopolitical irrelevance is equally striking. Its defence is being shouldered by long-suffering US taxpayers. The French are nowhere to be seen in the fight against the Houthis; its army is a shadow of its former self, and wouldn’t last long in a real war. The Poles and a few others are trying their best, but the German military is a joke, and all the great promises to rebuild European armies made in 2022 have meant nothing. The continent is almost completely demilitarised, lacks personnel and hardware, doesn’t have the capacity to produce more of the latter, has zero long-term answers to contain Putin and has done nothing to prepare for the possibility of a second Trump victory. It’s a disgrace.

It beggars belief that so many of the middle-class British Remainers and Rejoiners, who will help propel Labour to victory this year, are still so unfathomably ignorant about the true state of Europe’s economy and society. Blinded by anti-Tory hatred, obsessed by shiny TGVs and the memories of their pleasant holidays in southern Europe, they assume that things must – just must – be better in Europe.

Almost all Labour MPs privately believe that the solution to our own lack of growth is to rejoin the single market or customs union, even though these have failed to save Europe’s own economies. How can further increasing our ties with a zero-growth continent or a shrinking German economy do anything for Britain? It can’t. And how will the British Left respond to the rise of the far-Right in Europe? Will it still love Germany if the AfD is part of its government? Will it still love statist France if Marine le Pen is in the Elysee?

Britain is in an appalling state, but so is Europe. The Brexiteers’ Euro-pessimism has been vindicated; the problem is that the establishment refused to use Brexit to break with Brussels’ regulatory philosophy and to reorient our economy away from stagnant EU markets. Britain is therefore increasingly suffering from the same pathologies as Europe, and facing a similar terminal decline. This isn’t an argument for more EU, but one for even less, as well as radical domestic change. Europe’s gradual eclipse is accelerating, and it would be absurd for any British government to consider realigning the country with it.

P.S. I'm glad John is doing better.

[Optimus Prime]

I see that the Zeihans of the place haven't left.

It's interesting that people keep doubling down on US deep state propaganda. Just the way they like it.

Zelensky for the win!

[spottybrowncow]

I wasn't sure which thread to put this in, but I think this is as good as any.
I've long wondered why the Democrats are so in favor of mass illegal immigration, This finally explains it in terms even I can understand.
Highly recommended.

https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news ... t-accident

[Guest]

Demographic change financed by you, the tax payer.

Migrants are so awesome for the economy that it costs us $380 per day to house & feed them. That's $138,000 per year, more than most American families make per year.

The cost of a plane ticket to Mexico City is only $346, less than it costs us to house one of them for one solitary day.