Amen

When even Piers Morgan changes his tune... :chin:

@ssu told you so but since you're the only one capable of changing his mind I won't bother tagging anyone else. I'm sure you already shifted your position in the meantime but I've been ignoring this thread in favour of my blood pressure so have no clue where the discussion stands.

No. Every wasted word, wastes computing power which wastes energy.

Minerals deal signed. Another stupid and disastrous move by the clown train. But they sure do make idiotic decisions quickly. That counts for something. — Mikie

Why is it an idiotic decision? On the face of it, it seems favourable to the US. In fact, there's now (unfortunately) a framework under which Ukraine can more easily sell off part of its interest in exchange for continued support each time it's threatened to be taken away. Renewed support from the US will also deflate European will to improve military cooperation, making it unlikely that it will be an independent power in a future multipolar world, thereby ensuring the US only has to compete with China, with the EU condemned in a role of continued support for the US. Before the century is over, the EU will provide the US the same cover as we currently do for Israel.

it shouldn't make a difference because it should be about responsibility and not incompetence.

What does? — Vera Mont

It's not relevant for the critique itself, is it? But Marxism, Communitarianism, Arendt's action theory. Possibly others.

Who does this interrogation of whom before what power can consolidate, and how, without prediction, can anyone - everyone? - do this? Attempts have been made, based on warning signs and predictions but the collective responsibility was unresponsive. Liberalism fails because it lacks the vocabulary of fear and loathing. — Vera Mont

You pick at what you think you disagree with or where you think there's no alternative as if it invalidates the critique. Do you want a combative discussion or do you want to understand what I'm trying to relay? Liberalism fails because it assumes a concept of an atomistic human that never existed, assumes voluntarism because it conceptually only deals with freedom as non-interference and is procedural and formalistic in its approach to justice. It's conceptually an inhuman. In short, it's a political theory for machines, and it's no wonder most of us are reduced to cogs in a self perpetuating machinery no longer capable of questioning itself or to derive meaning from anything else but to consume.

Individualism resists, for instance, redistributive justice. Once power consolidates it can only react to discrete violations but it does not allow redistributing power that enables such violations in the first place. It does not enforce democratic decision making where it matters most in capitalist society because it is stuck in a formal conception of justice. I mean top-down led companies, the economic system that favours capital over labour and gives little to no choice to the latter. I mean externalising everything and having no tools unless rights are violated. The only solution it can seek is turning everything into a market, so we can assign rights to it so it can react to new discrete violations but it cannot deal with the underlying structures causing these issues in the first place and it has no concept of the rape it causes to what it means to be human by reducing everything to something that can be subjected to capitalist forces.

Democritising all socio-economic human activity and decentralising decision making are conceptually the easiest paths forward. What is shared decision making if not a preventative measure to avoid one or a few voices drown out others? What is shared ownership if not a preventative measure to avoid one or a few own most of everything? Sharing is caring!

But of course there are alternatives to Marxism. Liberal government is one such alternative! OSHA is an example of a peaceful political change to accommodate the then extant problems with industrialization. — NotAristotle

Oh oh, can I play? Of course, there's are alternatives to liberalism. Marxism is one such alternative!

Come on man.

Predicting a rights violation before it happens would be great, if you have any recommendations of how we can do this, I am all ears. But really I think this kind of predictive ability is not beyond only liberal governments, but any government that does not have a crystal ball or precogs or something like that. — NotAristotle

Did I say anything about prediction? No.

Also,

Freedom of speech is a qualified right in the US and probably in most liberal countries. It's true that the qualification isn't explicitly liberal, but it is within a framework that is largely liberal, and by that I mean freedom of speech is protected extensively.

Your concerns about collective power and algorithmic control will turn out to be true If you ignore successful lawsuits against companies like Facebook as well as lawsuits initiated by the United States government for anti-trust violations.

Regarding gene appropriation, have you heard of the case of Myriad Genetics vs. Association for Molecular Pathology?

I would say these can be seen as cases involving rectification of rights infringements, which is a core liberal value. — NotAristotle

I'm sorry but I think you're missing my point. You're right that liberal legal frameworks have mechanisms for redressing individual rights violations such as anti-trust actions, IP disputes and speech protections included. But my concern is whether liberalism has the conceptual tools to address systemic and structural power before harm is framed as a rights violation. It does not.

Cases like Myriad Genetics or anti-trust suits arise after monopolistic or extractive power has already accumulated. The system reacts retroactively, and often only when there's clear legal precedent. It still treats the issue as an anomaly, not a symptom of broader structural dynamics.

What’s missing is a vocabulary for preventative, collective responsibility; a way to interrogate power before it consolidates, and beyond the frame of discrete violations. That’s the conceptual gap I think liberalism completely and utterly fails to fill.

As to your request for suggestions. No one ever requires that when they critique Marxist thinking. "Oh, you can't just be critical, you must have a recommendation!" because most everybody lives within the assumption Marxism is wrong. I don't accept the burden. Especially when plenty of writers have already been mentioned in this thread who offer alternatives. You are coaxed to read them instead of perusing my (invariably incorrect and incomplete) second hand translations of them!

For the Liberal Champions in this thread; I think you're wrong. :wink:

Liberalism is poorly equipped to deal with structural and systemic problems that arise in modern societies. It was great as an idea to fend off autocratic and feudal power when it was originally conceived. But it lacks vocabulary. Its core vocabulary assumes a world of discrete individuals, neutral institutions and voluntary agreements. As a result, it lacks the concepts necessary to address power that operates indirectly, structurally or collectively.

Just take the infantile discussions around deplatforming. Bleeding heart liberalism defending freedom of speech and association, crying that deplatforming someone is a form of censorship. But this framing assumes everyone begins from an equal position and are merely removed from a shared space. It ignores the deeper structural questions: who gets platformed in the first place, and why? Which voices are boosted by algorithmic design and which are filtered out long before a ban enters the picture? These are not merely questions of personal liberty but of infrastructural power, design logic and market control. Liberalism has very little to say about any of this.

The same is true for economic concentration. A company like Google or Facebook may have been built through freely entered contracts, investments and user agreements. No rights have been explicitly violated. Yet these companies exert enormous influence over public discourse, access to knowledge and the contours of civic life. Liberalism sees this as the exercise of legitimate freedom rather than as the emergence of de facto private sovereignty. Because the framework is based on rights and voluntary choice, it struggles to see how power can aggregate without formal coercion. (But Power is everywhere).

The issue is not that liberalism ignores power, but that it understands it legally, as something visible in courts and codified in laws. Systemic power, whether economic, algorithmic, cultural or infrastructural, does not fit into its grammar. Liberalism has tools for punishing individual bad actors and... that's it. It can address discrimination by outlawing specific actions but falters when inequality results from patterns that no one individually chose. The assumption is that as long as rules are fair and procedures are followed, outcomes are legitimate. This leads to a kind of blindness where injustice is only visible when it breaks the rules, not when it is produced by the rules themselves.

Liberalism’s emphasis on rights also tends to obscure the role of duties. If rights are powers granted through the mutual structure of society, they ought to imply obligations to that structure. But liberal theory tends to treat duties as secondary or voluntary. Civic responsibility is something you may take on, not something that defines you. The result is a moral and political culture where everyone is entitled and few feel responsible, where freedom is understood as non-interference rather than shared self-governance.

This inability to think structurally extends to economic questions. Capitalism requires constant expansion to survive. It presupposes growth through surplus value, enforced by competition and credit systems. This leads to overproduction, ecological degradation and manufactured demand. Consumerism is not the disease but the symptom. It is how the system copes with saturation. But liberalism, because it treats market participation as freedom, tends to see consumption as a matter of taste, not necessity. As long as no one is forced, the system appears fair. The cumulative impact on labor, the environment and society, is something it cannot grapple with other than infringement of rights (and even then it cannot handle future generations which have no rights).

Even in areas like education, healthcare and water access, liberalism’s instinct is to see goods as optional and their distribution as a matter of individual choice. When these goods are commodified or enclosed, when water is bottled and sold, when care work is commercialised, when genetic information is patented, liberalism cannot object. These are seen as legitimate exercises of property rights and freedom of enterprise. The fact that these markets systematically exclude and exploit is not, by itself, grounds for concern unless someone’s rights are violated.

In all these cases, liberalism lacks the tools to understand systemic harm or the unfreedom of "choice" in capitalist society. This is not a call to discard freedom but understanding it as embedded in society instead of removed from it. For me, freedom and therefore the protection of most liberal "values" is about maximising democracy in every facet of socio-economic interaction and decentralising decision making as much as possible.

I've given you plenty of suggestions. You're just refusing to read them, apparently. — Tzeentch

No, I haven't seen any suggestions beyond the "pivot to China" which in and of itself means nothing. I've asked you for policies; I got nothing. If people criticise your teet-weening point on Russia, it's "no, it's a long game". When I just decisively explained there's no long game through trade wars, I get, well, nothing.

Who do I trust? Benkei, who thinks the governing body of the world's most powerful nation is stupid, or the people who put in an effort to understand what's actually going on? — Tzeentch

It's not about trust. Maybe try to read my post and understand the actual arguments in it and just perhaps, maybe, learn a thing or two about economics?

Your argumentation means nothing to me if at the end of the day all you're doing is calling the White House stupid. — Tzeentch

Why? What's it to you I call them stupid? I call them stupid for very clear reasons, reasons I have regularly articulated founded on arguments. Arguments you have not addressed.

I don't feel one way or the other about the article. But it's clear to me that the situation is scarcely as cut and dry as you pretended. — Tzeentch

You should. I've given you three very good reasons not to like it.

On the contrary, I am actively hypothesizing possible reasons for the things we see, while the rest of the forum cannot seem to produce anything beyond "it's stupid". — Tzeentch

I've not seen a working hypothesis from you and how what is happening now supports getting to your theorised end goals. As I said, I expect policy ideas or something tangible. So far, you're not giving much other than restating in various ways it's a long game. I take it that you now subscribe to the theory of the USA pursuing a team USA and team China and wanting to increase US production to ? But there's an inherent contradiction there, when you're undermining trust, you are not creating a team USA. Which actually there already is but we see clear dismantling of it.

Oh boy... TPF looking mighty silly once again. Ya'll gotta stop basing your opinions on regurgitating below-average media slop. — Tzeentch

Read: I disagree with what others say, here's something that does agree with my view. People like you are searching for meaning where there is none. It's the same when interpreting books, where readers read things in it that the author never intended. Trump is stupid as exemplified in almost everything he does from the way he treats other people, his inability to speak coherently, a modicum of honesty, the number of convictions, etc. etc. What he has, is power, and as a result does not have to bear the consequences of his stupidity.

To the article then. While the article delves into the effects of trade policies and protectionist measures, it does not address how FDI interacts with trade deficits or the broader balance of payments. This omission is notable, as FDI plays a significant role in financing current account deficits and influencing long-term economic dynamics.​

By not considering FDI, the article overlooks a critical component of the international financial system that can affect the sustainability of trade deficits and the overall economic impact of trade policies. Incorporating FDI into the analysis would provide a more comprehensive understanding of the potential consequences of escalating trade conflicts. What will not hold true in the article with continued strong FDI in the US is:

1. it's trade deficit will remain. If FDI into the US stays robust, the US can continue running a trade deficit without economic collapse or adjustment pressure. The article assumes escalating tariffs are aimed at reducing the trade deficit, but doesn’t account for the fact that persistent FDI neutralizes that pressure.

2. FDI helps reinforce the dollar as a global reserve currency. If that status isn't under threat, financial flows into the US may actually increase during trade instability, contradicting any suggestion of a weakening US position due to its deficit.

3. If companies continue to invest in the US despite the trade war (perhaps to produce inside tariff walls), this blunts the long-term negative impact of trade disruptions and may even partially localize value chains rather than destroy them. This would temporarily increase FDI.

4. Strong FDI inflows into the US reflect continued confidence in American institutions and markets, even amid trade tensions. With sustained FDI inflows the macro-economic risks are much lower.

The article is economics only and only considers it from that angle and it ignores that the US could've used diplomacy in relation to its allies to reach more or less the same goal. So there's no explanation for why do exactly this to reach that.

Finally, and probably the worse part of the analysis is that it does not question whether the proposed end goal is feasible. Because it is again, a party of contradictions. The end-goal assumes the US can "out-export" China or reassert global dominance. The structural conditions do not allow it.

1. Demographic scale favours China. The US would need to leverage automation, innovation and high-value exports to compete because it cannot on volume cost alone. Meanwhile China continues to climb the value chain so US will be confronted with diminishing returns trying to stay ahead.
2. Rebuilding the industrial base in the US requires massive investment, time and political consensus and except for time, they don't have it.
3. As the last few decades have shown, being a dominant exporter is not the only measure of power. Being the reserve currency, having the most liquid and trusted capital markets, leading tech companies, military reach and cultural and soft power are involved as well. Focusing on trade only misunderstands the kind of power the US already holds (but is relinquishing in its aggressive trade policies).
4. If FDI does decline it will result in lower growth, weaker dollar, austerity or inflation and loss of global influence. It's not strategic at all.

The problem is, as I've explained before, that to reduce the trade deficit you must reduce FDI. To reduce FDI global trust in the USA must diminish. But at the same time trust is essential if you want to lead a global alliance of "team USA". It's contradictory crap as usual with Trump.

Next time you want to call everybody here "silly", you might start by being more critical of what you read.

I wasn't suggesting as much. But only a fool would assume there isn't one. — Tzeentch

The plan is at most grift and at least anchoring in negotiations. Other than that, there's nothing sensible to find there.

Sorry! I was mixing two answers, ignore that. It was meant as a reaction to Tzeentsch.

I agree with that, yes. Stability and developing from there is preferable but we need to be prepared it will just become more unstable. For me it feels like we've not had a lot of stability since 2008.

For the U.S. to remain relevant on the world stage she needs to work with China and Europe to reach stability and pragmatism and restore the global order that was being forged via the UN. This is not a good time due to pandemics and climate change to break the world order. — Punshhh

Your go-to reaction seems to be "wait and see" and geopolitics is about "potential" instead of well, grounded in fact. If it's not true in 3 years, we must wait 5, if it's not true then it must be 10, but maybe in 20. Not very convincing. To put it differently, if my dad had a vagina he would've been my mother.

If it is geopolitical strategy, you need to be able to formulate the strategy. If weening Russia from China's teet is the goal, you should be able to set out several policy initiatives that make sense to reach it. Give me that and I can start entertaining the notion.

The reason why people are discounting it is because they aren't short sighted. In 4 years is the US policy gonna be as pro-Russia and maniacally protectionist as it is now? Russia isn't gonna abandon a stable China for an unstable US, but the EU may abandon the unstable US for a more stable China. — Mr Bee

And this just puts succintly what is going on. Nothing the US has done in the past week suggests the existence of a grand geopolitical master plan.

For the U.S. to remain relevant on the world stage she needs to work with China and Europe to reach stability and pragmatism and restore the global order that was being forged via the UN. This is not a good time due to pandemics and climate change to break the world order. — Punshhh

Comments like these give me the heeby-jeebies with the implied assumptions underlying it. We do not need pragmatism, we need a revolution away from the current world order and that will be messy. I think the instinct of all the right wing nutjobs is correct and that the times were already destablising and they are accelerating it in the hopes of coming out on top. The alternative, more democratic, more equitable world order cannot be ushered in with China at the helm or in cooperation with them; only Europe can currently hope to offer it together with young democracies.

From a geographical perspective it is, for instance, ridiculous China has more influence in Africa than the EU. Not that I want us to influence Africa but we certainly should partner with them and create very close ties with fundamentally democratic societies. We need to come together across ideological lines thereby reducing Chinese influence with Mauritius, Cape Verde, Botswana, South Africa, Fhana, Seychelles and Namibia and offer them trading terms that would be enviable for other countries to want to start political reforms.

Tariffs and import duties should be ideologically driven. We should be telling autocratic countries what to do, we should let democratic countries find their way on their own but with the clear support of a peer with like-minded political outlook on geopolitical stability and what the world ought to be like.

Finally, the current world order does nothing to stop pandemics or climate change or indeed to prioritise human beings over "the economy". It's historic track record has been terrible.

The letter from the Departent of Education (DOE) to Harvard (and probably similar letters to other universities).

https://www.harvard.edu/research-funding/wp-content/uploads/sites/16/2025/04/Letter-Sent-to-Harvard-2025-04-11.pdf

In the clause "government and leadership reform" DOE requires a restructuring of governance to reduce the influence of individuals "more committed to activism than scholarship". Seems to me a perfectly acceptable position to be an activist and scholar so this is a blunt instrument to create consequences to exercising your first amendment rights. At a minimum it would have a chilling effect on free speech. Unconstitutional.

While the government can impose conditions on funding, exercising such power is not unlimited. The broad and intrusive nature of the demands in the letter to a private organisation probably exceed the scope of authority.

I don't think there's an obligation under regular law to report criminal behaviour but this letter requires Harvard to report "conduct violations" of foreign students to Homeland Security and the State Department. That's... not troubling at all. Especially considering what the current government's idea is of anti-semitism.

If the Americans have to give up Europe to get Russia back on their side (something which the Russians were very interested in prior to 2014), they will. They need Russia to counterbalance China. — Tzeentch

I find the presupposition that it is realistic to ween Russia from the Chinese teet a pipe dream.

Let's hear it! — Tzeentch

For starters, they can stop doing all the stupid shit I'm calling out as stupid.

I don't think the answer is found in a dicitionary but a history book. Liberalism and capitalism developed in tandem and share core assumption about the individual, property and greedom (that was a typo but I like it).

If I have to nitpick at your last few posts, I think the focus on consumerism is unnecessary.

First, consumerism is not as a foundational mechanism of capitalism, but rather a necessary consequence of capitalism’s structural imperatives, particularly its demand for perpetual growth. In my view, consumerism is symptomatic rather than causal, it emerges because capitalism requires ever-expanding markets.

Second, the problem with consumerism is not that people buy things they don’t strictly need. There's nothing inherently wrong with pleasure, desire or personal expression through material things. The critique shouldn’t rest on some moralistic asceticism or a return to “just the essentials.” Instead, the issue lies in how and why consumerism emergesas a structural solution to capitalism’s growth imperative and within a system of production that is exploitative, ecologically unsustainable and alienating.

On the first point, I think this becomes apparent when asking why a capitalist system is dependent on endless consumption.

In a capitalist society money is no longer just a mediator between commodities but it is capital. The most straightforward expression of it is Marx' M' = M + ΔM (Money - Commodity - Money(+profit). The goal becomes the accumulation of surplus value and the reinvestment loop makes this accumulation theoretically unlimited. Hence capital's continued quest to valorise everything in terms of money, clean air are carbon credited, fairness is pursued through true pricing, your music purchase isn't exhausted with a record but becomes a monthly recurring subscription where you own nothing, etc. etc.

But I digress, I was meaning to make a point on capitalism dependency on continuous growth and how this must necessarily lead to consumerism. Capitalist grwoth can can happen by expanding through:

• Increasing productivity through technological innovation
• Cutting costs (including wages and working conditions)
• Finding new markets (imperialism, globalization)

But these have limits; diminishing returns on technological innovation, reduction in wages undermine demand and at some point new territories cannot be added. But there's a fourth and that is increasing consumption per capita. Under normal circumstances, demand would cease when need is met and this would be a limit in itself. But consumerism breaks that limit because it is no longer about need but manufactured demand. This is achieved through:

• Advertising and branding (emotional appeal over function)
• Planned obsolescence (products designed to wear out or go out of style)
• Fashion and tech cycles (inducing dissatisfaction with the old)

So you buy identity, lifestyles, status and experience. In other words: meaning.

Point 2, though, is the damning part of this dance between supply and demand. Under capitalism our desires are serviced by a mode of production that exploits labour, depletes resources, externalises social costs (pollution, waste, inequality) and concentrates wealth. In that sense, consumerism justifies capitalism. It creates the appearance of fairness by foscuing on freedom to choose between a big mac and a whopper, while obscuring the lack of freedom in production where almost everyone is a wage slave, have no say how a company is run, have no control on the externalisation of social costs and has no say how the use of resources can be equitably distributed among existing and future generations.

True freedom should therefore involve collective democratic control over production to decide what gets produced, how it's produced and for whom.

My other beef with capitalism involves how it encroaches on public goods, financialises it and makes a profit of it. But this is a work in progress for me how I should accurately state it. I'm thinking of how clean air (which should be a human right) is now measurable in carbon credits, gives the right to pollute and offset it even if achieved on the other side of the globe (we have strong winds in the Netherlands, but not that strong). Or bottling water and privatising municipal water systems. Patenting genes, seeds or personal data from DNA tests. The whole personal data market. Pollution of public space through advertisement. Eco-tourism and selling "tranquility" as an experience.

Meanwhile, the FT reports EU personnel on record stating "the translatlantic alliance is over". https://www.ft.com/content/20d0678a-41b2-468d-ac10-14ce1eae357b?shareType=nongift

Well, it's been fun while it lasted.

I don't see how anything you just wrote answers my three main questions: threats to leaving NATO, starting trade wars and stop support from Ukraine. There also appears to be an inconsistency where the Blob is about US primacy and yet they are giving it up.

The days of US primacy are obviously definitively over, the system has become multipolar and the US is having to shift its strategy accordingly. — Tzeentch

It's over, therefore burn all your bridges? Even in a multipolar world a country is presumably stronger with allies than without.

The US empire is wildly overextended, leaving it no room to divert its resources towards China which is the only peer competitor in the system, and thus the most important.

In other words, the US is already in the process of cutting its losses to create a situation from which it can counteract China sustainably. It is weighing which interests to keep afloat, and which to cut off. — Tzeentch

Threatening to leave NATO certainly will increase EU spending on military equipment. We'll just not be spending it on US material. Starting trade wars immediately affects both economic performance of the US but also its ability to produce military equipment due to its reliance on rare earth metals. Ukraine support is and was a fraction of what the EU provides and they can certainly stop such economic aid altogether but it doesn't make sense to alienate allies while doing so or to stop intelligence sharing. I mean, if the US would just say, we think China is the bigger threat and the EU needs to resolve Ukraine that's a different story than trying to blackmail Ukraine in surrender and giving a way half of the country to Russia and calling it "peace".

Altogether, if it is intended to pivot to China and diminish the overextension, making everything wildly more expensive and difficult does not help.That's not cutting your losses, that's shooting yourself in the foot.

That's why the US is seeking to restore ties with Russia - it was historically used to counterbalance China. That's why the US is taking a more critical stance towards NATO - the Europeans lack the will and capability to engage in a power struggle in the Pacific. That's why Trump is trying to cut a deal with Iran - Israel cannot win a war on its own, and the US is too weak to bail it out. etc. — Tzeentch

Where have you read this and when was it that the US had ties with Russia with the goal to counterbalance China? I'm not familiar with it and nothing turns up searching for it.

That the EU will not engage in a power struggle in the Pacific is most likely correct, assuming no NATO member is attacked. But that Russia is going to turn its back on China any time soon is, in my view, a pipe dream. Both countries are autocratic, both countries oppose US power and China is Russia's most important trading partners.

Meanwhile, even if you want to improve ties with Russia, it's not clear why that needs to be at the expensive of NATO or existing alliances. And certainly the tariff wars still don't make sense (if you want to target China, just do so).

My main point here being: this easily fits into the changing global security and power structure, and thus there is little indication that 'the Blob' has lost control. — Tzeentch

Well, no, I don't see it. Apparently you consider certain things self evident but there are different and much smarter ways to go about it then what has happened now, which suggests the Blob is not in control and since Trump isn't smart enough, he isn't in control either. It's a regular clusterfuck.

It's you who tries to warp that into talk of cabals, because probably the idea that states function along other lines than the democratic deeply conflicts with your worldview, and the way you cope is by writing me off as a 'conspiracy theorist'. — Tzeentch

I'm quite clearly not. I'm explaining that the nexus for raising the term "cabal" stemmed from your use of "deep state", which I've argued against from the get-go. If we agree about it, then we can stop it, right?

I've already given you the quotes in which both articles describe in detail what the elite class is comprised of, and it is clearly not strictly structural (though obviously, a considerable part is structural), by virtue of the simple fact that parts of the foreign policy elite have public panel discussions in which they openly discuss their ideas, the well-known power of lobbies, etc. - even single lobbies, for example AIPAC. — Tzeentch

As I said, doing this, is cherry picking what the articles are about. They aren't about specific groups of people but structural aspects of decision making processes resulting in a myopic approach to foreign policy. Lobby activities are but a part of it.

That much remains to be seen. — Tzeentch

I've rather clearly set out how Trump's policies regarding the tariff war undermine US primacy. If the Blob is in favour of US primacy then it's not in control because it's allowing actions that grossly undermine that primacy. The idea that there's some sort of 4D-chess going on doesn't make economic facts dissappear.

Only focusing on the short-term makes one miss the bigger picture, and if the various Trump threads attest to anything it's TPF's complete obsession with Trump's daily ramblings, or whatever Trump's political opponents vomit out at the same frequency.

In terms of geopolitics, a few months is insignificant. Even a single presidency is insignificant, as Trump 1 proves; back then people were exhibiting the same mass hysteria and nothing ended up happening.

This tells me little though. We were talking about control by the Blob of Trump. I'm still taking issue with that position as there's no argument for it and it's not supported by those articles because we have a clear deviation of the doctrine of primacy. If your point is that this is all smoke and mirrors, you need to do more than raise the possibility or there's nothing to engage with.

How would it work? What is the underlying grand plan that they allow Trump to threaten to leave NATO (alienating allies), start trade wars (alienating allies) and throwing Ukraine under the bus (alienating allies)? At what point is this going to turn in favour of the US primacy doctrine? What possible mechanism will do this?

Maybe be more precise in your rejections then? There's a rather rich body of collectivist thought. If you're interested, aside from Hegel and Marx, there's more recent authors that could be interesting. Happy to give you a bit of a reading list...

Just as the most obvious point, most collectivist thought wants to maximise democratic processes where they are currently barred due to the structure of liberal/capitalism. I mention it because I assume you're rather fond of democracy considering your stance towards Trump.

I agree that liberalism is preferable to collectivism or theocratic culture where values are imposed. — Wayfarer

Why? What has been said that proves liberalism is better than collectivism? And what is collectivism according to you?

I know it's very popular to chalk all of this up to Trump's incompetent machinations, but I don't subscribe to such a view. I don't think he's all that important or powerful. Washington drives this bus - they aren't dummies - and people like Trump are the perfect lightning rod. — Tzeentch

It's fine if you disagree, but you can disagree without all the phoney shit where you have to pretend there isn't an academic basis for the ideas I'm proposing, and without strawmans about cabals and what not. — Tzeentch

Again, the point I raised was what you said in the first paragraph above. You think the Blob is still in control. So they must be controlling Trump or they aren't in control. In fact, that Trump is a lightning rod, suggests his incompentence is even strategically used. A useful idiot if you will.

Both articles point towards a foreign policy elite that spans both sides of the aisle. A 'deep state', if you will. Stephen Walt, Mearsheimer, etc. - they'll all say the same thing.

Who or what exactly comprises this 'deep state' is a more murky topic, but not necessarily all that relevant. — Tzeentch

You called them "deep state", which yes I translated as "cabal", because they are not "deep state" but a result of structural circumstances. The fact you are looking for "who or what" comprises it, further underlines you are cherry picking from the articles as both articles explicitly point to structure. Porter points to habit. Friedman identifies group thinking, donor-driven incentives, political insulation and an operational mindset on how instead of why. All structural aspects and none of it supports the view of a "deep state".

You are making a translation of the article into something bordering conspiracy which I take issue with as unsupported in those very articles.

What Porter and Friedman are describing is more akin to an emerging property of structure, shared ideology and behaviour, then an elite, deep state or cabal, or whatever term you want to give to it. Even if the end result is named the "foreign policy elite", it's incorrect to understand it in other terms than structural. It's analoguous to try and figure out "who or what" is behind systemic injustice. It's the wrong interpretation.

Returning to the original point of your belief the Blob is still in control. While the Blob may constrain the execution of some of Trump's plans, they aren't in control, given the sheer idiocy of policy in the past months. In fact, I think statements of the Blob being "in control" are inherently confused, since it has no agency. It appears concerted when it is merely emergent from the establishment.

I suspect the only plan Trump has is grift on a scale we've never seen before. Create market swings that Trump causes and will benefit from. Everything else, his stance on foreign policy, trade etc. is how a conman misdirects attention from what's really going on. What the dismantling of democratic institutions has to do with it, I have no clue. But that too is clearly at odds with the Blob, since it undermines trust in the US and therefore its economic primacy.

If you're categorically uninterested in my line of thought, why be so disingenuous as to ask for sources, and then proceed to give me this cunty attitude when I go through the effort of finding quotes for you? I even literally asked you whether you were genuinely interested.

Man, didn't know you were such an asshole. — Tzeentch

I read both articles and directly addressed your line of thought and how it's not supported by those articles. You seem to redefine “interest“ as if I have to agree with a badly argued position. I don't agree for the reasons stated. My interest in your position was evident when I spend my valuable time trying to make sense of it.

Could just be "Trump’s loose lips and sticky fingers" I suppose. Insider trading is still illegal. — jorndoe

Not really when Trump is in power. Nothing will come of it even if there was insider trading in the White House he'll just pardon them.

I know it's very popular to chalk all of this up to Trump's incompetent machinations, but I don't subscribe to such a view. I don't think he's all that important or powerful. Washington drives this bus - they aren't dummies - and people like Trump are the perfect lightning rod. — Tzeentch

You were implying control, called them deep state, etc. So yes, my eyes. Glazed. Still do. There's clearly nobody at the wheel.

No, they quite obviously don't. Maybe read them again.

Friedman & Logan's point is that there's no real debate because of consensus around US primacy, the Blob doesn't typically engage in first-principles questioning, they don't debate what the strategy should be but focus on how to execute it; it's institutional inertia.

Patrick Porter argues purusing primacy isn't inherently rational or constantly reassessed but instituionalised. It's reinforced by beliefs, norms and habit of the Blob which creates the Overton window if you will of legtimate policy. Even if global conditions suggest alternatives (at least in his view) the continuity of primacy prevails. That is not a secret cabal but power married to ideology and bureacracy. He demonstrates this with Clinton and Trump's previous administration. It's institutional inertia.

Both articles are a critique of foreign policy establishment's resistance to change and doesn't support Trump being managed by anyone.

It does support my point that if the Blob is resistant to change, it's entirely unlikely they are now masterminding this wild departure from the status quo. Trump's erratic moves all contradict the Blob preferences with respect to NATO, Russia and trade.

The absence of logic and coherence in Trump's foreign policy suggests no one competent or unified is currently in control. If they're so fucking smart as you seem to suggest because there's some hidden goal we simpletons can't fathom, then they'd understand their economics. And no matter how smart they are, that still does not make basic economic facts dissappear. The same facts that perfectly predict how this will affect US economic power negatively.

Nobody is in control.

Doge meanwhile is dismantling key agencies and cutting funding that obviously undermine the Blob.

Nobody is in control.

Trump is an idiot and does not have any trust among foreign leaders so he can't get anything done either.

Nobody is in control.

Right right, so the "Blob" that has been controlling foreign policy for decades and basically has no interest in changing what it's been doing suddenly has radically changed tactics. You do realise these articles don't support the notion anybody is "controlling" Trump behind the scenes, right?

In this context, "Washington" is primarily the United States foreign policy establishment aka "the Blob". If you're genuinely interested I can provide some sources, but considering your tone I doubt that you are. — Tzeentch

Oh, I'm very interested in understanding the rabbit hole you hide in so I can drag you out of it and find some common ground out in the light of reason.

I know it's very popular to chalk all of this up to Trump's incompetent machinations, but I don't subscribe to such a view. I don't think he's all that important or powerful. Washington drives this bus - they aren't dummies - and people like Trump are the perfect lightning rod. — Tzeentch

Statements like these just make me zone out. Who is "Washington"? What evidence do you have for it? The fact that there's no rhyme or reason to the tariff war any way you cut it means nobody competent is in control and not some secret cabal pulling Trump's strings.

You're shifting the frame from economics to political realism, fine. But let's not pretend the economic analysis offered earlier was any good. It still doesn’t actually answer the economic point. Even enemies trade. The Cold War didn’t stop the US from selling grain to the USSR, and modern Russia still sells gas to Europe. If you’re serious about "rivalry" as the defining framework, then you need to think in strategic terms, not just emotional ones. And that includes understanding how global interdependence works.

Facilitating China’s export-driven growth wasn’t just charity. It was part of a strategy to integrate China into the rules-based order, stabilize global supply chains and secure cheap goods and capital inflows that benefited US consumers, corporations and investors. You can call that “feeding the beast” if you like, but it also fueled decades of low inflation and higher real incomes in the US (and the West).

If you want to unwind that relationship now, fine - but udnerstand the costs. This approach does not just cut off your enemy. It's cutting off your own economy from the financial and logistical circuits it has been built around for decades. Doing that without understanding how capital flows and trade balances interact is not realism. It’s just self-harm with a flag on it.

Strategic rivalry doesn't mean throwing out your central position in the global economy. It means using it intelligently. Right now, China still needs dollar access, still needs external demand and still holds US Treasury debt. That’s leverage. You don't use that leverage by blowing up your own system.

If your argument is that the US needs a more self-reliant economy and less exposure to adversarial regimes, I agree. But dressing up a dumb tariff war as strategic realism just replaces one illusion with another.

No, I think it is quite right. Though, I look at it a bit from a more cynical perspective. — Tzeentch

What follows in no way, shape or form addresses my comment and just reiterates economic nonsense. Countries with surpluses do not profit relatively more. It's like saying that the seller in a sale, profits more than the buyer. If my posts aren't clear enough for you I'd be happy to give you a reading list to clear up these economic misunderstandings.

Not spiral but we decided we don't want it on the front page for the next 4 years.

It's not an analysis but reflects common intuitions that are wrong. This is a classic case of taking a few surface-level truths and spinning them into a deeply confused and wrong position.

Let’s start with the premise: “free trade is good for economies with excess production and trade surpluses.” That is a misunderstanding of how trade works. Free trade isn’t some rigged game that only benefits surplus countries. The US has run trade deficits for decades and still emerged as the most powerful economy on earth. That's not despite those deficits but in part because of the structure that allows them - namely FDI and the reserve currency status of the USD.

The US receives massive foreign capital inflows. Foreigners buy US Treasury bonds, stocks, real estate and invest in businesses. Those inflows keep interest rates low, fund domestic investment and support the dollar’s global role. In other words, the trade deficit is not some evidence of decline. It is the accounting counterpart of America’s central role in the global financial system. That is just how the balance of payments works.

You also claim that the US created the postwar global system because it used to run surpluses and that it should step away now that "the East" benefits more. But that ignores the actual historical logic behind the system. The US didn’t create the global economic order to rack up trade surpluses. It created the order to prevent another world war, contain communism and entrench a rules-based system in which it would remain the institutional and financial center, regardless of whether it was exporting more goods than it imported. That strategy worked. The US became the issuer of the reserve currency, the seat of global capital and the main power in the world. Walking away from that now doesn’t punish China. It vacates the field for them to take over as the second largest economy in the world .

You say China should carry more of the burden. Fair enough. But then what? Are we handing them the keys to the system because the US is tired of leading it? Tariffs aren’t creating “space” for anything coherent. They’re just inflaming tensions and undermining trust in US stability. A real renegotiation of global institutions would require diplomatic capital and credibility; the very things a chaotic trade war destroys and Trump personally lacks.

Your swipe at the left is a convenient distraction that makes me wonder why it's even in there. Yes, parts of the left were historically anti-globalist, but that was in defense of labour standards, environmental protections and democratic oversight: not nationalist economic isolation. And as a leftist I'm STILL in favour of tariffs but to force other countries to produce at the same level of regulations as the EU does so we have a level playing field between local and foreign producers and costs of production aren't unfairly externalised unto poor people abroad and the environment there.

EDIT: to add, a consistent trade deficit is only possible because of offset by FDI. Without it, the deficit will have to balance out at some point and if this cannot be done through attracting FDI, it will correct through currency depreciation, reduction in consumption (skewed towards import), increase in national savings and lower investments. This can also happen in an uncontrolled manner through capital flight or a debt crisis.

The big problems are getting it to work and getting it to work safely. — Agree-to-Disagree

Really? What safety issues exactly?

Bessent according to the Guardian:

“This was his strategy all along, and that you might even say that he goaded China into a bad position, they responded. They have shown themselves to the world to be the bad actors, and we are willing to cooperate with our allies and with our trading partners who did not retaliate. It wasn’t a hard message, don’t retaliate, things will turn out well.”

You hit someone in the face, you tell them not to hit back but they do any way because they won't be bullied and then they're the bad actor. Yeah, that makes total sense. And what allies exactly? He shafted Europe with Ukraine already so I'm not sure who he's talking about.

The best part, he's now negotiating from a position of weakness because he admits needing his allies and trade partners. What an insane loser.

EDIT: also I forget but obviously the EU raised retaliatory tariffs as well. So when do we get the 100% tariff?

The easiest thing to do would be to devalue their own currencies relative to the dollar. Trump has already issued a warning to them not to do that. There aren't any countries whose trade with the US is large enough to make that option reasonable though. — frank

I'm not sure how this relates to what I said. Devaluing a currency doesn't make it more interesting to use as a reserve currency; stability does.

Isnt the fear at the moment that the markets are headed for a liquidity crisis, which happened during the 2008 financial crisis? In such a crisis, panicked investors sell everything, even bonds, so instead of what usually happens during a downturn, that investors turn to bonds as a safe haven, lowering their yields, they are sold along with everything else and their yield jumps. In 2008 the Fed has to step in and provide liquidity. — Joshs

The Fed had to step in to provide liquidity because the banks capital and liquidity ratios tanked due to their cross derivatives exposures of worthless MBS on each other in a market where interbank trust had totally evaporated. Secured lending (under GMRAs for instance) was the only way to get a loan for a while. US treasuries, along with other high rated government bonds were still considered a safe haven in 2008. Yields dropped because most investors were prepared to accept even a negative yield as long as they knew for certain their money was safe. Which is precisely why AAA-rated bonds had negative yield at some point, that's how much investors wanted them!

During a recent speech at the American Bankers Association, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said this:

"For the next four years, the Trump agenda is focused on Main Street. It's Main Street's turn. It's Main Street's turn to hire workers. It's Main Street's turn to drive investment. And it's Main Street's turn to restore the American dream."

"For too long, financial policy has served large financial institutions at the expense of smaller ones. No more. No more. This administration aims to give all banks the chance to succeed, whether it's JP Morgan or your local mortgage and loan."

"It aims to get capital to Americans who need it by getting bureaucracy out of the way. For the last four decades, basically since I began my career in Wall Street, Wall Street has grown wealthier than ever before, and it can continue to grow and do well.

(I would post the video, but these kinds of facts are now verboten).

Given that wealth inequality has been on the lips of progressives for who knows how long, if this plan bears fruit for the working class, will it change some minds here? Or is it anti-Trump all the way down? — NOS4A2

You are not making any philosophical, political or economic point. Instead, you're just stirring the pot. Would be nice if you'd actually made an effort.

I just shared an extensive economic explanation how this doesn't help any Americans any time soon. If you want to help Main Street, there's myriad ways you can do this without being a communist about it or, in Trump's case, an idiot. Raising tariffs isn't going to help anyone and is more likely to hurt poorer people disproportionally because, well, they're poor and have no budget to absorb price hikes.

Meanwhile, companies in the US are faced with an immediate increase in costs for resources and machinery produced outside of the US. Shareholders and company owners, especially in the US, will just fire people to absorb the increase in cost and expect the remainder to pick up the slack. So you'll see a surge in unemployment, lower tax income through income tax, etc.

That the industrial capacity of the US has gone down is not only the consequence of its unique position having had a trade deficit for 40 years but also policy, where even critical industries or part of the vertical integration for that, has been outsourced (much like most of Western Europe as well). The idea of correcting this through tariffs without dealing with capital flows is idiotic, more so when the expectations is to reverse a process that took decades.