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. — Benkei

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

The US has one interest, and one interest only: power. The reason it made the dollar the reserve currency is because of power. The reason it championed an "international rules-based order" is because of power, and so forth.

When it runs a trade deficit, it means other nations - in the case of China, a peer competitor - relatively profit more, turning it into a dynamic that over the long-term cedes power to other countries by virtue of the fact that, even though on paper it is 'mutually beneficial', one side is profiting more than the other. In the Machiavellian terms Washington thinks in, that means losing.

It makes zero sense for the United States to uphold a system that has fed and continues to feed its main geopolitical rival China. The US started this policy way back when China was not seen as a major geopolitical threat. Times have changed.

Moreover, upholding the system is increasingly no longer an option. The United States is sitting on a giant bubble - waiting for the mother of all economic crises to hit - made worse still by the dollar's world reserve currency status being under pressure and probably being history somewhere in the next ten years.

The United States has two options: retreat to its island or go down with the ship.

That's a pretty solid analysis. :up:

Red? No idea how anything I have said can possibly be interpreted as such.

Considering you're coming at me with the standard "Everything's the other guys' fault!" spiel, maybe you should be checking your own lenses?

Do you see a trend there? — tim wood

Primitive tribalism?

Gestapo/KGB tactics on the streets, abuse of law - abuse of everything and everybody - disappearing people, destroying lives, delivering a steady stream of lies and "alternate facts" as justification. — tim wood

How is that in any way different from the way the establishment used to run things? :chin:

Trumpsters and people who voted for Trump are "stupid", yet TPF categorically ignores what gave rise to Trump, and fails to provide a suitable alternative other than a return to the pre-Trump status quo - a status quo that American voters rejected.

Populists are the product of a bankrupt system, which Trump critics are inadvertently defending if they fail to critique that system and don't come up with a better alternative.

This isn't something the Trump administration randomly cooked up on a Wednesday.

These current moves vis-á-vis the global economy are quite fundamental in nature.

The fact that the US is choosing economic pain for greater economic independence and to curb foreign economies implies to me that they are preparing for major conflict.

It is a learning disorder. — javi2541997

In a school system that requires you to sit still for hours on end, I can certainly understand why it would be classified as such.

I doubt highly energetic individuals were problematized in older times, though, for obvious reasons. Isn't it a great quality to have?

The US seems to have its hands full, trying to deal with these 'basket cases'.

It appears to me that the US establishment is seeing the writing on the wall, and is retreating to its island to regroup.

In today's geopolitical circumstance, it simply cannot compete with a united Russia-China-Iran bloc. And while the US would have to spend all its energy counteracting this bloc, other power blocs would start to pop up, creating more unsolvable headaches for the US.

The best thing there would be to do is to fall back on the Monroe-doctrine of US primacy in the western hemisphere - the bedrock of US foreign policy - which the Trump administration is already hinting at wanting to reinforce.

We can of course talk about how crazy all these moves supposedly are, but likely we are not fully aware of the economic realities that led to them - for example, how great the threat of a US default might actually be. For obvious reasons these things cannot always be made public.

In my opinion, everything points to full-blown panic within the US establishment. The jig is up.

I wonder whether ADHD is a disorder at all. Except in perhaps extreme cases, people with ADHD are perfectly functional and healthy in a general sense. It's society that problematizes them, because they don't fit society's straight-jacket. And then kids fall from being problematized into medication (medication for psychological problems I find a very prickly subject, especially for chidlren), and then a kid goes from just being overactive to being 'a patient'.

What if all that energy was put to good use instead?

Is that really so? — ssu

So get your history and historical perspective correct, Tzeentch. — ssu

The United States was instrumental in creating the pretenses necessary for the Khmer Rouge takeover and the genocide that followed. The United States bombed the Cambodian countryside comprehensively in the beginning of the 1970s to disrupt supply routes of the
communist Viet Cong along the Ho Chi Minh trail.

In actuality, the bombings destabilized the relative economic stability of Cambodia and radicalized shell-shocked Cambodian peasants to join the Khmer Rouge to avenge their dead relatives and friends. Not only did the United States inadvertently provoke the Khmer Rouge coming to power, they also shielded Pol Pot and his lieutenants from prosecution during the 1980s, massively contributing to impunity for crimes against the people of Cambodia. According to Ben Kiernan, a leading scholar in the Cambodian genocide, the United States had two main reasons for delaying justice for Cambodia.

The first reason being that, due to the Cold War, the United States provided military and financial support to the Khmer Rouge during the 1980s in order to undermine the Vietnamese occupation of Cambodia, which demonstrated that they saw Cambodia as a dispensable pawn in a larger ideological struggle between the dominant nations of the day. The United States waited until “1997…to condemn the Khmer Rouge” because then they no longer posed a military threat to the Vietnamese and, therefore, their role to the US was over.6

The second reason that the United States delayed justice in Cambodia was because of their muddy involvement in the genocide. The Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC) was limited to prosecuting Khmer Rouge crimes from 1975-1979 because the United States could have been culpable for their contribution to the genocide with the bombing campaigns and the aid they provided to the Khmer Rouge after the official genocide ended. — Elmhirst, 2023

-

You should also tell the Cambodians that we will be friends with them. They are murderous thugs, but we won’t let that stand in our way. We are prepared to improve relations with them. — Henry Kissinger

I encouraged the Chinese to support Pol Pot. Pol Pot was an abomination. We could never support him, but China could.” According to Brzezinski, the USA “winked, semi-publicly” at Chinese and Thai aid to the Khmer Rouge. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

-

That Kissinger quote is from 1975, by the way. If you know your dates, you'll know exactly what that means.

What you're inadvertently engaged in is the denial of responsibility for genocide - apparently not something that only Likud-sympathizers are guilty of.

Anything without the Americans seems to be totally meaningless for you. That's your biggest problem. And this is the insane navel-grazing that either some Americans and anti-Americans fall into where they cannot see any other actors than their hated USA. — ssu

I think quite the opposite is the case, actually.

Every time I point out what kind of an awful country the United States is, people look for ways to twist the facts so they don't have to acknowledge its long list of transgressions.

Anything not to have to face the fact that the US can compete with the absolute worst humanity has had to offer.

The US commited genocide in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia, in all three cases murdering large percentages of their peasant populations through indiscriminate carpet bombing and chemical warfare - each several orders of magnitude above what Israel is doing is Gaza, I remind you. The total destruction of the Cambodian societal structure was a direct cause for Pol Pot's power grab, which the US then supported in full knowledge of what Pol Pot was about.

The reason you feel the need to shift the topic away from America's role is because you are unable to accept it.

So again, you just have no idea?

You've got the gal to criticize my opinions, and you need citations to know what the fuck even happened?


How convenient that Yale university has a webpage dedicated specifically to sources on this topic...

U.S. Involvement in the Cambodian War and Genocide


Several books by Michael Haas - nominee for a Nobel Peace Prize by the way...

Cambodia, Pol Pot, and the United States: The Faustian Pact

Genocide by Proxy: Cambodian Pawn on a Superpower Chessboard


And of course what was confirmed by WikiLeaks documents...

Wikileaks: US supported Khmer Rouge to weaken Soviet-allied Vietnamese communists


Oh, why not throw in something recent as well while we're at it...

Delayed Justice: How US Actions Paved the Way for the Khmer Rouge and Prevented Justice in Cambodia


Tip of the iceberg.


Ah, I see. So Uncle Sam is just about as bad as Mao. Got it. I sort of agree, actually.

Every nation has got its black pages, but there isn't a single one that seems so eager to repeat them as the United States.

This alone demonstrates your ignorance disqualifies your "opinions" from consideration as anything worthy. — tim wood

Many agree with that view, considering the number murdered at the hands of the Khmer Rouge must be seen against a backdrop of a population of only 7 million people, making it one of the worst genocides in human history.

Of course, being the well-informed and non-ignorant American that you are, I'm sure you already knew that.

But don't let me keep you from your 'worthy' opinions. :vomit:

Ah, I see.

The US is exceptional. So exceptional in fact, that they get to commit a little genocide every now and then. Just a little. Or a lot.

But hey, those are just details. No use in getting hung up on a little genocide.

And what wanton destruction? — tim wood

It's always the Americans that have no clue about what their own country gets up to.

In terms of mass murder, Stalin and Mao each make Hitler look like a small-timer. — tim wood

Pol Pot was possibly even worse, and guess who he was funded by?

And that's just one example.

(And btw, a pet peeve is a small but particularly annoying annoyance.) — tim wood

Thanks for the correction, though.

We’ve been here before. — Punshhh

So have you done any research into that shining US track record since the last time 'we were here'? Pol Pot, East-Timor, Vietnam, endless wars in the Middle-East, etc. and of course Uncle Sam's retarded pet monkey Israel? Do these ring any bells?

Now imagine a world dominated by China and Putin, or more realistically BRICS. You think there will be less genocide? — Punshhh

Probably so. Obviously I don't expect either of them to usher in the new utopia, but continental powers work fundamentally different from peripheral powers like the US.

The US functions on a basis of destroying what it cannot control - it has to, because of its inherently weak position - and evidently that frequently involves laying waste to unruly regions, and their populations if need be, in every far-flung corner of the world.

Continental powers have no such inherent incentives to go scorched earth on their neighborhood.

It really isn't. Neither Russia nor China can hold a candle to the wanton destruction the US has wrought upon the world.

Did you know Uncle Sam seems to have a pet peeve for conducting and supporting genocides?

The above commentary though might be considered a simplistic strawman that no one really submits, but I offer it just to ask the question of why do we think it matters if women fared better in prehistoric times than today? — Hanover

Catharsis for people who have a chip on their shoulder, probably.

Trump's election is like national catharsis for Americans. (And some confused Transatlanticists)

For a few years they pretend all of America's trouble stem from Trump, so that when he's gone they can pretend America has been cleansed of evil, ready to once again take the moral high ground in the name of freedom and democracy!

The blinders go back on, and America can go back to its rapacious ways with full consent of its people. The powers that be creep back into the shadows, and the people go back to sleep.

Of all things to come out of Trump's presidency, this will be the worst.

Good call.

Let's speculate about how victimized women were in the past, so we can project more original sin on men in the present. The lord of strife cares not whence the resentment flows, as long as it does.

Sure thing. I guess I took the opportunity to just elaborate on the concepts in a little more detail for anyone who might find it interesting. :smile:

I would probably steer away from interpretations of Yinyang that are too dichotomous. If we assume yin = feminine = 'things women do' and yang = masculine = 'things men do', we have basically arrived back where we started, and I'd argue we'd be missing the point.

The main thing about Yinyang is that it is not dichotomous. People are an interplay of yin and yang energy, and these are in constant flux.

Things that appear yang on the outside must be balanced with yin on the inside, kind of in line with what suggested.

Even a very masculine man must still be capable of being receptive, calm, nurturing, etc. to be a father, husband, friend, etc.

Yinyang can be applied on micro levels, like how a single movement requires the accumulation (yin) and expenditure (yang) of energy, or it can be applied on macro levels.

Furthermore, the 'yin-in-yang' and 'yang-in-yin' principles are also fundamental (represented by the dots in the Yinyang symbol), again emphasizing its non-dichotomous nature. A simple example: a lot of people find relaxation in exercise - yin-in-yang.

Yinyang is of course only a single element from Taoist philosophy. It is often combined with Five Elements theory (Wuxing), and that's where it becomes quite comprehensive.

You've not made an error - Socrates reigns supreme, after all. But you've simply made it clear that you're not genuinely interested in debate or understanding.

Right - and as expected, you have to pretend discernment doesn't exist and retreat to relativity.

Had you told me that 10 replies ago, we could have spared ourselves this pointless exhibition.

Absolutely nothing in our discussion so far has been about odd numbers or mountains. — fdrake

That's a bit rich, coming from someone who was expecting me to create a bridge to sushi not too long ago.

Yin is:

feminine/the female force/feminine energy
black
dark
north
water (transformation)
passive
moon (weakness and the goddess Changxi)
earth
cold
old
even numbers
valleys
poor
soft
and provides spirit to all things.

Yin reaches it's height of influence with the winter solstice. Yin may also be represented by the tiger, the colour orange and a broken line in the trigrams of the I Ching (or Book of Changes).


Yang is:

masculine/the male force/masculine energy
white
light
south
fire (creativity)
active
sun (strength and the god Xihe)
heaven
warm
young
odd numbers
mountains
rich
hard
and provides form to all things.

Yang reaches it's height of influence with the summer solstice. Yang may also be represented by the dragon, the colour blue and a solid line trigram. — Yin and Yang

It does ring a bell somewhere, though I haven't heard it expressed as a general rule. The body of Taoist literature is gigantic.

You pick universality or exceptions, not both. — fdrake

Because I have a concept of masculinity and femininity, I now have to provide explanations for all of the silly things people believe or do? — Tzeentch

Apparently you believe the answer to that question to be 'yes' - otherwise I would be 'obviating myself of the need to explain some of its manifestations'.

And then you pull up Socrates' chair and ask me "Let's hear this explanation for everything! Where does sushi come into all of this?"

It's black & white thinking at best - a dishonest trick at worst.

You're just going to double down on your cosmic strawman and ignore what I said then?

Fine, be that way.

I never pretended to provide such a thing, nor do any of the schools of thought I named. So I'm not sure what you're getting at. You're the one who started coining terms such as 'mysticism' and 'cosmic principles'.

Well, based on extensive bodies of thought that have remained consistent throughout the ages. If you want to call that 'vibes-based', sure. I'm not pretending to have some sort of definitive answer set in stone.

I think it's more a matter of which properties one thinks it's worthwhile to pay attention to, and which aren't.

If you think it is worthwhile to analyze sushi through the lens of any of these philosophies, go for it.

Funnily enough, traditional chinese medicine does categorize food preferences in terms of, among other things, Yin and Yang.

My earlier reply was meant to give you an idea of which direction I think in: Taoism, Jungian philosophy, etc. - two well-established schools of thought which provide exhaustive concepts of 'masculine' and 'feminine'.

If you're genuinely interested, you can find most if not all of it freely available on the internet.

No. But I think it makes sense to be able to provide one, if you've got an account of masculinity or femininity. Like why do the gals go for sushi and the guys go for burgers bro. I find it difficult to believe the sheer degree of affectation that goes into gender derives from any cosmic principle. — fdrake

People put great affectation into many things. Some people think they are defined by the type of sunglasses they wear, the perfume they use, the shape of their couch or the color of the rims on their car.

Because I have a concept of masculinity and femininity, I now have to provide explanations for all of the silly things people believe or do?

I'd call the account non-mystical if it tried to come up with an answer — fdrake

You weren't expecting an answer to "Where does sushi fit into all of this?", were you?

You write as if you work in an IDF command center. — BitconnectCarlos

No, I just tuned in to their Twitter feed.

Israeli intel can still locate and target them even if they aren't in uniform. — BitconnectCarlos

Yes, they seem to have conceived a most genius method: look where groups of civilians are, and assume some among them must be terrorists.

No there's a target/terrorist in mind with these strikes. — BitconnectCarlos

Oh, I'm sure they have all sorts of things in mind. But you just said yourself they have no clue where the terrorists are. They blend in with the population and don't wear uniforms.