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Jack Ma: US wasted trillions on warfare instead of investing in infrastructure

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Re: Jack Ma: US wasted trillions on warfare instead of investing in infrastructure

#31

Post by maxxxxx »

stcredzero wrote: post #7
hopyinail wrote: post #3

[flagged]

Anyone from the US who has flown overseas to modern, industrialized countries in the past decades will note the aging look of the US. Given overall industrial and cultural trends, why wouldn't everyone just keep building new stuff every 15 years? This would certainly fit the Chinese regime's policy of increasing GDP. (We'll have to crack the problem of carbon neutral concrete sometime.)

"Anyone from the US who has flown overseas to modern, industrialized countries in the past decades will note the aging look of the US"

True. Whenever I get visitors from Germany they always comment on how run down a lot of parts of the US look.

Re: Jack Ma: US wasted trillions on warfare instead of investing in infrastructure

#32

Post by cpursley »

fit2rule wrote: post #10

Not to mention the hundreds of thousands of innocent lives lost, murdered by America's war machine in its lust for total military domination of its so-called enemies. Its not enough that Americans' finally come to grip with the terms of their own scam. The American people must confront the crimes against humanity that their state has committed, time and again. With such human destitution in its midst, as well as at t…

Yeah, it's not that black and white.

Despite a pretty spastic and often misguided foreign policy, the US human rights record is much much better than other large political entities (i.e, USSR, China, etc).

Re: Jack Ma: US wasted trillions on warfare instead of investing in infrastructure

#33

Post by alexashka »

If you view USA as heavily influenced by corporate interests - waging wars to further global corporate empires seems like a good deal all of a sudden.

Education? Infrastructure? Corporations don't benefit from that. Ruining countries and installing 'democracy' to ensure billion dollar contracts? Great business.

While most of the world still thinks in nationalistic terms - our country vs theirs, folks who run corporations that span across 100 countries do not and cannot think in those terms.

Re: Jack Ma: US wasted trillions on warfare instead of investing in infrastructure

#37

Post by snow_mac »

hopyinail wrote: post #3

[flagged]

This is a crap response. I went to Shanghai about 3 summers ago right when Denver was finishing up the "A Line" train from Downtown to the Airport. This project cost over a billion dollars and the damn thing can't run smoothly or stay operational. Tons of issues. Meanwhile we took the Maglev train from the Pudong Airport to the Shanghai City Center. The Maglev cost $1.2 billion dollars [1]. The train can travel up to 270 MPH [1]; it takes about 15 minutes to get from the Airport to the city. The Denver train? 45 minutes, goes somewhere around 45 MPH for $1.1 billion dollars [2]. The train in China goes 6x faster then the Denver train.

So, tell me again how the Chinese infrastructure is not good?

[1] http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/go_east_young_man/2005/03...

[2] https://pagetwo.completecolorado.com/2016/05/31/otoole-takin...

Re: Jack Ma: US wasted trillions on warfare instead of investing in infrastructure

#38

Post by sound1 »

curtis wrote: post #9

The reason why China is spending a lot more on infrastructure than the U.S. is because they didn't have a lot of infrastructure to begin with and if they want some they have to build it. The U.S. already has most (not all) of the infrastructure we need. A lot of what we need to build is to replace existing infrastructure which is getting old but technically still works. Comparing Chinese to American infrastructure sp…

I think US has used its military to armtwist other countires or wage a war when they don't agree to their terms. And so far it has given a great economic ROI for the corporations and top 1% at the cost of taxpayer money. System is working exactly as designed.

Re: Jack Ma: US wasted trillions on warfare instead of investing in infrastructure

#39

Post by donaldknuth123 »

Matticus_Rex wrote: post #21

The US wasted trillions on warfare period -- they could have just not spent it, and either not run up the debt or left that money in private hands.

Oh it went to private hands. Hands that owned stock in Halliburton, Raytheon, Lockheed Martin etc...

Re: Jack Ma: US wasted trillions on warfare instead of investing in infrastructure

#40

Post by Thriptic »

dragthor wrote: post #8
hopyinail wrote: post #3

[flagged]

Yup. At least in the US we use our infrastructure. In China they build stuff just to build stuff.

It is totally true that we have wasted trillions on wars we will never win at the expense of improving our infrastructure which is very clearly inadequate.

It is true that our education system (pre college) sucks.

It is true that we don't enable people who don't have money to succeed.

Most of what Jack Ma said was true. Do I think that the Chinese have all the answers, that the Chinese infrastructure projects are all value adding, that the US should behave like China, or that China should take a larger role in the world? No, but that has nothing to do with the truth value of Jack Ma's statements.

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