41–50 of 349 posts
With all of articles like this, I am puzzled how correct is this? Is it possible that China isn't really betting but only the Economist that think so? I mean Biden admin use the word 'China' to accelerate his wishes (infrastructure, stimulus and so on).
I'd like to think that extreme racism, homophobia, and other forms of bigotry won't be a winning recipe. A lot of the advantages China has in their government is beneficial for competing with other nations but will eventually eat itself from within.
It worked just fine in/for the US though. Look back at the US's rise to where it is today and it was pretty bad. Another example is that it is still pretty bad in the US today and it is top dog anyways. I doubt it will make any difference in PRC either.
They are probably not wrong. When you look at the infighting within the US that is front page news every day...the decline is in full swing. People care less about how to actually improve the country than they do about trying to hold entire professions accountable for the actions of a few (not just cops)...then we are focused on the wrong things. Spending hundreds of days protesting something instead of putting that…
Out of curiosity, have any other items than "defund the police" happened in, say, March 2020 through the present, that might've affected crime rates?
The west is in decline because progressive values don't promote strength. They focus on class and are inherently divisive. Ironically, they only blossom in strong societies. The decline will allow other societies with a more conservative philosophy to take over and it will be their turn in a few centuries to succumb to the same tragedy. The baizuo tragedy.
I hate to break it to you, but progressive values aren't why the dictators of the world walked all over the US for the past 4 years.
They are probably not wrong. When you look at the infighting within the US that is front page news every day...the decline is in full swing. People care less about how to actually improve the country than they do about trying to hold entire professions accountable for the actions of a few (not just cops)...then we are focused on the wrong things. Spending hundreds of days protesting something instead of putting that…
The west is in decline because progressive values don't promote strength. They focus on class and are inherently divisive. Ironically, they only blossom in strong societies. The decline will allow other societies with a more conservative philosophy to take over and it will be their turn in a few centuries to succumb to the same tragedy. The baizuo tragedy.
It's in many ways even less useful than Historical Marxism. (Which is a damn low bar to fail to clear.)
- China is net food and energy importer. Look at last year for a preview of future food. The land they leased in Africa won't help in terms of climate shift, locusts, etc. Who is the number of one food and energy exporter?
- China has an aeging population, and it's already a rapid shift.
- China's infrastructure isn't as well built as other countries (see their most important infrastructure project ever being the literal definition of half-assed), and it will start degrading, and maintenance is a pain. What happens when a few dams collapse, or nuke plant blows up?
- Supply chains are moving elsewhere.
- Taiwan has enough medium-range missles to take out the Three Gorges Dam, which is effectively MAD as far as China is concerned. One could also see Taiwan being a few minutes away from going nuclear, if need be(learning the Ukraine lesson).
- The US controls space, and will solidify it's grip in the next 3 years. Nobody is within even a decade of SpaceX's launch technology. 60s solid fuel missles to launch small satellites into orbit won't cut it. Putting Mir 2.0 into orbit won't cut it. A moonbase that is effectively an even more expensive and worthless version of Belt and Road won't cut it (and obviously will provide less jobs).
- What do you do about automation, if it wipes out jobs for all the restive angry young men?
Now sure, a war in the South China Sea favors China heavily, but I don't think the "Let's party in Taiwan" scenario is winnable for them without wiping out 80% of their agriculture, their entire biomedial industry and their main banking centre, along with a bunch of nuke plants and military bases. Not to mention the US soon being able to just stack depleted uranium telephone poles in orbit to protect it's dependencies. A larger scale war in SE Asia would probably just drag the region back 50 years, and China would likely be on the losing end as all their neighbors hate them, and India for example has a very competent military.
The whole "West is in decline" narrative assumes countries are static- the US is especially dynamic in terms of social trends. We are about to end the war on drugs and undergo a massive shift in our education trends as we realize most schooling is worthless, and there is decent chance we'll go to UBI. Now granted the current expamles of UBI in the ME don't bode well, but it's kind of a hazy future.
Now if this was for Western Europe, sure I could buy it.
It's very hard to disagree IMO. The west is in decline and unless something catastrophic happens in PRC or war breaks out (also pretty catastrophic) I can't see any future where the PRC isn't going to at least become on par with the US soon but most likely it will succeed it as top dog. The only question in my mind is where do the EU end up in all this and if Russia will become closer with PRC or EU. IMO the biggest…
elections in the US are like earnings calls for public companies and drive the same short-term thinking.