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China is betting that the West is in irreversible decline

economist.com

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Re: China is betting that the West is in irreversible decline

#321

Post by shatnersbassoon »

newdude116 wrote: post #243
shatnersbassoon wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the US fighting was negligible. This is either ignorant or dishonest. Just because the US wasn't insanely profligate with lives, doesn't mean they didn't make a huge contribution to defeating Germany. Multiple German armies were defeated by the Western allies in Africa, Italy, France, the low countries and subsequently Germany. Germany's war production was crippled by USAAF and RAF bombing, and its transport was al…

Africa was never a major theater. Landing in the Normandy was in 44 (?). The war was lost in 42. For starters: http://www.fallen.io/ww2/ Start at 4:45

Like I said, the number of deaths is not a good measure of contribution towards actual defeat. Sending punishment battalions to die in their hundreds of thousands was a Soviet choice, and not a good one. Allowing millions of men to be encircled in 1941 was Soviet incompetence. Likewise, sending men into battle unarmed was Soviet callousness.

Africa absolutely was a major theatre. The defeat of the Axis in Libya and Tunisia removed their dominance over the mediterranean, and allowed the Suez canal trade routes a level of safety and ultimately ensured allied economic dominance. Russia would not have received the same level of economic support if it was not clear.

The Germans had not lost the war in 1942. A less despotic leader could have strategically retreated 500 miles and stabilised after Stalingrad.

Also, if you're uncertain about the year when the landings in Normandy took place, perhaps your overall grasp on events is less than perfect?

Re: China is betting that the West is in irreversible decline

#322

Post by b0rsuk »

ceilingcorner wrote: post #77

On an optimistic note, I am not convinced that China is going to win any cultural wars. America, for all its problems, still is essentially a leader for much of the developing world, at least in terms of culture. People watch American shows, know American celebrities, listen to American music, etc. This is facilitated by the fact that these cultural elements are pretty diverse and are open to immigrants. As in, a guy…

> The possible, but worrying scenario is that Chinese capital owns Western cultural production, implicitly (see: Disney or the NBA) or explicitly.

Tencent (PUBG, Fortnite, Path of Exile; Companies: Paradox Interactive, Klei Entertainment, Discord, Reddit, Splash Damage, Epic Games, Activision Blizzard, Ubisoft, Funcom, Riot Games, Grinding Gear Games ; Tencent hosts Call of Duty and League of Legends) The share ranges from 5% to 100%.

Also, they're making movies with high production values. Drug War, various historical epics, Crouching Tiger, Shaolin Soccer etc. Bollywood may have more recognized moveis, but China makes better action movies. And I'm saying this as a person who didn't enjoy most of them (except for the Johnnie To movies).

Re: China is betting that the West is in irreversible decline

#323

Post by indigochill »

bellyfullofbac wrote: post #143
pcbro141 wrote: post #69

Why did the US let its infrastructure get to such a bad state? And why are there so many dilapidated neighborhoods and literally crumbling schools? The US is filthy rich, couldn't they have fixed these things decades ago? Just spend hundreds of billions investing in neighborhoods that have historically been intentionally left to rot? Is it just disdain for the people who live in the crumbling areas? Serious question.…

Attempt of a serious answer: it seems like it's really Republican (party) ideology that government should be small enough to be able to be drowned in a bathtub, and any amount of money for the people is deemed sinful. Never mind that it makes sense to build good roads, fast trains, and even good schools to educate people. Seems like the GOP has a "If we do x, that will prove our propaganda all this time has been wron…

> ...government should be small enough to be able to be drowned in a bathtub...

The key piece you're missing is that this is the case for national government, because the rest should be managed at, ideally, the local government level where citizens are able to self-govern, such as on city council meetings. That power should move up the organizational structure only as far as it needs to (for instance, you cannot build interstate highways at the city level).

In a country the size of the US, consolidating political power at the national level turns politics into the spectator sport it's become.

Re: China is betting that the West is in irreversible decline

#324

Post by KaiserPro »

gher-shyu3i wrote: post #167
KaiserPro wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> because progressive values don't promote strength. Venice in the 1400s, London in the 1685-1700 Paris 1875-1914 vienna 1890-1914 London in the 1960s All of these cities flourished because they were progressive.

Counter point: Islamic empires until the Ottoman empire collapse post WWI. They flourished, yet were not "progressive" in the modern Western sense of the word.

I don't think thats a counter point! Depending on which time frame you are talking about, the ottoman empire was a cosmopolitan fairly free empire. There was freedom of religion (of sorts, there was a tithe.) and a civil law system that appeared to have some semblance of working for the lay man.

If you compare the treatment of jews in venice, parts of the ottoman empire were a haven. Spain's loss was the ottoman's gain.

Re: China is betting that the West is in irreversible decline

#325

Post by bellyfullofbac »

russli1993 wrote: post #317
bellyfullofbac wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't like China and find what they're doing in Xinjiang abhorrent (and I believe that the Western media reports are truthful and not just made up shit), but that part of the article made me wonder if the West has been or is as bad, but the Economist (and myself) ignore it because, "Hey, we're the good guys!". There isn't a lot of outrage about miners of rare minerals with dangerous working conditions or poorly pai…

From my knowledge of what is happening in xinjiang, I strongly questions what the western media reports are saying. My opinions are very long so I posted it on medium. I would appreciate it if you have the time to take a look. I offer my perspectives on the issue. https://lty13800.medium.com/my-thoughts-on-xinjiang-daa8d391...

God, your response is too long, too rambling, and would take too much time to refute. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gish_gallop . But here I am having wasted half an hour anyway.

You're doing the same thing you accuse them of doing, using online videos (apparently Chinese-sanctioned ones!) to claim things aren't happening. Sure things look nice there, but I would question if these video makers are being sponsored by China, or being lead through a Potemkin village: https://theprint.in/opinion/china-is-paying-foreign-journali... (yeah, random link from a Google result, very trustworthy). If I were the Chinese government, I'd find the few people who are willing to say my version of the story, and lead the Youtubers to them.

Even the Malay vlogger wrote in her captions that her friend got into an incident where police asked her to take off her Muslim garment, and the friend seemingly able to get away with keeping it on because she was foreign... how is that not religious oppression? In her vlog I see mostly Han Chinese, and she even added a part where she said people around her are asking each other why she has a headscarf on.

And how do you explain this lady's experience? Did the CIA/western propagandists pay here to write this? https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jan/12/uighur-xinjian...

Anyway, your long response haven't convinced me that the CCP aren't doing oppression in Xinjiang. I'm not going to defend the "1 in 12" number, nor can I defend the maybe exaggerated Western media reports you have read, but my guess is the oppression is done in a hushed way that you won't see it by walking into a Grand Bazaar.

Re: China is betting that the West is in irreversible decline

#326

Post by ceilingcorner »

stjohnswarts wrote: post #271
ceilingcorner wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Easy: give the individual states more responsibility. This has already begun. There is really no reason why California and Alabama need to have 100% of the same laws on highly contentious issues. It's not called the United States for nothing.

Actually there is because southern states are well on their way to removing women's rights to do what they want with their body, installing theocratic governments, and resurrecting Jim Crow laws. If that's not a reason for more federal involvement I don't know what is.

This comment is exaggerated hyperbole and oversimplification.

Re: China is betting that the West is in irreversible decline

#327

Post by tim333 »

Daho0n wrote: post #23

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…

I wouldn't say the west is in decline in absolute terms though maybe in relative power as the likes of China get richer. Against that the culture of 'the west' is I think spreading to more counties. Places like Japan have long been western allies and I think a lot of countries wouldn't be very taken with the Chinese system.

Re: China is betting that the West is in irreversible decline

#328

Post by cbHXBY1D »

arcanon wrote: post #270

Ironically, if you are capable of understanding demographics, you know that China is about to have a population collapse and India will overtake it.

Economics and power is not that simple. I'm sure most commenters here know about China's demographics - but it is asinine to think they'll collapse because of an ageing population. That's not how the world works.

Re: China is betting that the West is in irreversible decline

#329

Post by earthboundkid »

Ancapistani wrote: post #309
earthboundkid wrote: post #300

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve heard my right wing family members talk about voter fraud since at least 2000, but it’s basically a symptom of the bigger problem, which is a failure of belief in human nature. Changing the topic briefly, how do I know that 9/11 was not an “inside job”? Do I know anything about whether jet fuel melts steel or surveillance of the Pentagon hit, etc.? No, I do not. How then? Well, I know human nature, and so I know…

> Changing the topic briefly, how do I know that 9/11 was not an “inside job”? If you enter the conversation believing that, then I suppose you have no way of knowing. It's reasonable that people tell you you're wrong and that your belief is crazy. The difference that I see is that people don't tend to tell you that you - specifically you - are evil because of your beliefs. > How then? Well, I know human nature, and…

> That said, looking at this objectively, you assert "if there were, it would be known." According to the polling I referenced in the GP, it is "known" by ~60% of GOP voters.

It is not known by a court of law, despite numerous opportunities for the Trump team to do so. At best, Trump is so incompetent that he predicted massive fraud before the election, had it happen, and then failed to collect any evidence of its having happened. If he's really that incompetent, we're better off with the fraudsters.

Again, it doesn't take deep insight to figure out the above. It's just common sense about human nature, how the courts work, how the media works, etc.

Re: Hunter Biden's laptop, the Trump team chose to sit on the story until October, so the media chose to ignore it. Impeachment #1 had already made it clear that Trump was planning to attack Hunter. Why should the media choose to let themselves be played? If Trump's team wanted the story to be publicized, they had months and months to do it but instead they waited until October and the media declined to cover a story that was a best irrelevant to Biden Sr.'s job performance.

Re: China is betting that the West is in irreversible decline

#330

Post by dang »

EdwinLarkin wrote: post #320
dang wrote: post #314

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nationalistic flamewar will get you banned here. You did that repeatedly in this thread, and you broke the site guidelines egregiously with this one. Please read the rules and do no more of this on HN. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html I'm not going to ban you right now because you've posted other comments that are within the intended use of the site, but you've been seriously abusing it also. Comments…

What's wrong with the latter? It's a standard practice of indian outsourcing companies like Infosys,Tech Mahinda,TCL... Also the "lifting out of poverty" is standard propaganda spread by CCP https://www.firstpost.com/world/china-claims-to-have-ended-e... What's nationalistic about that?

One-liner national putdowns are nationalistic flamebait. If you had written substantively about "standard practices" that would be different, but you didn't.

As for your GP post, if you read the site guidelines you'll see immediately why that wasn't acceptable as an HN comment.

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