America Will Collapse by 2025 (2010) • Hacker News Board

Re: America Will Collapse by 2025 (2010)

#21

Post by systemvoltage » Fri, Jan 14, 2022, 4:12 PM UTC

phekunde wrote: post #12

America will not collapse, it will become less relevant. The multipolar world is going to be more prominent going forward. Even France's Macron is talking about making EU independent of US influence. And with emerging country like India already having a DNA of non-alignment, it looks like the US will have a say in global world order but the influence will be far more limited than what it use to be.

Good, US has been spending unfair share and has been the nanny of the world. One thing I agreed with Trump policy was this inward-looking aspect - no more stupid wars, no more pulling the weight of NATO and no more nation building in ME. Note that these policies were bipartisan - Bushes and Clintons/Obama supported them and spun the military industrial complex slot machine. What Trump did was very much in the stark contrast to the classic liberal/conservative stance of US foreign policy. Essentially a more lucid version of Ron Paul.

Re: America Will Collapse by 2025 (2010)

#22

Post by fallingknife » Fri, Jan 14, 2022, 4:12 PM UTC

coldtea wrote: post #9

starwind wrote: post #3

I lol'd at this oil analysis. The author had no idea what technological developments would be widely deployed in just the next couple years after they wrote this

> I lol'd at this oil analysis. You really shouldn't tho. > The author had no idea what technological developments would be widely deployed in just the next couple years after they wrote this None of the technological developments created since then [2010] are able to mitigate an oil shock of the kind described in the article given their current deployment levels. Actually, not even any developments that might be cre…

Given that the US is now a net oil exporter, an oil shock scenario is pretty much off the table. Moving to EVs is going to take so much oil demand off the table that it's pretty much a non issue going forward too.

Re: America Will Collapse by 2025 (2010)

#23

Post by anonporridge » Fri, Jan 14, 2022, 4:13 PM UTC

djohnston wrote: post #6

I believed it until China started scoring own goals kneecapping their tech industry and their best and brightest kept coming to the West... Someday though, my VEMAX investments will look like a good decision.

One of America's secret sauces is that everyone in the world is welcome to defect from their home regime and come here. Hell, there's even a chance we'll make your children our leaders (Obama and Harris for example). And you personally have a chance to start a business and become a billionaire or advance up the corporate ladder to CEO of existing giants.

The inverse is not true.

The best and brightest Americans (regardless of race) can never effectively defect to China. Maybe if you're ethnically Han Chinese your children will have a chance to be fully integrated and accepted, but definitely not if you're any other race.

The gravity of best and brightest migration is still one way into the American singularity.

Re: America Will Collapse by 2025 (2010)

#24

Post by newaccount2021 » Fri, Jan 14, 2022, 4:14 PM UTC

No post body was provided.

Re: America Will Collapse by 2025 (2010)

#25

Post by JavaBatman » Fri, Jan 14, 2022, 4:14 PM UTC

Even if we transition to a multipolar world order and renewed great power competition, America will still be the strongest and most secure global power. It has hegemony in the western hemisphere through its enforcement of the Monroe Doctrine; it is protected by the two largest oceans; it has historical, linguistic, and cultural ties to two regional powers on both sides of the ocean (UK and Ireland in Europe, Australia and NZ in the Asia Pacific, Five Eyes, etc.); it is by far the leader in soft power (music, movies, TV, technology, English language, etc.); and most importantly, it has the strongest military by far. Despite strategic defeats in the Middle East and South Asia, US officers gained tons of battlefield experience and the ability to test its weaponry. So even if the US now has to deal with a hegemonic challenger in East Asia (China) and more assertive one in Europe (Russia), its geography and demography give it advantages no other great power has.

Re: America Will Collapse by 2025 (2010)

#26

Post by Joker_vD » Fri, Jan 14, 2022, 4:14 PM UTC

esens wrote: post #13

Clubber wrote: post #5

Doom and gloom has been selling for decades. Don't buy it.

Empires all do end and when they do they often fracture because of a built up of social discontent, but they are predicted to be ending 1000x more often than they end. Eventually someone calls it correctly though, and generally you only know who in hindsight.

It's like predicting someone's death: undoubtedly one day that person will die, it's just quite hard to predict it accurately. As devil in a certain book jested, "Yes, the man is mortal, but that's half the trouble; it's that he sometimes is abruptly mortal, that's the trick!"

Re: America Will Collapse by 2025 (2010)

#27

Post by jeffreyrogers » Fri, Jan 14, 2022, 4:14 PM UTC

djohnston wrote: post #6

I believed it until China started scoring own goals kneecapping their tech industry and their best and brightest kept coming to the West... Someday though, my VEMAX investments will look like a good decision.

They kneecapped some of their consumer internet industry. They're still investing a lot in all other forms of technology.

Re: America Will Collapse by 2025 (2010)

#28

Post by 300bps » Fri, Jan 14, 2022, 4:15 PM UTC

coldtea wrote: post #9

starwind wrote: post #3

I lol'd at this oil analysis. The author had no idea what technological developments would be widely deployed in just the next couple years after they wrote this

> I lol'd at this oil analysis. You really shouldn't tho. > The author had no idea what technological developments would be widely deployed in just the next couple years after they wrote this None of the technological developments created since then [2010] are able to mitigate an oil shock of the kind described in the article given their current deployment levels. Actually, not even any developments that might be cre…

The article's oil analysis is laughable in hindsight. Look at this chart:

https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/oil-and-petroleum-produc...

Almost immediately after the article was written, US oil production hockey-sticked up to the point we were a net exporter of oil starting in 2020. The Salon analysis is actually hilarious against what actually happened.

Re: America Will Collapse by 2025 (2010)

#29

Post by rsstack » Fri, Jan 14, 2022, 4:16 PM UTC

COGlory wrote: post #17

sAbakumoff wrote: post #8

America will not collapse, but American democracy likely will collapse. At the end of 2022, GOP will win the mid-term elections and have the majority in the house and the senate. They already have state legislatures effectively under control, and the supreme court is full of conservative judges. In 2024 Ron De Santos, or another authoritarian candidate, will win the GOP nomination and easily win the election because…

"If the other party wins, it's not democracy."

That's not what he said. It doesn't matter which party wins. The issue would be if representatives of any party end democracy, which he outlined in short how it could be done - and some of the representatives of the "other party" have expressed real interest in performing those actions.

Re: America Will Collapse by 2025 (2010)

#30

Post by xboxnolifes » Fri, Jan 14, 2022, 4:16 PM UTC

coldtea wrote: post #10

Clubber wrote: post #5

Doom and gloom has been selling for decades. Don't buy it.

I think you've gotten the wrong takeaway message from "The boy who cried wolf story". At some point, there were indeed wolves, so dismissing the chance of them because of fradulent/failed prior warnings turned out to be a mistake. Plus, in 2022 it's more accurate than ever. Though of course, Rome didn't decline in a day, either...

The take away isn't to always listen, but to not always exaggerate/lie. The reader never got impacted by the wolves, the speaker did. So in the end, maybe the ones impacted will be the media, not the readers.