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Re: undefined

#91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But they won't have anywhere to sell their products. Most of their economy gone just like that. The internal Chinese economy* is at 80% as against 20% for exports.** Of those exports, the US plus Europe are about 30%. In other words, if the entire West is decoupled from China's economy, the Chinese economy still has 80%+ (70% of 20% = 14%) or a total of 94% left. The West is not actually as important as it thinks. *…

This is a good analysis. People need to hear it. Do you have sources for these numbers?

Those numbers are a couple of years old. They're also rounded off. IIRC, the export figure was actually around 18%. They're out there on the Web somewhere. *

It's very likely that the internal economy is even larger now, because there was a new emphasis on enlarging it to reduce the economy's vulnerability to external factors when the US started to work on reducing imports from China some years back.

* EDIT: Latest figure from 2022 is 20.68%. https://www.theglobaleconomy.com/china/exports/#:~:text=Expo....

Exports to US (2021) are 3% of China's GDP. https://www.aei.org/foreign-and-defense-policy/us-and-china-....

Many Americans think that China would go under if the US stopped importing from China. In fact, exports to the US are less than 15% of China's exports world-wide. (3/20.68 x 100 = 14.51)

The China of 2023 is the US of 1942. When the US gets belligerent with China, I just shake my head. It's a bit like a 5-year-old kid threatening a quarter-back.

Re: undefined

#92
post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But they won't have anywhere to sell their products. Most of their economy gone just like that. The internal Chinese economy* is at 80% as against 20% for exports.** Of those exports, the US plus Europe are about 30%. In other words, if the entire West is decoupled from China's economy, the Chinese economy still has 80%+ (70% of 20% = 14%) or a total of 94% left. The West is not actually as important as it thinks. *…

> The Chinese internal market size is four times the size of the US market for consumer goods. And that's apart from the the Chinese rolling in cash reserves that lets them afford to build lots of infrastructure, just like the US was able to build back in the 1950s and 1960s. I was under the impression that large amounts of the infrastructure projects were debt-financed. Is this not the case?

Not to the extent that most countries would need to. It's a bit silly in financial/economic terms to have cash just sitting there doing nothing, while you take out a costlier mortgage on something else.

Most of the infrastructure debt that you're likely to be thinking of is taken out by other countries who have China constructing the railways, etc, used in making the BRI. China is shelling out plenty of cash for those railways, etc in the near term, while the other countries will pay it off over the longer term.

Re: undefined

#93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a good analysis. People need to hear it. Do you have sources for these numbers?

Those numbers are a couple of years old. They're also rounded off. IIRC, the export figure was actually around 18%. They're out there on the Web somewhere. * It's very likely that the internal economy is even larger now, because there was a new emphasis on enlarging it to reduce the economy's vulnerability to external factors when the US started to work on reducing imports from China some years back. * EDIT: Latest f…

Thank you sir! Sometimes, when I see that belligerence, I think "China must already be in charge. It's deputized US to play the provocateur role to give it the pretext it needs for war." But I doubt that's true.

I think the analogy of US-China to 5-year-old to quarterback is a bit of stretch. But given that the US is a young nation/culture and China an old one, it could be more apt that I realize right now. I don't know. Yet China's foreign ministry diplomatic tantrums, mirrored in the (admittedly much rebuked by Chinese netizens) occasional tantrums of its travelers on foreign soil, look more akin to 5-year-old behavior, to me. Do you have more insight your analogy?

To me it seems more like, if China is the QB, then US is like the wizened old coach, battle-scarred, full of wisdom and experience, Hall-of-famer, but now beyond its prime. Living vicariously through youth, easily enraged by yet ready to rise to the challenge of the upstart, but also needing to let go of the idea that it's the only power on the field. Sometimes it gets embarrassing when it goes on its lengthy rants and speeches about the glory days, but still, nobody wants to follow the QB, everyone still needs Coach. Yet Coach needs to evolve and adapt.

I think picking aged leaders could be a weird subconscious expression of this "decrepitude". In another sense, Steve Rogers, "Captain America", the "man out of time" is a fictional embodiment of this idea, and his character's trajectory an allegory of America's trajectory overall, right back to the desire to travel back in time to "Fix things" and harken back to a fading Americana. :.(

Re: undefined

#95
post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Russia is quietly sapping the strength of Ukraine, NATO and the EU, and Israel is reaping the harvest from sowing discontent in the region for decades. I think it's the other way around, Ukraine is decimating Russias fighting strength, theres no other real way to explain Russias reactivation of T62 tanks and its frankentechnicals that it has been making from any spare gun it can find and a MTLB.

Nonsense. Ukraine ceased to exist as an independent entity quite some time ago. It 's hanging on only because NATO and EU are propping it up. As soon as the USA finds a new thing, and the EU/NATO realise they have been played, then Ukraine will be done.

> Nonsense.

Literally everything I said is true.

> Ukraine ceased to exist as an independent entity quite some time ago. It 's hanging on only because NATO and EU are propping it up.

It's being propped up because it's hard to have a functioning economy during a war thats literally inside your borders.

> As soon as the USA finds a new thing, and the EU/NATO realise they have been played, then Ukraine will be done.

How have EU/NATO been played may I asked?.

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