• Putin and Trump meet, trump claims US "stupidity" as source of Russian distrust.
    184 replies, posted
On the contrary, you seem to have a naive binary view of the world and the powers that precede it. I don't expect anything about any entity such as a country, i view their past and present actions and base my opinions around that. You claim i have a worthless and ignorant worldview and keep talking about how i'm not worth your time replying even though you still do, that's pretty funny.
US hasn't censored their internet, censored the news, keep black mirror level surveillance, completely ban and arrest opposing parties, or prop up islands and claim foreign nations as their own. You have to be dumb as hell or ignorant to not see how they treat the SEA nations and especially japan. Imagine that but with western nations and see why its a horrible idea to think they would be better leaders. I'm not defending the horrid shit the US has done, but ignoring the blatant human right's abuse and totalitarianism in the East is ignorant. Oh and before you go "That doesn't mean their foreign policy will reflect that" all nations that trade have traded political stakes to appease each other.
How am i ignoring anything you've just mentioned when above you i pretty much repeated, much how i've been doing througt this thread, that indeed China has been/is a huge ammount of questionable things.
Because you're implying said things are better than the US just being fucking retarded for 4 years vs an totalitarian government that is already spying on people without having the leverage of being able to just stop trade with nations entirely if they don't get their way.
How is my argument only based only on the US's past 4 years lmao? I literally mentioned more policy that's been enacted over the last 70 years than Trump's recent policies.
Man if this thread hasn't been derailed hardcore.
And im pointing out both Russia and China are heading straight to what they were in the 70s, Totalitarian governments with insane spying/nationalism that is detrimental to globalization. You know, what the leader of the world should be preaching about? China doesn't give a shit about it's neighbors, China gives a shit about it's own government and that's it. To sit back and said the US is somehow not for their neighbors when they have signed plenty of trade/military/peace alliances since then is willfully ignorant. I mean, I know why you have a massive fucking hardon for hating america with the dirty wars. Its been 35 years since the dirty war ended, and Just recently Chinese is doing the same exact shit with their people, and you really want them to be the lesser of two evils. America has done dumb as hell things with the red scare, but to say they shouldn't lead for the horrid shit they promoted 40 years ago is asinine considering globalization wasn't barely out of it's infancy even by the end of the red scare.
But that's totally the opposite, nowadays you have China which is trying to develop globalization through heavy investments in third world nations like African ones and promoting international trade via several infrastracture project while at the same time you have the US anti-globalist policies by enacting discriminatory immigration laws, imposing tariffs on imports and enacting protectionist policies for their industries. China doesn't care about other nations but they're own, that's true and i've never claimed otherwise but the fact that you have this double standard and think the US actually does is completely false. The only reason the the US is in Europe is to counter Russia sphere of influence and this has been like this since the end of WW2, just as the only reason they are in Japan and South Korea is to counter China. For you to claim that "The US is for their neighbors because they have signed plenty of trade/military/peace alliances" shows how naive you are. I mean, this is literally geopolitics 101, why don't you think the US rarely, if ever, looked towards helping African countries with any significant policies when they are arguably the most in need? It's almost like to them they had no value since no adversary nation like Russia was there.
Last century a whole fucking lot happened to china chiefly not under its own terms, that's why it's called the era of humiliation and in this century they got their shit together after getting it kicked around by japan twice and built their economy back up to being a rival of the U.S. and to build a industry from a country of ash is a tad more difficult than a civil war that lasted 4 years compared to a fun 150 years of civil war and foreign exploitation. I'd argue china has done more because it has had to do more to get where it's at. Not to diminish the U.S., we certainly had our fair share of struggles but we weren't the worlds cheap floozie for a century. Now quit moving your goal posts, it's making your position seem more like incoherent ramblings than thought out arguments.
How am i moving goal posts? My first post was: IMO i'd rather have China than the US as a world superpower. And that still stands? I also agree that one of the reasons of China's economic boom was their subjugation for more than a century first by the British empires and then by Japan, also, Mao's disastrous GLF.
Their version of Globalization is the guise of proxy control. They give out massive loans to developing nations and have insane interests rates to basically grab them by the balls when they can't pay up. Its why the are pushing so hard for their highway system that only chinese workers and equipment are allowed to build in foreign nations. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-silkroad-europe-montenegro-insi/chinese-highway-to-nowhere-haunts-montenegro-idUSKBN1K60QX?utm_source=Facebook&utm_medium=Social A Chinese loan for the first phase has sent Montenegro’s debt soaring and forced the government to raise taxes, partially freeze public sector wages and end a benefit for mothers to get its finances in order. Despite those measures, Montenegro’s debt is expected to approach 80 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) this year and the International Monetary Fund says the country cannot afford to take on any more debt to finish its ambitious project. This only benefits China and their interests and allow a lot more stakes in the nations that bite into it. Its the total opposite of globalization which is equal trust and stakes to promote positive growth for both nations. My boy, NATO was created to protect America and it's allies. The US has always been in good relations with western nations way before WW1 even started, and hell of a lot longer since the red scare. Saying they only give a shit about fighting Russian influence (fucking lmao considering at that point Russia and America were allied) and ignoring the massive mutual benefit the allied nations have had that predate the time period you were referencing is ignorant. Japan originally was trading with the US way before WW1/2 and only became hostile once they were denied crucial oil deposits for their conquest in china. They were occupied by the US after the war, as with most of the Axis states. Saying America is there now just because of china is ignoring the massive trade japan has done since WW2 with their electronics and automobiles. South Korea occupation is at the behest of the government there and the immediate threat of North Korea. We still have massive amounts of trade with the south, just like Japan that benefit all 3 countries. The only ignorant person is the one claiming that the US had global connections/trade after the WW2 and that's it. Easy, their government is very unstable with warlords running rampant. Maintaining government ties with a nation that is constantly at war with themselves is extremely hard and pointless. If anything, wouldn't you be more upset if the US did come in and enforce their pick for rule Just like the dirty wars? We don't have a rich history with Africa bar the slavery period like we do with the nations we do trade/talk with. Besides, saying we aren't there because Russia/China isn't there is completely contradictory to your first statement with china investing and building a much bigger presence in Africa. You asked for modern examples of China doing more heinous shit than the US, then say you never denied it. So either you're just saying literally 55 million people perishing from a government backed famine is nothing, or you think that's somehow not as bad as the US having a red scare period and backing right wing rebels.
Never claimed NATO wasn't beneficial for both parties as you seem to imply i did. Never claimed the US had no relations with European powers before WW2. I did claim that the US enacted NATO because of the USSR which is true and lmao @ claiming Russia and the US were allies in everything but name and not just because of Germany. Keep saying i'm only talking out of ignorance, maybe i'll become reality. Also, your reason for the US not projecting into Africa is because of instability? lmao, what about the middle east then? China has only started looking towards Africa in the late 90s and mostly for economic reasons but it's funny how you mention i contradict myself since i claim China is in Africa while the US isn't, which after China's development in the region, actually is, it's pretty telling when a US document actually describes that their only reason for them to move into Africa recently, is because of China. You are again conflating both internal and foreign policy, note how the GLF doesn't correlate to their current foreing policy at all and note how i don't mention any of US interment camps, racial segregation or slavery throught their history because those were internal issues and never manifested into their foreign policy.
Sooooooo your point of america only being in it for themselves is false, thanks for ironing your point out. America/Brits/Russia were all on the same side and cooperating before WW2 and before the Bolsheviki revolution. In fact, Russia backed the union during the American civil war, and Roosevelt brokered the peace treaty of the Russo-Japanese war. Even then, the US backed the Bolsheviks during the revolution with the other allied nations trying to prevent the communist takeover. Even AFTER the takeover, the US still traded and negotiated with Russia. It was only after WW2 did Russia and the European nations turned on each other. Again, you are literally ignoring decades of history to try to prove your viewpoint. The middle east has been a focal point for geopolitical conflicts since before WW1 with the Ottoman empire. These conflicts are literally a resonance from decades long instability caused by almost every single nation in the world, not just the US. Everyone has had their fingers dipped in the middle east since the Oil boom, compound the fact that they recently became nuclear backed is adding a lot more tension and projection from all nations. Your PDF just reinforces my claim btw, Read how the US is trying to establish contact, but its extremely hard with the instability in the region. I didn't say we have literally no involvement there, as the UN/US has done peacekeeping operations in Africa since the 90s. I just pointed out your claim that we don't develop there because of China and Russia not being there was idiotic since China is there already and we were there before china even sneezed on the nation because of the genocide happening in Africa. In fact the General stresses that the Chinese presence should not be seen as an aggressive force, he was merely saying their infrastructure should focus on stabilization instead of commercialization. So thanks for not reading your own source and providing me a source to prove my point. All of which are either from, wartime laws, past slavery laws, and racial laws. All of which were either from a strict context to why it happened, or were already being treated before the modern globalized America came to be. Again, you're comparing that to much more recent atrocities China pushed, and what China is currently doing with their highway loan programs. My point with the Chinese loan programs is that it allows china (which is a totalitarian state) to have more leeway with enacting their laws and beliefs. The IMF a coalition of 189 countries, not just the US, and it includes China as the 3rd biggest member (japan is second). China doing what its doing is strictly in Chinese interests and not the global powers.
Both of you are arguing the same thing... Colonialism never ended and all these global powers are just fighting for pieces of a pie of neocolonialist hegemony, just with different flavors of nationalism.
The IMF ruined them economically bud, never mentioned intrusion in the democratic way of goverments of the loaning countries, you are literally trying to argue against this while i know first hand how IMF's neo-liberal ECONOMIC policies triggered my country's crisis in 2001, literally what you claim China is trying to do right now, is what the IMF did in the 90s: Despite promises from the IMF to "work rapidly with the Argentine authorities" [22], successive negotiations failed to reach an agreement. This failure was in part because the IMF set a number of strict conditions including repealing a law on economic subversion (corruption), the passage of new laws on bankruptcy and commitments to reduce public spending by 60 per cent, especially by the provincial governments.[23] By the end of 2002 the IMF had still not resumed lending to Argentina. A new programme was eventually signed in January 2003.[24] Argentina owes the IMF and World Bank US$13.8 billion.[25] Literally: Lend money to a corrupt goverment while you know they won't spend it wisely -> when country is in shambles and desperate try to enact extreme austerity measures. Also, i don't know if you are being intentionally obvlivious or not but saying the IMF is not spearheaded by the US is as dumb as saying NATO isn't either. All and all, you still fail to justify how China's foreign policy is worse than the US, while trying to dwelve on irrelevant things to the topic like whether or not Russia and the US were truly allies back in WW2 or if they had economic ties with Europe prior to it. Your point on how loans by China allows them to have greater leeway on their laws is irrelevant since literally the US does the same exact thing or are you gonna argue that US's loans aren't only based on their self interest just like you claim China does?
Oh I see. You’re not comparing, you’re just stating “this is worse because I said so”. What he he did was compare them. You did not
Sure i am buddy. Let me entertain your argument though, like i've said before, he is trying to correlate internal to foreign policy arguing that "all nations that trade have traded political stakes to appease each other" trying to pass the false equivalence that China's foreign policy must be the same as it's internal while providing no backing for that argument at all. But feel free to provide an example for him if you so desire, let's see, if your worldview of foreign = internal policy, China would have had to enact any ot this internal policies on their foreign policies as well: -Famine of rural population. -Authoritarian way of goverment -Mass censorship of dissenting opinions -Quelling of protests So please, feel free to indicate the times that China has enacted this in any of their foreign policies as to greatly outnumber the times the US has done so themselves.
I wouldn't argue in favour of the IMF either. but the US and the IMF are different things. Do you think a China world superpower would lack this form of corruption? I'm not cheerleading for the US, I'm against China's rise to power because it's bad for, well, pretty much fucking everyone. Having a totalitarian state that genuinely seeks to have it's fingers in every element of day to day life, more so than the US government does, is not a prospect I feel anyone should support.
"My government was irresponsible with their money and the IMF is to blame." If I took a loan out and spent all the money with no plan to actually pay it back, why is it the banks fault for allowing me to be retarded. I just posted that there is no evidence that the IMF was at fault for nations falling apart. That's the fault of their own governments. The IMF did give a loan, but the Argentinian government didn't meet their agreed GDP growth: In December 1999, President Fernando de la Rúa took office, seeking assistance from the IMF shortly thereafter. In March 2000, the IMF agreed to a three-year $7.2 billion stand-by arrangement with Argentina, conditioned on a strict fiscal adjustment and the assumption of 3.5% GDP growth in 2000 (actual growth was 0.5%). In late 2000, Argentina began to experience severely diminished access to capital markets, as reflected in a sharp and sustained rise in spreads on Argentine bonds over U.S. Treasuries. In December, The de la Rua government announced a $40 billion multilateral assistance package organized by IMF. The uneven implementation of fiscal adjustments and reforms, a worsening global macroeconomic environment, and political instability led to the complete loss of market access and intensified capital flight by the second quarter of 2001. Argentine debt, held mostly in bonds, was massively sold short and the government found itself unable to borrow or meet debt payments. With Argentina no longer in compliance with the conditions of the expanded IMF-supported program, the IMF decided to suspend disbursements. At the end of December, in a climate of severe political and social unrest, the country partially defaulted on its international obligations; in January 2002, it formally abandoned the convertibility regime. They settled in a reasonable growth rate to pay back the loan and faulted on it instead. Plus, your economy was tanking before they even approached the IMF for any assistance: Although the economy was already in a mild recession at this point, conditions worsened substantially after the devaluation of the Mexican peso during December 1994. The economy shrank by 4%, and a dozen banks collapsed. With the labour force continuing to expand and employment falling sharply along with aggregate demand, unemployment rose by over 6% in 6 months. But the government responded effectively: it tightened bank regulation and capital requirements, and encouraged foreign banks to take over weaker local ones. The economy soon recovered and, between 1996 and 1998, both output and employment grew rapidly and unemployment declined substantially. However, at the beginning of 1999, the Brazilian currency underwent a strong depreciation. The Argentine economy contracted 4% in 1999, and unemployment increased again. All that turmoil was the fault of your government, not a loan given to them after the fact. Sure, if the IMF didn't give the loan, Argentina wouldn't owe the interest. But regardless, the economy was collapsing with or without the intervention. Way to move that goalpost even more. You were the one saying America had interests with Europe and japan just because of China/Russia. I pointed out how that's just false according to history, and current/past trade. You also claim America only gives a shit about themselves, while also saying they don't? Then you try to compare a singular nation's loan programs that are completely different to another conglomerate of nations loan program which makes no sense. I showed how the US has supported globalization with equal support from other nations. Your whole rant with Argentina clearly paints why you have such a hardon for hating america's place, and its because you rather blame america than your country for fucking themselves up. I'm going to stop arguing, because clearly showing how full of shit your points are isn't working when you just keep moving the goal around.
Sure i can, first of all, i hope you understand that saying "every country before this has done this, so this one will inevitable do it too" is a pretty common fallacy. My second point would be that a nation's treatment of their population is irrelevant to their supposed treatment of foreign nations, my example being the US itself, treating their citizens to a different standard to what they did to the inhabitants of the countries they've meddled it. My third point would be that you have provided very few sources showcasing China's treatments of other countries and when you have, those policies were far less damaging that what the US has done in the same timespan, proving my whole argument of both countries being responsible of unfair treatment but one being clearly the lesser of the two.
Everyone accepts and acknowledges the US did what it did through out history to empower itself. No one is skeptical of that. Stop acting like we don't understand that. America has done a lot of fucked up things through out history, and no one here has denied that. We have considered them, and compared them, and consider them less than what China has done. I do not think you can look at foreign policy and domestic policy in the case of imperialist expansion the same way. You're looking at military action the US has used through out the last 40 years as an example of their foreign policy. That's not fair, reasonable, or an accurate definition of what "Foreign policy" is. It's only part of the issue. Trade, economics, outreach and support in different methods due exist, and sure, you can point to instances of extreme failure in policy, procedure, and administration, but those are outliers in the grander trend. China has a horrible human rights record, and no free media. They do not have free, or uncensored media. They have state controlled media. Those two things combined lead me to believe without a shadow of a doubt they would be the worse of the "two evils" you keep speaking of. Trump is an outlier in the american history and experience, and even though there's shit tons of things I have, and do criticize america for fucking up across that time span, I would consider them to be a vastly better candidate for "Superpower" than China, and I can make that claim easily and without fear of rebuke based on my last two points, human rights record, and state run media.
"The IMF said they helped caused it" source says: the IMF said it ought to have prevented the Argentine government from following poor economic policies. The base issue with your whole argument with the IMF is your own government being stupid and buying into a loan they knew they couldn't afford. I don't know how else to say it other than your government fucked up, not the IMF. They simply acknowledged it technically made it worse, but the source of the issue was the Argentinian government it's self. Truthfully tell me, If you took out a loan while having literally no money or idea on how to pay for said loan, why would it be the bank's fault for your mishandling of the money.
How about their relations with Taiwan? What about their aggression in the South China Sea? As an Australian thank god it's the US that's the biggest super power and not China.
Then we have an essential disagreement on how would both nations act in the future if they remained (in the case of the US) or take over (in the case of China) as world leader. Take into consideration that for me, the US had the chance to turn things around and actually choose what it seemed to be a great leader, Bernie Sander, who also had a much less interventionist policy but then the US establishment actively dismantled that and the rest is history. If i'm not misconstructing what you are saying, you think that China would act the same way as they do in their own land (with control of the media and their human's right record) and accept that while the US still continues to enact some dubious policies they are still in your eyes the lesser evil. While in my case, i'd rather give China a chance over the US, even if that is based on the assumption that their foreign policy would not be the same as their internal, considering what the US has done in the past (and yes, that includes military involvement since i do think that's reasonable) while also acknowledging that they are far from perfect. In the end, it's a matter of who's vision of the future ends up being correct and that's why no one can truly argue 'who's right'. Atleast, i take confort in the fact that ultimately we both want the same thing, a better world, even though we have drastic viewpoints on how that would happen.
https://twitter.com/KevinWhitelaw1/status/1020010651744374785 https://twitter.com/mattyglesias/status/1020014947248627712
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