basilico:
Iran can do anything they want with the cash.

I expect you to say some rubbish about CNN and then post something 2000mulish, which is why I wouldn't bother too much with you.

While the Iranian government claims it can use the money however it pleases, the Biden administration has repeatedly stressed that the funds are narrowly limited to non-sanctionable purchases like food and medicine, and that they will be subject to strict oversight.

“These funds are paid to vetted third-party vendors for food, medicine, medical products and agricultural products to go into Iran over a period of years. If there is any diversion, we’ll know it and we’ll lock up these accounts,” he told CNN’s Jake Tapper on “The Lead.”

https://www.cnn.com/2023/09/18/politics/iran-money-explainer/index.html

budaatum:


I expect you to say some rubbish about CNN and then post something 2000mulish, which is why I wouldn't bother too much with you.

You never seem to get it..CNN is obviously lying about funds that are not in control by America. Qatar is host to your favorite Muslim Brotherhood members. The top Taliban were living there all the time before taking up their new positions in Kabul.
Iran would likely get arms from.Russia or China..What prevents them writing a cheque to a Russian company for grains but get ammo instead. Who is there to inspect the cargo delivered?

basilico:


You never seem to get it..CNN is obviously lying about funds ......

See the below and watch to see how it plays out instead of trying your useless qanon strategy of presuming your own subjective factless doubts would be swallowed as facts for anything like you don't have a history of touting debunked 2000mules!

https://en.mehrnews.com/news/207047/Iran-says-has-access-to-unfrozen-funds-in-Qatar

Also,
https://www.iranintl.com/en/202310132841

basilico:


You never seem to get it..CNN is obviously lying about funds that are not in control by America. Qatar is host to your favorite Muslim Brotherhood members. The top Taliban were living there all the time before taking up their new positions in Kabul.
Iran would likely get arms from.Russia or China..What prevents them writing a cheque to a Russian company for grains but get ammo instead. Who is there to inspect the cargo delivered?

Leaders of hamas and other terrorist group have a safe haven in Qatar.

bemeruca:


Leaders of hamas and other terrorist group have a safe haven in Qatar.

This budaatum has no shame supporting terrorists. Clever people weasel their secret admiration surely. Budaatum has to take every leftie position.Their type is truly devoid of happiness, they would start debunking this story without reading behind the lines.

https://babylonbee.com/news/hamas-disappointed-leftists-dont-believe-they-massacred-jews-after-they-went-to-all-the-trouble-to-livestream-it

basilico:


This budaatum has no shame supporting terrorists. Clever people weasel their secret admiration surely. Budaatum has to take every leftie position.Their type is truly devoid of happiness, without thinking they would start debunking this story without reading behind the lines.

https://babylonbee.com/news/hamas-disappointed-leftists-dont-believe-they-massacred-jews-after-they-went-to-all-the-trouble-to-livestream-it

Budaatum supports anything that destroys a nation.

bemeruca:


Budaatum supports anything that destroys a nation.

Ivy league Havard student groups among others who sided with Hamas. Philanthropist stops his funding, top law firms refuse to hire them . Other firms want the names of those who signed statement.
Lefties are truly nuts.
Havard deleted the love letter to Hamas, but the internet never forgets.
Some smart company is driving around with names of those who are on the statement. These Havard nuts are protesting being doxxed yet their names are public.
Ijebos will claim that all Havard alumni are being targeted
https://nypost.com/2023/10/15/pro-hamas-protests-show-higher-education-has-crossed-the-line/

The prosperous and wealthy American middle class of the 1950s and 1960s was a historical abnormality and it is never coming back.
Boomers just had a super good time for a couple of decades because of circumstances that we can't repeat and many people in the US really struggle to wrap their heads around this notion.

A large and affluent middle class is the cornerstone of the American dream. A dream in which anyone with a high school diploma and hard work should easily afford a nice house in the suburbs, 2 cars and a nice vacation with the family to a cool place once a year. Americans assume that this is the way the universe should work. That things were always like this, and that Americans have the "God given right" of the American dream.

However, this reality of a exceptionally wealthy and prosperous middle class by global standards is NOT the norm or the natural way of things, but a by product of a very unique and relatively recent set of historical circumstances, specifically, the end of World War II. At the end of the second world war, the US was the only major industrial power left with its industry and infrastructure unscathed. This gave the US a dramatic economic advantage over the rest of the world, as all other nations had to buy pretty much everything they needed from the US, and use their cheap natural resources as a form of payment.

After the end of world War II, pretty anywhere in the world, if you needed tools, machines, vehicles, capital goods, aircraft, etc...you had little choice but to "buy American". So money flowed from all over the world into American businesses.

But the the owners of those businesses had to negotiate labor deals with the American relatively small and highly skilled workforce. And since the owners of capital had no one else they could hire to men the factories, many concessions had to be given to the labor unions. This allowed for the phenomenal growth and prosperity of the US middle class we saw in the 50s and 60s: White picket fence houses in the suburbs, with 2 large family cars parked in front was the norm for anyone who worked hard in the many factories and businesses that dotted the American landscape back then.

However, over time, the other industrial powers rebuild themselves and started to compete with the US. German and Japanese cars, Belgian and British steel, Dutch electronics and French tools started to enter the world market and compete with American companies for market share. Not only that, but countries like Brazil, South Africa, India, China, Mexico, Thailand, Turkey, South Korea and more also became industrialized. This meant that they were no longer selling their natural resources cheaply in exchange for US made industrial goods. Quite the contrary, they themselves started to bid against the US for natural resources to fuel their own industries. And more importantly, the US work force no longer was the only one qualified to work on modern factories and to have proficiency over modern industrial processes. An Australian airline needs a new commercial jet? Brazil's EMBRAER and European Airbus can offer you products as good as anything made in the US. Need power tools or a pickup truck? You can buy American, but you can also buy South Korean, Indian or Turkish.

This meant that the US middle class could no longer easily outbid pretty much everyone else for natural resources, and the owners of the capital and means of production no longer were "held hostage" by this small and highly skilled workforce. Many other countries now had an industrial base that rivals or surpasses that of the US. And they had their own middle classes that are bidding against the US middle class for those limited natural resources. And manufacturers now could engage in global wage arbitrage, by moving production to a country with cheaper labor, which killed all the bargaining power of the unions.

If everyone in the world lived and consumed like what the average American sees as a reasonable middle class lifestyle (i.e. drive an F-150 or an SUV, families with multiple cars, living in a house in the suburbs, high meat consumption, etc...), it would take 4.1 Earths to provide enough resources to sustain that lifestyle. But we don't have 4.1 Earths, we have just one. And unlike before, the USA no longer can outbid the rest of the world for those limited resources.

That is where the decline of the US middle class is coming from. There are no political solutions for it, as no one, not even Trump's protectionism or the Democrat's Unions, can put the globalization genie back into a bottle. It is the way it is. Any politician who claims to be able to restore "the good old days" is lying. So yes, the old middle class lifestyle of big house, big car, all you can eat buffet, shop until you drop while golfing on green grass fields located in the middle of the desert is not coming back no matter what your politician on either side of the isle promised you.

We are going back to the normal, where the US middle class is not that different from the middle classes from the rest of the world. Like a return to what middle class expectations are elsewhere, including the likes of Europe, Japan, South Korea and Malaysia. Their cars are smaller. They don't change cars as often. The whole family might share a single car. Some families don't even own a car and rely on public transportation instead. Their homes are smaller. They don't eat as much meat and their food portions are smaller.

They are not starving. They are not living like peasants. But their standard of living is lower than what we in the US have considered a "middle class" lifestyle since the end of World War II.

Now, that is not to say that there isn't a lot of inequality in the US or to deny that policies are needed to address that inequality. But my issue with most of the "give us equality" folks in the US is that they imagine the rich being taxed so that they can finally afford that house in the burbs and the F-150 in the driveway like their parents were able to. That is NOT going to happen for the reasons I've already explained. No amount of taxation and public policy will make that happen. That version of the middle class is never coming back. Where I see public policy for wealth redistribution having an active and effective role is making healthcare more affordable, making the cities more walkable and livable so that young Americans can transition from the suburbs to smaller and more affordable homes in dense urban neighborhoods where cars are not a basic necessity to earn income. Our middle class will become more like other countries' middle classes. That cannot be changed. What we can aim for is having our social services and social safety nets more in line to what exits and is available for the middle classes of those other countries.

basilico:



Ivy league Havard student groups among others who sided with Hamas. Philanthropist stops his funding, top law firms refuse to hire them . Other firms want the names of those who signed statement.
Lefties are truly nuts.
Havard deleted the love letter to Hamas, but the internet never forgets.
Some smart company is driving around with names of those who are on the statement. These Havard nuts are protesting being doxxed yet their names are public.
Ijebos will claim that all Havard alumni are being targeted
https://nypost.com/2023/10/15/pro-hamas-protests-show-higher-education-has-crossed-the-line/

It's crazy. In Israel there is a huge arab community. Only those who don't understand how to make peace will fight even when fighting is at disadvantage to them.

Egypt and other nations who stopped fighting and respect Israel rights to exist got their Land back.

bemeruca:


It's crazy. In Israel there is a huge arab community. Only those who don't understand how to make peace will fight even when fighting is at disadvantage to them.

Egypt and other nations who stopped fighting and respect Israel rights to exist got their Land back.

A (diversity hire?) at Stanford.
The instructor asked Jewish and Israeli
students to identify themselves” and then,
“told the Jewish students to take their
belongings, stand in a corner, and said,
‘This is what Israel does to the
Palestinians,’” The Forward reported on
Thursday.
the instructor explained to the students
that “Hamas is a legitimate
representation of the Palestinian
people. They are not a terrorist group.
They are freedom fighters. Their
actions are legitimate.”

While not confirmed exactly who this is, pundits disclose that she largely influenced the oppressed black millionaire brought up by white parents Colin's Kaepernick who was reputed to be the star pupil.
Her profile on the Havard University website is locked.




https://www.campusreform.org/article?id=24168

PDPGuy:
The prosperous and wealthy American middle class of the 1950s and 1960s was a historical abnormality and it is never coming back.
Boomers just had a super good time for a couple of decades because of circumstances that we can't repeat and many people in the US really struggle to wrap their heads around this notion.

A large and affluent middle class is the cornerstone of the American dream. A dream in which anyone with a high school diploma and hard work should easily afford a nice house in the suburbs, 2 cars and a nice vacation with the family to a cool place once a year. Americans assume that this is the way the universe should work. That things were always like this, and that Americans have the "God given right" of the American dream.

However, this reality of a exceptionally wealthy and prosperous middle class by global standards is NOT the norm or the natural way of things, but a by product of a very unique and relatively recent set of historical circumstances, specifically, the end of World War II. At the end of the second world war, the US was the only major industrial power left with its industry and infrastructure unscathed. This gave the US a dramatic economic advantage over the rest of the world, as all other nations had to buy pretty much everything they needed from the US, and use their cheap natural resources as a form of payment.

After the end of world War II, pretty anywhere in the world, if you needed tools, machines, vehicles, capital goods, aircraft, etc...you had little choice but to "buy American". So money flowed from all over the world into American businesses.

But the the owners of those businesses had to negotiate labor deals with the American relatively small and highly skilled workforce. And since the owners of capital had no one else they could hire to men the factories, many concessions had to be given to the labor unions. This allowed for the phenomenal growth and prosperity of the US middle class we saw in the 50s and 60s: White picket fence houses in the suburbs, with 2 large family cars parked in front was the norm for anyone who worked hard in the many factories and businesses that dotted the American landscape back then.

However, over time, the other industrial powers rebuild themselves and started to compete with the US. German and Japanese cars, Belgian and British steel, Dutch electronics and French tools started to enter the world market and compete with American companies for market share. Not only that, but countries like Brazil, South Africa, India, China, Mexico, Thailand, Turkey, South Korea and more also became industrialized. This meant that they were no longer selling their natural resources cheaply in exchange for US made industrial goods. Quite the contrary, they themselves started to bid against the US for natural resources to fuel their own industries. And more importantly, the US work force no longer was the only one qualified to work on modern factories and to have proficiency over modern industrial processes. An Australian airline needs a new commercial jet? Brazil's EMBRAER and European Airbus can offer you products as good as anything made in the US. Need power tools or a pickup truck? You can buy American, but you can also buy South Korean, Indian or Turkish.

This meant that the US middle class could no longer easily outbid pretty much everyone else for natural resources, and the owners of the capital and means of production no longer were "held hostage" by this small and highly skilled workforce. Many other countries now had an industrial base that rivals or surpasses that of the US. And they had their own middle classes that are bidding against the US middle class for those limited natural resources. And manufacturers now could engage in global wage arbitrage, by moving production to a country with cheaper labor, which killed all the bargaining power of the unions.

If everyone in the world lived and consumed like what the average American sees as a reasonable middle class lifestyle (i.e. drive an F-150 or an SUV, families with multiple cars, living in a house in the suburbs, high meat consumption, etc...), it would take 4.1 Earths to provide enough resources to sustain that lifestyle. But we don't have 4.1 Earths, we have just one. And unlike before, the USA no longer can outbid the rest of the world for those limited resources.

That is where the decline of the US middle class is coming from. There are no political solutions for it, as no one, not even Trump's protectionism or the Democrat's Unions, can put the globalization genie back into a bottle. It is the way it is. Any politician who claims to be able to restore "the good old days" is lying. So yes, the old middle class lifestyle of big house, big car, all you can eat buffet, shop until you drop while golfing on green grass fields located in the middle of the desert is not coming back no matter what your politician on either side of the isle promised you.

We are going back to the normal, where the US middle class is not that different from the middle classes from the rest of the world. Like a return to what middle class expectations are elsewhere, including the likes of Europe, Japan, South Korea and Malaysia. Their cars are smaller. They don't change cars as often. The whole family might share a single car. Some families don't even own a car and rely on public transportation instead. Their homes are smaller. They don't eat as much meat and their food portions are smaller.

They are not starving. They are not living like peasants. But their standard of living is lower than what we in the US have considered a "middle class" lifestyle since the end of World War II.

Now, that is not to say that there isn't a lot of inequality in the US or to deny that policies are needed to address that inequality. But my issue with most of the "give us equality" folks in the US is that they imagine the rich being taxed so that they can finally afford that house in the burbs and the F-150 in the driveway like their parents were able to. That is NOT going to happen for the reasons I've already explained. No amount of taxation and public policy will make that happen. That version of the middle class is never coming back. Where I see public policy for wealth redistribution having an active and effective role is making healthcare more affordable, making the cities more walkable and livable so that young Americans can transition from the suburbs to smaller and more affordable homes in dense urban neighborhoods where cars are not a basic necessity to earn income. Our middle class will become more like other countries' middle classes. That cannot be changed. What we can aim for is having our social services and social safety nets more in line to what exits and is available for the middle classes of those other countries.

Nice. One of the best pieces I have read on this thread. You really broke it down perfectly. I have known most of this for a while but guess I couldn’t articulate it this way.

The Second World War crippled major industrial powers across Europe and effectively ended the British empire. After the war the US established the United Nations which designed a new world order that obviously favored the US massively including by making the Dollar the global reserve currency - this is another major reason for US affluence since that period which I think you missed in your write up, and it is one of the last legs America is still standing on as a “superpower” -

but you are very correct that as other counties recovered from the war and rebuilt their industries, it was always going balance things out and strip away that ridiculous notion of “American exceptionalism” that most Americans have had since the 1950’s. There is nothing exceptional about America. Certain historic events just favored them as you have so brilliantly explained but that era is gone. The empire is over and it didn’t even last half as long as the British empire.

I’m not sure I agree with you that America can’t do anything to bring it back though. You see all that is needed is another major war across Europe, the MiddleEast and Asia to restore things as they were. America will always have the advantage of geographic isolation from most of the world so a war in those areas will never reach its shores unless it goes nuclear or something.

I guess I’m doing a little bit of prognosticating now but don’t you think this could be why so many establishment politicians like Nikki Haley, Lindsey Graham and others are such war mongers? Always quick to advocate for war in those parts of the world at the slightest opportunity? These people believe that war is the only tool America has left to use to hold on to its position as the worlds undisputed superpower. They don’t even try to hide it anymore.

BornAgainCow:


Nice. One of the best pieces I have read on this thread. You really broke it down perfectly. I have known most of this for a while but guess I couldn’t articulate it this way.

The Second World War crippled major industrial powers across Europe and effectively ended the British empire. After the war the US established the United Nations which designed a new world order that obviously favored the US massively including by making the Dollar the global reserve currency - this is another major reason for US affluence since that period which I think you missed in your write up, and it is one of the last legs America is still standing on as a “superpower” -

but you are very correct that as other counties recovered from the war and rebuilt their industries, it was always going balance things out and strip away that ridiculous notion of “American exceptionalism” that most Americans have had since the 1950’s. There is nothing exceptional about America. Certain historic events just favored them as you have so brilliantly explained but that era is gone. The empire is over and it didn’t even last half as long as the British empire.

I’m not sure I agree with you that America can’t do anything to bring it back though. You see all that is needed is another major war across Europe, the MiddleEast and Asia to restore things as they were. America will always have the advantage of geographic isolation from most of the world so a war in those areas will never reach its shores unless it goes nuclear or something.

I guess I’m doing a little bit of prognosticating now but don’t you think this could be why so many establishment politicians like Nikki Haley, Lindsey Graham and others are such war mongers? Always quick to advocate for war in those parts of the world at the slightest opportunity? These people believe that war is the only tool America has left to use to hold on to its position as the worlds undisputed superpower. They don’t even try to hide it anymore.

You study US History for school?

Hamas and Gaza. The whole world knows that Hamas is a terror org.
The US ,UN and NATO in cases where terrorists take over spend resources internally to overthrow the crooks. Well sometimes they have helped the Muslim brotherhood eg Egypt, Syria. But they have sought to democratize states like Somalia, Afghanistan and Yemen.
CIA by now should be waging strife among the peace loving Palestinians in Gaza to kick out Hamas. The US, EU and UN should be applying sanctions to force Palestinians into democratic elections.They are not, instead they have always applied pressure on Israel to give away territory to people who want them dead.
Conclusion. The west knows that nearly if not all Palestinians support Hamas. Hamas would win elections hands down beating Mahmoud Abbas too in west bank. In other words , it's easier to find terrorists among Palestinians than ....err,,,,,,( what's the opposite of a terrorist?)
Could we say the radical Hamas terrorists want to chop off the heads of Israelis, the moderate Palestinians want them to do it.The moderates will gladly restrain the Israelis limbs while Hamas saws off heads?

PDPGuy:
The prosperous and wealthy American middle class of the 1950s and 1960s was a historical abnormality and it is never coming back.
Boomers just had a super good time for a couple of decades because of circumstances that we can't repeat and many people in the US really struggle to wrap their heads around this notion.

A large and affluent middle class is the cornerstone of the American dream. A dream in which anyone with a high school diploma and hard work should easily afford a nice house in the suburbs, 2 cars and a nice vacation with the family to a cool place once a year. Americans assume that this is the way the universe should work. That things were always like this, and that Americans have the "God given right" of the American dream.

However, this reality of a exceptionally wealthy and prosperous middle class by global standards is NOT the norm or the natural way of things, but a by product of a very unique and relatively recent set of historical circumstances, specifically, the end of World War II. At the end of the second world war, the US was the only major industrial power left with its industry and infrastructure unscathed. This gave the US a dramatic economic advantage over the rest of the world, as all other nations had to buy pretty much everything they needed from the US, and use their cheap natural resources as a form of payment.

After the end of world War II, pretty anywhere in the world, if you needed tools, machines, vehicles, capital goods, aircraft, etc...you had little choice but to "buy American". So money flowed from all over the world into American businesses.

But the the owners of those businesses had to negotiate labor deals with the American relatively small and highly skilled workforce. And since the owners of capital had no one else they could hire to men the factories, many concessions had to be given to the labor unions. This allowed for the phenomenal growth and prosperity of the US middle class we saw in the 50s and 60s: White picket fence houses in the suburbs, with 2 large family cars parked in front was the norm for anyone who worked hard in the many factories and businesses that dotted the American landscape back then.

However, over time, the other industrial powers rebuild themselves and started to compete with the US. German and Japanese cars, Belgian and British steel, Dutch electronics and French tools started to enter the world market and compete with American companies for market share. Not only that, but countries like Brazil, South Africa, India, China, Mexico, Thailand, Turkey, South Korea and more also became industrialized. This meant that they were no longer selling their natural resources cheaply in exchange for US made industrial goods. Quite the contrary, they themselves started to bid against the US for natural resources to fuel their own industries. And more importantly, the US work force no longer was the only one qualified to work on modern factories and to have proficiency over modern industrial processes. An Australian airline needs a new commercial jet? Brazil's EMBRAER and European Airbus can offer you products as good as anything made in the US. Need power tools or a pickup truck? You can buy American, but you can also buy South Korean, Indian or Turkish.

This meant that the US middle class could no longer easily outbid pretty much everyone else for natural resources, and the owners of the capital and means of production no longer were "held hostage" by this small and highly skilled workforce. Many other countries now had an industrial base that rivals or surpasses that of the US. And they had their own middle classes that are bidding against the US middle class for those limited natural resources. And manufacturers now could engage in global wage arbitrage, by moving production to a country with cheaper labor, which killed all the bargaining power of the unions.

If everyone in the world lived and consumed like what the average American sees as a reasonable middle class lifestyle (i.e. drive an F-150 or an SUV, families with multiple cars, living in a house in the suburbs, high meat consumption, etc...), it would take 4.1 Earths to provide enough resources to sustain that lifestyle. But we don't have 4.1 Earths, we have just one. And unlike before, the USA no longer can outbid the rest of the world for those limited resources.

That is where the decline of the US middle class is coming from. There are no political solutions for it, as no one, not even Trump's protectionism or the Democrat's Unions, can put the globalization genie back into a bottle. It is the way it is. Any politician who claims to be able to restore "the good old days" is lying. So yes, the old middle class lifestyle of big house, big car, all you can eat buffet, shop until you drop while golfing on green grass fields located in the middle of the desert is not coming back no matter what your politician on either side of the isle promised you.

We are going back to the normal, where the US middle class is not that different from the middle classes from the rest of the world. Like a return to what middle class expectations are elsewhere, including the likes of Europe, Japan, South Korea and Malaysia. Their cars are smaller. They don't change cars as often. The whole family might share a single car. Some families don't even own a car and rely on public transportation instead. Their homes are smaller. They don't eat as much meat and their food portions are smaller.

They are not starving. They are not living like peasants. But their standard of living is lower than what we in the US have considered a "middle class" lifestyle since the end of World War II.

Now, that is not to say that there isn't a lot of inequality in the US or to deny that policies are needed to address that inequality. But my issue with most of the "give us equality" folks in the US is that they imagine the rich being taxed so that they can finally afford that house in the burbs and the F-150 in the driveway like their parents were able to. That is NOT going to happen for the reasons I've already explained. No amount of taxation and public policy will make that happen. That version of the middle class is never coming back. Where I see public policy for wealth redistribution having an active and effective role is making healthcare more affordable, making the cities more walkable and livable so that young Americans can transition from the suburbs to smaller and more affordable homes in dense urban neighborhoods where cars are not a basic necessity to earn income. Our middle class will become more like other countries' middle classes. That cannot be changed. What we can aim for is having our social services and social safety nets more in line to what exits and is available for the middle classes of those other countries.

I have driven through some places in middle America and I can see the sample carcass of a once thriving interior, You see giant facilities that look like it was once a huge company but has now been abandoned, the neighboring town which looked once thriving is now a ghost town. Probably with only aged grandparents and signs of drugs use all over town

I can understand where the longing of an American who grew up in this setting for those good old days where you have a job in a factory and worked till you retire

I was chatting with an African American man, I think around 64yrs, who was in Louisiana close to Mississippi, very funny man, He told me "I was just finishing High School, 17 going on 18, impreganted my girlfriend who was about 15yrs, those times nothng like child molester, you just gotta go to her parents and marry her"
His uncle took him to the railroad where he started working at 18yrs and he worked there everyday till I spoke to him at 64yrs. He said "Men everyday I woke up and got to work at 4:30am same schedule for the past 40yrs". With the job he was able to get a house a comfortable life for his family. He is still married to that girlfriend till date.

Those type of stories is what the people long for. Some don't want to go and get higher degrees thy just want a comfortable job and live their lives

But with globalization, lower cost of production in other countries, other comparative advantage some countries have its becoming increasingly more difficult to keep those industries open so all we have now is half the population who feel the economy is not working for them, They feel ignored by the elites and will vote for the next person who promises to disrupt the system

Truth is there is little that can be done for them to bring that life they experienced with their parents back. Also the gap between Americans and the rest of the world will close up gradually

When you go out to other countries and see how they live you will know how blessed it is to be an American. I saw a video that says $30K is the top 1% salary in the entire world. This amount barely puts you over the poverty line in many US states

Those who feel shut out will blame many things like immigrants, shipping jobs out, tariffs etc. they will even have politicians who fuel their worries but it's looking increasingly unlikely that it will come back

This is not unique to America alone, its happening in many western countries which is why there are more calls for protectionism

raumdeuter:

This is not unique to America alone, its happening in many western countries which is why there are more calls for protectionism

Not unique at all. And protectionism wouldn't save them because they too must sell to somewhere.

Biden restricted sale of high end chips to China today while it's being reported sale to date of iPhones in same China is disappointingly 4.5% below last release. Basically, don't sell Intel and Nvidia but sell iPhones. Can't be sillier than that. Meanwhile, China just need to stop buying American grain and thereby influence American elections.

Pensions. That's what I blame. When Ford sold its first car none of its cost was pensions. Now, with loads of pensioners, imagine that added to the cost of making Ford, plus all the corruption. It's why made in America is so expensive and easily undercut with cheaper made elsewhere. And money does like profit.

America has been rotting for decades now, as we see in its debt. I just do wonder how it will play out and fear it favours the likes of dump in the short-term.

Thankfully, there's fracking. And gas. And Hamas to fight a war against.

BornAgainCow:


Nice. One of the best pieces I have read on this thread. You really broke it down perfectly. I have known most of this for a while but guess I couldn’t articulate it this way.

The Second World War crippled major industrial powers across Europe and effectively ended the British empire. After the war the US established the United Nations which designed a new world order that obviously favored the US massively including by making the Dollar the global reserve currency - this is another major reason for US affluence since that period which I think you missed in your write up, and it is one of the last legs America is still standing on as a “superpower” -

but you are very correct that as other counties recovered from the war and rebuilt their industries, it was always going balance things out and strip away that ridiculous notion of “American exceptionalism” that most Americans have had since the 1950’s. There is nothing exceptional about America. Certain historic events just favored them as you have so brilliantly explained but that era is gone. The empire is over and it didn’t even last half as long as the British empire.

I’m not sure I agree with you that America can’t do anything to bring it back though. You see all that is needed is another major war across Europe, the MiddleEast and Asia to restore things as they were. America will always have the advantage of geographic isolation from most of the world so a war in those areas will never reach its shores unless it goes nuclear or something.

I guess I’m doing a little bit of prognosticating now but don’t you think this could be why so many establishment politicians like Nikki Haley, Lindsey Graham and others are such war mongers? Always quick to advocate for war in those parts of the world at the slightest opportunity? These people believe that war is the only tool America has left to use to hold on to its position as the worlds undisputed superpower. They don’t even try to hide it anymore.

The American glory has been diminished as rightly pointed out ..A good exple is China which self identifies as developing country despite being the 2nd largest economy. Using income per Capita China is developing and enjoys preferential perks in trade with the west. Its also able to subsidize it's exports gaining a competitive edge
America long fell to the global behemoths whose wealth keeps growing and is projected to grow. They have offshored production and in China, once they learn your big trade secret, have no qualms producing replicas. With no research, China can produce cutting edge products at a fraction of the cost in America.
Ditto other Asian tiger economies where patent rights exist in name only, IP enforcement is lax.

I don't see America going back to those days, with Unions, with politics of minimum wages and now the sudden shift to only fund green projects and get rid of fossil fuels

Another fool gaslighting. Jake Sullivan National Security Advisor said just weeks ago on Sep 29 that the Middle East has never been that quiet for two decades.With such advisors Biden is setting up Americato be the greatest empire ever conceived.Pun intended.

Speaking at The Atlantic Festival eight
days before Hamas attacked, Sullivan
said: "The Middle East region is quieter
today than it has been in two decades
now. Now challenges remain — Iran's
nuclear weapons program, the
tensions between Israelis and
Palestinians — but the amount of time
that I have to spend on crisis and
conflict in the Middle East today
compared to any of my predecessors
going back to 9/11 is significantly
reduced


Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken hurried
into a bunker as air raid sirens wailed in Tel
Aviv on Monday, in the most dramatic
moment of a whirlwind — and unusually
chaotic — Middle East tour for America’s top
diplomat.
After his second visit to Israel in five days,
Mr. Blinken was scheduled to land in Amman,
Jordan, on Monday night, but he ended up
stuck in a marathon overnight negotiation
session in Tel Aviv, and his next destination
was uncertain. A trip originally scheduled for
two days has now extended into its sixth, with
10 stops and counting.
For an official whose travel schedule is
meticulously planned and rarely revised, Mr.
Blinken’s frenetic journey has underscored the
scale and complexity of the diplomatic crisis
he faces.

[I] If they prioritized ntelligence over wokeness, this would have never happened. My own words [/I]

NEWS
Report: Hamas offers Israel 10
conditions for a10 year truce

BY IRA GLUNTS - JULY 16, 2014




Hamas had offered a 10 year truce in 2014.
Why 10 years and not 50? They did not wait for those years to elapse before unleashing untold terror.
Answers: Hudna.

basilico:

NEWS
Report: Hamas offers Israel 10
conditions for a10 year truce

BY IRA GLUNTS - JULY 16, 2014

Old. Very.

budaatum:


Old. Very.

Did I not indicate that was 9 years ago?
And I gave the answer as to why they requested a 10 year truce and not like 50 years.Can someone tell you I won't fight you for 10 years for no reason. Within those 10 years that person will be stockpiling his war machine in readiness for round 2 .

You need to have a creative mind. If you had one you would have questioned where the 10 year duration of truce came from.

Who says going to Havard sets you apart? These fools of Havard have lost potential jobs. Have sunk Havard's reputation.Many people will fear to engage these Ivy League lawyers for a long time.
Where is that LatinX from Nigeria? That product of DEI?




Oct 17 (Reuters) - U.S. law firm Davis Polk & Wardwell on Tuesday
rescinded job offers to law students who signed on to public
statements supporting Palestine in the wake of Hamas’ deadly
attacks in Israel, following a similar move by fellow law firm
Winston & Strawn last week.
Davis Polk's managing partner, Neil Barr, told members of the New
York-based firm on Tuesday that it had revoked job offers to three
law students in leadership positions at Harvard and Columbia
university groups that issued statements regarding to the latest
wave of violence in the Middle East, according to an internal email
obtained by Reuters.

basilico:


This budaatum has no shame supporting terrorists. Clever people weasel their secret admiration surely. Budaatum has to take every leftie position.Their type is truly devoid of happiness, they would start debunking this story without reading behind the lines.

https://babylonbee.com/news/hamas-disappointed-leftists-dont-believe-they-massacred-jews-after-they-went-to-all-the-trouble-to-livestream-it

Please buda stop talking to this idiot who doesn't know the difference between (bland and unfunny) satirical article than a real news.

What a disgrace quoting babylonbs to support any point you make. You are a really dull and unintelligent slowpoke.

Just like me quoting the Onion news and using it as fact.

Obrigardo:


Please buda stop talking to this idiot....

I will try harder. Thank you.

Obrigardo:


Please buda stop talking to this idiot who doesn't know the difference between (bland and unfunny) satirical article than a real news.

What a disgrace quoting babylonbs to support any point you make. You are a really dull and unintelligent slowpoke.

Just like me quoting the Onion news and using it as fact.

Take your meds. It's not too late to start on Omega-3 regimen, they help develop some intelligence.
I posted that satirical link. It's a joke but intended to point out in real life what must be Hamas motivation.Hamas livestreamed the attacks some of them, like one callous terrorist who went live posting on an executed victims Facebook wall from her own phone, only for the relatives to see the post of their departed loved one.
That Babylon bee article is mocking Hamas and lefties like you who think Hamas fires bouquets of flowers to Israel.

feedthenation:
Jim Jordan, Trump’s endorsed candidate, officially loses the second vote for Speaker of the House by more votes.

Jeffries (D): 212
Jordan (R): 199
Others: 22

Hakeem Jeffries could in my dreams much easily get the 5 he needs to be speaker, lol.

basilico:


Take your meds. It's not too late to start on Omega-3 regimen, they help develop some intelligence.
I posted that satirical link. It's a joke but intended to point out in real life what must be Hamas motivation.Hamas livestreamed the attacks some of them, like one callous terrorist who went live posting on an executed victims Facebook wall from her own phone, only for the relatives to see the post of their departed loved one.
That Babylon bee article is mocking Hamas and lefties like you who think Hamas fires bouquets of flowers to Israel.

you have been found DULLING
Just shut up and hide your face

budaatum:


Hakeem Jeffries could in my dreams much easily get the 5 he needs to be speaker, lol.

Will the dead and gone republiqan party keep this charade till another shutdown looms or will five out of the 20 just make Jeffries speaker so the grown-ups can actually do some governing work?

budaatum:


Hakeem Jeffries could in my dreams much easily get the 5 he needs to be speaker, lol.

Lofty dreams. Republicans are the majority in the house, The backlash they would face if they elected a democrat speaker.Unlesz those 5 are blackmailed with serious crimes esp CP.