Agreed... I do hope that human societies, organized it states or whatever, find more collaborative means to manage their affairs. Much as members go on about "capitalist greed" here, trade and the exchange of goods and services is likely the best way to go, depending on the "terms" of course! I'm guardedly hopeful that is where humanity …
Agreed... I do hope that human societies, organized it states or whatever, find more collaborative means to manage their affairs. Much as members go on about "capitalist greed" here, trade and the exchange of goods and services is likely the best way to go, depending on the "terms" of course! I'm guardedly hopeful that is where humanity is headed, however fitfully and inequitably. I suspect survival is the more visceral base than "reason". After all, minor counterpoint, reason as technical know-how invented the machine-gun, stand in for the enormous and now very expensive panoply of weaponry in this world. On the side, don't you think it odd that political discourse has been shaping up China as America's "main enemy", the country with whom USA has immense economic and financial ties?
Thanks Frank -and yes, it is clear through nearly every section of the 900+ pages of the Heritage toxic Project 2025 that China is “The Enemy”. I know the right-wing always loves an enemy to bolster military spending. Nevertheless we seem much closer to conflict with Russia due to the criminal Putin. Although China certainly has a disconcerting interest in Taiwan.
Taiwan... well, it was long part of China proper before it became the offshore residence of Changkaishek who ran the island as a dictatorship for a generation or so. I agree, Taiwan has become a Chinese breakaway region and increasingly nationalist in nature among the younger generation. Is that something USA and other regional nations have a vital interest in? How about Vietnam? Interestingly, the Ukraine story is very similar in terms of nationalist aspirations; our public discourse have made perhaps too strong a point in stressing that the Russian invasion was a bully attack on an "independent nation"...not that I agree, by any stretch, with Russian methods, or that Ukrainian nationalism lacks legitimacy. In a way, this thing is akin to a civil war. At this point, I'd say the Russians have blown it, but if they win suppression and gulag will be the order of the way, another tradition going back a few centuries now at least. There is a long, tortured history here. Try Synder's Bloodlands or better, Plokhy's The Gates of Europe, if you haven't already. They will shake you down.
Agreed... I do hope that human societies, organized it states or whatever, find more collaborative means to manage their affairs. Much as members go on about "capitalist greed" here, trade and the exchange of goods and services is likely the best way to go, depending on the "terms" of course! I'm guardedly hopeful that is where humanity is headed, however fitfully and inequitably. I suspect survival is the more visceral base than "reason". After all, minor counterpoint, reason as technical know-how invented the machine-gun, stand in for the enormous and now very expensive panoply of weaponry in this world. On the side, don't you think it odd that political discourse has been shaping up China as America's "main enemy", the country with whom USA has immense economic and financial ties?
Thanks Frank -and yes, it is clear through nearly every section of the 900+ pages of the Heritage toxic Project 2025 that China is “The Enemy”. I know the right-wing always loves an enemy to bolster military spending. Nevertheless we seem much closer to conflict with Russia due to the criminal Putin. Although China certainly has a disconcerting interest in Taiwan.
Taiwan... well, it was long part of China proper before it became the offshore residence of Changkaishek who ran the island as a dictatorship for a generation or so. I agree, Taiwan has become a Chinese breakaway region and increasingly nationalist in nature among the younger generation. Is that something USA and other regional nations have a vital interest in? How about Vietnam? Interestingly, the Ukraine story is very similar in terms of nationalist aspirations; our public discourse have made perhaps too strong a point in stressing that the Russian invasion was a bully attack on an "independent nation"...not that I agree, by any stretch, with Russian methods, or that Ukrainian nationalism lacks legitimacy. In a way, this thing is akin to a civil war. At this point, I'd say the Russians have blown it, but if they win suppression and gulag will be the order of the way, another tradition going back a few centuries now at least. There is a long, tortured history here. Try Synder's Bloodlands or better, Plokhy's The Gates of Europe, if you haven't already. They will shake you down.