Why Continuity is Important

[DoomYoshi]

Oh shit. I forgot that there were no dams in the US. I also forgot that China's infrastructure is perfect in every way, and they have outstanding safety records at all their factories. I also forgot that because US spends 3.8% of GDP on military compared to China's 2.0% and compared to WW2's USA's 40%, today's United States spends all of its money on the military.

Nice, the Utne reader couldn't have published it better.

[waauw]

For 70% the price of this:



You can get this:



Which do you think may increase your ability to generate more economic output?

In the 70's the US and the Saudi's agreed that Saudi Arabia would only accept USD's as currency for all oil-trade and in exchange the US would lend military support for Saudi interests in the area. Considering this deal, which is the basis of the petrodollars strength, I wouldn't be so certain that the dam creates more economic output.

[_sabotage_]

Mr Continuity,

What'd you write about GDP as an indicator?

Since the US has zero dollars to put towards military spending, per capita overspending on military is $2000. Since the public can't and won't provide this money, it is taken from their future security and by devaluing their incomes.

Military spending provides zero social gain and we might as well have large digital bonfires and claim the public's currency has been equally devalued instead of creating actual enemies and destroying actual lives.

You can't equate military spending with invasion of sovereignty. Some of the US's most invasive measures have been extremely cheap.

China's military spending also has to be seen as what it is: propelled higher due to US military spending. As the US frantically tries to cut off and surround China, one would expect China to react differently than it would if the US were a benevolent rather than belligerent presence.

[_sabotage_]

The petrodollar does not "create" economic output, Wauw, it creates an economic advantage. It artificially stabilizes US currency when it's being drastically overprinted and passes the cost to the world.

A dam creates energy where none was being created (usefully). There is more in the system for all after it is created. With the petrodollar, the pie is the same size, the US is just getting a bigger slice.

[mrswdk]

2) China is not communist.

See, I would generally agree with that, except the leading party is still called CCP.

And North Korea's official name is the 'Democratic People's Republic'.

[mrswdk]

sab, posting all this doe-eyed stuff about China the benevolent friend and America the malignant bully might keep your wife happy but it makes it rather difficult to take what you say about China seriously. Your posts in this thread read like a People's Daily editorial.

[_sabotage_]

It's not doe-eyed and I wish it weren't just about China. I wish the British, French, Dutch, Italians, Portuguese or Spaniards had better examples to choose from, but unfortunately, they all fail somewhere along the line.

But the fact that economic joint prosperity is a possibility for foreign policy remains. That the US has not been going this route and China has, remains. That it would be better for the US public in general to go this route remains, and that the public are largely utterly ignorant of what their country does to benefit the few remains.

I do protest China's insistence on impinging on Canada's democracy in trade deals, but can understand that no one will invest heavily with a wishy washy government with a long history of letting economic ventures become quagmires of wasted capital because they can't maintain any long-term promises. As such, I blame this more on Canada than on China.