Right man for the job (decline and fall)?

[shunyadragon]

I'm OK with not leading the world.
If we'd done that well, it would be one thing.
But our leadership has too often been about bombing enemies we'd previously created.

Moral and ethical leadership does not equate to dominance, control or being the biggest. At present all of the recent presidents have misused power to try and dominate others with money and bombs.

Dignity....indignity....not things to worry over.

Dignity is only one factor in good relationships, and does not help to negate.

 

[Stevicus]

The rest of the world can go suck eggs.
They didn't like Nixon.
They did like Clinton.
They didn't like Dubya.
They did like Obama.
They don't like Trump.
They'll continue being fickle.
It's what they do.

You're saying nobody likes America anymore?

 

[Revoltingest]

You're saying nobody likes America anymore?

Only that ferriners are fickle.
We can't let our self esteem be wrapped up in their feelings de jour.

 

[shunyadragon]

The rest of the world can go suck eggs.
They didn't like Nixon.
They did like Clinton.
They didn't like Dubya.
They did like Obama.
They don't like Trump.
They'll continue being fickle.
It's what they do.

Yes, humans are fickle. Actually world wide Obama was very popular, and the most popular in recent history except for Putin, and the leaders of North Korea. Nixon's bright spot was international relationships particularly with China, and Clinton was far more popular than Trump. Trump's bright spot is insulting and denigrating other leaders of almost every country except the wealthy powerful abusive violent corrupt dictators.

 

[Revoltingest]

Yes, humans were fickle. Actually world wide Obama was very popular the most popular in recent history. Nixon's bright spot was international relationships particularly with China, and Clinton was far more popular than Trump. Trump's bright spot is insulting and denigrating other leaders of almost every country except abusive violent corrupt dictators.

You've missed Trump's brightest spot.
It's the same as Obama's.
No new wars.....yet.

Hey, you're witness to post# 160,000.
Onward to 200,000 !!!!!

 

[PureX]

Generalizations about what is and the negatives of what is a 'welfare state,' does not address the problem of health care in the USA where the wealthy and the members of Congress have 100% health care, and lower and middle income have insufficient health care. Relying on expensive emergency room heath care, and looses do not resolve the problem.

Please present adequate solutions?

The problem is that the people of the United States have lost control of their own government because their government has legalized bribery, and has been making all it's decisions based on increasing profits to those wealthy elites who are paying the bribe money. So the solution is simple: the people of the United States need to vote out of office EVERY INCUMBENT IN EVERY ELECTION REGARDLESS OF PARTY AFFILIATION, UNLESS AND UNTIL WE GET PEOPLE IN OFFICE THAT WILL ACT TO END THE LEGALIZED BRIBERY. Until we stop the legalized bribery, and start sending politicians to prison for taking bribes in exchange for acting in the interests of the people paying them the bribe money, nothing can or will change.

Those of you who are telling yourselves that the corruption is inevitable are MAKING IT INEVITABLE. Our politicians were not always this corrupt, and there is no logical reason why we should accept this level of corruption from them.

 

[Stevicus]

It isn’t that simple. Days before the Berlin Wall came down, leaders in East Germany held a conference in which they celebrated something or other, only to turn round and say the wall will stand for another hundred years.

The collapse of communism in eastern Europe and the USSR was partly because the parties were willing to reform. Gorbachev didn’t send the tanks in like he predecessors did in Hungary or Czechoslovakia. Very few people anticipated the “end” even when things started to unravel. Chernobyl only demonstrated the need for reform. It showed the rot was there but it was far from automatic that it would lead to a collapse.

The path to an actual social and political revolution in the United States as the equivalent of what happened in the USSR is far from obvious. The easiest way would be for Bernie Sanders to win the democratic nomination by a series of landslides in the primaries or in a contested convention, then win the Presidency and be America’s Gorbachev, dismantling the evil empire from the inside.

Only, like Gorbachev, the reforms fail, the economy collapses, a military coup is attempted and fails and the American people radicalise to the point where the government is overthrown and replaced.

I would urge caution before saying the system is going to collapse. That is far from a fore gone conclusion. But America’s response to the pandemic does show how deep the rot has gone and that it the U.S. government is a danger to its own citizens.

The Marxist in me says, the pandemic won’t cause anything new, but will accelerate pre-existing processes and aggregate antagonisms. But the human factor- the choices we make- remains. If we step up, things will get interesting.

I don't think collapse in America is inevitable, but there will be pain to endure. I've noticed a good deal of squabbling at all levels of government. For example, our local government is at odds with the state government, although our state governor is a Trump supporter. Other state and local governments are all getting pretty vocal these days.

This is a situation that most people aren't really used to. A lot of people are worried, they don't know what to do, and they try to the best they can. The panic buying of toilet paper is just an example of some of the lunacy which is going on. And there's no real leadership.

I don't think it's gotten to the end of the world yet, but I was thinking about this movie and how some self-appointed "messiah" led a small group of survivors in some bizarre cult.

 

[Terrywoodenpic]

Mr. Trump is handing the world to China -- and the Chinese have been behaving like they know it. The only people on the planet who are still clueless about what's going on are those who are paying absolutely no attention to it -- and Mr. Trump's cult followers.

They are one and the same people.

The more Trump attacks the Chinese and puts bans and extortionate tariffs on their goods, and purchases from the USA.
The more self reliant and the stronger that they get.
If you ban a sale to china they very soon make it themselves, weakening your own position.
Huawei is a case in point up to now they have bought essential technology from the USA. The bans have forced their hand to develop their own replacements, strengthening. their position in the world market place.
They are already the world leaders in telecommunications. albeit purchasing some components and software from other countries including the USA. they are already pretty much able to go it alone.
If the other phone makers followed suit it would be a massive hit on American high tech sales.

Trump seems to be unable to see the value or the necessity for the symbiotic relationship between countries to generate trade.

 

[Stevicus]

Only that ferriners are fickle.
We can't let our self esteem be wrapped up in their feelings de jour.

Nobody likes us.

 

[Evangelicalhumanist]

The rest of the world can go suck eggs.
They didn't like Nixon.
They did like Clinton.
They didn't like Dubya.
They did like Obama.
They don't like Trump.
They'll continue being fickle.
It's what they do.

Yet I can't help but feel that's an unfortunate attitude in a world that continues to shrink around us. Many of the problems we will face in future will be multinational, and require concerted, coordinated and cooperative efforts on a planetary scale. And if that is the case (and I believe it is), then boy-oh-boy, we are not ready!

 

[Revoltingest]

Yet I can't help but feel that's an unfortunate attitude in a world that continues to shrink around us. Many of the problems we will face in future will be multinational, and require concerted, coordinated and cooperative efforts on a planetary scale. And if that is the case (and I believe it is), then boy-oh-boy, we are not ready!

When we stop leading unilaterally, & start cooperating, I predict improvement.

 

[Terrywoodenpic]

I've heard how Ameristan has fallen so many times.
If any one of those prognostications were true,
it'd have done so before Trump even became Prez.
We'll survive him. I guarantee it.

You will certainly survive him, just as you would survive just about anyone however disastrous.
But you will be poorer and weaker and have far less influence after his stint in office.
in many ways he has just speeded up the inevitable decline that all top nations/empires come face.

It seems to be China's turn again. Though they have never shown other than an inclination for more than internal power.
Though now they are showing an interest in leadership of the entire far eastern area.

 

[Terrywoodenpic]

The rest of the world can go suck eggs.
They didn't like Nixon.
They did like Clinton.
They didn't like Dubya.
They did like Obama.
They don't like Trump.
They'll continue being fickle.
It's what they do.

The rest of the world do not need to like any American president.
we just have to put up with what ever you elect.
Fortunately unlike some of their own leaders, they do not stay in office very long.

They Certainly quite liked Jimmy carter and Eisenhower
They liked Roosevelt
They liked Clinton quite a lot.
They very much liked Obama
They even quite liked Tricky dicky Nixon.

There never has been a president they actively disliked as much as Trump.
He is the all time pits, to the rest of the world.

 

[Revoltingest]

You will certainly survive him, just as you would survive just about anyone however disastrous.
But you will be poorer and weaker and have far less influence after his stint in office.
in many ways he has just speeded up the inevitable decline that all top nations/empires come face.

It seems to be China's turn again. Though they have never shown other than an inclination for more than internal power.
Though now they are showing an interest in leadership of the entire far eastern area.

We were poor & weaker after Johnson, Nixon, & others.
And yet despite being poorer & weaker, we were richer & stronger.
Chicken Licken believes that Trump is different...the sky is really falling this time.
She hasn't been right yet.

 

[Revoltingest]

There never has been a president they actively disliked as much as Trump.
He is the all time pits, to the rest of the world.

Meh.
I don't like or dislike your leader(s).
Same for every other Eurostanian or Scandistanian countries.
It would be like picking a favorite or least favorite Kardashian.
Why bother?

 

[Shad]

They are one and the same people.

The more Trump attacks the Chinese and puts bans and extortionate tariffs on their goods, and purchases from the USA.
The more self reliant and the stronger that they get.
If you ban a sale to china they very soon make it themselves, weakening your own position.
Huawei is a case in point up to now they have bought essential technology from the USA. The bans have forced their hand to develop their own replacements, strengthening. their position in the world market place.
They are already the world leaders in telecommunications. albeit purchasing some components and software from other countries including the USA. they are already pretty much able to go it alone.
If the other phone makers followed suit it would be a massive hit on American high tech sales.

Trump seems to be unable to see the value or the necessity for the symbiotic relationship between countries to generate trade.

China has laws which require many foreign business to openly share their technology with Chinese partners. That is a unique law not found in the West.

 

[Kangaroo Feathers]

Patrick Cockburn: The US has faced decline before – but nothing like what’s to come

The US may be reaching its “Chernobyl moment” as it fails to lead in combating the coronavirus epidemic. As with the nuclear accident in the Soviet Union in 1986, a cataclysm is exposing systemic failings that have already weakened US hegemony in the world. Whatever the outcome of the pandemic, nobody is today looking to Washington for a solution to the crisis. The fall in US influence was visible this week at virtual meetings of world leaders where the main US diplomatic effort was devoted to an abortive attempt to persuade the others to sign a statement referring to the “Wuhan virus”, as part of a campaign to blame China for the coronavirus epidemic. Demonising others as a diversion from one’s own shortcomings is a central feature of President Trump’s political tactics. Arkansas Republican senator Tom Cotton took up the same theme, saying that “China unleashed this plague on the world, and China has to be held accountable”. US failure goes far beyond Trump’s toxic political style: American supremacy in the world since the Second World War has been rooted in its unique capacity to get things done internationally by persuasion or by the threat or use of force. But the inability of Washington to respond adequately to Covid-19 shows that this is no longer the case and crystallises a perception that American competence is vanishing. The change in attitude is important because superpowers, such as the British Empire, the Soviet Union in the recent past or the US today, depend on a degree of bluff. They cannot afford to put their all-powerful image to the test too often because they cannot be seen to fail: an exaggerated picture of British strength was shattered by the Suez Crisis in 1956, as was that of the Soviet Union by the war in Afghanistan in the 1980s. The coronavirus crisis is the equivalent of Suez and Afghanistan for Trump’s America. Indeed, these crises seem minor compared to the Covid-19 pandemic, which will have far greater impact because everybody on the planet is a potential victim and feels threatened. Faced with such a mega-crisis, the failure of the Trump administration to lead responsibly is proving extraordinarily destructive to the US position in the world.

I'm not sure how anyone would reasonably defend Trump in the way that he has behaved in the last month or so, and many other leaders from the right (often trashing their advisors), that is, their inability to take onboard proper advice when their own perspectives seem to dominate their thinking.

Comments?

But...but... Bidden... but Hillary...

 

[Revoltingest]

China has laws which require many foreign business to openly share their technology with Chinese partners. That is a unique law not found in the West.

This is one area where Trump has the right idea,
ie, bargain hard with China on this.
But is he doing this well? I'm not prepared to judge.

 

[Shad]

This is one area where Trump has the right idea,
ie, bargain hard with China on this.
But is he doing this well? I'm not prepared to judge.

He isn't restricting the tech flow at all by forced partnerships. He is only targeting trade deficits.

 

[Revoltingest]

He isn't restricting the tech flow at all by forced partnerships. He is only targeting trade deficits.

I recall otherwise.
But I'm heading out soon, & unwilling to find links.