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Now that we have a new thread, in order to ensure that this thread continues to meet TL standards and follows the proper guidelines, we will be enforcing the rules in the OP more strictly. Be sure to give them a complete and thorough read before posting! NOTE: When providing a source, please provide a very brief summary on what it's about and what purpose it adds to the discussion. The supporting statement should clearly explain why the subject is relevant and needs to be discussed. Please follow this rule especially for tweets.
Your supporting statement should always come BEFORE you provide the source.If you have any questions, comments, concern, or feedback regarding the USPMT, then please use this thread: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/website-feedback/510156-us-politics-thread |
On March 13 2026 12:00 Fleetfeet wrote:Show nested quote +On March 13 2026 11:56 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 11:54 Fleetfeet wrote:On March 13 2026 11:40 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 09:41 Fleetfeet wrote:On March 13 2026 09:20 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 07:29 doubleupgradeobbies! wrote:On March 12 2026 23:20 Billyboy wrote:On March 12 2026 21:43 Harris1st wrote:On March 12 2026 17:22 doubleupgradeobbies! wrote:
[quote]
Frankly, the breakdown of that trust of the US is the best thing to come out of this whole thing.
I'm quite frankly a little miffed the US hasn't threatened/belittled/antagonized us (Australia) more other than some tariifs. My worry is that when Trump is gone, we are going to try and go back to the old status quo of being a defacto US vassal, rather than try to bargain our strategic position against the US like we should have all along (especially with the Murdoch media constantly trying to vomit American politics directly into our media environment).
Frankly, other Western countries would benefit from having a more Machiavellian attitude towards their relationship with the US too. In Germany it's slowly shifting from funny to annoying to outright hatred of the US. So yes, I am all for decoupling from the US. If possible for forever This is the part that the non MAGA republicans do not understand. His insanity is fucking their country long term. I work with, both in my company and customer, like 100% conservatives. They have mostly all turned away from him. With the new war and oil prices being the last straw. And it’s almost like an awakening. So many of them are very devout Christian’s and it’s like they are just seeing the complete lack of morality now too. I get it’s easier for Canadians but I think it will happen more and more. But that full level of trust won’t return. Countries are going to buy arms from more than just the US. Our official strategy now involves buying and selling to as many countries as possible. Many snowbirds (old people who travel south for the winter and there is 100,000’s) are looking elsewhere and finding it cheaper and just as safe, they are not coming back. Even if the US regains a reasonable path the Donald has hurt the US for at least 50 years. Not to be a MAGA defender, but this isn't really a Trump issue. I don't feel that differently about the US (or see it that differently), than what it was like for the proceeding decades. Canadians and Greenlanders might disagree, at least they weren't threatening to annex you prior to this. This is just a less polished, less competent, more honest (ironically...) version of what the US body politics has been for at least the last several decades now. In some ways, Trump is in fact the most representative American. Not in the sense that is representative of what they are like individually as people, but he is an accurate representation of how they've behaved as a nation. That being confidently (oh so confidently) wrong about things then blaming anyone else for taking advantage of them even as they sit literally in the middle of a global order set up to benefit them. And ruthlessly pursuing their geo-political interests while moralising to everyone else about why what they are doing is good for democracy/human rights/rules based order. Even as they do pretty much the same things (worse even, if only due to their capability for scale and ability to shrug off consequences) that they criticise their geo-political rivals for. I don't see this as Trump hurting the US for the forseeable future (though I guess that's also true, marketing matters). So much as the US allies and affiliates making rational corrections on their rather abusive relation with the US, that has certainly not just appeared recently, merely had a light shown on it. Hopefully, this is seen as a mask-off moment for the US rather than just an abberation of this particular administration/political moment/president. But the familiar is very appealing, and I'm afraid many people in the west might want to return to how it was before Trump. Memory is a funny thing, and if there is a desire to remember this political moment as being just an anomoly rather than a peek at how the US really is, then that might just be how people will remember it. No doubt, the Murdoch media in Australia will try to spin it that way, and they have a lot of power over our attention economy here, and always been very pro-US. I for one, would feel a lot better if public sentiment soured past the point of salvaging before Trump leaves office. Again, for Americans here, don't take this as an attack on how you, or even your compatriots are personally. I understand the behaviour of individual inhabitants of a country is a completely diffrerent thing from how your entire country acts as a nation-state. But as a nation-state, you've had this coming for a while. I still wish you all individually all the best. I think majority of Europeans/Canadians/Australians are stuck at stage 1, being shocked at the US acting out of self interest. One day they will get to stage 2, understanding that a nation acting out of self-interest doesn't imply there isn't mutual benefits. It's definitely worthy of a chapter in history text book, not just on Trump policies, but the awkward transition when Canada and UK wanting to work closer with China because they are at stage 1 of realization. China, a country with allies like NK, Russia and Iran etc. How is it acting out of self interest NOW if it wasn't BEFORE? Are you under the impression that the US was altruistic prior to Trump and Trump put a stop to all that giving stuff away for free? I wasn't, plenty certainly did. Else why are there so many crying about cutting in fundings to other nations, aids and whatnot? the US was sending 50billions per year of aids to Africa in 2024. Do you think it was altruistic or achieved whatever self interest goal it had? Source(s)? Googling suggests US's total yearly foreign aid totals around that number. USAID's budget was around 25b. Are you sourcing an amalgam of US citizen/corporation's donations to charities that are in support of africa or something? You can halve that amount, and the question still applies. Do you think it was altruistic or achieved whatever self interest goal it had? Yeah a bunch of corporations got tax cuts and not-for-profit charities kept functioning and keeping people employed.
my comment was majority thought it was a "nice thing to do/have" and thus being upset about them being cancelled.
Certainly very few are writing about how business are getting less tax cut?
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On March 13 2026 12:10 ETisME wrote:Show nested quote +On March 13 2026 12:00 Fleetfeet wrote:On March 13 2026 11:56 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 11:54 Fleetfeet wrote:On March 13 2026 11:40 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 09:41 Fleetfeet wrote:On March 13 2026 09:20 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 07:29 doubleupgradeobbies! wrote:On March 12 2026 23:20 Billyboy wrote:On March 12 2026 21:43 Harris1st wrote:
[quote]
In Germany it's slowly shifting from funny to annoying to outright hatred of the US. So yes, I am all for decoupling from the US. If possible for forever This is the part that the non MAGA republicans do not understand. His insanity is fucking their country long term. I work with, both in my company and customer, like 100% conservatives. They have mostly all turned away from him. With the new war and oil prices being the last straw. And it’s almost like an awakening. So many of them are very devout Christian’s and it’s like they are just seeing the complete lack of morality now too. I get it’s easier for Canadians but I think it will happen more and more. But that full level of trust won’t return. Countries are going to buy arms from more than just the US. Our official strategy now involves buying and selling to as many countries as possible. Many snowbirds (old people who travel south for the winter and there is 100,000’s) are looking elsewhere and finding it cheaper and just as safe, they are not coming back. Even if the US regains a reasonable path the Donald has hurt the US for at least 50 years. Not to be a MAGA defender, but this isn't really a Trump issue. I don't feel that differently about the US (or see it that differently), than what it was like for the proceeding decades. Canadians and Greenlanders might disagree, at least they weren't threatening to annex you prior to this. This is just a less polished, less competent, more honest (ironically...) version of what the US body politics has been for at least the last several decades now. In some ways, Trump is in fact the most representative American. Not in the sense that is representative of what they are like individually as people, but he is an accurate representation of how they've behaved as a nation. That being confidently (oh so confidently) wrong about things then blaming anyone else for taking advantage of them even as they sit literally in the middle of a global order set up to benefit them. And ruthlessly pursuing their geo-political interests while moralising to everyone else about why what they are doing is good for democracy/human rights/rules based order. Even as they do pretty much the same things (worse even, if only due to their capability for scale and ability to shrug off consequences) that they criticise their geo-political rivals for. I don't see this as Trump hurting the US for the forseeable future (though I guess that's also true, marketing matters). So much as the US allies and affiliates making rational corrections on their rather abusive relation with the US, that has certainly not just appeared recently, merely had a light shown on it. Hopefully, this is seen as a mask-off moment for the US rather than just an abberation of this particular administration/political moment/president. But the familiar is very appealing, and I'm afraid many people in the west might want to return to how it was before Trump. Memory is a funny thing, and if there is a desire to remember this political moment as being just an anomoly rather than a peek at how the US really is, then that might just be how people will remember it. No doubt, the Murdoch media in Australia will try to spin it that way, and they have a lot of power over our attention economy here, and always been very pro-US. I for one, would feel a lot better if public sentiment soured past the point of salvaging before Trump leaves office. Again, for Americans here, don't take this as an attack on how you, or even your compatriots are personally. I understand the behaviour of individual inhabitants of a country is a completely diffrerent thing from how your entire country acts as a nation-state. But as a nation-state, you've had this coming for a while. I still wish you all individually all the best. I think majority of Europeans/Canadians/Australians are stuck at stage 1, being shocked at the US acting out of self interest. One day they will get to stage 2, understanding that a nation acting out of self-interest doesn't imply there isn't mutual benefits. It's definitely worthy of a chapter in history text book, not just on Trump policies, but the awkward transition when Canada and UK wanting to work closer with China because they are at stage 1 of realization. China, a country with allies like NK, Russia and Iran etc. How is it acting out of self interest NOW if it wasn't BEFORE? Are you under the impression that the US was altruistic prior to Trump and Trump put a stop to all that giving stuff away for free? I wasn't, plenty certainly did. Else why are there so many crying about cutting in fundings to other nations, aids and whatnot? the US was sending 50billions per year of aids to Africa in 2024. Do you think it was altruistic or achieved whatever self interest goal it had? Source(s)? Googling suggests US's total yearly foreign aid totals around that number. USAID's budget was around 25b. Are you sourcing an amalgam of US citizen/corporation's donations to charities that are in support of africa or something? You can halve that amount, and the question still applies. Do you think it was altruistic or achieved whatever self interest goal it had? Yeah a bunch of corporations got tax cuts and not-for-profit charities kept functioning and keeping people employed. my comment was majority thought it was a "nice thing to do/have" and thus being upset about them being cancelled. Certainly very few are writing about how business are getting less tax cut?
My comment is making fun of you because you haven't sourced shit, so I can just make up whatever I want irrespective to anything because we're in imaginationland.
If you want to say 'The US gave 25b in aid to africa in 2024. Do you think that was altruism or no?' and then try tell me I can double or half the amount and the question still applies, I'll happily also exist in imaginationland and say it was actually 700 billion dollars and it wasn't altruistic because they were trying to leverage soft power in a bet to monopolize Africa's lithium mines.
You surely can see how sources might be important.
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On March 13 2026 12:01 Billyboy wrote:Show nested quote +On March 13 2026 11:46 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 10:08 WombaT wrote:On March 13 2026 09:20 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 07:29 doubleupgradeobbies! wrote:On March 12 2026 23:20 Billyboy wrote:On March 12 2026 21:43 Harris1st wrote:On March 12 2026 17:22 doubleupgradeobbies! wrote:On March 12 2026 04:50 Vivax wrote:
Nobody‘s recovering from this stuff both sides of the atlantic.
As soon as somebody clearly puts ambition over pacts for personal gain and tramples over ‚allies’ in name only, it takes ages to repair that trust.
Dude went all-in as soon as he began threatening Canada and Denmark. That was like the bell of doom. If they can do anything, they‘ll just do anything because they can. Frankly, the breakdown of that trust of the US is the best thing to come out of this whole thing. I'm quite frankly a little miffed the US hasn't threatened/belittled/antagonized us (Australia) more other than some tariifs. My worry is that when Trump is gone, we are going to try and go back to the old status quo of being a defacto US vassal, rather than try to bargain our strategic position against the US like we should have all along (especially with the Murdoch media constantly trying to vomit American politics directly into our media environment). Frankly, other Western countries would benefit from having a more Machiavellian attitude towards their relationship with the US too. In Germany it's slowly shifting from funny to annoying to outright hatred of the US. So yes, I am all for decoupling from the US. If possible for forever This is the part that the non MAGA republicans do not understand. His insanity is fucking their country long term. I work with, both in my company and customer, like 100% conservatives. They have mostly all turned away from him. With the new war and oil prices being the last straw. And it’s almost like an awakening. So many of them are very devout Christian’s and it’s like they are just seeing the complete lack of morality now too. I get it’s easier for Canadians but I think it will happen more and more. But that full level of trust won’t return. Countries are going to buy arms from more than just the US. Our official strategy now involves buying and selling to as many countries as possible. Many snowbirds (old people who travel south for the winter and there is 100,000’s) are looking elsewhere and finding it cheaper and just as safe, they are not coming back. Even if the US regains a reasonable path the Donald has hurt the US for at least 50 years. Not to be a MAGA defender, but this isn't really a Trump issue. I don't feel that differently about the US (or see it that differently), than what it was like for the proceeding decades. Canadians and Greenlanders might disagree, at least they weren't threatening to annex you prior to this. This is just a less polished, less competent, more honest (ironically...) version of what the US body politics has been for at least the last several decades now. In some ways, Trump is in fact the most representative American. Not in the sense that is representative of what they are like individually as people, but he is an accurate representation of how they've behaved as a nation. That being confidently (oh so confidently) wrong about things then blaming anyone else for taking advantage of them even as they sit literally in the middle of a global order set up to benefit them. And ruthlessly pursuing their geo-political interests while moralising to everyone else about why what they are doing is good for democracy/human rights/rules based order. Even as they do pretty much the same things (worse even, if only due to their capability for scale and ability to shrug off consequences) that they criticise their geo-political rivals for. I don't see this as Trump hurting the US for the forseeable future (though I guess that's also true, marketing matters). So much as the US allies and affiliates making rational corrections on their rather abusive relation with the US, that has certainly not just appeared recently, merely had a light shown on it. Hopefully, this is seen as a mask-off moment for the US rather than just an abberation of this particular administration/political moment/president. But the familiar is very appealing, and I'm afraid many people in the west might want to return to how it was before Trump. Memory is a funny thing, and if there is a desire to remember this political moment as being just an anomoly rather than a peek at how the US really is, then that might just be how people will remember it. No doubt, the Murdoch media in Australia will try to spin it that way, and they have a lot of power over our attention economy here, and always been very pro-US. I for one, would feel a lot better if public sentiment soured past the point of salvaging before Trump leaves office. Again, for Americans here, don't take this as an attack on how you, or even your compatriots are personally. I understand the behaviour of individual inhabitants of a country is a completely diffrerent thing from how your entire country acts as a nation-state. But as a nation-state, you've had this coming for a while. I still wish you all individually all the best. I think majority of Europeans/Canadians/Australians are stuck at stage 1, being shocked at the US acting out of self interest. One day they will get to stage 2, understanding that a nation acting out of self-interest doesn't imply there isn't mutual benefits. It's definitely worthy of a chapter in history text book, not just on Trump policies, but the awkward transition when Canada and UK wanting to work closer with China because they are at stage 1 of realization. China, a country with allies like NK, Russia and Iran etc. No, we’re confused why the US is posturing and behaving in such a manner that actively harms its own self-interest in the medium and long-term, while being annoying to us also. If of the two increasingly hegemonic powers, both are arseholes why wouldn’t Europe cultivate closer links to China? I fail to see how China, which literally fund Russia invading Ukraine (existential crisis of Europe), profits off dumping products to the point it's killing local industries, are on par with the US putting tariffs. That's on top of them funding Iran and North Korea and what not. Is that not actively harms its own self-interest in short, medium and long term? Leverage is pretty important. As is reducing concentration risk. It is also basically a return to what our trade with China was before they got mad at us for arresting a Chinese national at the Americans request. You see we were such a good ally and partner of the US, we negatively impacted our own economy to support them. In return the ignorant man Abby threw a tantrum because he doesn’t understand basic economics like trade deficits. It was very pragmatic to become less reliant on a non trust worthy actor. And we didn’t replace the US with China. We replaced a small part of the trade we lost with the US with the UK, China, India and a bunch of other nations. It was a pragmatic choice when dealing with an unpredictable buffoon. And a pretty moronic voter base that trusts influencers that are actively peddling them products over doctors and so on.
Yes, same thing happened when Europe being pressured by the US to cut huawei off.
Economics wasn't the concern there, it's the world letting huawei dominating the 5G era.
Canada has a nickname amongst asian /chinese community, Chinada, so we never saw it your way, sorry.
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On March 13 2026 12:19 Fleetfeet wrote:Show nested quote +On March 13 2026 12:10 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 12:00 Fleetfeet wrote:On March 13 2026 11:56 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 11:54 Fleetfeet wrote:On March 13 2026 11:40 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 09:41 Fleetfeet wrote:On March 13 2026 09:20 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 07:29 doubleupgradeobbies! wrote:On March 12 2026 23:20 Billyboy wrote:
[quote]
This is the part that the non MAGA republicans do not understand. His insanity is fucking their country long term.
I work with, both in my company and customer, like 100% conservatives. They have mostly all turned away from him. With the new war and oil prices being the last straw. And it’s almost like an awakening. So many of them are very devout Christian’s and it’s like they are just seeing the complete lack of morality now too. I get it’s easier for Canadians but I think it will happen more and more. But that full level of trust won’t return.
Countries are going to buy arms from more than just the US. Our official strategy now involves buying and selling to as many countries as possible. Many snowbirds (old people who travel south for the winter and there is 100,000’s) are looking elsewhere and finding it cheaper and just as safe, they are not coming back.
Even if the US regains a reasonable path the Donald has hurt the US for at least 50 years.
Not to be a MAGA defender, but this isn't really a Trump issue. I don't feel that differently about the US (or see it that differently), than what it was like for the proceeding decades. Canadians and Greenlanders might disagree, at least they weren't threatening to annex you prior to this. This is just a less polished, less competent, more honest (ironically...) version of what the US body politics has been for at least the last several decades now. In some ways, Trump is in fact the most representative American. Not in the sense that is representative of what they are like individually as people, but he is an accurate representation of how they've behaved as a nation. That being confidently (oh so confidently) wrong about things then blaming anyone else for taking advantage of them even as they sit literally in the middle of a global order set up to benefit them. And ruthlessly pursuing their geo-political interests while moralising to everyone else about why what they are doing is good for democracy/human rights/rules based order. Even as they do pretty much the same things (worse even, if only due to their capability for scale and ability to shrug off consequences) that they criticise their geo-political rivals for. I don't see this as Trump hurting the US for the forseeable future (though I guess that's also true, marketing matters). So much as the US allies and affiliates making rational corrections on their rather abusive relation with the US, that has certainly not just appeared recently, merely had a light shown on it. Hopefully, this is seen as a mask-off moment for the US rather than just an abberation of this particular administration/political moment/president. But the familiar is very appealing, and I'm afraid many people in the west might want to return to how it was before Trump. Memory is a funny thing, and if there is a desire to remember this political moment as being just an anomoly rather than a peek at how the US really is, then that might just be how people will remember it. No doubt, the Murdoch media in Australia will try to spin it that way, and they have a lot of power over our attention economy here, and always been very pro-US. I for one, would feel a lot better if public sentiment soured past the point of salvaging before Trump leaves office. Again, for Americans here, don't take this as an attack on how you, or even your compatriots are personally. I understand the behaviour of individual inhabitants of a country is a completely diffrerent thing from how your entire country acts as a nation-state. But as a nation-state, you've had this coming for a while. I still wish you all individually all the best. I think majority of Europeans/Canadians/Australians are stuck at stage 1, being shocked at the US acting out of self interest. One day they will get to stage 2, understanding that a nation acting out of self-interest doesn't imply there isn't mutual benefits. It's definitely worthy of a chapter in history text book, not just on Trump policies, but the awkward transition when Canada and UK wanting to work closer with China because they are at stage 1 of realization. China, a country with allies like NK, Russia and Iran etc. How is it acting out of self interest NOW if it wasn't BEFORE? Are you under the impression that the US was altruistic prior to Trump and Trump put a stop to all that giving stuff away for free? I wasn't, plenty certainly did. Else why are there so many crying about cutting in fundings to other nations, aids and whatnot? the US was sending 50billions per year of aids to Africa in 2024. Do you think it was altruistic or achieved whatever self interest goal it had? Source(s)? Googling suggests US's total yearly foreign aid totals around that number. USAID's budget was around 25b. Are you sourcing an amalgam of US citizen/corporation's donations to charities that are in support of africa or something? You can halve that amount, and the question still applies. Do you think it was altruistic or achieved whatever self interest goal it had? Yeah a bunch of corporations got tax cuts and not-for-profit charities kept functioning and keeping people employed. my comment was majority thought it was a "nice thing to do/have" and thus being upset about them being cancelled. Certainly very few are writing about how business are getting less tax cut? My comment is making fun of you because you haven't sourced shit, so I can just make up whatever I want irrespective to anything because we're in imaginationland. If you want to say 'The US gave 25b in aid to africa in 2024. Do you think that was altruism or no?' and then try tell me I can double or half the amount and the question still applies, I'll happily also exist in imaginationland and say it was actually 700 billion dollars and it wasn't altruistic because they were trying to leverage soft power in a bet to monopolize Africa's lithium mines. You surely can see how sources might be important.
Just say "they were trying to leverage soft power in a bet to monopolize Africa's lithium mines", if that's what you think is happening.
Do you think there's ever going to be a source where Chinese gov coming out to say : they want all nations in the silk road, have Mandarin be taught at school, to be controlled and surveillance, and to have corruption and expand voting rights in the UN?
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doubleupgradeobbies!
Australia1213 Posts
On March 13 2026 11:55 ETisME wrote:Show nested quote +On March 13 2026 10:08 doubleupgradeobbies! wrote:On March 13 2026 09:53 LightSpectra wrote:
Trump hasn't done a goddamn single thing in the United States' interests, just the interests of his megadonors.
Nobody is shocked when the USA does selfish things, the international shock is at the fact that Americans are letting open corruption and willful ignorance shoot ourselves in the face. As an international person. I must say, while your internal Fascism and corruption problem maybe... not so much shocking as uncomfortable to watch. (I may not be representative in that I don't find it shocking, not sure here) I assure you, and I'm confident I'm more representative here, our attention is far less on the US shooting itself in the face, and far more on when it threatens to, or actually does, sometimes literally, shoot other members of the international community in the face. On a scale measuring fascism, Australia and Europe are pretty up there. Way tougher internet speech control, rise of far right like One Nation. Germany is actively targeting AFD to get it off political stage, EU targeting chat encryption.
Absolutely, we've had actual neo-Nazis out in the streets not that long ago. We absolutely have fascists here. While I might find their very presence in the country unpleasant, I can appreciate, that sort of militaristic nationalism is to some extent just a political leaning, and the world has people of that leaning everywhere. I wouldn't say we have a fascism problem in the same way though.
Fortunately, I wouldn't characterise our actual government actions as broadly fascist (yet). There are certainly some steps towards authoritarianism. But it'd be pretty hard to characterise any of them as being motivated by any sort of militarism, nationalism or even any sort of popularism, and certainly nothing to do with race/genetics/ethnicity.
Likewise, if in the US, there just happened to be some fascists idiologues, even coupled with some actual authoritarian actions in government, I wouldn't have characterised it as a "Fascism problem'. But when a government is a) ignoring the existing political checks and balances. b) being militaristic (ok this one is par for the course) c) spouting nationalist rhetoric about how other countries are taking advantage of you d) rounding up immigrants in a way that it's clear, at least for the people doing the actual rounding up, is ethnically motivated and e) talking about wanting to take territory from other countries because 'you need them'. I think at that stage it's not too far fetched to suggest you may be 'doing a fascism'. In a problematic way.
But justifying my choice of terminology aside, my point was that the rest of the world pays far more attention to the "wow, what the US is doing is really bad for countries that interacts with the US" than the "wow, what the US is doing is really bad for the US" part.
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On March 13 2026 12:27 ETisME wrote:Show nested quote +On March 13 2026 12:19 Fleetfeet wrote:On March 13 2026 12:10 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 12:00 Fleetfeet wrote:On March 13 2026 11:56 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 11:54 Fleetfeet wrote:On March 13 2026 11:40 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 09:41 Fleetfeet wrote:On March 13 2026 09:20 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 07:29 doubleupgradeobbies! wrote:
[quote]
Not to be a MAGA defender, but this isn't really a Trump issue. I don't feel that differently about the US (or see it that differently), than what it was like for the proceeding decades. Canadians and Greenlanders might disagree, at least they weren't threatening to annex you prior to this.
This is just a less polished, less competent, more honest (ironically...) version of what the US body politics has been for at least the last several decades now.
In some ways, Trump is in fact the most representative American. Not in the sense that is representative of what they are like individually as people, but he is an accurate representation of how they've behaved as a nation. That being confidently (oh so confidently) wrong about things then blaming anyone else for taking advantage of them even as they sit literally in the middle of a global order set up to benefit them. And ruthlessly pursuing their geo-political interests while moralising to everyone else about why what they are doing is good for democracy/human rights/rules based order. Even as they do pretty much the same things (worse even, if only due to their capability for scale and ability to shrug off consequences) that they criticise their geo-political rivals for.
I don't see this as Trump hurting the US for the forseeable future (though I guess that's also true, marketing matters). So much as the US allies and affiliates making rational corrections on their rather abusive relation with the US, that has certainly not just appeared recently, merely had a light shown on it.
Hopefully, this is seen as a mask-off moment for the US rather than just an abberation of this particular administration/political moment/president.
But the familiar is very appealing, and I'm afraid many people in the west might want to return to how it was before Trump. Memory is a funny thing, and if there is a desire to remember this political moment as being just an anomoly rather than a peek at how the US really is, then that might just be how people will remember it.
No doubt, the Murdoch media in Australia will try to spin it that way, and they have a lot of power over our attention economy here, and always been very pro-US. I for one, would feel a lot better if public sentiment soured past the point of salvaging before Trump leaves office.
Again, for Americans here, don't take this as an attack on how you, or even your compatriots are personally. I understand the behaviour of individual inhabitants of a country is a completely diffrerent thing from how your entire country acts as a nation-state. But as a nation-state, you've had this coming for a while. I still wish you all individually all the best. I think majority of Europeans/Canadians/Australians are stuck at stage 1, being shocked at the US acting out of self interest. One day they will get to stage 2, understanding that a nation acting out of self-interest doesn't imply there isn't mutual benefits. It's definitely worthy of a chapter in history text book, not just on Trump policies, but the awkward transition when Canada and UK wanting to work closer with China because they are at stage 1 of realization. China, a country with allies like NK, Russia and Iran etc. How is it acting out of self interest NOW if it wasn't BEFORE? Are you under the impression that the US was altruistic prior to Trump and Trump put a stop to all that giving stuff away for free? I wasn't, plenty certainly did. Else why are there so many crying about cutting in fundings to other nations, aids and whatnot? the US was sending 50billions per year of aids to Africa in 2024. Do you think it was altruistic or achieved whatever self interest goal it had? Source(s)? Googling suggests US's total yearly foreign aid totals around that number. USAID's budget was around 25b. Are you sourcing an amalgam of US citizen/corporation's donations to charities that are in support of africa or something? You can halve that amount, and the question still applies. Do you think it was altruistic or achieved whatever self interest goal it had? Yeah a bunch of corporations got tax cuts and not-for-profit charities kept functioning and keeping people employed. my comment was majority thought it was a "nice thing to do/have" and thus being upset about them being cancelled. Certainly very few are writing about how business are getting less tax cut? My comment is making fun of you because you haven't sourced shit, so I can just make up whatever I want irrespective to anything because we're in imaginationland. If you want to say 'The US gave 25b in aid to africa in 2024. Do you think that was altruism or no?' and then try tell me I can double or half the amount and the question still applies, I'll happily also exist in imaginationland and say it was actually 700 billion dollars and it wasn't altruistic because they were trying to leverage soft power in a bet to monopolize Africa's lithium mines. You surely can see how sources might be important. Just say "they were trying to leverage soft power in a bet to monopolize Africa's lithium mines", if that's what you think is happening. Do you think there's ever going to be a source where Chinese gov coming out to say : they want all nations in the silk road, have Mandarin be taught at school, to be controlled and surveillance, and to have corruption and expand voting rights in the UN?
Okay.
"I think you're making shit up and not a serious person. Happy birthday."
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On March 13 2026 12:36 Fleetfeet wrote:Show nested quote +On March 13 2026 12:27 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 12:19 Fleetfeet wrote:On March 13 2026 12:10 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 12:00 Fleetfeet wrote:On March 13 2026 11:56 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 11:54 Fleetfeet wrote:On March 13 2026 11:40 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 09:41 Fleetfeet wrote:On March 13 2026 09:20 ETisME wrote:
[quote]
I think majority of Europeans/Canadians/Australians are stuck at stage 1, being shocked at the US acting out of self interest.
One day they will get to stage 2, understanding that a nation acting out of self-interest doesn't imply there isn't mutual benefits.
It's definitely worthy of a chapter in history text book, not just on Trump policies, but the awkward transition when Canada and UK wanting to work closer with China because they are at stage 1 of realization.
China, a country with allies like NK, Russia and Iran etc.
How is it acting out of self interest NOW if it wasn't BEFORE? Are you under the impression that the US was altruistic prior to Trump and Trump put a stop to all that giving stuff away for free? I wasn't, plenty certainly did. Else why are there so many crying about cutting in fundings to other nations, aids and whatnot? the US was sending 50billions per year of aids to Africa in 2024. Do you think it was altruistic or achieved whatever self interest goal it had? Source(s)? Googling suggests US's total yearly foreign aid totals around that number. USAID's budget was around 25b. Are you sourcing an amalgam of US citizen/corporation's donations to charities that are in support of africa or something? You can halve that amount, and the question still applies. Do you think it was altruistic or achieved whatever self interest goal it had? Yeah a bunch of corporations got tax cuts and not-for-profit charities kept functioning and keeping people employed. my comment was majority thought it was a "nice thing to do/have" and thus being upset about them being cancelled. Certainly very few are writing about how business are getting less tax cut? My comment is making fun of you because you haven't sourced shit, so I can just make up whatever I want irrespective to anything because we're in imaginationland. If you want to say 'The US gave 25b in aid to africa in 2024. Do you think that was altruism or no?' and then try tell me I can double or half the amount and the question still applies, I'll happily also exist in imaginationland and say it was actually 700 billion dollars and it wasn't altruistic because they were trying to leverage soft power in a bet to monopolize Africa's lithium mines. You surely can see how sources might be important. Just say "they were trying to leverage soft power in a bet to monopolize Africa's lithium mines", if that's what you think is happening. Do you think there's ever going to be a source where Chinese gov coming out to say : they want all nations in the silk road, have Mandarin be taught at school, to be controlled and surveillance, and to have corruption and expand voting rights in the UN? Okay. "I think you're making shit up and not a serious person. Happy birthday."
Read. Opinion acknowledged. Thanks.
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On March 13 2026 12:22 ETisME wrote:Show nested quote +On March 13 2026 12:01 Billyboy wrote:On March 13 2026 11:46 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 10:08 WombaT wrote:On March 13 2026 09:20 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 07:29 doubleupgradeobbies! wrote:On March 12 2026 23:20 Billyboy wrote:On March 12 2026 21:43 Harris1st wrote:On March 12 2026 17:22 doubleupgradeobbies! wrote:On March 12 2026 04:50 Vivax wrote:
Nobody‘s recovering from this stuff both sides of the atlantic.
As soon as somebody clearly puts ambition over pacts for personal gain and tramples over ‚allies’ in name only, it takes ages to repair that trust.
Dude went all-in as soon as he began threatening Canada and Denmark. That was like the bell of doom. If they can do anything, they‘ll just do anything because they can. Frankly, the breakdown of that trust of the US is the best thing to come out of this whole thing. I'm quite frankly a little miffed the US hasn't threatened/belittled/antagonized us (Australia) more other than some tariifs. My worry is that when Trump is gone, we are going to try and go back to the old status quo of being a defacto US vassal, rather than try to bargain our strategic position against the US like we should have all along (especially with the Murdoch media constantly trying to vomit American politics directly into our media environment). Frankly, other Western countries would benefit from having a more Machiavellian attitude towards their relationship with the US too. In Germany it's slowly shifting from funny to annoying to outright hatred of the US. So yes, I am all for decoupling from the US. If possible for forever This is the part that the non MAGA republicans do not understand. His insanity is fucking their country long term. I work with, both in my company and customer, like 100% conservatives. They have mostly all turned away from him. With the new war and oil prices being the last straw. And it’s almost like an awakening. So many of them are very devout Christian’s and it’s like they are just seeing the complete lack of morality now too. I get it’s easier for Canadians but I think it will happen more and more. But that full level of trust won’t return. Countries are going to buy arms from more than just the US. Our official strategy now involves buying and selling to as many countries as possible. Many snowbirds (old people who travel south for the winter and there is 100,000’s) are looking elsewhere and finding it cheaper and just as safe, they are not coming back. Even if the US regains a reasonable path the Donald has hurt the US for at least 50 years. Not to be a MAGA defender, but this isn't really a Trump issue. I don't feel that differently about the US (or see it that differently), than what it was like for the proceeding decades. Canadians and Greenlanders might disagree, at least they weren't threatening to annex you prior to this. This is just a less polished, less competent, more honest (ironically...) version of what the US body politics has been for at least the last several decades now. In some ways, Trump is in fact the most representative American. Not in the sense that is representative of what they are like individually as people, but he is an accurate representation of how they've behaved as a nation. That being confidently (oh so confidently) wrong about things then blaming anyone else for taking advantage of them even as they sit literally in the middle of a global order set up to benefit them. And ruthlessly pursuing their geo-political interests while moralising to everyone else about why what they are doing is good for democracy/human rights/rules based order. Even as they do pretty much the same things (worse even, if only due to their capability for scale and ability to shrug off consequences) that they criticise their geo-political rivals for. I don't see this as Trump hurting the US for the forseeable future (though I guess that's also true, marketing matters). So much as the US allies and affiliates making rational corrections on their rather abusive relation with the US, that has certainly not just appeared recently, merely had a light shown on it. Hopefully, this is seen as a mask-off moment for the US rather than just an abberation of this particular administration/political moment/president. But the familiar is very appealing, and I'm afraid many people in the west might want to return to how it was before Trump. Memory is a funny thing, and if there is a desire to remember this political moment as being just an anomoly rather than a peek at how the US really is, then that might just be how people will remember it. No doubt, the Murdoch media in Australia will try to spin it that way, and they have a lot of power over our attention economy here, and always been very pro-US. I for one, would feel a lot better if public sentiment soured past the point of salvaging before Trump leaves office. Again, for Americans here, don't take this as an attack on how you, or even your compatriots are personally. I understand the behaviour of individual inhabitants of a country is a completely diffrerent thing from how your entire country acts as a nation-state. But as a nation-state, you've had this coming for a while. I still wish you all individually all the best. I think majority of Europeans/Canadians/Australians are stuck at stage 1, being shocked at the US acting out of self interest. One day they will get to stage 2, understanding that a nation acting out of self-interest doesn't imply there isn't mutual benefits. It's definitely worthy of a chapter in history text book, not just on Trump policies, but the awkward transition when Canada and UK wanting to work closer with China because they are at stage 1 of realization. China, a country with allies like NK, Russia and Iran etc. No, we’re confused why the US is posturing and behaving in such a manner that actively harms its own self-interest in the medium and long-term, while being annoying to us also. If of the two increasingly hegemonic powers, both are arseholes why wouldn’t Europe cultivate closer links to China? I fail to see how China, which literally fund Russia invading Ukraine (existential crisis of Europe), profits off dumping products to the point it's killing local industries, are on par with the US putting tariffs. That's on top of them funding Iran and North Korea and what not. Is that not actively harms its own self-interest in short, medium and long term? Leverage is pretty important. As is reducing concentration risk. It is also basically a return to what our trade with China was before they got mad at us for arresting a Chinese national at the Americans request. You see we were such a good ally and partner of the US, we negatively impacted our own economy to support them. In return the ignorant man Abby threw a tantrum because he doesn’t understand basic economics like trade deficits. It was very pragmatic to become less reliant on a non trust worthy actor. And we didn’t replace the US with China. We replaced a small part of the trade we lost with the US with the UK, China, India and a bunch of other nations. It was a pragmatic choice when dealing with an unpredictable buffoon. And a pretty moronic voter base that trusts influencers that are actively peddling them products over doctors and so on. Yes, same thing happened when Europe being pressured by the US to cut huawei off. Economics wasn't the concern there, it's the world letting huawei dominating the 5G era. Canada has a nickname amongst asian /chinese community, Chinada, so we never saw it your way, sorry.
That answer makes zero sense in this conversation. Can you try again, preferably telling the whole story and relating it the words I said.
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On March 13 2026 12:36 doubleupgradeobbies! wrote:Show nested quote +On March 13 2026 11:55 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 10:08 doubleupgradeobbies! wrote:On March 13 2026 09:53 LightSpectra wrote:
Trump hasn't done a goddamn single thing in the United States' interests, just the interests of his megadonors.
Nobody is shocked when the USA does selfish things, the international shock is at the fact that Americans are letting open corruption and willful ignorance shoot ourselves in the face. As an international person. I must say, while your internal Fascism and corruption problem maybe... not so much shocking as uncomfortable to watch. (I may not be representative in that I don't find it shocking, not sure here) I assure you, and I'm confident I'm more representative here, our attention is far less on the US shooting itself in the face, and far more on when it threatens to, or actually does, sometimes literally, shoot other members of the international community in the face. On a scale measuring fascism, Australia and Europe are pretty up there. Way tougher internet speech control, rise of far right like One Nation. Germany is actively targeting AFD to get it off political stage, EU targeting chat encryption. Absolutely, we've had actual neo-Nazis out in the streets not that long ago. We absolutely have fascists here. While I might find their very presence in the country unpleasant, I can appreciate, that sort of militaristic nationalism is to some extent just a political leaning, and the world has people of that leaning everywhere. I wouldn't say we have a fascism problem in the same way though. Fortunately, I wouldn't characterise our actual government actions as broadly fascist (yet). There are certainly some steps towards authoritarianism. But it'd be pretty hard to characterise any of them as being motivated by any sort of militarism, nationalism or even any sort of popularism, and certainly nothing to do with race/genetics/ethnicity. Likewise, if in the US, there just happened to be some fascists idiologues, even coupled with some actual authoritarian actions in government, I wouldn't have characterised it as a "Fascism problem'. But when a government is a) ignoring the existing political checks and balances. b) being militaristic (ok this one is par for the course) c) spouting nationalist rhetoric about how other countries are taking advantage of you d) rounding up immigrants in a way that it's clear, at least for the people doing the actual rounding up, is ethnically motivated and e) talking about wanting to take territory from other countries because 'you need them'. I think at that stage it's not too far fetched to suggest you may be 'doing a fascism'. In a problematic way.
That's why I said on a scale of fascism, none are there.
The 4 elements of what fascism is:
1. Cult like worship
2. Hyper nationalism
3. Surveillance / control over in information
4. Glorified military strength
Many of these do overlap with Nationalism/ Authoritarianism.
I think it's obvious that the US isn't one, you can obviously see how quick of a fall off Trump has.
He was also elected to solve domestic problems and end wars, not starting wars. The people in the US aren't wanting that neither.
All of these require government to have strong control over information flow.
And the public in these Europe and Australia are far open to allowing these options, while having pretty strong far right rise right now.
In some way the line of thinking shouldn't be authoritarianism not quite as bad as fascism.
I would say Mao's China is one of the worst regimes, literally destroyed thousands of years of traditions and social construct, and huge famines with loss of lives. It also participated in war and enabled other mass loss of lives under communisms.
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On March 13 2026 12:42 Billyboy wrote:Show nested quote +On March 13 2026 12:22 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 12:01 Billyboy wrote:On March 13 2026 11:46 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 10:08 WombaT wrote:On March 13 2026 09:20 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 07:29 doubleupgradeobbies! wrote:On March 12 2026 23:20 Billyboy wrote:On March 12 2026 21:43 Harris1st wrote:On March 12 2026 17:22 doubleupgradeobbies! wrote:
[quote]
Frankly, the breakdown of that trust of the US is the best thing to come out of this whole thing.
I'm quite frankly a little miffed the US hasn't threatened/belittled/antagonized us (Australia) more other than some tariifs. My worry is that when Trump is gone, we are going to try and go back to the old status quo of being a defacto US vassal, rather than try to bargain our strategic position against the US like we should have all along (especially with the Murdoch media constantly trying to vomit American politics directly into our media environment).
Frankly, other Western countries would benefit from having a more Machiavellian attitude towards their relationship with the US too. In Germany it's slowly shifting from funny to annoying to outright hatred of the US. So yes, I am all for decoupling from the US. If possible for forever This is the part that the non MAGA republicans do not understand. His insanity is fucking their country long term. I work with, both in my company and customer, like 100% conservatives. They have mostly all turned away from him. With the new war and oil prices being the last straw. And it’s almost like an awakening. So many of them are very devout Christian’s and it’s like they are just seeing the complete lack of morality now too. I get it’s easier for Canadians but I think it will happen more and more. But that full level of trust won’t return. Countries are going to buy arms from more than just the US. Our official strategy now involves buying and selling to as many countries as possible. Many snowbirds (old people who travel south for the winter and there is 100,000’s) are looking elsewhere and finding it cheaper and just as safe, they are not coming back. Even if the US regains a reasonable path the Donald has hurt the US for at least 50 years. Not to be a MAGA defender, but this isn't really a Trump issue. I don't feel that differently about the US (or see it that differently), than what it was like for the proceeding decades. Canadians and Greenlanders might disagree, at least they weren't threatening to annex you prior to this. This is just a less polished, less competent, more honest (ironically...) version of what the US body politics has been for at least the last several decades now. In some ways, Trump is in fact the most representative American. Not in the sense that is representative of what they are like individually as people, but he is an accurate representation of how they've behaved as a nation. That being confidently (oh so confidently) wrong about things then blaming anyone else for taking advantage of them even as they sit literally in the middle of a global order set up to benefit them. And ruthlessly pursuing their geo-political interests while moralising to everyone else about why what they are doing is good for democracy/human rights/rules based order. Even as they do pretty much the same things (worse even, if only due to their capability for scale and ability to shrug off consequences) that they criticise their geo-political rivals for. I don't see this as Trump hurting the US for the forseeable future (though I guess that's also true, marketing matters). So much as the US allies and affiliates making rational corrections on their rather abusive relation with the US, that has certainly not just appeared recently, merely had a light shown on it. Hopefully, this is seen as a mask-off moment for the US rather than just an abberation of this particular administration/political moment/president. But the familiar is very appealing, and I'm afraid many people in the west might want to return to how it was before Trump. Memory is a funny thing, and if there is a desire to remember this political moment as being just an anomoly rather than a peek at how the US really is, then that might just be how people will remember it. No doubt, the Murdoch media in Australia will try to spin it that way, and they have a lot of power over our attention economy here, and always been very pro-US. I for one, would feel a lot better if public sentiment soured past the point of salvaging before Trump leaves office. Again, for Americans here, don't take this as an attack on how you, or even your compatriots are personally. I understand the behaviour of individual inhabitants of a country is a completely diffrerent thing from how your entire country acts as a nation-state. But as a nation-state, you've had this coming for a while. I still wish you all individually all the best. I think majority of Europeans/Canadians/Australians are stuck at stage 1, being shocked at the US acting out of self interest. One day they will get to stage 2, understanding that a nation acting out of self-interest doesn't imply there isn't mutual benefits. It's definitely worthy of a chapter in history text book, not just on Trump policies, but the awkward transition when Canada and UK wanting to work closer with China because they are at stage 1 of realization. China, a country with allies like NK, Russia and Iran etc. No, we’re confused why the US is posturing and behaving in such a manner that actively harms its own self-interest in the medium and long-term, while being annoying to us also. If of the two increasingly hegemonic powers, both are arseholes why wouldn’t Europe cultivate closer links to China? I fail to see how China, which literally fund Russia invading Ukraine (existential crisis of Europe), profits off dumping products to the point it's killing local industries, are on par with the US putting tariffs. That's on top of them funding Iran and North Korea and what not. Is that not actively harms its own self-interest in short, medium and long term? Leverage is pretty important. As is reducing concentration risk. It is also basically a return to what our trade with China was before they got mad at us for arresting a Chinese national at the Americans request. You see we were such a good ally and partner of the US, we negatively impacted our own economy to support them. In return the ignorant man Abby threw a tantrum because he doesn’t understand basic economics like trade deficits. It was very pragmatic to become less reliant on a non trust worthy actor. And we didn’t replace the US with China. We replaced a small part of the trade we lost with the US with the UK, China, India and a bunch of other nations. It was a pragmatic choice when dealing with an unpredictable buffoon. And a pretty moronic voter base that trusts influencers that are actively peddling them products over doctors and so on. Yes, same thing happened when Europe being pressured by the US to cut huawei off. Economics wasn't the concern there, it's the world letting huawei dominating the 5G era. Canada has a nickname amongst asian /chinese community, Chinada, so we never saw it your way, sorry. That answer makes zero sense in this conversation. Can you try again, preferably telling the whole story and relating it the words I said.
Canada is becoming a security threat in the region due to how open it is to China.
Trades for one, the massively pro CCP china new chinese immigrants are another.
In ways similar to Germany dependent in Russia for gas.
All your talk about trade value etc, just gets to show why it's called Chinada.
You probably don't even know, there's a chinese dissident dead, hong kong refugees being targetted by so called "chinese underground police station"
There are even gov agency reports about these ACTIVE spy network in Canada.
trade with "non trust worthy" actor doesn't seem like a nono anymore?
Canada is looking and working to increase trade with China, the new world order.
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On March 13 2026 13:26 ETisME wrote:Show nested quote +On March 13 2026 12:42 Billyboy wrote:On March 13 2026 12:22 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 12:01 Billyboy wrote:On March 13 2026 11:46 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 10:08 WombaT wrote:On March 13 2026 09:20 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 07:29 doubleupgradeobbies! wrote:On March 12 2026 23:20 Billyboy wrote:On March 12 2026 21:43 Harris1st wrote:
[quote]
In Germany it's slowly shifting from funny to annoying to outright hatred of the US. So yes, I am all for decoupling from the US. If possible for forever This is the part that the non MAGA republicans do not understand. His insanity is fucking their country long term. I work with, both in my company and customer, like 100% conservatives. They have mostly all turned away from him. With the new war and oil prices being the last straw. And it’s almost like an awakening. So many of them are very devout Christian’s and it’s like they are just seeing the complete lack of morality now too. I get it’s easier for Canadians but I think it will happen more and more. But that full level of trust won’t return. Countries are going to buy arms from more than just the US. Our official strategy now involves buying and selling to as many countries as possible. Many snowbirds (old people who travel south for the winter and there is 100,000’s) are looking elsewhere and finding it cheaper and just as safe, they are not coming back. Even if the US regains a reasonable path the Donald has hurt the US for at least 50 years. Not to be a MAGA defender, but this isn't really a Trump issue. I don't feel that differently about the US (or see it that differently), than what it was like for the proceeding decades. Canadians and Greenlanders might disagree, at least they weren't threatening to annex you prior to this. This is just a less polished, less competent, more honest (ironically...) version of what the US body politics has been for at least the last several decades now. In some ways, Trump is in fact the most representative American. Not in the sense that is representative of what they are like individually as people, but he is an accurate representation of how they've behaved as a nation. That being confidently (oh so confidently) wrong about things then blaming anyone else for taking advantage of them even as they sit literally in the middle of a global order set up to benefit them. And ruthlessly pursuing their geo-political interests while moralising to everyone else about why what they are doing is good for democracy/human rights/rules based order. Even as they do pretty much the same things (worse even, if only due to their capability for scale and ability to shrug off consequences) that they criticise their geo-political rivals for. I don't see this as Trump hurting the US for the forseeable future (though I guess that's also true, marketing matters). So much as the US allies and affiliates making rational corrections on their rather abusive relation with the US, that has certainly not just appeared recently, merely had a light shown on it. Hopefully, this is seen as a mask-off moment for the US rather than just an abberation of this particular administration/political moment/president. But the familiar is very appealing, and I'm afraid many people in the west might want to return to how it was before Trump. Memory is a funny thing, and if there is a desire to remember this political moment as being just an anomoly rather than a peek at how the US really is, then that might just be how people will remember it. No doubt, the Murdoch media in Australia will try to spin it that way, and they have a lot of power over our attention economy here, and always been very pro-US. I for one, would feel a lot better if public sentiment soured past the point of salvaging before Trump leaves office. Again, for Americans here, don't take this as an attack on how you, or even your compatriots are personally. I understand the behaviour of individual inhabitants of a country is a completely diffrerent thing from how your entire country acts as a nation-state. But as a nation-state, you've had this coming for a while. I still wish you all individually all the best. I think majority of Europeans/Canadians/Australians are stuck at stage 1, being shocked at the US acting out of self interest. One day they will get to stage 2, understanding that a nation acting out of self-interest doesn't imply there isn't mutual benefits. It's definitely worthy of a chapter in history text book, not just on Trump policies, but the awkward transition when Canada and UK wanting to work closer with China because they are at stage 1 of realization. China, a country with allies like NK, Russia and Iran etc. No, we’re confused why the US is posturing and behaving in such a manner that actively harms its own self-interest in the medium and long-term, while being annoying to us also. If of the two increasingly hegemonic powers, both are arseholes why wouldn’t Europe cultivate closer links to China? I fail to see how China, which literally fund Russia invading Ukraine (existential crisis of Europe), profits off dumping products to the point it's killing local industries, are on par with the US putting tariffs. That's on top of them funding Iran and North Korea and what not. Is that not actively harms its own self-interest in short, medium and long term? Leverage is pretty important. As is reducing concentration risk. It is also basically a return to what our trade with China was before they got mad at us for arresting a Chinese national at the Americans request. You see we were such a good ally and partner of the US, we negatively impacted our own economy to support them. In return the ignorant man Abby threw a tantrum because he doesn’t understand basic economics like trade deficits. It was very pragmatic to become less reliant on a non trust worthy actor. And we didn’t replace the US with China. We replaced a small part of the trade we lost with the US with the UK, China, India and a bunch of other nations. It was a pragmatic choice when dealing with an unpredictable buffoon. And a pretty moronic voter base that trusts influencers that are actively peddling them products over doctors and so on. Yes, same thing happened when Europe being pressured by the US to cut huawei off. Economics wasn't the concern there, it's the world letting huawei dominating the 5G era. Canada has a nickname amongst asian /chinese community, Chinada, so we never saw it your way, sorry. That answer makes zero sense in this conversation. Can you try again, preferably telling the whole story and relating it the words I said. Canada was becoming a security threat in the region due to how open it is to China. Trades for one, the massively pro CCP china new chinese immigrants are another. In ways similar to Germany dependent in Russia for gas. All your talk about trade value etc, just gets to show why it's called Chinada. You probably don't even know, there's a chinese dissident dead, hong kong refugees being targetted by so called "chinese underground police station"
So we should stop trade with China because your sure they want to take us over. But we shouldn’t stop trade with the US where the war loving president openly said he wants to take us over, and is right next door?
Or do you think we should do 100% of our trade with the US because sure they both want to take us over but reasons.
And if you believe they both want too, doesn’t keeping them both more equal help Canada?
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If their was any justice in the world and a little less hypocrisy, US would be sanctioned the first day Trump started his little adventure without UN support.
But because there is no justice, I must hope that this war at least crushes MAGA's any political revelance in the long run, and will send likes of Vance, Witkoff and Hegseth on the political dumpster.
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Northern Ireland26359 Posts
On March 13 2026 11:55 ETisME wrote:Show nested quote +On March 13 2026 10:08 doubleupgradeobbies! wrote:On March 13 2026 09:53 LightSpectra wrote:
Trump hasn't done a goddamn single thing in the United States' interests, just the interests of his megadonors.
Nobody is shocked when the USA does selfish things, the international shock is at the fact that Americans are letting open corruption and willful ignorance shoot ourselves in the face. As an international person. I must say, while your internal Fascism and corruption problem maybe... not so much shocking as uncomfortable to watch. (I may not be representative in that I don't find it shocking, not sure here) I assure you, and I'm confident I'm more representative here, our attention is far less on the US shooting itself in the face, and far more on when it threatens to, or actually does, sometimes literally, shoot other members of the international community in the face. On a scale measuring fascism, Australia and Europe are pretty up there. Way tougher internet speech control, rise of far right like One Nation. Germany is actively targeting AFD to get it off political stage, EU targeting chat encryption.
I mean they really aren’t
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doubleupgradeobbies!
Australia1213 Posts
On March 13 2026 13:23 ETisME wrote:
That's why I said on a scale of fascism, none are there.
The 4 elements of what fascism is:
1. Cult like worship
2. Hyper nationalism
3. Surveillance / control over in information
4. Glorified military strength
Many of these do overlap with Nationalism/ Authoritarianism.
I think it's obvious that the US isn't one, you can obviously see how quick of a fall off Trump has.
WHAT DO YOU MEAN?!?!?
Points 2-4 are just part for the course for the US and has been for decades upon decades now, if not longer.
For point 1, people are literally currently wearing hats with his campaign slogan around their everyday lives. Not like, around just election time, or at explicitly political gatherings, just in their normal lives.
You've listed 4 points that accurately describe the current political climate of the US. (Albeit, 3 of them, are the normal state of affairs for the US) and preceded that with 'none of them are there'
Is this some subtle political satire that's gone over my head?
I'm not suggesting that anything intrisinc about the US political system or it's people will make it inherently Fascist. Just that the current administration (which usually happens to determine the actions of a country as... a country) is... currently doing a fascism. I don't see how Trump's overall popularity has anything to do with it, he is currently still president, the actions of the state obviously reflect his current decisions, especially since so many of them are done via executive order or are military actions authorised directly by him.
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On March 11 2026 22:16 LightSpectra wrote:Show nested quote +On March 11 2026 15:31 baal wrote:On March 09 2026 23:51 LightSpectra wrote:On March 09 2026 10:37 baal wrote:On March 08 2026 22:35 LightSpectra wrote:
Afghanistan is a country of est. 40 million and the NATO mission committed no more than 18,000 troops at a time to holding it. The total U. S. armed forces plus reserves is over 2,000,000 people, so the security force in Afghanistan is about 0.009% of what you're calling "the full force of the US military". there werent 40 million taliban combatants and the RoE would be very differnt, the US military can't just carpet bomb Los Angeles to kill armed citizens, the more the military escalates aggression the more internal turnmoil within it ranks happen, soldiers aren't going to blow up their own families, thats how civil war factions are formed. What Afghanistan proved is that no matter how many planes and tanks you have to control a population you need boots on the ground and people to surrender, unless you are willing to obliterate them which isn't an option in a civil war. What Afghanistan proved is that 18,000 troops being supplied from the other hemisphere can't hold a mountainous country of 40 million. It in no way proves that no government on Earth is capable of winning a civil war against insurgents using guerilla tactics, especially the richest government with the most well-funded military in human history. A perfectly loyal army, willing to kill their own friends and neighbors, to level its own infrastructure, that is not a realistic scenario in a civil war, however against an unarmed populous you only need a few bullets to seed enough fear to drive ppl into submission. You are again ignoring that many governments have indeed won civil wars/defeated insurgents throughout history. You can't just throw out platitudes and then cherrypick evidence for it. Show nested quote +If civilians in Venezuela and Cuba were armed they would have staged an armed resistance that would likely develop into toppling the regime, maybe some external actors fund one side or the other, but the thing is, if the population is armed its much more difficult for dictators to take root. Hilariously uninformed. There are numerous militias in Venezuela. It's lawful to own personal weapons in Cuba.
Talking with some of you is just... bizarre, you call others uninformed and then throw the dumbest imaginable statement ever like Cuban civilians owning guns.
It's literally one of the countries with least civilian gun ownership in the entire world for fucks sake.
![[image loading]](https://i.gyazo.com/897411f7ae79a98b5dacc7e7d8599710.png)
In Venezuela a civilian carrying a gun has a 20 year sentence, the militias are pro-regime to suppress civilians you maniac.
![[image loading]](https://i.gyazo.com/66e8fc86d2e74995160bf02dd259625b.png)
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On March 13 2026 15:29 doubleupgradeobbies! wrote:Show nested quote +On March 13 2026 13:23 ETisME wrote:
That's why I said on a scale of fascism, none are there.
The 4 elements of what fascism is:
1. Cult like worship
2. Hyper nationalism
3. Surveillance / control over in information
4. Glorified military strength
Many of these do overlap with Nationalism/ Authoritarianism.
I think it's obvious that the US isn't one, you can obviously see how quick of a fall off Trump has.
For point 1, people are literally currently wearing hats with his campaign slogan around their everyday lives. Not like, around just election time, or at explicitly political gatherings, just in their normal lives.
This is not what the personality cult is about. First of all, it's not state sanctioned - and that is critical. Second - critics of the dear leader can get away from severe consequences. And the most important thing - it is limited to actual supporters and not imposed on the majority of population.
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On March 13 2026 13:26 ETisME wrote:Show nested quote +On March 13 2026 12:42 Billyboy wrote:On March 13 2026 12:22 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 12:01 Billyboy wrote:On March 13 2026 11:46 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 10:08 WombaT wrote:On March 13 2026 09:20 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 07:29 doubleupgradeobbies! wrote:On March 12 2026 23:20 Billyboy wrote:On March 12 2026 21:43 Harris1st wrote:
[quote]
In Germany it's slowly shifting from funny to annoying to outright hatred of the US. So yes, I am all for decoupling from the US. If possible for forever This is the part that the non MAGA republicans do not understand. His insanity is fucking their country long term. I work with, both in my company and customer, like 100% conservatives. They have mostly all turned away from him. With the new war and oil prices being the last straw. And it’s almost like an awakening. So many of them are very devout Christian’s and it’s like they are just seeing the complete lack of morality now too. I get it’s easier for Canadians but I think it will happen more and more. But that full level of trust won’t return. Countries are going to buy arms from more than just the US. Our official strategy now involves buying and selling to as many countries as possible. Many snowbirds (old people who travel south for the winter and there is 100,000’s) are looking elsewhere and finding it cheaper and just as safe, they are not coming back. Even if the US regains a reasonable path the Donald has hurt the US for at least 50 years. Not to be a MAGA defender, but this isn't really a Trump issue. I don't feel that differently about the US (or see it that differently), than what it was like for the proceeding decades. Canadians and Greenlanders might disagree, at least they weren't threatening to annex you prior to this. This is just a less polished, less competent, more honest (ironically...) version of what the US body politics has been for at least the last several decades now. In some ways, Trump is in fact the most representative American. Not in the sense that is representative of what they are like individually as people, but he is an accurate representation of how they've behaved as a nation. That being confidently (oh so confidently) wrong about things then blaming anyone else for taking advantage of them even as they sit literally in the middle of a global order set up to benefit them. And ruthlessly pursuing their geo-political interests while moralising to everyone else about why what they are doing is good for democracy/human rights/rules based order. Even as they do pretty much the same things (worse even, if only due to their capability for scale and ability to shrug off consequences) that they criticise their geo-political rivals for. I don't see this as Trump hurting the US for the forseeable future (though I guess that's also true, marketing matters). So much as the US allies and affiliates making rational corrections on their rather abusive relation with the US, that has certainly not just appeared recently, merely had a light shown on it. Hopefully, this is seen as a mask-off moment for the US rather than just an abberation of this particular administration/political moment/president. But the familiar is very appealing, and I'm afraid many people in the west might want to return to how it was before Trump. Memory is a funny thing, and if there is a desire to remember this political moment as being just an anomoly rather than a peek at how the US really is, then that might just be how people will remember it. No doubt, the Murdoch media in Australia will try to spin it that way, and they have a lot of power over our attention economy here, and always been very pro-US. I for one, would feel a lot better if public sentiment soured past the point of salvaging before Trump leaves office. Again, for Americans here, don't take this as an attack on how you, or even your compatriots are personally. I understand the behaviour of individual inhabitants of a country is a completely diffrerent thing from how your entire country acts as a nation-state. But as a nation-state, you've had this coming for a while. I still wish you all individually all the best. I think majority of Europeans/Canadians/Australians are stuck at stage 1, being shocked at the US acting out of self interest. One day they will get to stage 2, understanding that a nation acting out of self-interest doesn't imply there isn't mutual benefits. It's definitely worthy of a chapter in history text book, not just on Trump policies, but the awkward transition when Canada and UK wanting to work closer with China because they are at stage 1 of realization. China, a country with allies like NK, Russia and Iran etc. No, we’re confused why the US is posturing and behaving in such a manner that actively harms its own self-interest in the medium and long-term, while being annoying to us also. If of the two increasingly hegemonic powers, both are arseholes why wouldn’t Europe cultivate closer links to China? I fail to see how China, which literally fund Russia invading Ukraine (existential crisis of Europe), profits off dumping products to the point it's killing local industries, are on par with the US putting tariffs. That's on top of them funding Iran and North Korea and what not. Is that not actively harms its own self-interest in short, medium and long term? Leverage is pretty important. As is reducing concentration risk. It is also basically a return to what our trade with China was before they got mad at us for arresting a Chinese national at the Americans request. You see we were such a good ally and partner of the US, we negatively impacted our own economy to support them. In return the ignorant man Abby threw a tantrum because he doesn’t understand basic economics like trade deficits. It was very pragmatic to become less reliant on a non trust worthy actor. And we didn’t replace the US with China. We replaced a small part of the trade we lost with the US with the UK, China, India and a bunch of other nations. It was a pragmatic choice when dealing with an unpredictable buffoon. And a pretty moronic voter base that trusts influencers that are actively peddling them products over doctors and so on. Yes, same thing happened when Europe being pressured by the US to cut huawei off. Economics wasn't the concern there, it's the world letting huawei dominating the 5G era. Canada has a nickname amongst asian /chinese community, Chinada, so we never saw it your way, sorry. That answer makes zero sense in this conversation. Can you try again, preferably telling the whole story and relating it the words I said. Canada is becoming a security threat in the region due to how open it is to China. Trades for one, the massively pro CCP china new chinese immigrants are another.
huh? There are not many "pro CCP china new chinese immigrants". There are maybe 150,000 the last 5 years? maybe? how many of those are "massively pro CCP" ? what the hell would they want living in places like Toronto, Markham and Misssissauga?
less than a million mainland China born residents live in Canada in total. Most are 2nd generation A substantial % of "Chinese" immigrants are from Hong Kong and bolted before China took over Hong Kong in the late 90s. They don't like communism.
The overwhelming majority of immigrants—including Chinese Canadians—are ordinary residents contributing to society. Most that I've met were faced with their generations old family businesses being confiscated so they took all their resources and relocated to Canada and restarted their business... and hired 2+ Canadians as per whatever instant fast track immigration program they were on.
In Toronto, about half of the 2nd generation Chinese are married or have a gf/bf who is not Chinese. They are assimilating dawg.
https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/11-008-x/2010001/article/11143-eng.htm
If you spent any time at all in downtown Toronto you'd notice this trend right away.
YA, so, no, Canada is not becoming a security threat due to Chinese immigrants. Right wing hysteria about security threats in order to increase government spending on "security" is at an all time high.
When you want to create hysteria you talk about how things are "potentially dangerous" or "becoming a problem". This way you never have to get pinned down by actual facts.
All these potential dangers in Canada are starting to become potentially dangerous. Time to give CSIS and the RCMP more money.
On March 13 2026 13:26 ETisME wrote:
Canada is looking and working to increase trade with China, the new world order.
Canada is looking and working to increase trade with every country except the USA. Canada is trying to appear to be open to greater dealings with China and many other countries in order to create more leverage in negotiations with the USA.
Carney just did a Marcus Kincaid tour of the world.... China , India , Australia , Japan , Qatar , and the United Kingdom, and France. Carney is making deals with any one and everyone.
The only new world order I'm aware of has only 1 living member: Kevin Nash. Hogan and Hall are dead. 
I'd say the biggest threat to "security in the region" is the USA picking fights with random countries for made up reasons so the President can rationalize the request for doubling the military budget.
https://www.reuters.com/world/us/trump-says-us-military-budget-2027-should-be-15-trillion-2026-01-07/
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Norway28761 Posts
On March 13 2026 13:23 ETisME wrote:Show nested quote +On March 13 2026 12:36 doubleupgradeobbies! wrote:On March 13 2026 11:55 ETisME wrote:On March 13 2026 10:08 doubleupgradeobbies! wrote:On March 13 2026 09:53 LightSpectra wrote:
Trump hasn't done a goddamn single thing in the United States' interests, just the interests of his megadonors.
Nobody is shocked when the USA does selfish things, the international shock is at the fact that Americans are letting open corruption and willful ignorance shoot ourselves in the face. As an international person. I must say, while your internal Fascism and corruption problem maybe... not so much shocking as uncomfortable to watch. (I may not be representative in that I don't find it shocking, not sure here) I assure you, and I'm confident I'm more representative here, our attention is far less on the US shooting itself in the face, and far more on when it threatens to, or actually does, sometimes literally, shoot other members of the international community in the face. On a scale measuring fascism, Australia and Europe are pretty up there. Way tougher internet speech control, rise of far right like One Nation. Germany is actively targeting AFD to get it off political stage, EU targeting chat encryption. Absolutely, we've had actual neo-Nazis out in the streets not that long ago. We absolutely have fascists here. While I might find their very presence in the country unpleasant, I can appreciate, that sort of militaristic nationalism is to some extent just a political leaning, and the world has people of that leaning everywhere. I wouldn't say we have a fascism problem in the same way though. Fortunately, I wouldn't characterise our actual government actions as broadly fascist (yet). There are certainly some steps towards authoritarianism. But it'd be pretty hard to characterise any of them as being motivated by any sort of militarism, nationalism or even any sort of popularism, and certainly nothing to do with race/genetics/ethnicity. Likewise, if in the US, there just happened to be some fascists idiologues, even coupled with some actual authoritarian actions in government, I wouldn't have characterised it as a "Fascism problem'. But when a government is a) ignoring the existing political checks and balances. b) being militaristic (ok this one is par for the course) c) spouting nationalist rhetoric about how other countries are taking advantage of you d) rounding up immigrants in a way that it's clear, at least for the people doing the actual rounding up, is ethnically motivated and e) talking about wanting to take territory from other countries because 'you need them'. I think at that stage it's not too far fetched to suggest you may be 'doing a fascism'. In a problematic way. That's why I said on a scale of fascism, none are there. The 4 elements of what fascism is: 1. Cult like worship 2. Hyper nationalism 3. Surveillance / control over in information 4. Glorified military strength Many of these do overlap with Nationalism/ Authoritarianism. I think it's obvious that the US isn't one, you can obviously see how quick of a fall off Trump has. He was also elected to solve domestic problems and end wars, not starting wars. The people in the US aren't wanting that neither. All of these require government to have strong control over information flow. And the public in these Europe and Australia are far open to allowing these options, while having pretty strong far right rise right now. In some way the line of thinking shouldn't be authoritarianism not quite as bad as fascism. I would say Mao's China is one of the worst regimes, literally destroyed thousands of years of traditions and social construct, and huge famines with loss of lives. It also participated in war and enabled other mass loss of lives under communisms.
I think both of these are true: The US under Trump is less fascist than any country/regime of the past universally recognized as fascist, and - the US under Trump has moved in a fascist direction in all four of these elements. Trump has cultivated a personality cult unlike that of any other president (but it's still not imposed upon the nation as a whole and unlike fascist regimes, a regular citizen can freely express their hatred for Trump. However, not necessarily if they want to be employed by the state.) Hyper nationalism - obviously. Number 4 - they've literally had military parades for the first time in American history. If you look at the Umberto Eco list, you'll get a similar result - it's not at the level (or even close to it) of regimes that are universally recognized as fascist, but it's moving in that direction for a large majority of the 14 points.
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doubleupgradeobbies!
Australia1213 Posts
On March 13 2026 16:48 hitthat wrote:Show nested quote +On March 13 2026 15:29 doubleupgradeobbies! wrote:On March 13 2026 13:23 ETisME wrote:
That's why I said on a scale of fascism, none are there.
The 4 elements of what fascism is:
1. Cult like worship
2. Hyper nationalism
3. Surveillance / control over in information
4. Glorified military strength
Many of these do overlap with Nationalism/ Authoritarianism.
I think it's obvious that the US isn't one, you can obviously see how quick of a fall off Trump has.
For point 1, people are literally currently wearing hats with his campaign slogan around their everyday lives. Not like, around just election time, or at explicitly political gatherings, just in their normal lives. This is not what the personality cult is about. First of all, it's not state sanctioned - and that is critical. Second - critics of the dear leader can get away from severe consequences. And the most important thing - it is limited to actual supporters and not imposed on the majority of population.
Eh, I see this as being an issue of authority and capability/reach, rather than of ideology.
There's not usually a cult of personality organically started by state sanction, it's a regular cult of personality that's captured enough state power to then impose it on the populace. Neither Hitler nor Moussalini were popular because the state deemed it so. They had their own cult following who captured enough power to then impose state sanction on it. Hirohito was the exception, but he also wasn't really the one calling all the shots.
If in our hypothetical, the Nazi's didn't quite manage to seize power, or for the sake of argument, If Hitler became chancellor, but never quite got the authority to reach much beyond the normal powers of a German Chancellor of the time: would he or the NSDAP therefore not have been a fascist?
Because he would not have been able impose the state sanction on his cult of personality or have the crackdown on opposition that happened in actual history. However his political/philosophical/ideological position is unlikely to have been any different.
The current regime are largely motivated by the same core obsessions (maybe less on extermination of certain peoples, gays, communists etc... but certainly are in no way friendly towards these groups), So the question is, if you are motivated by, and act according to the same main ideological tennets as fascism, while I agree, that doesn't mean you are now in charge of a full blown fascist state, are you not still doing fascism? Just less successfully
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On March 13 2026 11:55 ETisME wrote:Show nested quote +On March 13 2026 10:08 doubleupgradeobbies! wrote:On March 13 2026 09:53 LightSpectra wrote:
Trump hasn't done a goddamn single thing in the United States' interests, just the interests of his megadonors.
Nobody is shocked when the USA does selfish things, the international shock is at the fact that Americans are letting open corruption and willful ignorance shoot ourselves in the face. As an international person. I must say, while your internal Fascism and corruption problem maybe... not so much shocking as uncomfortable to watch. (I may not be representative in that I don't find it shocking, not sure here) I assure you, and I'm confident I'm more representative here, our attention is far less on the US shooting itself in the face, and far more on when it threatens to, or actually does, sometimes literally, shoot other members of the international community in the face. On a scale measuring fascism, Australia and Europe are pretty up there. Way tougher internet speech control, rise of far right like One Nation. Germany is actively targeting AFD to get it off political stage, EU targeting chat encryption.
What the actual fuck are you talking about? Those are just blatant lies. You are just a liar
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EPT
