Yes, our once great country is in the shitter.

But that happens to all democracies or constitutional republics (if you insist). When idiots are allowed to vote bad things happen.

This is exactly how it is. Too bad the prevailing propaganda power structure won’t permit publication of stuff this accurate in their media.

Sorry, bad article. Bad comment. Economically illiterate. As was the case in the halcyon days of Japan’s rapid economic growth, China’s growth reflects a high-IQ people operating in now semi-open markets who are quickly adopting technologies that were already developed elsewhere (and, granted, have done some innovation on their own). China’s average living standards are still below Mexico’s. Japan’s average living standards never matched those in the US. Growth rates moderate as the country becomes more developed and converges to its steady-state.

Yet, alienated Western intellectuals leap to the conclusion that centralized control represents purposefulness, rationality, and competence. It turns out that Japan’s industrial policy did not systematically select “winners”, as a Harvard study meticulously documented in the early 1990s. Nor does the US represent “free-market ideology”. Per the Fraser Institute, there has been a substantial fall in economic freedom during the last two decades. President Trump’s calling CEOs to tell them where to locate their plants is not free markets. The US represents “crony capitalism” at best or “corrupt social democracy”. If my wife works, 50 percent of what she earns is taken by the government before her pay is deposited (federal income tax, California state income tax, Social Security, Medicare, state disability charge, etc.)

President Xi has consolidated power and now even has his name enshrined in the Chinese constitution. It is a personal cult, not anything resembling the Rule of Law, let alone liberty. Freedom of expression on the Internet has been sharply limited, and Christian churches (I am not a Christian) are being persecuted. Many Chinese are sincerely worried.

The Soviet Olympic team was impressive, too.

The Soviet Olympic team was impressive, too.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/olympics/2017/10/23/wada-investigating-claims-of-systematic-doping-in-china/106926420/

I agree with your comment and observations. Communists are very good at pageantry, systematic doping, massaging/suppressing statistics/data, etc., and this kind of propaganda seems to impress/convince a certain (superficial, easily swayed) personality type, like Mr. Godfree Roberts, for example:

Chou En Lai (who wrung from Henry Kissinger the admission that ‘the Chinese are smarter than us’) – https://www.unz.com/article/mao-reconsidered/#p_1_3:53-69

What is it about Henry Kissinger?

Part of the reason he has maintained his status is his personal schmoozing of those in power.

– https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2016/08/22/what-is-it-about-henry-kissinger/?utm_term=.b541ed45403a

China’s growth reflects a high-IQ people operating in now semi-open markets who are quickly adopting technologies that were already developed elsewhere

There is actually also some doubt about whether the Chinese are a high-IQ people:

The manipulation is quite apparent, Lynn largely over-estimated China (+22), Japan (+7) to make East-Asians cluster on top, thus protecting himself from accusations of nordicism and giving support to the inter-cultural validity of the IQs that he cherry-picked.
[…]
By pointing this out, I’m warning honest researchers and laymen about the dangers of relying on data resulting from undisclosed, unsystematic and un-replicable methodology. And although my estimates do not result from any actual IQ measurement beyond the relationship between IQ and schooling evidenced in Norwegian cohorts, my method uses a single, universal conversion factor applied to representative official data collected by professional demographers whereas Lynn’s and the likes’ cherry-picking of samples is only the hobby of a dozen scholars and pseudo-scholars. This is how I found out strong, consistent and meaningful correlations between IQ and various development variables.

– https://notpoliticallycorrect.me/2017/09/05/worldwide-iq-estimates-based-on-education-data/

The Myth of East Asian Intellectual Supremacy by Peter J. White

https://thecross-roads.org/race-culture-nation/25-the-myth-of-east-asian-intellectual-supremacy

China may not be as strong as you think

“There is actually also some doubt about whether the Chinese are a high-IQ people:”

Not among people who have tested them.

The data is based on estimates from education.

Not among people who have tested them.

This educational psychologist begs to differ:

Sorry, VOX. After living several years in Israel as a consulting educational psychologist who did IQ tests, I can safely say most of them are dishonest, dumb religious or communist fanatics who could and often do screw up a cup of black coffee. Much like those in the US. Much like what many say among themselves when they think they’re ‘entre nous.’

There is a very smart contingent who get headlines, but in my experience the claim that Jews or Asians (spent years in Asia as well) are smarter than US Whites is hidden far-left propaganda.

IQ-wise, Western and especially Britannic (North UK, North Spain, North France/Dutch) US Whites rule.

– https://www.unz.com/runz/the-myth-of-american-meritocracy/#comment-1959613

Video time-stamped at 5 min 10 sec:

Agenda: With George Friedman on China

America has relatively low taxes by the standards of other western countries. Your anecdotal example doesn’t disprove this. And the US has very low tariff barriers, which is one of the reasons why it is has chronic trade deficits. Your GDP per person wouldn’t be so flattering if you didn’t do what all land-rich Anglo colonial countries do and sell off land to foreigners to make up for your trade deficits.

TLDR = China rising, West falling. Hardly contentious. The Chinese certainly deserve great admiration and respect for their phenomenal achievements. Rarely have so many been uplifted so quickly.

One particular point was a bit unfair:

Never has an empire of such limitless power crumbled and declined with so few accomplishments.

I can think of at least two empires of limitless powers that crumbled and declined with few accomplishments – Qing Imperial China and the Ottoman Empire. In contrast, here are just some of the accomplishments of the US Empire:
– Invented and developed the nuclear bomb & nuclear energy.
– Sent men to moon, helped build space station, sent satellites to space.
– Perfected mass intercontinental jet-propelled air-travel.
– Created Hollywood. (We all criticize Hollywood yet we all watch its creations.)
– Co-created pop music together with the British.
– Perfected computing. Invented the PC.
– Created the Internet.
– Created Silicon Valley.
– Won WW2 together with the Brits and the Soviets.
– Perfected oil extraction & use. Plastics, etc.
– Genuinely espoused and protected free speech for a good two and a half centuries.
– And so on.

Some of those – e.g. nuclear energy, space exploration, and the computer – are epochal achievements.

So yeah, the Chinese are doing good but they have a long way to go yet. And even if the US were to sink into the ocean right now, it would go down having achieved more than almost any other outfit in history.

On a side note, a lot of US critics seem to believe that a dominant China will somehow be less warlike and more magnanimous than the imperial US has been. Hard to see justification for this belief beyond wishful thinking and the romanticizing of the exotic and the unknown. Americans are no boyscouts but neither are the Chinese. There is little room for sentimentality in international politics.

The article reminds me of the W European countries before EU neoliberalism struck: mixed economies, the government for public transport, health care, electricity, and directing some investments, for example Renault was a state enterprise.
Profit companies for clothing, tv, cars, whatever.
In these good old days there was no free movement of capital, this freedom robbed governments of power.
But there is a difference, in these W European countries we did not have a dictatorship,as exists in fact in China.
My expectation is that the economic liberalism will lead to political freedom.

One of the big USA problems, tax is seen as something dirty, wasted money.

– https://notpoliticallycorrect.me/2017/09/05/worldwide-iq-estimates-based-on-education-data/

One of countless proofs of the epic mental retardation of the Afroerectus. Thanks for the laugh!

Excellent rebuttal.

“Nor does the US represent “free-market ideology”. Per the Fraser Institute, there has been a substantial fall in economic freedom during the last two decades. ”

Since the Clinton Administration at least, Neoliberals have been in charge of American economic policy. Proper competition laws have been overturned ( eg Telecommunications Act 1996 ) or are unenforced. This has resulted in widespread oligopolies. For example, 30 years ago 5o corporations owned 90% of media outlets. Far from ideal, but now a mere 6 own 90%.
The controllers of these corporations tell the state what to do via funding political parties, bribing individual politicians or through their control of the mass media. This is the political definition of corporatism – a system under which the Corporations control the State.
Much of America is now a Corporatist State, indeed Corporatist Society. The only way capitalism will be reinstated is if proper competition laws are enacted and enforced, the oligopolies broken up and the oligopolists gaoled.
This will not be an easy task.

Okay… but if the American elites decided to act like Chinese elites, I don’t think ANY American would approve.

Do Americans, left or right, really want a one-party system where mandarin know-it-all technocrats have iron-grip on everything?

So, while CCP does some good things, it’s far from ideal.

Also, Chinese economy still depends so much on the American market.

I take a lot I hear in Western MSM about China’s problems with a big grain of salt, but this is so rosy that it actually defeats the intended purpose of portraying China in the realistically positive light that it deserves.

Sorry, bad article. Bad comment. Economically illiterate. As was the case in the halcyon days of Japan’s rapid economic growth, China’s growth reflects a high-IQ people operating in now semi-open markets who are quickly adopting technologies that were already developed elsewhere (and, granted, have done some innovation on their own)..

Agreed. But Japan’s success has a limit capped by its owner – the US; whereas theoritically speaking China’s has no such a limit , because as a historical statue-quo power China can operate, and have been operating, both inside and outside of the current US global system. That’s why most US political elites are panicking.

China’s average living standards are still below Mexico’s.

FX rate derived- so called “living standard” of non-traditionally industrialised western countries reflects the power of greatly maneuverable mainstream narrative, sometimes to the degree of being funny, of petrodollar system guaranteed by aircraft carriers and ICBMs.

Anyone who has been to China and Mexico, for instance, can testify how absurd that “living standard” is per face value.

Japan’s average living standards never matched those in the US. .

In fact countries like Japan will NEVER match the living standard of the US. It has nothing to do with intelligence, innovations, organisations, etc, but because

1/Like all other major Western economies, Japan basically is a client state (albeit in the higher rank of the pecking order whenever US national interests are called upon) in the US-led petrodollar system backed eventually by a giant barrel of nukes that simply won’t allow it happen that clients live better than their owner, and

2/Japan’s natural resources per cap is vastly less than that of the US. Nothing can change that except major redistributions of natural resources through large scale wars which are impossible in the era of nukes.

One of the big USA problems, tax is seen as something dirty, wasted money.

That’s because, historically and presently, they were/are wasted. They’re dirty also because of the coercion (extortion) involved in their collection. That goes for both direct taxation, indirect taxation and the relatively hidden taxes of inflation, duty, and the cost of compliance to laws which favor only a few, to name just the most prominent.

A good example occurred right here on the pages of UR where some bureaucrat, supported and pampered by taxes, perverts the very meaning of ethics by searching for ways to justify aggressive war, then teaching it to impressionable young men at a tax supported military institution of higher brainwashing. It’s evil.

We need to grow up. Our nonage is based on wishful, even infantile ideation.

This enlightenment requires nothing but freedom–and the most innocent of all that may be called “freedom”: freedom to make public use of one’s reason in all matters. Now I hear the cry from all sides: “Do not argue!” The officer says: “Do not argue–drill!” The tax collector: “Do not argue–pay!” The pastor: “Do not argue–believe!” Only one ruler in the world says: “Argue as much as you please, but obey!” We find restrictions on freedom everywhere.

-IMMANUEL KANT An Answer to the Question: “What is Enlightenment?” Konigsberg, Prussia, 30th September, 1784

http://library.standrews-de.org/lists/CourseGuides/religion/rs-vi/oppressed/kant_what_is_enlightenment.pdf

I do believe you hit several nails on the head in your comment.

The wonder of it is that such truths need to be pointed out, especially to a guy who writes such accurate gems as this..

Nor does the US represent “free-market ideology”. Per the Fraser Institute, there has been a substantial fall in economic freedom during the last two decades…The US represents “crony capitalism” at best or “corrupt social democracy”. If my wife works, 50 percent of what she earns is taken by the government before her pay is deposited …

China will be the dominant power in the world by mid-century and that’s great news for the EU. Even James Petras cannot get around that. His view is, of course coloured by his own pro-Putin position. Thus, he insists on assimilating the EU to the US rather than seeing it as being the victim of US domination. After all, if the EU was really the willing stooge of the US, why are Americans deploying so much money and effort trying to destroy it (as can be seen from even a cursory read of the internet propaganda machine!)? Equally Mr Petras sees China as Putin’s “ally”, although why a rising power with 1.4 billion people would be the ally of the Russian Federation, which has existed as a sovereign state for only about 25 years, has only 145 million people (20% non-Russian subject peoples) and is merely the largest piece of wreckage from the collapsed Soviet Union needs some explaining! Logically, it should be the reverse. Russia might be China’s ally but not the other way round. I tend to attribute the “Russia on top” vision to the instinctive and unassuming racism of white Americans: the Russians are the Whites so, naturally, they must be the leaders. Indeed, the railway projects to which Mr Petras refers have the effect of disenclaving the former Soviet republics in Central Asia by linking them to Chinese, Iranian and even European ports, thereby breaking the Russian stranglehold on their trade and communications and undermining Putin’s beloved “Eurasian Economic Union” (and probably the inherently rickety Russian Federation as well).

One of the big USA problems, tax is seen as something dirty, wasted money.

Unfortunately it often has been.

One of the questions that Mr. X. asked me thirty years ago was why socialism doesn’t work in the US. My answer was that for socialism to work you need and a capable and efficient bureaucracy. In the US the federal government is the “employer of last resort”. Positions are awarded on the basis of points rather than demonstrated competence.

My X. replied that China had a tradition of fiercely competitive civil service exams that extends back thousands of years. Those who pass are intelligent and literate. He suggested that an effort to root out corruption in the party could also benefit them. If socialism could work anywhere, it would work in China.

It sounded like an interesting experiment to me.

Indeed.

An economist once said that the big difference in a nation is whether it has an establishment or an oligarchy. An establishment may be stuffy and arrogant and not above gaming the system for personal benefit, but they feel a personal connection to the state, they expect themselves and their descendants to profit from it, and they are mostly careful not to kill the goose that lays the golden eggs. An oligarchy, however, has either no interest in, or any faith in, the long-term prospects of their nation. It’s all about how much they can grab now before it all goes away – and if there is a collapse, they’ll just sail away in their yachts.

China and Japan and Singapore have establishments. Mexico and most of Latin America have oligarchies (think: “banana republic”). The United States used to have an establishment, but around 1970 we switched to full-on oligarchy.

As the saying goes, for nations as with fist, rot starts at the head.

Japan has far better distribution of income than the USA. Unfortunately, like the USA, has now too many low-paid, low-rights servile jobs. Many (most) are taken by students who will later to have better opportunities.

In Tokyo and Kansai areas, many of those are overseas people, too.

Within the mid- to large companies, however, the pay differentials never are approaching the sickening differentials between executive and boardroom pay, and the pay of ordinary staff (from workers through technicians, technologists, to upper-middle management), that the USA is flaunting.

Must adding, even an institution like Japan Post is now pretty bad, a close friend is desperately wanting to become a formal employee, passed the written exam, but failed the interview. Have a friendly acquaintance who is a manager at a major centre, he is surrounded by people (all men in that case, many also friendly acquaintances) who are toadying to him to get the formal employee status. … but he is buying the most devoted dinner and drinks,

Last time i was meeting that group, none had gone to formal employment.

lapan Rail, or the eight or so companies into which was theoretically split (although, as with Japan Post, it is very theoretical, since the national govt. is retaining a controlling interest in all) is the same, am not having direct knowledge, not the same kind of social connections, but it is obvious, even from recruitment posters.

However, executives, boardrooms, bosses, as is the custom in the USA, to awarding themselves ‘golden parachutes’, making them obscenely wealthy for life, does not happen.

The insanely wide disparities do not happen.

Carlli Fiorina? Running a great company into the dirt. The woman who was taking over original Yahoo, am forgetting her name, bring back Jerry Yang!

Not to blaming women managers, but it is seeming a reliable way to place a formerly profitable company face-down in a pile of dirt, am knowing that many men have doing the same, but it is not sexism that is bringing those cases first to mind. Just their greed and incompetence, so spectacular.

On a side note, a lot of US critics seem to believe that a dominant China will somehow be less warlike and more magnanimous than the imperial US has been. Hard to see justification for this belief beyond wishful thinking and the romanticizing of the exotic and the unknown. Americans are no boyscouts but neither are the Chinese. There is little room for sentimentality in international politics.

most people think like that because they don’t believe in a declining usa. in the near future china would be able to counter usa’s power. but the reverse is also true.

usa have 12 carriers
china is building 8(just a number) in a few years, it will have 12.

not like the american 12 will disappear, there is no absolute power decline. but there is relative power decline. the 12 CVGs will still make usa a super power, just that it will now have to share that status with china who also have 12 CVGs in the near future. I don’t see anything wrong with that. relative power only matters in a war. think usa and china will ever go to war without going nuclear? if so, there is nothing to worry about, you will be dead or dying, like the entire planet.

about china being warlike, who knows. you are making an assumption while trying to counter another assumption. based on our own behavior no less.

I wish we could get prof thompson in to stomp on you 🙂

If my wife works, 50 percent of what she earns is taken by the government before her pay is deposited (federal income tax, California state income tax, Social Security, Medicare, state disability charge, etc.)

In Scandinavian nations people pay more than 50% taxes, they have a very happy life with good social securities, and they are envy of the modern social model of the world; then why is paying more taxes for a better society something wrong? Your resentment of paying taxes is because you have a corrupted political system run by unscrupulous and greedy people and bureaucrats, they steal your money instead of benefiting the society, it is not an issue of paying taxes but an issue of bad culture.

You are living in a world with a mindset belonging to the past, stalled in the old days of colonialism and constrained by the zero-sum cold war mentality like the western mainstream media and intellectual who are mired down in gossip, idle speculation and petty denigration of its leaders; any article does not fit China into a characature of repression, lack of freedoms, and evil, the article will not make sense to you and all other readership. Religion prosecution is a tradition and culture of the West and Islam in case you don’t know.

George Friedman is jealous, resentful and fear of Chinese achievements, are you in the same camp with George Friedman?

George Friedman is jealous, resentful and fear of achievements. China’s peaceful and win-win approach to bring humanity forward through commerce makes the Anglo’s dominance of the world in the last couple hundreds of years barbaric, regressive, greedy, and destructive, a darkest age in the history of humanity; in fact, all the ills in the world nowadays are planted by the Anglo if you have read any real history.

Agreed, the author is economically illiterate.
There’s a good litmus test for having a clue about development economics. Does the author mention Baumol’s cost disease (if only to argue against its importance in the context of his argument), or does the author not mention it because he’s never heard of it?

George Friedman is a jew not an Anglo, what he wants is Zionist domination of the world. It is the jews that rule and he wants them to continue to rule, what he wants is that Israel is served by the USA, if China replaces the US he would have no problem in having China serving Israel.

It’s not a question that whether Japan’s average living standard could match that of the US.

The problem of the US is not the wealth (as it still can print all the wealth it wants), but fairness of the redistribution of that wealth.

China has invited the US to join with them in the Belt & Road initiative via high-speed rail linking Alaska and Siberia via the Bering Strait. This is totally doable and would be a private/public effort regarding costs. Perhaps Trump and Xi will seal the deal during the trip.
https://robertmagill.wordpress.com/2017/05/02/the-art-of-the-deal/

Color me skeptical. Central planning did not work in the 20th Century and why would it do any better in the more complex and dynamic 21st century?

China’s current “Central Planning” is not a-la-Marxism/Soviet.

Indeed being the primary function of brains, Central Planning literally has been working in the entire evolutiuonary history of mankind. Everyone uses it in fact. Whenever the West uses it though, MSM would prefer phrasing it like “long-term strategic planning”, what a beauty!

On the contrary, so-called leaving it to the “market force”, or more voodoo style “invisible hand”, sounds a bit funny from time to time, yet enough to get through those 85 IQers nonetheless.

Sebastian Gorka fancies he is still working on behalf of Trump/MAGA, tho he’s not sitting in the White House — “where I sit, or where Steve Bannon sits, is immaterial; we are working for Trump’s vision.”

In an interview on C Span the other day, Gorka said part of Trump’s agenda on his Asian trip is to disrupt OBOR, not participate in it.
https://www.c-span.org/video/?436767-3/washington-journal-sebastian-gorka-discusses-national-security-future-republican-party

I think Gorka’s an idiot with a strong gene for self-promotion, and that he doesn’t understand why or that Trump fired him — tossed him like a used Kleenex, actually, and that what Gorka says about Trump-China-OBOR is not grounded in what Trump actually hopes to accomplish re China (and North Korea).
I’d watch Paul Singer re North Korea, not Gorka.

Thank you Phil, as I didn’t know where to start with this guy. I’ll have more to say in a while, but thanks to you for this initial intelligent comment to this Commie, and thanks to the others – most of your repliers.

I understand Mr. Unz advertises controversial points of view, but man, between you, Petras, and the other Mao sack-hangar Godfrey Roberts, in addition to Tom Engelhardt, I am beginning to think this site is one big survey of the stupid. Peak Stupidity covers the stupidity daily (unless it get too depressing once in a while), but we try to UNDERSTAND the stupidity. We do not display it on the front page like it is something to be proud of!

If it weren’t for iSteve, Fred Reed (when he’s not on another Mexicanity-binge), the multiple authors that get shared from VDare, and Dr. Ron Paul and a couple other Liberty-lovers, this site would really suck, content-wise. If I wanted to visit Communism Central, I’d take a real trip, what North Korea maybe?

Japan did not ‘systematically pick winners? Toyota? Of course there must have been failures in targeted investment but one or two big ‘wins’ cancels those out many times. I’m not sure which “Harvard” study you’re referring to but I believe there is general agreement among those not indoctrinated into Washington Consensus doctrines that Japan’s ‘developmental state’ was very effective, at least until it had achieved its goals in the 80’s.

And on standard of living? Doesn’t it depend what you value? I suppose America’s diverse, vibrant economy of deracinated strangers wandering about in generic retail outlets reflects a higher standard of living than what I might find in Japan, but that is at least debatable.

Your post is muddled up crap. You are equating the brain of one individual with the central planning organ of a government of a giga State. Also, market forces are not “voodoo”. They are as real as gravity, men and mice. “Voodoo” economics is a term coined by some to describe the exactly the opposite of what you think – it is the meddling with the market forces to find short cuts to achieve some short term goals instead of addressing the fundamentals. According to this definition, Chinese “capitalism” is the mother of all “voodoo” economies.
Note, I am not defending and comparing American 85 IQ economy with Han Chinese 1200 IQ economy. I am just critiquing the Chinese system on its on merits or lack there of.
I think what you want to imply is that the 85 IQers can only hope for a “voodoo”ized market economy, while the great 12000 IQ than can use their giant brains and do better than the 85 IQ market.
This hubris is what will take China down. Hard.

Mr. Petras, your 1st problem with this asinine column is that you conflate many TYPES of goings on in these 2 big nations with just a simple Communism vs. Capitalism comparison. What I mean there is, that one can be completely against the American empire, a Pat Buchanan*, say, and not be a freakin’ central planning Communist. The USSR had/was an empire and it was communist. China had not so much of an empire and was communist. The US of the pre-1980’s was fairly free-market capitalist and had an empire. The US of 1850 was capitalist to the core yet had no empire. THERE IS NO CORRELATION HERE!

This brings me to your 2nd major piece of stupidity: The US is anything but capitalist at this point. Crony capitalism, which is pretty close to the definition of Facism (officially private big business working on behalf of big government) is the way this country is run.

Your direct statements that central planning is what makes a great country can be contradicted by a quick read of the recent history of the very same damn country that you praise here! Chairman Mao was a big, biiiiggg central planner, was he not? He just decided that the people of China were to produce steel at the local level and may have to quit farming to do it. The people had nothing to say about it, as that’s how central planning works , right, Petras? Wouldn’t you agree that it can’t work if people ignore the central planners with no punishment? 30 – 40 MILLION Chinamen (AND Chinawomen) starved to death and I know the grandaughter of one of them. This was a direct result of central planning. Most people who plan their lives on their own DO NOT PLAN TO STARVE!.

This blatant statism you write here shows that you would not know freedom or liberty, Petras, if they came up and bit you in the ass right now. I am ashamed that someone like you could even live here – I’d rather have 75-IQ Somalians honestly.

Lastly, I am not a China-hater anyway, and I have written here, here, here, and here in praise of the modern Chinese free-market in health care.

Lastly, the book shown in the image on this post may be something readable – I have nothing but hatred for the invade-the-world/invite-the-world policy that the US has implemented since the end of the Cold War (at the latest). It’s just that all that has nothing to do with Statism vs. Freedom.
.
.
.

* I should have included Mr. Buchanan in my last comment as another author worth reading on unz.com. Apologies, Pat!

On the contrary, so-called leaving it to the “market force”, or more voodoo style “invisible hand”, sounds a bit funny from time to time, yet enough to get through those 85 IQers nonetheless.

I don’t know if the IQ level to understand market forces, prices as information, and the prosperity that happens when government is restrained, is something you could aspire to, Panda-man. I think it takes an imagination that you don’t have to understand freedom.

What’s funny is that the very country you and Mr. Petras are praising here for their economic prowess only got there when government in China was kept from controlling individuals in their, YES, FREE-MARKET business dealings. This started in Guangzhou, Shenzhen etc in the early 1980’s due to the fortunate death of the butcher Mao and the wise move of Mr. Deng.

This whole article is so damn stupid, because nobody would be writing much about China now if they hadn’t relaxed the central planning on small business 30-40 years back. It’d still be a black hole otherwise with poverty and starvation that we didn’t know the half of, besides – “eat your peas, boy, there are starving children in China!”

George Friedman???

Is Daffy Duck on strike?

must be something about the name Friedman that turns Reason into Rubbish.

phil did not rebut a single thing in the article, he merely trolls his nostalgia of a long gone era. The author is trying to warn the American that current way of doing business is unsustainable, it is the death spiral the Roman Empire and British Empire have walked, all of them are gone like dodo, if the USA empire does not want to follow their predecessors, they must change, the author proposed USA to follow China’s lead. Anyhow the author is wasting his time, there are too many bigots in the USA just like in the Roman Empire and British Empire, they are megalomaniac and ignorant, like the Titanic running full steam ahead toward the iceberg in the believe its iron can beat the iceberg.

America has accomplished more because the pace of discovery increased, just like it has done throughout history.

The next dominant culture, be it China or someone else, will blow away America’s accomplishments just like America left everyone else in the dust too.

But… but… Chinese politicians are promising sooooooo much.

You need to humble-read the article again.

What Xi Jinping is gonna deliver is yooge!

Exports to USA was 18% of China’s exports in 2106.

The insanity in the USA is their (western) culture, the amazing thing is that the 99% of the Americans never benefit from that culture, but they blindly support it and adore the 1% exploiting them like living god. Anybody points out they are duped they will get outraged like you insulting them personally and attack you like a mad dog. It is really a rare phenomenon of successful brain washing on industrial scale.

damn, you want an echo chamber that badly? why not stick to vdare? or isteve? they will serve as the perfect “safe space” for you.

Central Planning does not work. But who is Central Planning exactly?

Just because America calls itself capitalistic and China calls itself Communist doesn’t mean anything.

America with its high tax rates, high regulation, powerful central bank which intervenes in the economy, centralized media and politics is in fact centrally planned. China is also centrally planned, but in some instances like regulation, China is more free.

You are correct, America is a corporatist society… it’s planning is done by financial monied Oligarchy. PCR labels these interest groups as: AIPAC, Extraction Industries (Oil mostly), MIC, and most importantly Finance. These interest groups work together in an unholy neocon type alliance.

Private corporate banking takes the economic surplus of the country and funnels it into Wall Street Casino. There it trades for other paper, including debt instruments. The U.S. economic surplus since the mid 70’s has funneled into the Casino.

This type of capitalism is called FINANCE CAPITALISM. Lumpen Capitalism is a made up term, because the author is probably weak on monetary history.

China is following INDUSTRIAL CAPITALISM policy. Peshine Smith/Henry Clay used this policy in America. Frederick List used this policy in Germany, to good effect.

Smith went to Japan, became native (he wore a sword and Japanese clothing) and was instrumental in helping Japan’s take0ff. Japan post WW2 secretly used Credit Guidance Windows, which is INDUSTRIAL CAPITALISM. Japan did well post WW2 up until BOJ’s raid in the mid 80’s.

Here is List:
http://socserv2.socsci.mcmaster.ca/~econ/ugcm/3ll3/list/list1

See also America’s Protectionist Takeoff 1815 to 1914, by Hudson.

Finance Capitalism in America actually SOLD america’s patrimony for wage arbitrage today, at the expense of the future. This mechanism especially started with Shabbos Goy Clinton. Wall Street exported jobs to China with greenmailing techniques forcing American captains of industry to relocate.

China did its dirty deeds by funneling their excess dollars (won in Mercantile trade) into debt instruments (TBills) rather than buying goods from U.S. mainstreet. China and transplanted American companies purposefully bought debt paper rather than goods, in an unequal trading system. China also copied American methods at night, and forced American companies to give up their secrets. Chinese employees working at American companies by day would work in counterfeit companies at night, divulging what the learned during the day.

Finance ((Capitalism’s)) seeds were planted firmly in 1913 during progressive era, then grew post WW2.

A country that has its own sovereign money supply, and which uses Industrial Capitalism will always win no matter if it is China or Argentina. Germany, including Nazi Germany, with its unique economy was a huge threat to finance capitalist England.

Stop waxing poetic about China. They have not invented a new economic system. They are not that smart, it is the West now steeped in implanted hypnotic usurious thoughts that has become stupefied. This hypnosis of finance capitalism and free markets! is an implanted memory promulgated by parasites. Said parasites have bought up and now control the press, and force real history down the memory shit hole. The real story is NOT how great China is, but how the U.S. especially came to be parasitized. Go to college in America and become a walking moron, especially if you get a degree in economics.

Opening up new “roads” is exactly the same mechanism as Germany’s Baghdad to Berlin Railroad … said railroad is main reason why Atlantacist/Finance Capitalist countries started WW1.

A country that has made a long stride in historical civilization achievement and have been producing an army of America backbone of STEM field, was ranked at 80 (China), and a country that was built by a British convict and never produced anything significant of their own, i.e, medicine, patent, science, but piggybacking on the US and the UK glory of the past, was ranked the highest (Australia), you know there’s something seriously wrong with the analysis.

Or maybe a guy like this in Australia is making Australian education better?

I don’t need a safe space. I just call out stupidity when I see it. I don’t want to think of unz as Communism Central, that’s all. That’s what this crap is here.

Exactly, great comment there. It is stupid to argue about the results of “Communism” vs. “Capitalism” where the whole premise of which country “IS” which, is way way off.

You are right that the US must indeed change. It will have to, in fact. Following China’s lead is a bad idea. I am glad we didn’t follow China’s lead during the Red China times, and, as another example, we do seem to have followed China’s lead regarding PC and cultural revolution, although 4-5 decades later. It wasn’t good for China, and it’s not going well here either.

The brainwashing starts early. Libertarianism is the psyop to indoctrinate the unconditional affirmation of 1-percenter class.

This hypnosis of finance capitalism and free markets! is an implanted memory promulgated by parasites.

I think you got it right. This not the only hypnosis out there.

Good you mentioned Frederick List.

I don’t think the US is keeping anybody down in terms of living standards, it even build the Soviet industry according to Anthony Sutton’s research, Cuba’s unspeakable poverty is not thanks to the US embargo. Japan is a mountainous country where people live packed closely together, they live in different conditions, their culture is different. Norway gave $850M to the Clinton Foundation, then it must be a client state as you call it, yet its standard of living is the highest in the world thanks to the North Sea oil, and low, homogeneous white population. Japan has 25 times the population of Norway, their circumstances are more to blame than the US. Lacking natural resources Japan had no choice and did very well exporting quality manufactured goods. In the 80’s economists in the US worried that Japan would overtake America in terms of GDP by the year 2000.

These two comments might be of interest to you:

https://www.unz.com/jthompson/scrabbling-for-excellence/#comment-1911398

and

https://www.unz.com/jthompson/intelligent-lifespans/#comment-1996218

Source: https://voat.co/v/European/1040757

Seriously?

I can’t think of easier, fatter military targets than US aircraft carriers in / near Chinese waters.

Talk about ancient WWII thinking, aircraft carriers are it.

College freshman statement:

“in Scandinavian nations people pay more than 50% taxes, they have a very happy life with good social securities, and they are envy of the modern social model of the world”

Boy, talk about hopelessly out of date.

The myth of Scandinavian socialism
https://www.reviewjournal.com/opinion/the-myth-of-scandinavian-socialism/

Dark lands: the grim truth behind the ‘Scandinavian miracle’
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jan/27/scandinavian-miracle-brutal-truth-denmark-norway-sweden

Sorry, liberals, Scandinavian countries aren’t utopias
http://nypost.com/2015/01/11/sorry-liberals-scandinavian-countries-arent-utopias/

just talking points wally. even the numbers are made up. but CVGs are still the power measurement since it is essential to power projection. the future for CVGs is basically acting like a drone hive. they only become irrelevant when you are talking about a war between powers like russia, usa, china.

Monitoring tools are significantly improved, for one.

but that was exactly what you asked for. you want like minded only. that is echo chamber. that is safe space.

Personal experience in Finland confirms this. There’s something like existential despair there which is hard to pinpoint, but blankets over everything. The taxes and wage structure have a lot to do with it – why struggle for anything if it probably won’t amount to much? Most of those who seem to want more, end up moving away.

Exports to USA was 18% of China’s exports in 2106.

A huge chunk.

Also, China does business with nations that are very dependent on the US, like Japan and South Korea and India.

Muddled up crap? brilliant! now kindly allow Panda turn on the fan:

Congrats, you got it well that the human brain is about the equivalent to the central planning organ of a state in the analogy. Certain degrees of central planning at any time is critical for healthy development and survival both as a state and as an individual.

Sorry, but Panda doesn’t have such romantic imagination, perhaps as you do, that earlier hunter gatherers left themselves to the “market force”, or Trump got Melania through “invisible hand”, ok, afterwards perhaps, not before.

FYI, Panda coined “voodoo economy” to both extremes of the curve obviously: tendency towards , 100% market economy (which only exists in the la-la land) and 100% central planning(which Mao & the Soviet found out in the hard way).

Are you 85 IQer, or American economy is 85 IQ? Do not try to argue for it if you’re not.

I don’t think the US is keeping anybody down in terms of living standards,

Hehe, really? Perhaps you should revisit some geopolitics textbooks.

A few Switzerlands, Singapores, UAEs here and there don’t matter two hoots to the American elites obviously. The keywords are “major economy”, since those are the ones could have, in the own words of every US presidents & senators, “threaten our way of life” (aka petrodollar system).

Has it ever occurred to you that world’s #2 economy, no matter which colour that is,
somehow has always been threatening “American way of life”, and through “unfair means”, and “steal American technologies day and night” of course, not to mention that their currencies were/are “manipulated” and all that crap…

Japan? Why not read up “Plaza Accord”?

Panda doesn’t know if the IQ level…errr… to understand that there’s no such a thing as perfect market info and flow.

Perhaps what’s s even more funny is that the prosperity happens when government is restrained, yes, restrained, restrained, restrained, not eliminated, superman.

Panda isn’t arguing for or against the article, but only on politically-charged words such as “central planning”.

Joe,

You are making some good points there, but am not thinking all USA people are bad, at all. I would love to visit, but between time for flight, inconvience and danger of surface public transport there, maybe never will, danger of many places at night.

I would like to visit towns in the ‘flyover country’ that are quiet, but having a noisy bar to visit at night, and no or almost no muslims or SJWs (whatever colour).

That would, I think, be nice. If I ever am going there, sure wanting to visit Linh’s Friendly Bar.

The Sutherland First Baptist church, simple but pretty building, so sad, if I had been passing through on the day of a service, would surely have been attending, even if not completely to agreeing with the theology.

More to your point, I was working for a company with a USA ‘president’ for seven or eight years, the USA and English workers, particularly those married to office ladies, were the second -worst backstabbers I have encountered in my life.

It was ugly. The one who was explaining the backstabbing USA office culture to me was top backstabber (informant) on me, when I was to complaining about that shithole, he was always to reporting to management. Only to work that out later, but from his own account.

One of the US bosses was supporting me, he was losing his position as the consequence. Other Japanese workers I liked, always ejected within months.

Not crying at that, they were losing a top customer to me, so I am having the last laugh!

Yes, brainwashing and mad dogs, but you can see, on this site, many USA people are not at all like that. I learn much from some .

BTW, of those of your own posts that I have read, have learnt nothing.

Do Americans, left or right, really want a one-party system where mandarin know-it-all technocrats have iron-grip on everything

Me: Haw. By “Americans,” I assume you mean the ‘ordinary’ wo/men voters in the so-called ‘democratic’ USA street?

If so, then perhaps you could explain how anything those ‘voters’ might want could possibly influence the USA’s current system which differs only from China’s by replacing:

“mandarin know-it-all technocrats” with:

“vampire oligarchs, psychopathically aggressive military, vast numbers of equally psychopathic spies and incompetent, ‘equal opportunity’ bureaucrats [including all of LGBTIQ, possibly more], all ‘led’ by ‘elected ignoramuses’ approved if not actually selected by AIPAC et al..”

I’m reminded of this yesterday:

“But citizens, they’re good with just thinking we’re “fighting terrorists”. What a great foil, eh? Brilliant!” by substituting “fighting for democracy”. for “fighting terrorists”.

Haw indeed.

Granted, majority of modernization comes from those big fours. No one denies that.

If we further look at those big fours, the top twos are colonizers. As much as I’d like to take a discourse on this subject, I don’t have time. To put it in a summary, human capital achievement comes resources, be it natural or outsourced.

But countries are bulky and their borders change. Saying that a certain number of significant figures came from Italy obscures the reality that most of them came from specific parts of Italy surrounding Florence and Venice.

Even within a country, a significant number of figures emerged from their heart of the country, i.e., city where resources are abundant.

The same can be applied in China too. Due to their influence back in the days, they have made significant contributions compared to say Japan and Korea. That’s the very fundamentals of how humans succeed in inventions and discoveries.

Coupled that with immense amount of resources garnered from the entire world via colonization, you can only imagine if those countries hadn’t emerged as an influencer, they must be a country made up of idiots and retards.

Now, if we assume Whites are very good at creativity and inventions, why not Whites from Iceland hadn’t made historical achievements as good as their closest counterparts, Britain and France? resources? geographical connection?

We can go on and on.

The bottom line is, if one were to downplay the historical achievement of Europeans, especially the big fours, they’re turning their back on history.

The same can be said, if one were to put aside historical contributions of China, one can only find himself drawing specious conclusion from the current plethora of Chinese achievement in the STEM field.

China’s peaceful and win-win approach to bring humanity forward through commerce …

Mr. Wong,

the American/Western lower middle class has not benefited from this “win-win” approach:

It is by now well-known that the period from the mid-1980s to today has been the period of the greatest reshuffle of personal incomes since the Industrial Revolution. It’s also the first time that global inequality has declined in the past two hundred years. The “winners” were the middle and upper classes of the relatively poor Asian countries and the global top 1%. The (relative) “losers” were the people in the lower and middle parts of rich countries’ income distributions, according to detailed household surveys data from more than 100 countries between 1988 and 2008, put together and analyzed by Christoph Lakner and myself, as well as my book Global Inequality: A New Approach for the Age of Globalization, which includes updated information to 2011.
[…]
They lead to an obvious question: does the growth of the Asian (or more generally global) middle class occur on the back of income stagnation of the Western middle classes? Or at least, are the two somehow related? The follow-up question: how long can it last?
[…]
Even if globalization were to be associated with an absolute real income improvement for all, or almost all, and reduced global inequality, if it is also associated with rising national inequalities, the unhappiness stemming from the latter may dominate. Globalization may be “felt” to produce a more unequal world, even if it objectively does not.

Source: https://hbr.org/2016/05/why-the-global-1-and-the-asian-middle-class-have-gained-the-most-from-globalization

Charles Koch Foundation: An Income Of $34,000 Puts You In The Wealthiest 1 Percent (VIDEO)

If you earn $34,000, that puts you in the wealthiest 1 percent of the world, according to the Charles Koch Foundation.

That’s one of many assertions made in a new ad that attempts to undermine government policies that protect low- and middle-income Americans. You can watch the ad, which is produced by Koch’s conservative non-profit group, here:

– https://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/11/koch-brothers-commercial_n_3581017.html

Economic Freedom in 60 Seconds

Are you in the same camp as the greedy, destructive arch-capitalist Koch Brothers, Mr. Wong?

Bernie Sanders:

Open borders? No, that’s a Koch brothers proposal.
[…]
But I think what we need to be doing as a global economy is making sure that people in poor countries have decent-paying jobs, have education, have health care, have nutrition for their people. That is a moral responsibility, but you don’t do that, as some would suggest, by lowering the standard of American workers, which has already gone down very significantly. – https://www.vox.com/2015/7/28/9014491/bernie-sanders-vox-conversation

Panda, you are a moron with a sub 85 IQ. Most Chinese are dumb as funk.

Are you saying the blood letting and violent French Revolution and English Civil War are bad ideas? Without the French Revolution and English Civil War where would the West bragged modern Western civilization of Democracy and the Rights of Man and of the Citizen come from?

Or are you saying those kind of great social overhaul happens in China it is bad idea while those same kind of bloody violent upheaval happens in the West it became refreshing enlightenment of humanity? Even bombing, killing and waterboarding on the fabricated allegation is a necessity with good intention? It seems you are so deep in the ideology/Orientalism even you don’t know you have ideology/Orientalism.

Now, if we assume Whites are very good at creativity and inventions, why not Whites from Iceland hadn’t made historical achievements as good as their closest counterparts, Britain and France? resources? geographical connection?

Population size is an important factor to take into account as well in this regard, especially in the case of Iceland, in my opinion. Interestingly, Iceland, I believe, has the highest per capita number of chess grand masters: https://www.unz.com/akarlin/world-map-chess-grandmasters/

But you are generally correct; it is a combination of a fairly large high-IQ population, culture (Protestantism), resources, geographical location, climate, etc. that leads to discoveries, inventions, prosperity, etc.

Sweden is a good example, of a relatively small population which contributed disproportionately to the scientific field:

Source: http://www.businessinsider.com/this-brilliant-graphic-shows-you-which-country-discovered-every-element-in-the-periodic-table-2014-4

I attribute these Swedish contributions to both nature (higher intelligence, creativity, curiosity) and nurture (entrepreneurial, scientifically-minded, Protestant culture), best exemplified by the Wallenberg Foundations:

Peter Wallenberg Jr tells the story about the Wallenberg Foundations

Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation 100 years

wow, classy!

Yet you’re premitted by Panda to cry your grey matter out.

Mr. Panda,

have you seen this article, yet?

How the panda became China’s diplomatic weapon of choice

by Jamil Anderlini, Hong Kong https://www.ft.com/comment/columnists/jamil-anderlini https://twitter.com/jamilanderlini

https://www.ft.com/content/8a04a532-be92-11e7-9836-b25f8adaa111

The author also narrated this short documentary:

The end of the Chinese miracle | FT Features

Published on Mar 9, 2016

China’s economic miracle is under threat from a slowing economy and a dwindling labour force. The FT investigates how the world’s most populous country has reached a critical new chapter in its history. Jamil Anderlini narrates.

Not entirely surprisingly, the pro-globalization Financial Times is the psychopath’s newspaper of choice 😉

Kevin Dutton, a psychologist at Oxford, and the author of The Wisdom of Psychopaths, has been gathering data on musical tastes and other preferences for a psychopath study with Channel 4. More than three million people have responded so far, and while online surveys have serious weaknesses, the results so far suggest psychopaths favour rap music over classical and jazz. They also seem more likely to read the Financial Times than other newspapers. – https://www.theguardian.com/science/2017/sep/26/playlist-of-the-lambs-psychopaths-prefer-rap-over-classical-music-study-shows

Xi Jinping delivers robust defence of globalisation at Davos

The spectacle of a Chinese Communist party leader in the spiritual home of capitalism defending the liberal economic order against the dangers of protectionism from a new US president underscored the upheaval in global affairs brought about by the election of Donald Trump. – https://www.ft.com/content/67ec2ec0-dca2-11e6-9d7c-be108f1c1dce

In terms of living standards the US is quite low for a major power, if one only looks at whites it may not be that bad, so are you talking about that or military strength, or that the US is the largest and strongest economy currently. Politicians explain themselves in one way or another when they want to do something major, to start a war. These wars have nothing to do with living standards and “ways of life”. Why has China risen so rapidly if the US is fighting tooth and nail to prevent that. American companies have been investing in China big time, not pulling out. When Nixon persuaded the Saudis to only accept the dollar in 1973, the US was already past its prime of the 50’s and 60’s. Even in the 70’s when Americans showed up as tourists in Europe they could easily afford much luxury, not so much anymore. How did that happen if they supposedly control the world. These politicians are so incompetent they don’t see anything coming, they may try to react when things are obvious but the US will not be able to prevent the rise of China, or anybody else. The British were afraid of Germany rising before WWI, yet capital fled Europe to the US between and after both world wars and the British empire was finished. Historically every country used its military to ensure its domination and economic interests and it’s better not to be on the receiving end. America’s greatness has not been thanks to politicians, but they helped to destroy it, capital will go where it’s treated best. And sure, a small country can’t compete with one with a large economy for world reserve currency status, but it can have a high standard of living. If the EU thought the euro out better, it could compete with the dollar, but Europe would have to be one country for that to happen and issue common debt. And the debt market thwarts the oil trade by a huge margin.

Glad the Chinese centrally planned economy always gets things right. Chinese excess steel making capacity is very conservatively estimated at 130 million tons per annum. To put that in prospective, their excess capacity is 65% higher than total US steel production in 2016.

“American companies have been investing in China big time, ”

Actually, American investment isn’t that much in China.

77% of all foreign investment in China come from Asia. HongKong, Singapore and Japan holding top 3, Korea #4, USA #5, Taiwan #6, Germany #7, Netherlands #9. And, all foreign investment combined is only 12.7% of China’s total investment.

Please, American investment is very welcomed in China, but please don’t claim to have “bankroll” China. Anyway, the country that has most foreign investment is the USA, not China.

ccp ‘persecution of xtians……’

[sic]

Here’s quizz for you mr crusador,

1] which’s the most xtianised country , with a 80% xtian population ?

2] which country engaged in a 78 days aerial vandalism, targetting and destroying centuries old monastries in a bombing orgy over ex Yugo , 1999 ?

3] which country is on track to have the most xtians in 2030, even projected to overtake [1] to be the most xtianised country in 2040 ?

4] which two ‘democratic’ countries in Asia resort to state terrorism to supress the xtian faith, amongst others ?

Not reassuring that they create more than they intend

https://www.fhi.ox.ac.uk/nick-bostrom-speaks-world-intelligence-congress-china/

At the World Intelligence Congress on the 1st of July in the city of Tianjin in China, Professor Bostrom spoke about the future of machine intelligence over the coming decades. Other speakers included leaders in Chinese tech and academia such as Jack Ma, Robin Li, and Bo Zhang. This follows a recent talk he gave to leading Chinese CEOs such as Pony Ma and Richard Liu, hosted by Tsinghua University on 23rd May.

china suffers from over production, too much capacity. the 2nd term of huo was suppose to be the start of the transition. yet he added more production. there were claims of “vested interests”. some of those got arrested the moment xi came into power. internally, huo’s two terms were called lost years. just something I read, no idea if it is true or not.

I was surprised by this self correction by the ccp. impressed by it even. imagine a 5 star general getting arrested in the usa. that was what happened. and not just a slap on the wrist like patraeus got.

Ansers to quiz,
[not holding my breath !]

[1]
USA

[2]
USA
Anybody who doesnt know the answer ought to be shot !
Its a no brainer !

Who else, I mean who else but the USA, has been dropping bombs willy nilly, all over the world since ww2 ?

[3]
CHINA !

OMFG !
The country supposedly persecuting xtianity !
hhhhhh

[4]
Indonesia/India. !
[raping nuns, killing pastors, burning churches,
You mean your ‘free’ press didnt tell you about these ?]
I guess it’s considered bad form to rat on a fellow ‘democrazy’
hhhhhhh

So the gawd fearing murkkans bombed a fellow xtian country, ,
praise Indonesia as a ‘model moslem ‘,
wax lyrical about India the ‘model democracy‘ ,
but accuse China of ‘persecuting xtian faith’ !

yOU just couldnt make this shit up. !

‘rule of law’ [sic]

Hey Phil,
I hate to burst your bubble but…..

fukus [anglos] and ‘rule of law’ is an oxymoron !

hhhhhhh

You’re way too pessimistic. American avg living standard is still very high and you don’t realise it: even for the average masses, you have very cheap daily expenses ( food, clothes, etc) + clean air + generous avg household living space… in comparison ,for instance, to the the East Asia(let alone others):
do you know how hard and how long hours average East Asian people work everyday in thier entire life in order to afford a tiny living space, a space their American counterparts would consider a basement corner where they put their suitcases & an old bike from childhood ? A blue collar American worker who got C or less in entire his school years spending much of his time partying enjoying life would earn, quite easily, about the same as an East Asian white collar, who studied so hard & got A in his school years going to a top East Asian university working & saving like no tomorrow every day. Do you think it’s fair? Do you know that in Japan, for instance, even simple fruits like watermelon are so expansive that are sold mostly in carefully-cut small pieces so that avg people could afford, whereas in the US people buy those for dogs?… What causes such differences?

As Panda mentioned previously, the problem of the US is not wealth, but the way to use it, and fairness of the distribution of it. US elites, as the richest group in entire human history, have been squandering unimaginable wealth for decades when the US was the sole superpower. You just can’t blame others for your own mistakes. Let’s be honest, US wars are not for charity purpose so that China or others could take a free ride, but for world-domination – pure sporting urge for power – due to their obvious nature in controlling even more natural resources and questing insatiable geopolitical & economical advantages. Both US elites and the mass profit from them directly or indirectly: e.g.

well-oiled trillion dollar defence sector + the freedom of printing wealth 24*7 for luxurious public spending that others can only dream of or have to work extremely hard for. For starters, these are all the benefits for being #1 setting petrodollar system… heck, just imagine what kind of natural advantages and (potential)wealth of even a disadvantaged American of 80IQ with barely any education would have vís-a-vís an 105IQ study-hard work-hard middleclass East Asian? At least the former could teach English aboard in a kindergarden, as many are doing, easily earning the same as the latter, if not more, while sporting much better and relaxed lifestyle. That could be the economic bottom line for the entire far left end of US IQ curve, a pure luxury compared to the rest of world, isn’t it? Why? It’s the #1 position that sets English as the langua franca of the business that the world at large ought to spend a wealth to learn. And you’re still complaining…

Xi is smelling blood. (Or carcass ?)
There is no one Democrat who would like Republican idea. And there is no one Republican who would like Democrat idea. There is duel to the death of the opponent.
US democratic system of Government did become totally inane, dysfunctional lacking any direction, and lacking any accomplishment. Like in everything there is birth, life, and eventually death.
Death of American democracy is being presented, right to our own eyes.

Christian churches (I am not a Christian) are being persecuted. Many Chinese are sincerely worried.

[sic]

If I were Xi and co, the prospect of a 800m xtian sheeples who pledge loyalty to the pope is enough to make me sit up in the middle of the night in cold sweat !
A diehard xtian sheeple makes a MKULTRAED zombie looks like child’s play !

Trouble is,
XI cant bomb them to smithereens like the xtian murkkans did,
burn their churches like in Indonesia/India.
Thats the prerogative of the ‘democrazies’ !
The moment ccp tried to crack down on some underground xtian outfits,
the whole gawd damned west bear down on it like tons of bricks !
‘Persecution of the xtian faith’ !

He can only watch helplessly while the cancer spread like wild fire, until one day all of China is engulfed .

China’s days are numbered, never mind the ccp.

This is even worse than the opium war,
Taking over a country of 1.4b people without firing a single shot.

And you should complain ?

hhhhhhhh

Anglo-American capitalism’s downfall is its “war of all against all” ethos that pits citizen against citizen in a desperate struggle to keep poverty and destitution at bay while the billionaires pocket insane amounts of money and balk at paying even minimal tax.

A society that has no shared values besides fleecing and cheating one’s own countrymen and slaughtering foreigners in sovereign nations that want to remain free from Western exploitation…that is no society at all. It is a collapse waiting to happen. The writing is on the wall, yet still many many Americans, as you mentioned, blindly worship a capitalism that blatantly fucks them over a barrel again and again and again.

Europe could have built an interesting social-market society based on European social democracy but the EU is full on neoliberal and it is falling apart as well. How ironic that the “high IQ” oh-so-superior and civilized west would rather engage in emotional tantrums and bellicose bluster rather solving its many problems, thereby sowing the seeds of its own destruction. Talk about deluded!

James Petras,

You write the following.

“As the US declines, its publicists degenerate.”

I would amend that to say the following:

As the US declines, its publicists dissemble.