Only in times of war. It's literally one of the checks and balances to specifically prevent a president from stopping an election. Now, if we start a full blown war with Russia...
If that happens good? Why do we think having countries and borders that creates strife a good thing? If we eliminate all borders and are just humanity I see that as an absolute win.
I'm curious. When you read articles about how great the economy in the US is and it's just the voters that don't understand, do you agree? Do you believe the US government no matter how badly they do? If you don't believe the US government on this, why do you believe what their propaganda says about their enemies?
It's because they were never that effective before. But with the advent of drones, they have suddenly become a wildly important protection. This is cause the drones can get stuck in those slat gaps. No other weapon before had this kind of weakness. They were all basically just ballistics before drones.
And the US becoming a petrostate is hurting this massively. It's why even the Saudis are now looking to do transactions in local currencies. I'm not sure where all this is headed, but USA weird and sudden shift to independent energy is damaging relationships more than Russia ever could.
Oh thank God for a moment there I thought we might actually do the right thing. Thank God for our global leaders assuring the universe will be safe from the disease that is humanity. /s
I don't know why this isn't talked about more, but the reason for the disconnect is that USA has become a petrostate. As a petrostate, the rich get wildly rich and makes the economy look good, while the citizens are fed a bunch of religion to keep them from protesting.
This is true, China doesn't care. I'm actually confused about the narrative around China wanting to take TSMC. Even the most cursory glace at the situation should make it obvious this isn't one of China's goals. This is because these EUV machines don't work on magic. They work on knowledge and spare parts. Even in the unlikely scenario that China somehow invades and these machines aren't destroyed by either China or the retreating Taiwanese, they aren't going to be able to operate them and more importantly get spare parts to keep them running. They'd at best be used to disassemble and review.
All of this ignores the fact that China is already at 5nm using their own equipment anyway. For the extra 2nm of difference between TSMC's 3nm to SMIC's 5nm isn't large enough to rationalize anything close to what they're talking about. It'd be cheaper to just keep subsidizing the Chinese industry rather than invading.
All of this is to say, that China may or may not invade, but TSMC isn't on the list of reasons. If anything, it's on the opposite end. China has a LOT of motivation to bomb TSMC to prevent the west from getting chips as if TSMC is gone, then suddenly Chinese 5nm are pretty much the most advanced chips in the world (besides Samsung). Thus, the real conclusion is we need to invest in Samsung, which surprisingly isn't happening for whatever reason is beyond me.
Uh yea, it's very much the swatstika is my heritage. And it really shows how your just dismissing cultures you don't like.
We both agree Nazi swastikas should be banned, your just trying to argue that it wasn't cultural when it absolutely is. Just as it's literally part of Chinese and Indian culture. But suddenly when it's applied to a group you don't like you just dismiss it? That's hilariously ignorant.
Also, what's happening in China has nothing to do with Uigurs. Famously they did it to Hans Chinese first, which lead famously to Tiananmen. Then they did it to the Tibetans, and we made movies like 9 years in Tibet. Now they're just expanding it. There is no cultural target, it's just whatever group is next.
Edit. BTW that's why it was called the cultural revolution, they were trying to wipe out Hans Chinese culture.
I mean if that's your definition, then China is not doing cultural genocide. They aren't separating children from parents and re-educating the children to assimilate. They're taking the parents, re-educating them and telling them to tell their children to be like them moving forward. That's what the whole sleeping in the beds thing is about. They're going family to family to make sure they don't break up families and make the whole family accept a new way of living.
Also, the destruction of racism was targeting white people. Heck that's what they're complaining about. They even had traditions and parties based on racism, least we forget who the KKK is So unless black people were also the target of anti-racism, then it was very much just the white people. Also, it was very much a movement from the government. It's why it lead to a civil war where the south said they could not abide by the northern government.
*Edit: In fact there's video after video of families in XInjiang asking the people who fled to come home. NOW, that said, it's entirely possible and likely they were forced to do this. But what I'm pointing out is, they're absolutely making sure that the families stay together and change as a unit, not forcing separation like what Canada did.
Except by your own argument it really is. The UK has blocked many sites for many reasons. However, none of those reasons are for crowd control. Your example is ironically proof of the statement. This is the first time a western nation has banned media for the explicit purpose of quelling a protest and suppressing speech. Your example is a government banning a site not to quell a protest or to suppress speech, but instead because of a governmental disagreement between two nations. Now which one you think is valid for suppressing speech is a totally different question, only that they are two separate and completely different reasons.
Unfortunately I can't find articles talking about bed sharing without it being from western media. It's obviously not something that's news worthy to begin with. I only know this because of my friends from the Xinjiang region.
The problem with the concept of cultural genocide is that there's a culture to genocide. Culture is defined by the situations and effects of the moment. Culture changes, ebbs and flows. The Menorah is as much a part of Jewish culture as the Torah. But the Menorah was created out of what we today would call cultural genocide. You can't genocide culture that idea is ridiculous, instead the culture will adapt and change with whatever is happening at the moment.
The question then isn't is there cultural genocide, but what if anything we should protect in a culture. USA used to have a culture of racism, we obviously went out of our way to "culturally genocide" that. Should we have not done that? Should the fact that it was part of our culture mean we should protect oppressing black people? In reality, by our own definitions, some cultures do need to be genocided.
Well a problem with your argument is that assimilation is not only not unethical, but absolutely necessary for a functioning society. Imagine if you will for a second if our culture accepted racism and bigotry. It would be necessary to force assimilation on people to stop racism and bigotry. Oh wait, that's happening right now. We're literally forcing a culture of acceptance on a culture of racism and bigotry. Is that unethical? Should we stop? Perhaps we should have colored drinking fountains.
The problem you're having with China is:
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The government is the one that's doing it, instead of naturally letting companies like Disney shove it down people's throats.
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The assimilation is over reaching.
The biggest problem is #2. We don't know what the fuck that means. Should I be allowed to say the N word if there's no other racism or bigotry? If there's no racism and bigotry, is the N word even racist? Yet we enforce word usage today, just words that only have meaning because we give them meaning. yet it's quite over reaching to censor words no? Where's the line drawn?
It's a hot take because while you are right, it's something that all countries do. It's just not necessarily the government that does it. Just look at the culture wars in the US. China's biggest difference is it's controlled by the government. But it also has nothing to do with Xinjiang. They do it to everyone, Hans Chinese inclusive. Technically that's what the great leap forward was. First forcing the Hans Chinese people to assimilate to the government's idea of a unified country. It worked, so they're pushing it everywhere.
Also, it's important to note that the only violent enforcement of this was on the Hans Chinese. This was Tian an men. After that they've gotten really good at subversion. There was only one suspicious killing in the HK riots for example. For as large a protest as it was, it was largely nonviolent. Compare that with BLM in the States.
The truth is it's all propaganda from both sides and no one actually knows what's going on. And because I'm saying this anywhere I'm probably going to be downvoted to oblivion as either side will downvote me. However, what we do know is:
- China has admitted there are training camps in the Xinjiang Area.
- The training camps are mandatory and people have been forced to go there.
- The graduates have been spread all over China gaining employment in pretty much every factory in China (This imho is because it makes things impossible to sanction)
- The people are compensated for their time in the training camps (This is what makes them forced labor camps in theory)
- It is a cultural thing where guests in Xinjiang are invited to sleep in the same bed. This has lead to many stories of Chinese people forcing themselves into the bedrooms of Xinjiang people.
What we are sure isn't quite right:
- They are not genociding the people in the camps. This is why the conversation has turned to "cultural genocide" whatever that means. I believe this is propaganda to reinforce that they could be genocide when there is no evidence.
- There is a lot of fake evidence for the genocide. For example the prison camp image or the truck that is censored but has red liquid leaking out of it were all doctored. Just this alone has to make you question the truth of those claiming genocide.
- The "leaked list" of prisoners is fake. It contains HK movie stars and actors.
What we could probably conclude:
- I'd argue that there is forced labor occurring as they are literally being forced into training camps and getting paid for it.
- There is no forced labor in the factories USA is claiming there is. After graduating, the students are welcome to move and work where they want, so this can't be forced labor.
Final questions:
- What happens to those who won't participate in the forced training camps? We don't know, and that's ultimately where the disconnect and miscommunication is coming from. The west is claiming they're being killed. China isn't saying anything but then are at a minimum keeping them locked up indefinitely. So, in the end, it's a bad situation for sure but it's likely not as bad as the western propaganda makes it look.
This is just it getting doled out. You agree to 60 Billion and then you slowly release it as they are doing now. It would be impossible to actually just ship 60 billion worth of weapons, there are logistical issues as well as supply issues. The 60 billion is also partially going to making the missiles and weapons that Ukraine will need in the future.
On the other hand, it would be super cool if humanity figured out teleportation and we could just beam 60 billion dollars worth of goods, but until then, this is what you should expect.
Actually it exactly resembles stagflation. It's one of the reasons I said underemployment and not unemployment. During the 90s, Japan's inflation rate was around 3% and they couldn't get it under 2%. Sound familiar?
The other part was low unemployment, but mostly government jobs that didn't do anything. But it did create historically low unemployment and higher than average labor force participation.
What you are seeing is USA doing exactly what Japan did in the 90s, which is have a target inflation rate of 2% that they can't reach and hiding the high unemployment numbers with underemployment in crappy jobs.
Edit: just look at this rocketing government employment.
More than doubled in a decade.
It's not a bubble, it's much much worse. You only hear of it in whispers among the financial world. It's stagflation. Japan seen this story before, they call it their lost decade that has been going on for nearly half a century. It's when you deficit spend like crazy to prop up the economy and that leads to high inflation and stubbornly high costs (IE: Housing). It's coupled with basically no wage growth and high underemployment. Does any of this sound familiar? It buried Japan, it might bury USA.
It's good that you point that out. Because it shows US really can't sanction China and only entities within it like it does to its own allies as opposed to straight country sanctions like Iran and North Korea.
https://www.tradecompliance.pitt.edu/embargoed-and-sanctioned-countries
Here's a list.
In fairness though, that list also shows the US can't sanction Russia either. So not sure how much of a flex not being able to sanction China is.
Bizarrely there are, that's what black water essentially is, a paramilitary group that can hold off a military. If you think it's insane that we allow private companies own their own military, well it is. They of course not allowed to operate on US soil, but they exist.
Even Russia has laws against this, it's kind of nut USA allows it. Of course, Russian law is one thing and wagers existence shows how well that law is followed. But even the Russian founders understood having a private military is insane.
*Edit arguably, Putin flaunting the law and creating Wagner is a reason he became a dictator and what the country was trying to prevent when they made the laws.