1

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: March 06, 2025, 01:58:31 AM »

Oh no, I'm simply countering your claim that the dollar has lost value as the reason.  Unless you want to claim that every currency on earth is The Dollar and thus loses value/inflation hits simultaniously. The only other explination is that something, beyond America, caused the large inflation spike.

If only there were something you could look up to determine factual information instead of "I looked at the prices in my grocery store."

Ukraine was a major grains exporter to Europe so yeah, they care.  Also, Russia being bigger and more powerful is bad for Europe.  I get that Trump wouldn't care, but we do.  We do NOT want Russia to get bolder.  We saw what happened in WW2 when Germany got bold.

Ukraine hasn't stopped being a major grains exporter and the EU, as well as Europe overall, has proven they don't actually care where their resources come from. Whether they pay a Ukrainian or a Russian for grain and gas makes no difference.

"This is just like Germany in WWII" screams that your understanding of modern geopolitics is primary school tier. Do you get all your news from Xitter and BlueBalls?

2

Science & Alternative Science / Re: Blue Ghost

« on: March 05, 2025, 07:36:12 PM »

Contractors are just the US government wearing a mask in order to avoid legal and fiscal responsibility. And, as Tom pointed out, Blue Ghost doesn't have any private facilities where they developed this supposed moon lander. Go figure.

3

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: March 05, 2025, 07:26:43 PM »

My Norwegian Kroner exchange rate as well as my food bill would disagree with that assessment.

Ah yes, I forgot, Norway doesn't experience inflation.

Several hundred times is the EU's entire defense budget and then some.  America is literally the highest spending country in the world when it comes to defense.

And? You think the EU can win a war with their peacetime budget? In order to go to war, you have to increase your war budget. I don't how America's defense expenditures matter here. If we want to buy lots of tanks, we're not obligated to give them away to corrupt eastern European shitholes just because some other equally corrupt shithole invaded them.

Which is not what I wrote.

Yes it is.

Yeah, you're right.  I see the most recent charts now.
Fortunately winter is over so it should drop again.

You think they won't keep buying gas to refill their now-quite-empty reserves?

Face it, Dave, the EU doesn't actually care about Ukraine. It's performative rhetoric to appease voters who, ironically, also do not actually care about Ukraine. The EU, the Europeans themselves, and everyone else on the planet is fully aware that no modernized nation is actually under threat from Russia. No NATO countries are genuinely afraid of Regional-Power-Russia. It's a farce.

4

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: March 05, 2025, 02:02:24 AM »

Why do you think food is so expensive?

Food isn't expensive, the dollar became worth considerably less. Ukraine's grain exports didn't cause worldwide inflation.

Couple of problems.
1. The "pocket change" is compared to the US.
Europe spent about $340 billion in 2024 on defense.  All of the EU.  Since the war, the EU spent about $900 Billion in defense.  So $198 billion is about 22% of their entire defense spending.  Not pocket change. They're giving MORE and MORE OF A PERCENTAGE of their spending than the US.

They should be giving several hundred times the amount the US gives, considering they're several hundred times closer to the problem.

The EU has a larger average government budget than the US does (thanks to their outrageous taxes). They should be spending more money.

2. More money isn't everything.  While continued funds are needed, you can't spend $100 billion all at once and get everything immediately.  Even if you bought $100 billion in missiles, you gotta wait til they're made and delivered.  Most weapons makers have a long back long of orders and your request for 100 missiles is just gonna take time.  So they need money, aid, weapons... But In a steady amount.  Which is why they haven't even gotten all the money congress approved for them. (And Trump is illegally denying)

If the money isn't a big deal then I guess Ukraine won't miss it!

3. Why is Europe still buying Russian oil and gas?  They're not buying nearly as much.  Alot if which got cut off with the pipeline explosion.  What you fail to understand is how intertwined European heating is with Russian gas. Most countries relied on it completely.  When it was cut off or severely hampered, most people had to switch to the only source available on such a short notice: electric.  And trust me, I felt that.  I know someone who could not even use their heater because the power bill was far too high.  In winter.  Hell, my electric bill trippled and we don't use Russian gas, we use electricity.  Which we sell to the nations that did use Russian gas for heating.

So yeah, it's a trade off of how much you wanna hurt but let me assure you: they are using considerably less Russian gas than they used to with some nations totally cut off.

They're not buying less Russian gas, in fact they're buying more than ever. The only reason it's slowed down somewhat is that we destroyed a pipeline Germany was going to use to buy even more! We can't trust Europeans not to fund a war they claim they are against.

5

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: March 04, 2025, 08:30:46 PM »

Ukraine was a major grain exporter.  You knew that, right?

Oh no, not my grains!

As for money:
If we go by Tom's numbers with the US allocating $174 billion...

The EU has allocated $198 billion.
https://www.eeas.europa.eu/delegations/united-states-america/eu-assistance-ukraine-us-dollars_en?s=253

The $174 billion over 3 years is Pocket change to the US military budget.  7% of the military budget over the last 3 years, specifically.
Pocket change.

Cool, so the EU, which claims they are under existential threat from Russia is giving 13% more in aid than a country on the other side of the planet.

If the EU were really at a point where they are about to actually die in a horrific war, they should be giving trillions in aid. But, like you said, they're only giving pocket change. Why is that?

6

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: March 04, 2025, 07:18:30 PM »

If the war in Ukraine is so pivotal for the security of the Western world, and the EU genuinely believed this to be the case, then they wouldn't be giving Ukraine what is effectively their loose change they found in the couch cushions. They also wouldn't be actively buying oil and gas from Russia, sorry, I mean "India".

The actions of the EU do not align with their rhetoric. If the EU does not take Russia's invasion of Ukraine seriously, then why should the US?

7

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: February 28, 2025, 07:56:19 PM »

Zelensky is a lib and he found out that libs at the Trump white house get owned. Maybe if you wanted more help you should be more grateful to your benefactors instead of trying to smugly correct them on national television. He should have respected his superiors but couldn't put his ego aside for even one second to save his own country. Sad!

8

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Is the UK okay?

« on: February 25, 2025, 04:13:20 PM »

The UK does not have freedom of assembly or freedom of speech, so it's no surprise that you can be ordered to "pay more than £9,000 costs" for thought-criming in the wrong location.

9

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: February 21, 2025, 02:10:21 PM »

Current lib status: eternally owned

Trump is going to win again in 2028. Agent Musk is going to finally eliminate the deep state. Everything is going according to plan.

I want to remind everyone that when we say we're going to own the libs, we don't mean it metaphorically. We're literally going to own libs as property.

10

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Aliens!

« on: December 13, 2024, 04:05:06 PM »

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2014/01/13/iranian-news-agency-says-the-u-s-is-secretly-run-by-nazi-space-aliens-really/

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/ncna1250333

These are old but I am putting them here for very important public archival purposes.

11

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: December 13, 2024, 02:27:37 PM »

it was a joke, captain serious.

Well that's annoying, I wanted to get into a 10 page argument about what China does and why no one hates China enough.

• The U.S. government should maintain higher tariffs on imports of goods from China
(1) of which China is the dominant supplier and that the Departments of Defense and
Commerce consider key technologies and (2) that could undermine U.S. industries con-
sidered critical to U.S. economic or national security.
• To maintain the overall competitiveness of U.S. manufacturing and to benefit U.S. con-
sumers, the U.S. Trade Representative should offer to negotiate reductions of U.S. tariffs
on nonsensitive imports of consumer goods and manufacturing inputs from China in
exchange for reductions in Chinese tariffs on U.S. goods.

Wow, it's almost like whether we have tariffs or not doesn't depend solely on the economic outcomes of them but instead also depends on China's offensive measures. Perhaps you need to replace "tariffs" with "bombs" and you'd get it? "We will stop bombing you if you stop bombing us" seems like it's better for you to read because you keep getting hung up on "ahhh muh economy".

i'm in a trump thread commenting on a proposal trump made. "there are other people recommending different things that are possibly more rational than this thing" is largely irrelevant to me.

You made a generalized statement about Tariffs Never Working And Are Always Bad. Some of Trump's tariffs are Actually Good. His new plans Are Probably Not Good. You haven't delineated between the two up to now.

not really, it's just hard to be anything more than halfhearted when i reply to posts that don't actually read the things i write and are 90% "don't you agree you're obviously wrong?" and "here's 10 things i'm not saying. can you guess what i am saying?"

Not reading the things that I write is how this argument mostly got started, to the point that you're like "hmm your position has changed, but I won't explain why, because it's funny". How dare you use the "ur retartet but u donut even kno it and I walnut tel u y" on me.

i think it sounds way dumber to make an argument by analogy that relies on russia : ukraine :: china : united states. i do not agree that chinese steel exports are literally an existential threat to the united states. or anything close. and i think inflation and unemployment are worse than just "muh economy."

Nice opinion.

from my point of view, the analogy is that trump proposes simply carpet-bombing the entirety of ukraine. when i say that this is fucking stupid, you pop in to be like "okay but the dept of defense actually recommends increasing targeted strikes of russian supply bases in eastern ukraine while lowering strikes elsewhere because they themselves demonstrate that all strikes come at a significant cost. i bet you feel so dumb now." i don't, though.

Trump routinely proposed ridiculous things in his first term, then backed off of them to more sane numbers. It's part of his "I make deals" meme. Surely you picked up on that by now.

12

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: December 12, 2024, 02:07:28 PM »

lol pass. it's way funnier watching you completely change your argument mid-discussion.

If you say so. It's almost like you realized you can't put your problem into words because it's nonsense!

china is our ally.

Ah yes, the turbofascist dictatorship with literal concentration camps for undesirable ethnicity groups and a military build-up with the intent of invading one of our actual allies is somehow our ally. Truly, you are a wizard of geopolitics.

for one thing, it absolutely does. they recommend increasing tariffs only on materials deemed critical to the economy while negotiating the others away.

Where?

for another thing, their analysis does not calculate or estimate the net effect of the tariffs. they quantify the overall cost to the us economy (e.g. it's a tax on poor people), and they assert some of the benefits (e.g. decreased trade deficit). but since they don't compare the two, i can't tell you why they recommend their proposals other than "they believe the benefits outweigh the costs."

Hmm, what proposals do they recommend? You're dancing around it now, previously you said they didn't make any. I seldom see someone change their stance mid-post!

for another another thing, none of this matters

Ah yes, the classic retreat to "well ackshully this argument doesn't matter"

what's that got to do with 25% tariffs on literally all products from canada and mexico? or raising all tariffs on all chinese goods by 10%? sorry, but that's an absolutely horrifically fucking stupid economic policy, and you should feel super silly for defending it.

idk my bff jill, I never argued Trump's plan was a good idea. My problem was your "tariffs are bad dumb because muh economy" argument that I think you've already accepted was obviously wrong.

In short, the increases in U.S. tariffs in 2018 resulted in reductions in U.S. manufacturing exports, output, and employment; accelerated producer and consumer price inflation; and diminished household welfare, especially for lower-income households.

i think that's bad. i think vastly expanding the scope of things that are bad is even more bad.

Imagine telling Ukraine that they shouldn't fight Russia because it makes their quarterly GDP outlook worse. Imagine telling Germany it should keep buying Russian gas because buying it elsewhere hurts their economy.

You still obviously haven't read the RAND report. Maybe you should, I don't know, actually read it?

13

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: December 03, 2024, 08:36:40 PM »

if you say so.

"Yeah lol we should just keep letting our miners and manufacturers go bankrupt competing with subsidized Chinese firms lmao, who even needs steel or aluminum amirite?"

"Their purpose is to keep a foreign adversary from killing vital industries in your nation."

Yes. I did say those things. If you want to claim what I've said so far is counter to them, you're going to need to elaborate quite a bit more.

yes. flattening the distribution of nations we import steel from (i.e., diversifying the supply chain) doesn't keep domestic steel/mining/whatever from dying.

Diversifying the supply chain keeps us from relying on an adversary. The tariffs target China specifically. If we were worried about only growing US companies, we'd target everyone equally. As you've probably noticed, we're not doing that.

>"you don't know anything. read this paper and learn something, idiot."
>"this paper agrees with me."
>"oh so you just get your opinions from nerds and their nerd papers? trying listening to the GOVERNMENT sometime, idiot."

The parts of your argument the paper agrees with aren't parts I ever argued against, hence why I linked it to you. It seems all it did was cause you to double down on points only tangential to the political outcomes of tariffs. This is clearly a "can't see the forest for the trees" situation. Maybe, and I should emphasize this, you should actually read the report. I can only assume you skimmed it, since you seem to have come away from it without actually learning anything about why the tariffs are being put in place.

Hint: the paper doesn't recommend that the US lift its tariffs. Why is that?

14

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: December 03, 2024, 06:50:02 PM »

i'm simply describing a cause-and-effect relationship measured by economists, but okay.

You described a series of things you googled given your limited knowledge of economic policy.

As an analogy, imagine China fired an artillery shell into the US. The US fires one back. You begin arguing this was a bad decision, because firing expensive artillery shells into adversarial nations is not economically advantageous. You link some studies pointing out that artillery shells are expensive and firing them is also expensive. You present this as an argument that others should take seriously, for some reason.

i said spur growth and protect jobs, and i obviously mean with respect to the protected industries. and the 2018 tariffs absolutely were mapped to specific domestic production/employment growth goals.

Okay.

in other words -- tariffs reduce domestic production and manufacturing (among many other things).

I never argued otherwise.

they conclude that the benefit of tariffs for access to steel is by diversifying the supply chain globally

lol they're not saying anywhere that tariffs are "keep a foreign adversary from killing vital industries in your nation" or anything of the sort.

Biden and Trump's administration, as well as the EU, don't really differ much in terms of economic decision making with respect to China.

yes, that's what i said.

Yes, so it's you, some various economic papers you googled in your spare time, versus the economic policy decisions of world governments. Surely you can think for a moment and identify that you're missing something and barking up the wrong trees with respect to tariff criticism.

15

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: December 03, 2024, 02:53:49 PM »

then why aren't steel tariffs working? we've had steel tariffs on china since 2018. biden did not remove them. the initial capability utilization rate target was 80%. it still has not been reached. "In the week ending on November 23, 2024, domestic raw steel production was 1,655,000 net tons while the capability utilization rate was 74.5 percent."

tariffs are a fucking stupid way to spur growth and protect jobs. they do not work.

This is an uncharacteristically pro-capitalist take from you, gary. The purpose of tariffs is not to "spur growth". Their purpose is to keep a foreign adversary from killing vital industries in your nation. This is the same reason that the EU has implemented import taxes on a variety of basic goods and just recently extended their import tax on specifically Chinese steel.  To put it bluntly, you seem to entirely misunderstand modern economic policy. Perhaps reading something that explains modern goals (and how we're achieving them) is a more prudent use of your time instead of wallowing around in economic ignorance:

https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RRA3055-1.html

Biden and Trump's administration, as well as the EU, don't really differ much in terms of economic decision making with respect to China.

16

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: President Joe Biden

« on: December 03, 2024, 02:34:05 PM »

it's his son and not a crony

Now this is funny.

17

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: President Joe Biden

« on: November 26, 2024, 04:14:18 PM »

why the fuck would russia nuke ukraine, that doesn't make an ounce of sense

Luckily, nuclear bombs are not real, so we don't have to worry about it.

18

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: November 26, 2024, 04:09:26 PM »

https://www.reuters.com/world/us/trump-promises-25-tariff-products-mexico-canada-2024-11-25/

the best way to make things cheaper is to make everything more expensive. lol imagine being such an idiot that you actually cast a ballot for this.

Yeah lol we should just keep letting our miners and manufacturers go bankrupt competing with subsidized Chinese firms lmao, who even needs steel or aluminum amirite?

19

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Political pundits be damned - why they were all wrong.

« on: November 26, 2024, 04:05:30 PM »

It's almost like introducing a two trillion dollar stimulus package in the middle of a pandemic was actually a bad idea! Biden thought he could copy and paste Obama's economic policies, seemingly unaware that an entire decade has passed.

Well, yes. You weren't hoping that I'd identify the "good guys" in US politics, were you?

I appreciate the agreement but you'll need to elaborate on the question.

They thought that by catering to illegals that illegals would eventually add to the bottom line Democratic voting population.

Democrats cater to illegal immigrants and criminals because it is a party of people with an active hatred of America. The DNC is ruled by communists that would prefer the US government not exist at all. As far as they are concerned, the legal system is only meant to be used as a bludgeon on your political opponents. And when that doesn't work, they'll just try to shoot you dead.

20

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: President Joe Biden

« on: November 26, 2024, 03:54:36 PM »

If they're willing to kill them with nukes, what's stopping them from using it on us too?

The fact that we supposedly have them as well.

Better kill them first before they try to kill us.

It's all about escellation.

Why would the US escalate to nuclear war over Ukraine? You still haven't answered the question beyond "because they just would, okay?". Come on, use your big words. Tell me why America would decide to kill itself if Russia landed a one megaton warhead in a Ukrainian city.