Lots of people still see it in exactly this way. The fact that Palantir IPO'd and is a magnet for investors doesn't contradict this. Palantir always had a reputation for champagne and surveillance.
Lots of people still see it in exactly this way. The fact that Palantir IPO'd and is a magnet for investors doesn't contradict this. Palantir always had a reputation for champagne and surveillance.
I also agree with his premise. There is really no gray area working for defense tech in the US. In my opinion people have a rather lopsided view of that. You would rarely find any other nation that where defense tech companies are turned away from job fairs. Kinda ridiculous.
Probably because US MIC is weird political place. On one hand, it's turns out really cool tech and US needs defense. On other hand, who are we defending from and why are spending all this money on world police when we have a ton of internal problems? Throw in some pork barrel in there to add to political stuff.
When people post memes about "You are about to find out why US doesn't have free healthcare." with some overwhelming American firepower equipment in the image, it's not hard to see why a lot of people find it a grey area.
Because someone has to be this if you want the continuation of the post-WWII rules-based international order that underpins the entire global economy. The Department of Defense and US hegemony are essentially overhead that is the Least Bad Option to stop WWIII from kicking off or the world from fragmenting into spheres of influence (which is starting to happen already). Who else would do this and not screw over everyone else even worse? Russia? China?
This country has a collapsing middle class, horrendously bad health outcomes, ever increasing amount of corruption and little chance to turn things around because of entrenched interests.
I can just picture the thought process going in your head(and many others) right now. If you hate it so much why dont you leave.
America benefited greatly from this position though, it's just the gains have not been equally distributed, and one can make an argument that Americans simply vote for that outcome. It is very unclear to me how the situation of the middle class in the US becomes any better if the US gives up its leverage for Chinese to dictate the terms. FWIW pre-WW1 the US had even worse inequality while not propping up anyone's lifestyle abroad.
The GP says that they don't want to prop up foreign lifestyles because the middle class in the US is struggling but isolationism in the 21st century will not make things better for the US middle class. Nor for middle class of any other country really, although the GP doesn't care about those.
This was explained in the other post which I will reproduce here:
"looking at history of the US, the only time the people at the top ever gave any semblance of crumbs to everyone else was when they knew they were in deep trouble and were forced to part with whatever little they could give to calm the masses.
Think of Medicare, Social Security etc. We saw it again with Obamacare. The country was in a rage so out came the bare minimum. Elimination of barbaric things like pre-existing conditions in exchange for guaranteed income for the insurance companies. Absolute breadcrumbs but it was something.
We just need something like that on a worldwide level. Maybe China rising will finally put pressure on the US given that the EU never amounted to much more than being a US vassal state."
We saw the best of the US system during the cold war. The system had to prove itself. Im not advocating for communism nor Chinese style fascism just more competition.
The third world is already taking advantage of this situation. Nearly every country in the global south has been negatively damaged by the US or Europe at some point. They don't have many options other than to tough it out and hopes the West leaves them with whatever scraps they can get by. If they got too powerful, then the West topples them over. See Pakistan or Bolivia as a recent example. Now China has entered the scene and it has provided the ability for countries to start playing the US and China off of each other to see what they can get out of both countries. Djibouti and its military bases is a small example but we see it with countries like Brazil and Pakistan as well.
How would this help the middle class in the US? Well if the elite in the US start to think they will lose out they will start to enact change that will bring the middle class up to snuff in order to better compete...and lets be honest for a moment, whatever they say goes.
The US isn't going anywhere. In fact China has serious structural problems that may make all this conversation pointless. But there needs to be some sort of pathway for the global south to move forward. If that involves having China rise up and then countries accepting that all they can do is play the US and China off of each other to get the best deals out of them then thats still a step forward. If climate change comes to pass it may not even matter. The US and the West is the cause for the majority of the historical pollution yet its the unprepared global south that will bear the worst brunt of climate change. So the best I am advocating for is that the global south take one step forward and hope they don't end up five steps backwards in the long run.
>The GP says that they don't want to prop up foreign lifestyles because the middle class in the US is struggling but isolationism in the 21st century will not make things better for the US middle class. Nor for middle class of any other country really, although the GP doesn't care about those.
As to improving the middle class, we need to understand the structural reasons why they are sinking. Decades of erosion to US institutions has led to a situation that can only change if things get really bad and the citizens really demand change..or the US elite are challenged with some real competition. I dont see how it can happen naturally in the US anymore. Every time people get fed up, there is a "release valve" or a distraction in the form of crumbs offered to people so that enough settle down or fixate on something else. We saw it after the "Occupy Wall Street Protests" with the beginning of the culture wars as well as the passing of Obamacare which eliminated the most barbaric provisions of health care in the US. It is not meaningful change but it calmed people down. This method will lead to decades of the elite retaining their leverage. I dont want to see my life pass before my eyes and no real reform ends up happening.
In terms of the second method of having the elite being challenged, We saw in the cold war how the US system had to prove itself and that led to a strong taxation on the wealthy, good institutions, positive movement for the middle class, all to show the Russians that the US led system is the best. There currently is no forcing function to return to that situation at this time.
I don't think anyone sane thinks that Russians or Chinese masses have it better in economic terms. In fact, the message of Russian propaganda including its American extension is that everything sucks everywhere.
Uh did I say anything of the sort?
When the Cold War was going on the communist system was initially out producing and out maneuvering the US but eventually the fallacy of a communist (and subsequently fascist takeover of the government) made it inevitable that it was going to fail.
However during this fight between the two powers, the US saw great advances in the prosperity and rights of its middle class. As the USSR started to fall, we saw the beginnings of corporate takeover of all layers of the US government and it really accelerated after the USSR fell. You are making this argument that the US had it so good while ignoring how it got so good and also failing to acknowledge why it has declined so much over the last few decades. If you don't buy my argument then I challenge you to provide an alternative explanation.
Thats what we have seen historically. People always demand improvements. The leadership of this country hasn't actually done it until they really have a pissed off populace at their doorstep. I wouldn't believe it if it weren't for the historical precedent.
>What's the point in this accelerationism with allies as casualties then?
Americans should be first in line when it comes to who the government serves but if you just look at the US government's actions vs other governments in the west, the US government clearly does not have their citizens interests first and foremost.
Think of all the rights and regulations the EU(or hell even many third world countries) have vs the US.
It manifests itself in so many ways:
Some easy examples demonstrating small issues as well as big ones:
1. EU countries mandate physical addresses for VOIP number registration. US spends years not implementing its half assed regulations Result: Americans are drowning in spam calls
2. EU negotiates drug prices as a government and refuses to pay more than a specific %. Companies would rather get something vs nothing from the EU market. US despite being the largest market, refuses to negotiate as a government even though they have a universal health program(for seniors only but thats a different issue). Result: American made drugs are sometimes up to 10x more expensive in the US than elsewhere. A vial of insulin in EU: ~9$ USA: ~99$
3. US sends its Navy to patrol world seas, ensuring flow of goods. Result: EU does not meet required 2% of NATO spending and instead funnels that money into social services like subsidized colleges. Result: US citizens either drown with a lifetimes worth of college debt or take a chance in the Military for subsidized college after giving up 4+ years of their young adult life serving their military contract while EU citizens graduate debt free and take a gap year traveling instead.
I can go on for literal dozens of examples. I specifically chose to go from small to big to show that the problem is systemic and permeates all aspects of American life. In many ways the American system is one giant scam and they only people benefiting are people who have managed to survive in the upper echelons of the income stratosphere or are foreigners.
If the US changed its focus to be more inward, it can focus on rebuilding manufacturing which would increase jobs availability and give more power to workers which would lead to other rights for the common man such as demanding more from the government to help US peoples among many other examples.
On one hand, there are specific things that the US _could_ stop doing: not selling arms left and right, and bombing third countries. Maybe you might not call that a meaningful change in the "post-WW2 world order" – but we'd argue that's the case, since it has been a consistent feature of the post-WW2 world order.
It's also a very big leap to assume that the middle class of any country would suffer after whatever is assumed here happens. Why would you assume that Russia and China not be interested in that? Moreover, why would you assume that Russia and China would _not_ want "trading, industry, technology and education" in the absence of great power competition?
But it is all moot in the world of today where the US competitors are not providing alternatives for people to strive for. Russian propaganda of "everything sucks" works wonders to keep Russians docile and it will work wonders to keep the US middle class down as well, ending Pax Americana will do nothing to change that.
I disagree, Americans just vote for that. Yes, we can talk all day long about the two party system, winner takes all, the electoral college and unfairness of everything being decided on the margins, but when the rubber hits the road, talk is cheap, action is what matters and a solid half of Americans has been consistently voting for the US government to put the interests of rich people first. The US as a whole is a beneficiary of globalism and it's on the Americans to decide how to distribute the gains, allies are not at fault.