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Huawei arrest, US-China relations and effect on electronics industry
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raptor1956:

--- Quote from: beanflying on December 11, 2018, 04:10:19 am ---As I said it isn't about the money it is about the ongoing Hypocrisy.

The USA took us and other nations to war against the information and UN sanctions/compliance/mandate in the 2nd Iraq war. Using things like this gem "The U.S. replied by saying that the responsibility of proof of disarmament was upon Iraq, not on the UN or the U.S. Guilty because it suited the USA's agenda without proof or any evidence before or since. How many lives did that BS cost and is still costing?

Simple Trumpesque China, North Korea, Iran, Russia ..... bashing and brinkmanship isn't a resolution mechanism.

--- End quote ---


The blow-back from Bush/Cheney forcing the west to go back into Iraq is still with us -- the decision to go back is in my mind the single greatest foreign policy fuckup the USA has ever made.  We learned, only with the help of a Scottish newspaper, that the Bush admin was filled with members of the PNAC (Plan for the New American Century) that had been pushing to go back into Iraq since the mid 90's -- they seized upon 911 to convince the American people and other western nations that Saddam Hussein was part of OBL's terrorist group and needed to be taken out.  They fooled many but not all. 

In late 2001, November or December, I remember watching an interview with Admiral Woolsey, who I would later learn was a member of the PNAC, and his answers to the questions had my bullshit detector going off big time.  I don't remember who the interviewer was but this was not long after we (USA) had started fighting alongside the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan and after some initial problems we were making great progress and pushing the Taliban back on all fronts.  What I found odd was that no matter what the question posed to Woosley was he ignored it so he could resume talking about our need to go back to Iraq.  He'd be asked about our progress in Afghanistan and he ignored the question and would talk about nothing but going back to Iraq.

So, after the war in Iraq started and the story from the Scottish paper came out we then learned additional facts about what the Bush/Cheney admin and the PNAC team around them were doing -- within not weeks or even days but hours Rumsfeld was coordinating an effort to push the Iraq plan.

Once the strongman Saddam was out of the way the country descended into warring factions that ultimately lead to the rise of ISIS in the northern reaches and with the war now waging in Syria, a war also enabled by the turmoil in the region, ISIS was able to extend to the west and into Syria. 

All of that propagated the migration of millions from the region and that has resulted in the rise of right wing nationalists in many countries in Europe, east and west.

When asked if we should have gone into Iraq Cheney still says it was the right thing to do -- he'll never admit a failure of this magnitude nor his role in tricking the incompetent Bush into it. 

The Britts and others went along for the ride in Iraq but the French knew better and opted out.  If only we had listened to the French just this one time...


Brian
beanflying:
Our Prime Minister (Howard) of the time was 'shown the evidence of WMD's' before he committed a few thousand of our troops in his visit to the USA so we were there on day 1 and to this day still doesn't admit it was based on a lie or that uni lateral action was wrong. As you say the fallout is on going.

The Chinese have much better tools of war toward the USA than guns and that is what the bluster is all about.

Interesting read on the WTO vs the USA, China and who has made claims against who. https://theconversation.com/why-trumps-wrong-about-wto-treating-us-unfairly-102562

The US is still one of the most protected economies of the world and protesting other countries for doing similar is  :bullshit:
BravoV:

--- Quote from: beanflying on December 11, 2018, 07:01:28 am ---Our Prime Minister (Howard) of the time was 'shown the evidence of WMD's' before he committed a few thousand of our troops in his visit to the USA so we were there on day 1 and to this day still doesn't admit it was based on a lie or that uni lateral action was wrong. As you say the fallout is on going.

--- End quote ---

As foreigner, I'm wondering, why there is no any significant sign of voicing objections on that, like demonstration, or thru people representatives and etc until today ? Suppressed ?
beanflying:
Partly because he got dumped by the opposition party who rolled into power for a thing called 'work choices' giving way to much power to employers and other unpopular ideological 'reforms' this resulted in him losing his 'safe seat' in 2007 so was thrown from being PM to out of politics overnight  >:D

As a side player we were sold a lie by others is why I suspect we didn't as a nation see the need to lynch him personally in the Legal sense but he got his reward for not listening to the people in 2007 some of which was likely anti Iraq war related.
raptor1956:

--- Quote from: beanflying on December 11, 2018, 07:01:28 am ---Our Prime Minister (Howard) of the time was 'shown the evidence of WMD's' before he committed a few thousand of our troops in his visit to the USA so we were there on day 1 and to this day still doesn't admit it was based on a lie or that uni lateral action was wrong. As you say the fallout is on going.

The Chinese have much better tools of war toward the USA than guns and that is what the bluster is all about.

Interesting read on the WTO vs the USA, China and who has made claims against who. https://theconversation.com/why-trumps-wrong-about-wto-treating-us-unfairly-102562

The US is still one of the most protected economies of the world and protesting other countries for doing similar is  :bullshit:

--- End quote ---


There are two eras here with respect to the USA -- Before Trump and after Trump.  Tariffs are useful when there is disparity in wages, working conditions and environmental conditions but when there is little or no disparity there should be no tariffs.  In the absence of tariffs when one nation has much lower wages and less is spent on workplace safety and environmental controls the effect is to move production to the cheaper country which increases pollution because the product is no longer being made where compliance is tougher, it increases the injuries and death when workers have less adequate workplace safety controls, and it puts a downward pressure on wages in the more developed country.  All these things are evident and have been evident for decades.  OTH, there is little to be gained from applying tariffs when the two trading nations have a comparable standard of living, wages, and workplace safety and environmental controls EXCEPT when one country is cheating in some way.

The truly odd thing is that Trump is applying tariffs to nations with comparable economies and the only justification is when a nation is cheating in some way.  Much of Trumps actions are political in nature as he's playing to a base that's been shit on by multinational companies and are susceptible to demagogues like Trump. 

I hope we can weather the Trump admin, but, sadly, there is little hope the opposition will change its ways and we can expect more of the same if he's reelected.  To make matters worse the situation in the USA is not the only tragedy in the world as many other western nations are being swept up by nationalism.  So, Trump is our problem and his problem has ramifications beyond our borders, but Trump is not to blame for the rise of nationalism in the other western nations.  We went through this last century and it cost 60M lives -- the next time could be 10X that ... or worse.


Brian
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