We've been content for generations to allow the government to pick winners, though. The winners are those who can put together import mechanisms at the scale necessary to make that cost-effective.

It is not cost-effective to manufacture most goods in the US or Europe. Most of that is because of labor cost. We are happy to wear clothes made by cheap labor or drive cars or use smart phones made with materials mined or otherwise constructed using cheap labor. In many instances, this might even be slave labor.

In the '80s, it was the auto manufacturing industry getting the headlines for those practices - that was the beginning of the realization that our protection of individual rights had a cost (note: please don't take that to mean I think that was a mistake - it's a lot more complicated than that). More recently, it's about mining and energy production.

A lot would have to happen to bring back energy and materials security - to take those functions back from countries that do not see individual human rights the same way we do. This isn't an "oh, it sucks to pay $4 per gallon rather than $2 per gallon" issue, it's a security issue.

If we did that with manufacturing, we'd end up in trade/tariff wars that would further destabilize the world. China has become immensely wealthy very quickly building all this stuff cheaply. It would also be essentially an isolationist policy that would quickly bring even more harm to our own economy.

It all comes back to "what is a government" and why. What did the US get right that allowed such rapid advancement? We see what China has done right more recently, becoming the world's producers.

So what did we get right? I think it's the "we the people" concept, and essentially the implementation of laissez-faire economics. We refused to accept monarchy or dictatorship or a dear leader and we let individuals do their own thing as long as it didn't prevent other individuals from doing their own thing. We developed a complex form of government whose role was as limited as possible. We have a judicial system wedded to the idea that any restriction must be "narrowly tailored" to address a specific goal.

This system of checks and balances is supposed to give us the ability to react quickly (the House, budgeting, certain executive functions of the President) without losing the big picture and moving as slowly as possible (the Senate, the courts).

What did we get wrong? The obvious is the slavery issue. It's uncomfortable to talk about because that's so intensely personal to so many Americans today. I don't want to try, which doesn't mean I don't think about it and worry that getting past that is an unsolvable problem.

And now, I think we're getting it wrong with security. Aside from the "we the people" concept that a government creates an environment where individuals are free to pursue their own dreams, we have to have a defense. So we need concepts like an army for the outside, police for the inside - physical security. We need schools so that our children can learn enough to join us and pursue their own dreams - call it dream security, for lack of a better term. And we need energy security so that our army has the tools it needs to defend us and we have the best possible environment to maintain our standards of living.

So, what do we need to do to ensure we have that security? Unfortunately, continue the "arms race" ensuring mutual destruction. We might "meh" about the damage caused by a hypersonic missile with a conventional load, but we should note that the true value of this missile is evading defenses designed to prevent a missile with a nuclear load from hitting a target. It's a big concern if we want a world where no one thinks they can win anything by going nuclear. We need to keep upgrading and maintaining our military. And for those sensitive concepts, that means we need to keep mining many materials. Our current technology won't continue to work if we lose those supplies mined by countries that aren't necessarily our friends.

And we also need a reliable power grid, which means, for now, we need to keep drilling and adding capacity and pipelines and trains to move it around more safely and efficiently. That doesn't mean we forget that everything will work better if we stop burning fuel for energy, but for now, it's the only way to meet our needs. Getting Venezuela, Iran or even Saudi Arabia on our side not only isn't possible, but is still a short-term solution to a long-term problem. China and Russia sure won't stop adding capacity, why should we become more and more reliant? Europe is in more immediate danger because they are further down that path.

I wonder if perhaps its easier for an outsider to see what is going wrong in other cultures. From the outside looking in, maybe it's possible to zoom out. I come from the UK, and I know we have our fair share of problems. I have built a large number of friendships with Americans playing FOF over the years. So don't take this as a put down, but looking at America here is what I see...

Other countries look at the past 80 years and they hold grudges. Many fear America or are wary, exactly in the same way many fear or are wary of China and/or Russia. The history of conflict over the years doesn't always seem to fit within the good vs evil narrative.

I see respect paid to those 2,000 who died in pearl harbour from my American friends. Yet it seems nukes being dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki causing deaths, suffering and destruction to hundreds of thousands women and children is swept under the carpet. Dismissed as being down to "end the war" on an already beaten Japanese force. Putin could say he is trying to end the war right now, by bombing civilians in a more measure manor. We accuse Putin of war crimes?

Numerous wars there after right up until modern times. Honestly it seems the motives are questionable in many instances. I have no idea how neutral your media is, in the UK ours love to spin the good versus evil narrative. But clearly there are shades of grey. We are told the Russian military is attacking civilians, but we all know they could flatten cities in a heartbeat or use chemical weapons if they so desired. They are holding back. Invasions seems to happen when it suits us. It didn't seem to bother us a whole lot when close to a million were slaughtered slowly but surely in Rwanda by forces we could of stopped easily. We did nothing.

I would also ask how as a nation you would feel if Russia and it's forces set up shop on your border. Cuban missile crisis? NATO forces are doing exactly that in ex Russian states such as Latvia and Lithuania. They trust us as much as we trust them. What would the U.S. do if a joint Chinese/Russian force set up in Mexico?

I think the pride and sense of righteousness people have in their own countries is usually detrimental. It really clouds being able to exercise an ability to see situations clearly for what they are.

All that said of course what is happening in Ukraine is evil and wrong. But black and white? Probably not.

This is a pretty big "Yikes" comparison.

Yeah. We can't admit the US has done some morally objectionable things without then excusing that behavior from the Russians.

I think comparing WW2 to what is happening now as a pretty bullshit comparison.

I'd argue that the Ukraine-Russian war is as unsound as US's intervention into Vietnam and probably the Iraqi invasion under Bush W. But I would also state that the US meritless claim of WMDs, still didn't discount that Iraq had in some ways become a haven for al-qaeda which did do the biggest terrorist attack on the West ever.

The nation building was bullshit. The Iraq war was to destabilize and intimidate Iran and control oil investment. Afghanistan at least had a more credible proof of hiding Bin Laden for a time and becoming his base of operations. If the US had had any success there it would have been a sphere of influence against Pakistan and Russia, but most experts would've told you how fruitless it was. And let's face, Afghanistan's collapse to the Taliban was probably what Putin was hoping for with Ukraine.

I don't think the Ukraine attacked any Russian locations. The real reason why Russia invaded was because they were more Western influenced and should they become a NATO member, it would have had the enemy in Putin's eyes right at the front door.

It was not a justifiable reason to invade.

There is no both sides argument here.

Russia is deliberately attacking civilians. They are sending Ukrainian women and children back to Russia.

As I said in an earlier post, I believe Russia will grind everything to dust if they can't have it for themselves (A very Trumpian notion). And they will use nuclear weapons if need be.

I don't think there are any exits now. They'll continue to commit war crimes and atrocities until there is no one left to resist, or the West will step in and we'll have a new world war.

But spare me the "U.S. is just as bad" bullshit.

Whatever hate boner you have for Americans, being pro-Putin is not a good response. But it does say anything anyone needed to know about you.


I was bothered. You're not "bothered" by genocide? I realize it's not as entertaining as the British pastime of looking down at Americans and declaring their moral superiority at every opportunity.

I'm seeing more and more of this sentiment that it's somehow wrong for Americans to care about Ukraine because of things the American government did. It's frustrating, but not surprising.

I don't read pro-Putin. I see a lot I don't agree with and could try to discuss if it doesn't take us too far off-topic. But just because he's trying to discuss the grey areas within this issue doesn't make him pro-Putin.

No one should get blind support or blind condemnation. Sometimes, someone does something that is so far out-of-bounds that you can't think about the person without thinking about that act. I think Putin is at that level now. Hitler, Lenin, Stalin, Milosevic and Saddam Hussein were certainly there.

Putin's attack is absolutely brutal and far beyond what the US did in Iraq. In Mariupol, the goal is clearly to target civilians, reduce the civilian infrastructure to rubble, and send the people who haven't been able to flee because of the constant shelling to what hopefully isn't concentration camps, but looks like it might be something along those lines. The idea of grey areas also requires understanding the difference. That doesn't mean Bush was right to go into Iraq. I don't think he was. But our military was under orders not to target civilians and Russia is doing the opposite. I don't recall the UK refusing Bush - there were troops from quite a few countries.

Until Putin invaded Ukraine, he had the ability to open a reasonable line of discussion about Crimea and NATO. He had a legitimate beef regarding the Maidan rebellion. But reasonable people keep trying diplomacy - even sanctions on their end if no one is listening. Instead, Putin supported this long, pointless war in Eastern Ukraine for eight years, is still doing the same thing in Georgia, then lined up his troops and attacked the rest of Ukraine, where his only claims relate to a very limited historic context that just isn't true today and something everyone knows is false regarding Nazi control.

Now, all we will recall is that this butcher attacked an independent country and when his military couldn't seal the deal in the expected 72 hours, started trying to kill as many people as possible. I don't see this as an opportunity to bring Hiroshima and Nagasaki into the discussion. The Japanese might have been close to defeat, but they were still doing everything they could to prolong the war because surrender was not something that leadership would consider at that time. Not that we should be proud of the use of atom bombs, but I think if you had asked the numerous allies their take on that in the 1940s, you wouldn't have gotten "fear of the Americans" as a significant response.

I don't read it that way. It's not that it's wrong for us to care about Ukraine. It's that it's wrong for us to not care about other issues as much as we care about Ukraine. Not you individually or me individually, but us collectively as Americans/westerners.

It's not a case of whether we are 'bothered' by genocide in Rwanda, but a case of whether we do anything about it. Did it dominate the news, which is driven by viewer ratings, the way Ukraine does? Why is that? These are reasonable questions to ask.

I agree completely with Qwikshot (and pretty much the rest of the board) that it was not a justifiable reason to invade. At the same time you could call NATO 'closing in' a war by proxy, and we don't react with a ton of restraint when our interests are threatened. It's not as clear-cut as we pretend it is sometimes. There's nothing wrong with admitting that, and there's nothing pro-Putin about it.

No it isn't. It was called "shock and awe" for a reason.

Re: War Crimes, it does get to the point of intent, degree, legality etc. AND who won the war. Lots of fair debate about this Debate over the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki - Wikipedia. But your point is taken, if the US lost the war to Japan, it would have been a "war crime".

I think Hiroshima was a no-brainer. I am troubled about Nagasaki which occurred 3 days later. We could have let Hiroshima sink in for a little while longer IMO but generally okay with it considering the outcome.

IMO, does nuking the Hiroshima to explicitly to stop a war AND to stop the other country's war crimes for the greater good (talk to the civilians of China, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore etc.). Yes.


This happened after Mogadishu fiasco (93) vs Rawanda genocide (94). So no doubt that factored into the decision. Good news is we did intervene in Bosnia (95) to end that. So honestly, think this is a cheap shot at the US.

I think we've found out that wars can't be "stopped easily".


There is definitely grey for sure but the difference is Russia had other options than invading, the US didn't have an alternative in Japan after Pearl Harbor.

One of the big differences is which continent those two countries are on though.



I really don't want to weigh in on the Hiroshima argument, I've talked about it to death IRL. But the other question that tends to get left out of that narrative is; why did Japan bomb Pearl Harbor? The years leading up to both Pearl Harbor and Hiroshima are not black and white either.

Mogadishu Somalia is in Africa. We had every good intentions and then it went awry. No real strategic advantage, it was for humanitarian reasons.


It's that darn liquid goal and also to prevent a US response to Japanese manifest destiny goals.

Good lord.

Komsomolskaya Pravda, the pro-Kremlin tabloid, says that according to Russian ministry of defense numbers, 9,861 Russian soldiers died in Ukraine and 16,153 were injured. The last official Russian KIA figure, on March 2, was 498. Fascinating that someone posted the leaked number. pic.twitter.com/LHrBWIQ49z

— Yaroslav Trofimov (@yarotrof) March 21, 2022

Those numbers aren't that far off from the official Ukrainian numbers that are published daily

The Kyiv Independent on Twitter: "These are the indicative estimates of Russia’s losses as of March 21, according to the Armed Forces of Ukraine.… "

SI

I just learned today that Russia and Japan never declared peace after WW2 and still are technically still at war.

I would have hoped NATO would have told Putin that use of chemical weapons is a redline for them. Biden may have some intel that prompted Biden to speak out but who knows.

Also Biden warning of cyber attacks. Isn't that already a given?

https://www.usnews.com/news/world/ar...ons-in-ukraine

My work's parent company (Expeditors) has been under cyber attack for like a month now. They're a massive global logistics company, and I am curious if there is any kind of international/Russian connection, but they're not exactly announcing the details.

i mean basically anything putin says ukraine is doing, he does....same with trump and all reps really

It's really just leaving bear poop on their doorstep and running at this point...but still...

Yup, I think this is a good move. Ukraine will get EU membership which is best it can expect, and EU will be sympathetic in helping rebuild and also defend Ukraine in the future.

Don't know if this is enough face saving for Putin though.

https://apnews.com/article/russia-uk...73c314f8c2fa12

When this war winds down and things calm down, I can't imagine the quagmire it'll be for western world to start working with Russia again if Putin & cronies stay in power.

Politically. It'll be another cold war with China being a major factor.

Economically. Hey, we want to start selling Big Macs again, let's talk.

Socially. Believe majority of Russians support the invasion (at least in the beginning). There'll be a lot of defensiveness, acrimony etc. between neighbors, and friends & family.

Considering they lost about 10k in troops.

Word is that they are running low on troops number and are trying to recruit (I'm betting there aren't many takers).

Also their major tank facility shut down because of a lack of components.

The question for the West is that if there is a cease fire how fast do they get supplies and armaments to Ukraine to prevent a reoccurrence.

If Putin does pull back, how does he show strength? Does he plan to invade another country? If other nations pledge to join NATO does he attack again?

How fast does he attempt to kill Zelensky in peacetime?

I think it is a moot point. There won't be peacetime if Putin is alive.

I don't think so either. I mean, Ukraine can't really advance, so militarily there is no real threat to Putin. If he can't advance, he'll just keep shooting missiles. Does his best to deal with the sanctions, while cracking down internally as much as he needs. But without some sort of actual threat, I don't think you get a belligerent power to back down.

(At least not for a much longer time.)

Where I work, we just re-raised our Cybersecurity threat level this morning. It was high at the start of the war and sanctions. Then lowered for a couple of weeks. Now back up, as of this morning.

SI

The problem with the chip industry isn't needing subsidies. These companies are incredibly profitable. They just take their profits and buyback stock instead of investing in their companies. Any subsidies would just increase their profits more and increase buybacks.

To increase production, you'd have to either have the government make chips themselves or change tax laws.

Any subsidies I was suggesting would be tied to the creation of chips in country. Not just giving the money with no strings attached. The discussion was about bringing more vital production by to the States.

Sent from my SM-G996U using Tapatalk

A primary problem with chip production is crypto mining. That creates virtually unlimited demand. New component factories are being built to at least some degree, but that takes a while and there are many links in the chain. Ultimately though until something changes there will always be shortages and higher prices in that field no matter how much they produce.

Personally I wish people would realize how ridiculous crypto is as a currency (blockchain itself is a good and important development), but I don't see that happening.

I make distinctions between computer chips (and really anything else). There are those that are truly bleeding edge and others that are commoditized.

If bleeding edge or critical, keep production to US and close allies. If commoditized, go ahead and farm it out to allies or neutrals (e.g. I always see Malaysia stamped on the electronics whenever I look at my motherboard).

Vaccine research and production also. Vaccine research with close allies. Manufacturing & production with allies and neutrals.

Unfortunately, heavy crude that we need for the transportation sector still falls under critical.

Nike shoes, iPhones etc. who cares. If something bad was to happen to the supply chain, I can easily live without them.

4 weeks since the war started. Ukrainians are bad ass.

US warning that Belarus may very well start sending a lot of boots on the ground for Putin. This seems like an escalation, not sure what the NATO will do to counter other than send more equipment and provide intel.

I certainly don't want to come across as looking down on the U.S. Anyone who knows even a moderate amount of history knows the U.K. has no position of moral high ground.

I will say patriotism can be a cancer. It brainwashes people from making objective judgements. A very handy method of controlling us. The whole "we" business, them and us. It's holding us back as humans. But if we can all stop seeing ourselves as American or British, or Russian, blindly supporting the home team. Believing what you see and hear on TV without question, maybe then at that point we could start having a little more empathy for the other side. Perhaps seeing what they have done is awful, yet realising we have done the same in our history. Bridges need to be built or this won't end well for anyone.

This is really interesting. I don't think the US would sanction him anyway, but maybe Ukraine sees him as a middleman.

Ukrainian President Asked Biden Not to Sanction Abramovich to Facilitate Peace Talks https://t.co/rVgWd5XbQz

— Nancy Youssef, نانسي يوسف (@nancyayoussef) March 23, 2022

I guess at that point, why not just make it ourselves? If it's considered a vital resource we need for national security, we shouldn't rely on the whims of a few CEOs.

The standard answer would be innovation. Private companies are going to be more motivated to continue to innovate versus government employees. But you also know that people that always cry "socialism" are just fine with the government giving subsidies and tax breaks to private business. There would be weeping and gnashing of teeth if the government actually started opening factories.

Russian landing ships are burning in the port of Berdyanski.



US will take in 100k Ukrainian refugees. Western Europe should take the larger proportion and we help with $ but do think we can take in more. Estimated 3.5M have fled, about 10M total displaced out of total population of 44M.

So there's another Ukraine Charity Bundle out-this time from Fanatical. Has 57 games and 1 DLC if you donate $15 or more:


Stand With Ukraine Charity Bundle | Fanatical

That hasn't motivated them to keep the supply chain stocked. The private sector has failed in terms of chip-making, especially the American companies.

I'd also say that the chips we need most aren't the cutting-edge stuff you find in high-end graphics cards. It's the more basic, older stuff found in cars, medical devices, appliances, etc. That doesn't require the kind of innovation we pretend is coming from American companies.

Also, Japan and Korea were not impacted by this as much as we were. Their companies re-invested into their companies while American companies just bought back shares in their stock. Just saying that if we consider this a national security issue, we shouldn't be counting on companies that only care about pumping up stock prices for a handful of their top executives.

A tax credit based on the number of chips manufactured in the United States is way more likely to happen than nationalizing chip creation.

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I assume the US won't have much "shortage" other than higher prices. But I can see other countries suffering with real shortage (e.g. because US can afford to buy at the higher prices and price them out).

(Now if there was a true shortage of TP, there'd be an uprising)

Biden Says to Expect ‘Real’ Food Shortages Due to Ukraine War

Looks like the US will be supplying natural gas to Europe. But the 15B cubic meters is way less than what Russia is providing at 216B. So Europe will be dealing with the shortfall for a while.

https://www.bbc.com/news/business-60871601

The US & EU are fantastically wealthy. If they chose to tap into even just a little bit of the astronomical revenues generated as a result of their provision of safe & stable economies, they'd have more that enough money to ensure a) excess food production (which already happens in the US anyway), b) vast and quick improvements to building insulation where needed and c) ramp up of complementary renewable energy sources (e.g. solar & wind together). It's all a question of will, and we're going to see how far each bloc is willing to go to tap into all that wealth.

Is this Russia's anti-climactic way out?

Russia signals scaled-back war aims, Ukrainians advance near Kyiv

What is the West response sanction-wise if Russia just kind of runs out steam and scales things back?

They could also tap the massive amounts of Russian money that is laundered through their countries to pay for this. I still say that is what should be used to rebuild Ukraine after the war. I know it won't happen, but that makes the most sense.

That is a great question and I think it depends on if Ukraine makes concessions on Donbass. If they do, it gives western nations a path to back off a bit, which should further dampen the nuclear rhetoric, thankfully. If they do not make a concession on Donbass, it is still an active war and sanctions should remain.

Screw that, sanctions until they give up on Crimea.

Russian version of fragging. Wonder what happened to the driver.

Ukraine war latest: First phase of Ukraine war over, Russia says - BBC News

That's my guess. Keep some land that they do want and have civilian support, GTFO of rest of Ukraine, and call it a "win".

Crimea ain't returning to Ukraine. But I can see Ukraine not giving up on Donbass and trying to retake it. My guess is western powers will encourage Zelenskyy to take the easy way out if offered.

Nothing should change santions wise.