Russia vs. Ukraine Part 2

[BigRed]

to Mitch, the Bidens and everybody else skimming off the aid, I can believe that.

wait a sec I thought russia already lost

Not until the maximum amount of funds has been extracted from American taxpayers.

 

[JettaKnight]

The USA alone used to be 40%+ of global GDP. We have fallen a very long way.

We didn't fall, so much as others have risen.

 

[JettaKnight]

I did not post it because I trust China. I posted it because the world is not standing with Ukraine.
Not even all of NATO countries are. BRICS certainly are not and they make up more of global GDP than all NATO countries combined. The idea the whole world is against Russia is propaganda.

Brazil,  Russia, India, China, and South Africa aren't supporting Ukraine?

Shocked.

 

[smokingman]

We didn't fall, so much as others have risen.

We can not even make our smart weapons without chips from Taiwan or South Korea. We are a country dependent on others to produce the things we need. That is falling/digging a hole,not others rising up.

...we did it to ourselves.

 

[DragonGunner]

Regarding Reagan speaking with Gorbachev, it seems to be forgotten that Reagan QUADRUPLED the national debt to do so! When he entered office our national debt was about $1T. When he left it was about $4T. He spent them into massive economic destruction by increasing our military capacity far beyond what they were able to match, but they tried. Then they collapsed.

It was on the brink of collapse that he met with them, when they were crippled. He basically punched them in the face with a KO and they stood there staggered for a few years before falling over.

Regarding inflation we are going to have this for some years to come. It is being caused, in part, by a really good restructuring of our supply chains. We are decoupling with China and rebuilding manufacturing in North America. Mostly the US and Mexico. That said, it will take time and money. This money is helping to cause inflation.

The baby boomers are now at over 50% retired. They were the largest demographic generation in American history. There were so many of them they pushed down labor costs. They are being replaced by Gen X (that's me.) We are the smallest generation in recent decades. As there simply aren't enough of us to replace those olde codgers labor costs will go up. That is contributing to inflation.

Also as the boomers retire they are going to move some of their money out of the volatile stock market into more secure holdings. This will reduce, to a point, the availability of capital for investments and loans. This will contribute to inflation.

Regarding egg prices, see avian bird flu. Our chicken population has been severely reduced.

Soaring US egg prices put pressure on consumers, businesses

Chickens may not be able to fly very far, but the price of eggs is soaring. A lingering bird flu outbreak, combined with soaring feed, fuel and labor costs, has led to U.S. egg prices more than doubling over the past year, and hatched a lot of sticker shock on grocery aisles.

apnews.com

I believe that once we reshore production, adjust our workforce, and adapt to newer financial trends we will be far better off in about six (6) or seven (7) years. This corresponds to new production and the millennials hitting the workforce in numbers.

On top of all this Covid sped up unavoidable trends. People decided to retire early. Things shut down for a time that have never started up like the were before. In person meetings for example.

We are living through a great change that will present challenges to some and opportunities to others. To avoid the first and exploit the second will show wisdom.

Regards,

Doug

Well I stopped reading after Reagan. We were actually well under $1 trillion when he took office and he is the first to take it into the trillions. Raising and spending far more than any president in history. No one else has ever came close. So you’re right just off on the amount. Of course Raegan proved he was anti gun and pro choice but anything was better than Carter. So everyone believed his lies, few really knew and to this day many remain ignorant of the man.

 

[JettaKnight]

We can not even make our smart weapons without chips from Taiwan or South Korea. We are a country dependent on others to produce the things we need. That is falling/digging a hole,not others rising up.

...we did it to ourselves.

That was simply a choice to buy critical components from the cheapest source and abandon our own manufacturing ability in favor of other activities.

And it was dumb.

 

[DoggyDaddy]

abandon our own manufacturing ability

Right. We fell.

 

[JettaKnight]

Why am I eating time on something so far away from the topic?

Oh yeah, it's INGO.

Right. We fell.

The original statement was how the U.S. lost in it's overall world percentage of gdp. Our GDP has risen, not fallen, but emerging countries rose faster.

(rough numbers here) The U.S. is under 5% of the world population, and still is about 20% If the world's GDP. To think that we should be holding to 40%, which had was in the midst of WWII if ever (am I wrong?), is absurd. (Anyone have a source for this 40% number?)

If you want to make the claim that outsourcing labour and manufacturing helped those emerging nations, well, I don't think anyone can deny that.


Now you want to talk chips? My daily life life involves chip shortages. Let's agree we fell on that the strategy.

 

[DoggyDaddy]

Why am I eating time on something so far away from the topic?

Oh yeah, it's INGO.


The original statement was how the U.S. lost in it's overall world percentage of gdp. Our GDP has risen, not fallen, but emerging countries rose faster.

(rough numbers here) The U.S. is under 5% of the world population, and still is about 20% If the world's GDP. To think that we should be holding to 40%, which had was in the midst of WWII if ever (am I wrong?), is absurd. (Anyone have a source for this 40% number?)

If you want to make the claim that outsourcing labour and manufacturing helped those emerging nations, well, I don't think anyone can deny that.


Now you want to talk chips? My daily life life involves chip shortages. Let's agree we fell on that the strategy.

Yes, I do think you're wrong. When we moved from a manufacturing based economy to a service based economy, that was the trigger for the decline. When they talk about how many jobs are added, blah, blah, blah... it means nothing if those jobs are flipping burgers, waiting tables, serving Starbucks coffee, etc.. Show me job increases in manufacturing, construction, etc.. Show me increased exports, and lower imports. That's meaningful.

 

[BigRed]

Yes, I do think you're wrong. When we moved from a manufacturing based economy to a service based economy, that was the trigger for the decline. When they talk about how many jobs are added, blah, blah, blah... it means nothing if those jobs are flipping burgers, waiting tables, serving Starbucks coffee, etc.. Show me job increases in manufacturing, construction, etc.. Show me increased exports, and lower imports. That's meaningful.

Much skill and intellectual know how has been pissed away over the past several decades.

 

[smokingman]

Why am I eating time on something so far away from the topic?

Oh yeah, it's INGO.


The original statement was how the U.S. lost in it's overall world percentage of gdp. Our GDP has risen, not fallen, but emerging countries rose faster.
Take out inflation,and look again.
The U.S. is under 5% of the world population, and still is about 20% If the world's GDP. To think that we should be holding to 40%, which had was in the midst of WWII if ever (am I wrong?), is absurd. (Anyone have a source for this 40% number?)
1960
If you want to make the claim that outsourcing labour and manufacturing helped those emerging nations, well, I don't think anyone can deny that.

and helped destroy our middle class

1960 we were 40% of global GDP

The U.S. Share of the Global Economy Over Time

As of 2019, the U.S. made up almost a quarter of the global economy. This chart shows how the U.S. Share of the global GDP has changed over time.

www.visualcapitalist.com

https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/USA/united-states/inflation-rate-cpi 1960-2023(mind you they have adjusted how it was calculated on average every 3 years).

The topic is the war in Ukraine,and possible war with China. Economics plays a very large part, we learned that lesson once and collapsed the soviet union. Things seem to be heading the opposite direction this time.

 

[snapping turtle]

We can not even make our smart weapons without chips from Taiwan or South Korea. We are a country dependent on others to produce the things we need.

...we did it to ourselves.

Rant on (INGO follows my rants well)

Taiwan makes the semi conductor wafers now I believe down to 2 microns That ability was stolen from the USA over many years and taken back to Taiwan to start TSMC limited in the late 1980's. IBM Texas Instruments intel all hired out chipmaking by the 1990's why because the edge they needed came from the chips made better by TDMC limited on the ideas they had and gave away to others.

Send over your smartest people let the USA colleges enhance the brain hire them to improve your USA business and don't be surprised if their country starts a company to do what you do better than you can because it is state sponsored business. Hire back the countrymen who knew how to do it better and fund them fully until the business is profitable.

Making the wafers and semiconductors is a foundry service that is very expensive to start up and must be changed around every time a chip production drops a micro size. It tied Taiwan to the USA in a way that was and is a bind that helps both countries. We would not be talking about keeping China from invading them if they did not have the chip factories. When TDMC limited starts it's plant in Arizona how many smart college educated Americans will they hire to work for them to improve their line and process. I would venture to say zero.

What is not stated is these powerful wafers do nothing without the code and software to make them do the functions that are required to place "warheads on foreheads" and so far many of the companies that code to that degree are hiring foreign workers at lower pay than American workers. They will in time return to the country they came from and the country will hire them to code to drop "warheads on forehead's " also.

Who do we have to blame for all this. Hmm Sam Walton of Walmart fame who's company told American companies they had to meet a price to sell at Walmart and Walmart had a factory in China to make it. (Snapper mowers said no) most said yes. No snapper mowers at wal mart. Check wall mart.
Do we blame the hmm average American consumer for buying the cheaper Walmart mower and saving 100 dollars while the mom and pop mower company that sold snapper mowers was forced to close when Wally World opened down the street. Check American consumer (and most of us here on INGO)
Do we blame hmm Gordon Gecko from the movie Wall Street who told us all that greed is good. He waited until snapper mowers lost the wall mart contract fell onto hard financial times because American consumers bought they cheap mower and the local shop that also bought snapper mowers was out of business. Gordon bought snapper sold off the pieces and then sold the name to a Chinese multinational to make the new snapper mowers. Check Gordon
Do we blame US presidents who thought for different reasons (environmental finance economics or a hate of the land they represent ect) that trade agreements that sent that dirty manufacturing out of our country. Yes check every president since 1976.

I purchased 2 Polytech AK 47's in the mid 1980's for 259 fiat dollars each with 2 30 round mag and a 75 round drum and 5k rounds of ammo. The shop basically sold them to me at cost because (nobody wants to buy that Chinese made junk so I have to move them out to recover my money. My cousin and I were impressed with the quality for the money we spent but by that time soldier of fortune magazine touted the arm and they basically sold out quick and then we had a ban. Why do I mention this because it taught me that China can make quality items and banning them was the only way to compete in the market. If quality AK's could be purchased from the Chinese military complex. Who would have bought a 800-900 dollar colt AR if you could get a AK three mags and 2500 rounds for 259.

I try to only buy from USA but **** it is hard and expensive. I have kinda had to give up (more like forced to give it up).

People think they vote every two years or four years. I vote everyday with my wallet. If it is local or locally sold i by from them first. My wife wondered last Easter why I did not eat the ham she bought. Smithfield is now a Chinese company and I did not eat it. (I did eat some Smithfield bacon but it is bacon and was cooked and I don't know if my will was that strong)

Enough rant for now. (Rant off)

Second rant on: (more a rallying call to INGO)
Think. Exercise your "NO" muscles. Vote everyday with your wallet. Become a producer not a consumer. Let people know why you do what you do. Plant that seed in their mind that maybe one day grows into them doing something like you do or wondering why they are not doing what you do.

Second rant off

 

[BigRed]

The free market works...when the market is let alone to trade freely.

Unfortunately, we do not have a free market.

We have markets manipulated by centralizers and idiots. Bane of Hell are the centralizers and control freaks. May they return to the pit in which they were spawned.

I am a strong believer that free markets are good, just as I am a strong believer that centralizers are the scum dredged from the deepest pit of Hell.

 

[BugI02]

Reagan would have understood that Russia is not going for Ukraine, but rather what is on the other side of Ukraine, that being Poland and Romania - both NATO members.

IF Russia is allowed to get through Ukraine we will have a direct conflict with Russia and then there will be a direct nuclear threat to the continental United States.

This does not mean that I disagree with the China issue, except to say that they are not a military threat in any real way. We should remove their most favored trade status and disconnect trade from them, the sooner the better, but to ignore the Russian threat represents a perilous misjudgement.

Regards,

Doug

I disagree with your assessment. Russia began the hostilities with Ukraine when its access to a major and important naval base was threatened, resulting in the annexation of Crimea. We could abandon Subic when asked because we had many other naval bases to utilize. Russia does not have that option

The issue of Ukraine becoming a NATO member and possibly hosting western missile/interceptor systems only worsened the situation, as this is largely analogous to the Cuban missile crisis for us, with it's issues of minimal time of flight due to launch proximity as well as enhanced ability to intercept Russian missiles in the boost phase which destabilizes MAD

Like the US in Afghanistan and Iraq, they made a grave miscalculation; but strategically I understand why they did what they did

 

[flyingsquirrel]

Zelenskyy tells allies "Hurry Up". Per ABC World news. Are they mad at him or what?

 

[jamil]

So now we trust the word from China?

I seriously don't understand why so many conservatives are more in love with the communist then with America.

Why do you keep getting everything wrong?

 

[nra4ever]

 

[jamil]

Why does he want to take money from our pockets to put money in their pockets? I can see wanting to help a nation keep its sovereignty and fight aggressors trying to take it. But this is going far beyond that mission.

Again I ask the people who favor this, do you have a limit? Is there no number too high, or no end to your willingness to sacrifice other people’s resources.

What’s next? We gonna help Ukrainian parents fund their kids’ college? Maybe we should buy them all electric cars. Ukrainians must like to vacation. Won't you support sending them money to take a cruise? No? You ****ing bigots. How heartless of you not to spend your own children’s future on the whims of war torn countries.

 

[KellyinAvon]

I looked at the second one and expected to see the familiar Babylon Bee logo.

 

[bobzilla]

Why does he want to take money from our pockets to put money in their pockets? I can see wanting to help a nation keep its sovereignty and fight aggressors trying to take it. But this is going far beyond that mission.

Again I ask the people who favor this, do you have a limit? Is there no number too high, or no end to your willingness to sacrifice other people’s resources.

What’s next? We gonna help Ukrainian parents fund their kids’ college? Maybe we should buy them all electric cars. Ukrainians must like to vacation. Won't you support sending them money to take a cruise? No? You ****ing bigots. How heartless of you not to spend your own children’s future on the whims of war torn countries.

If that’s the case I now identify as Ukrainian. Where’s my free m4, ammo, retirement and law?