Israel is being the very opposite of a force for stability in the region, which isn’t going to help the Petro-Dollar.

Israel being a destabilizing force gives the US leverage over the oil rich nations of the region. That’s why Israel is important for the petrodollar. I’m also not sure the US currently has a way to maintain its global economic dominance without the petrodollar. That’s in part why I think you see the US doubling down on support for Israel even in a context where doing so is increasingly risky.

The FT is actually a tad bit more reliable than more mainstream outlets like WaPo or the NYT. It’s targeted towards people in finance who want more matter of fact reporting and fewer opinion pieces.

I think you underestimate just how many people are in China and how much development actually needs to happen in order to meet their needs. The urbanization rate of China is still lower than most developed nations despite the massive amounts of construction they’ve done in recent years.

Why would I lie and why does what I said make you so angry?

I doubt the person you’re replying to would disagree that the advent of capitalism is in fact what brought liberal democracy into existence. The point though is that such progress is unsustainable under a capitalist system and that it will result in various crises, war, and fascism. Therefore we do need to find a way to move past capitalism if we want even the possibility of creating a better world.

Growth isn’t a problem when it’s sustainable. However, there are natural limits to how far and how fast technological development and resource extraction will allow us to grow the economy.

Additionally, competition within capitalism forces the wealthy to seek out any and all means of growth. If they do not they actually risk all of their wealth becoming devalued. This drives innovation but it also is the driver of imperialism, exploitation, environmental degradation, all of which grow the economy.

When growth because less attainable due to various natural constrains, the wealthy start to cannibalize the systems that keep society stable. Again, they can’t help themselves. If they don’t their class position is threatened as some other capital owner beats them to the limited profits that come from privatization and austerity.

This usually results in mass unrest across all the various classes in society. That includes some of the middle classes who also rely on exploitation to maintain their standard of living. In response to threat of social unrest, the wealthy usually align themselves with right wing authoritarians that claim to be able to bring order to the chaos and renew growth through imperial expansion. This kind of politics is often supported by some of the downwardly mobile middle classes. That’s how we get fascism.

How could you possibly come to think that Marx’s works are censored in China? Marxism is literally taught in schools there.

Rotating villain

Don’t worry, Biden just imposed tariffs on Chinese EVs so they can rest easy now.

It’s complicated. Chiang Kai-shek was a historical adversary of the CPC and is viewed as a traitor and war criminal in the PRC. However, his nationalist party, the KMT, is alive and well in Taiwan. The CPC currently favors the KMT even though they were former adversaries because the KMT advocates for deepening economic ties to the PRC.

With this context I’m guessing the KMT’s primary opposition, the DPP, wants to highlight the KMT’s fascist legacy while also conflating the KMT’s and the CPC’s expression of Chinese nationalism. Making that false equivalency is easier because of the KMT’s interest in building stronger economic ties with the mainland.

Western media usually frames issues from the DPP’s perspective which would explain the commentary in the article.

Good luck with that. The US is the world’s largest oil producer and therefore it has a vested interest in preventing the development of sustainable energy alternatives.

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Yes and no. Deng was definitely a strong advocate for market reforms. However, if you ask any Chinese economist from that era they would say reform was inevitable.

Also the strategies Deng advocated for were similar to the failed shock therapy programs that Eastern European countries underwent following the collapse of the USSR. In doing so he risked the stability of the Chinese economy.

That said, he also helped keep political control out of capitalist hands. That allowed China to course correct when some of their reforms induced economic instability.

Which by all indications was something he didn’t actually want to do in the first place. It’s just the west wasn’t ready to give up exploiting the people of the former USSR. If Putin allowed that to continue he would have likely lost his power just as Yeltsin had.

Sure but it’s always like one small step forward and two large steps back. Abortion was made illegal in many states. US domestic surveillance of its own citizens has increased dramatically and gone unchallenged. Housing and healthcare costs have continued to outpace wage growth. Inequality has increased unabated. Green energy remains woefully underfunded. I could go on.

That’s not really true if you account for the purchasing power of the dollar within the US. While Americans might benefit from cheap imported consumer goods, their housing, food, and healthcare costs are incredibly high when compared to other countries.

This nihilistic right wing nonsense is just an excuse not to attempt to build something better. It’s lazy thinking and deeply unscientific.

The CCP does not want to go to war though. They’re far more risk averse than most people seem to think.

Exactly. It’s clear they did not foresee how rapidly their economy would expand following economic reform. An aging population and declining birth rates are some of the many growing pains that they’re currently figuring out how to manage.

It’s not Islam that’s the problem. Rather the breakup of the Ottoman Empire and the partition of India were decisions made by western governments, primarily the British. It was a classic colonial tactic to set the interests of various ethnic and religious groups against each other in order to maintain colonial domination. The British were experts at it.

They no longer had the capacity to maintain an empire after WW2 but they still wanted to maintain some level of economic domination over their former colonies. As such, they made sure to draw borders and empower certain ethnic groups in such a way that it would almost guarantee future conflict. The US inherited this strategy and has been deploying it ever since.