On 3/16/2024 at 1:44 PM, Enrico_sw said:

Mega-corporations love feminism, it helps them enslave women in BS jobs and crush the family to get more consumers. This is woke trash.

 

 

Yeah, feminism and the myth of the independent woman that "can have it all" (in reality only some make it, the others fail) and shaming women that put family first plays in quite well in procuring a new labor supply.  I think that is why corporations like to signal their support for this. The Sex and the City 'Dream' so to speak, and the sad myth of the average woman eventually getting a lifestyle like a hollywood celebrity...

 

On 3/16/2024 at 1:19 PM, Enrico_sw said:

 

 

Since the 2010s, there's a big folly in the West (especially in the European Union): very stringent regulations within our countries and free trade with countries that have close to zero regulations (China, India, etc.). This is the recipe for de-industrialization.  The Left is holding this view and wildly so. Parts of the Right (including Trump) see the folly and impact of it.

 

That's why our agricultors have been protesting in France in the past months. They're smothered by regulation while cheaper and less qualitative products come from overseas freely.

 

The biggest problem is "free trade".  It absolutely ruinous in a way that economists who are miseducated under the neoliberal paradigm do not understand.  When all of US industry disappears and instead goods from Mexico and China are imported, the American people lose not only tens of millions of jobs but the entire infrastructure and capability to make essential goods in the first place.  Then the people are impoverished and have to live on credit, hand to mouth and are unable to form families, raise more than 1 kid, stimulate local economies and create communities, leading to vicious cycle.

 

Both in North American and Europe the birthrate dropped massively only to be replaced by illegal and legal immigrants.  The white woman birthrate dropped by 1-1.5 children in these countries. 

 

The complete loss of countless industries since the 1970s means that Americans can no longer learn how to make such things, let alone create multinationals.   Also a society needs to have a jobs for all types of people, not just people who want to rot inside of cubicles and in front of computer screens. 

 

White collar work is physically/psychologically unhealthy and unnatural & mentally ill to an extent.

 

And it's not like multinationals are necessarily selling manufactured products cheaply, much of it rips off the consumer with a high profit margin.

 

This is why half of the US is looking more like a 3rd world country than a 1st world.

 

 

On 3/20/2024 at 9:50 AM, Enrico_sw said:

This is how Russians see the Americans. Interesting.

 

 

Why should we care what Russians think of anything? A country outside of the top 50 in quality of life rankings. Yeah, that's what we should all aspire to be.

2 hours ago, SympathysSilhouette said:

 

Why should we care what Russians think of anything? A country outside of the top 50 in quality of life rankings. Yeah, that's what we should all aspire to be.

 

I agree that Russia is far from being perfect. I'm happy to live in France and not there. But that doesn't mean they can't formulate valid criticism on us.

 

France (and I believe the West) in the 90s was a paradise, but we've been going downhill since then. The Zeitgeist causes an obsession for race, gender and all these other nonsensical issues. It's destructive and divisive. We used to be more united. That's a weakness. They exploit it.

If you look at what happens (even in Belgium), people are less and less happy every year, while we are getting more and more "woke". It's not just a correlation, it's causation.

Those rankings always appear to have a political bias.  They put nordic european countries on top even though they have extremely high taxes and it's freezing (eg. Finland sweden etc) and have low birthrate.  It's probably because they have less % poor people.  Japan/South Korea are strangely ranked so high when they have extremely dysfunctional work culture, high social pressure to conform, and young people are too poor to make families. 

 

UK is a really screwed up country too and it gets ranked high- basically if a country is in NATO or allies (considered friendly to the West) and has Nordic policies it gets ranked high and the other countries are sub-human lol.

 

Russia and China are in a completely different camp, they are industrialized countries that have a lot of relative monetary deflation and also don't have the debt problems of the West.  Their PPP is several times higher than nominal gdp IIRC. I know that in Russia much of the economic activity is off the books and the cost of fuel & goods is several times lower than the west.  Also in China manufactured goods are very cheap as they produce everything, similar to what it was like in America when it was industrialized.  Both also have traditional family values.  

 

Alcoholism seems to be a massive problem in Russia, they have a large male to female life expectancy gap.

 

 

 

25 minutes ago, Cult Icon said:

Those rankings always appear to have a political bias.  They put nordic european countries on top even though they have extremely high taxes and it's freezing (eg. Finland sweden etc) and have low birthrate.  It's probably because they have less % poor people.  Japan/South Korea are strangely ranked so high when they have extremely dysfunctional work culture, high social pressure to conform, and young people are too poor to make families. 

 

UK is a really screwed up country too and it gets ranked high- basically if a country is in NATO or allies (considered friendly to the West) and has Nordic policies it gets ranked high and the other countries are sub-human lol.

 

 

I agree. A 100%.

 

26 minutes ago, Cult Icon said:

Russia and China are in a completely different camp, they are industrialized countries that have a lot of relative monetary deflation and also don't have the debt problems of the West.  Their PPP is several times higher than nominal gdp IIRC. I know that in Russia much of the economic activity is off the books and the cost of fuel & goods is several times lower than the west.  Also in China manufactured goods are very cheap as they produce everything, similar to what it was like in America when it was industrialized.  Both also have traditional family values.  

 

Alcoholism seems to be a massive problem in Russia, they have a large male to female life expectancy gap.

 

True. Alcoholism is Russia's biggest problem. Putin recently took measures to cheapen Vodka's cost (I guess it helps to keep the population obedient...)

 

Eastern women are very attractive, because they're both beautiful and have traditional values.

+ Russia launched a large missile & Geran drone strike on Ukrainian energy infrastructure today (ukraine claimed 155 projectiles against 133 structures).  The biggest takedown was a hydro plant in Z-city.

 

+ Also a terrorist attack in a Moscow concert hall killed a claimed 40 people and injured 130 more.  The footage shows men in military gear gun down civilians with automatic weapons, they also detonated incendiary devices to collapse the roof of the building.

 

US / Ukraine denied their involvement, ISIS claimed that it is responsible 

 

It's literally a re-enactment of this scene from COD:

 

 

14 hours ago, Enrico_sw said:

 

The Zeitgeist causes an obsession for race, gender and all these other nonsensical issues. It's destructive and divisive. We used to be more united. That's a weakness. They exploit it.

 

What I have observed since the Obama years is that in the US there used to be powerful "family values" politics (coming from conservatives) and "middle class" politics- either bipartisan or democrat.  It then suddenly took a bizarre turn towards WOKE during the final years of Obama.

 

The middle class/family values politics got completely swamped by WOKE politics which was a pretty awful trade.

On 3/20/2024 at 7:40 AM, Enrico_sw said:

 

 

The Left is the prime destroyer of the industry in the West, because of a) their strong regulations in the West and b) their push for free trade with countries that have zero regulations (like China).

 

For decades it was the Left that defended the Unions and the Right that weakened industry, Trump's message has shifted alliances and times have changed.

 

This is one of the most interesting works on economics I've ever read.  It is interesting more as a historical and political-economic artifact though.

 

 

JKG was a highly influential public intellectual at the time and his arguments for the Democrats are very insightful, which included his defense of having a strong, diversified industrial base.  JKG imho was correct but his message has fallen on deaf years decades since.

 

 The thing that struck me the most is how in the 1960s he and other intellectuals (philosophers, sociologists etc.) had optimistic yet ultimately very false visions of the future.  They were from a time where Americans had a baby boom and a massively expanding middle class.  They took this recent history and believed that it could continue, that almost all Americans would have at least a middle class standard of living (home, 2-3 children etc) and people would become much more enlightened and civilized.  They even believed that one day, it was possible to even reduce working hours to 20 a week, and use the free time for enjoying social life and the arts, and one's true calling.  Government would work achieve this vision. 

 

This was coined the "Great Society" and was used by President Johnson in his legislative efforts.

 

They were ridiculously wrong as this dream has never happened 60 years later and the middle class instead has weakened so much since the 1990s and the quality of life went towards being far more dysfunctional/dystopian and anti-human.

7 hours ago, Cult Icon said:

+ Also a terrorist attack in a Moscow concert hall killed a claimed 40 people and injured 130 more.  The footage shows men in military gear gun down civilians with automatic weapons, they also detonated incendiary devices to collapse the roof of the building.

 

 

 

 

I read claims that U.S. intelligence passed on intel that suggested such an attack might be imminent? Or was that inaccurate reporting?

17 hours ago, Cult Icon said:

 

What I have observed since the Obama years is that in the US there used to be powerful "family values" politics (coming from conservatives) and "middle class" politics- either bipartisan or democrat.  It then suddenly took a bizarre turn towards WOKE during the final years of Obama.

 

The middle class/family values politics got completely swamped by WOKE politics which was a pretty awful trade.

 

That's how I see it as well.

15 hours ago, SympathysSilhouette said:

 

I read claims that U.S. intelligence passed on intel that suggested such an attack might be imminent? Or was that inaccurate reporting?

 

The warnings stuff I have seen before, it happens every so often.

 

1. US immediately try to distance itself and claims that Ukraine didn't do it.

 

2. Russia reported that they captured 4 of the muslim terrorists and claims that they are foreigners from Tajikistan & were trying to escape to Ukraine, there is social media footage of an AK-12 lying on the ground which is a Russian weapon.  Their state officials are trying to link them to Ukraine.

 

3. Some Ukrainian propaganda claims that Putin! killed his own people in order to escalate the war in Ukraine (2nd round of mobilization)

 

I'll wait until the dust settles....

Quote

‘Stellar Blade’ Director Rejects Criticisms Of Lead Character’s Sex Appeal: “I Don’t Want To See Something Normal; I Want To See Something More Ideal”

https://boundingintocomics.com/2024/02/09/stellar-blade-director-rejects-criticisms-of-lead-characters-sex-appeal-i-dont-want-to-see-something-normal-i-want-to-see-something-more-ideal/

 

This guy is awesome. Koreans and Japanese games are going to crush Western games if Western studios keep bending the knee to the woke mob.

 

Screw the ESG score. Long live free games!

 

Images have appeared, the Russian militarized police chased down the get-away car and shot up the wheels, then captured them on foot.

 

1 guy appears to be in a coma, the other 3 have been beaten.  

 

There is confirmed footage online that one of the Chechen militarized policemen cut off the ear of one of the suspects and put it in his mouth., the other man had his pants pulled down and appears to have been tortured.

 

Overall not very professional treatment of these terrorists, even if they are mass-murderers.

 

Death count claimed as 137 plus 182 injured, pretty much worse than almost all US mass shootings.

 

"Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba stated that Russian forces launched 190 missiles of various types, 140 Shahed drones, and 700 glide bombs at targets in Ukraine between March 18 and 24."

 

The Russians will probably raze the fortified city of Chasiv Yar with guided bombs in time.

 

The Russian space program created a new space rocket and revealed it recently.  It looks like going forward, Russian cosmonauts will not work with the US-Western nations to the degree that they did before.  It would be ironic if one day they create a new space station with Chinese, Persians, & North Koreans..

On 3/23/2024 at 6:12 PM, Enrico_sw said:

 

That's how I see it as well.

 

The main problem with the right wing right now is that they don't have any coherent ideology and vision of the future to move forward to after the previous ones failed.   Very sad.  The problems in the US are pretty obvious and there are obvious solutions to them but nobody (left or right) wants to talk about it because they are busy with other topics.

 

There used to be neoliberalism and then neoconservatism and now it's just the party of Trump and being anti-Woke & anti-left.  While the anti-woke is a necessary countervailing force it is fundamentally defensive.

 

The extreme focus on social issues and culture helps corporations, government, and the super-rich laugh their way to the bank as they get away with ripping-off the bottom 99%+.

 

20 hours ago, Cult Icon said:

 

The main problem with the right wing right now is that they don't have any coherent ideology and vision of the future to move forward to after the previous ones failed.   Very sad.  The problems in the US are pretty obvious and there are obvious solutions to them but nobody (left or right) wants to talk about it because they are busy with other topics.

 

There used to be neoliberalism and then neoconservatism and now it's just the party of Trump and being anti-Woke & anti-left.  While the anti-woke is a necessary countervailing force it is fundamentally defensive.

 

The extreme focus on social issues and culture helps corporations, government, and the super-rich laugh their way to the bank as they get away with ripping-off the bottom 99%+.

 

 

This is true. A couple of years ago, I thought that environmental issues would unite people, it turns out it divides them now.

 

Maybe it's alright that people are divided, as long as something productive eventually come up. It's not exactly the case right now.

 

For a long time, I considered that American economists had invented some of the greatest concepts. Antitrust laws are particularly genius IMO, but they aren't really applied anymore. Big corporations (especially big tech) are too powerful, but I don't see this as a sustainable situation.

On 3/16/2024 at 10:16 AM, Enrico_sw said:

@Stromboli1 have you seen that?

 

 

Yep, GG2 is upon us! Gamers are the one group that doesn't play around. Too bad a lot of the development studios have been infiltrated/infected with the woke mind virus.

@Enrico_sw  As expected there is no analysis of "Divide and conquer" on wikipedia for 'current day'  !

 

Divide and rule - Wikipedia

 

"Divide and rule policy (Latin: divide et impera), or divide and conquer, in politics and sociology is gaining and maintaining power divisively. This includes the exploitation of existing divisions within a political group by its political opponents, and also the deliberate creation or strengthening of such divisions."

 

 

Elements of this technique involve:

• creating or encouraging divisions among the subjects to prevent alliances that could challenge the sovereign and distributing forces so that they overpower each other.
• aiding and promoting those who are willing to cooperate with the sovereign
• fostering distrust and enmity between local rulers

In politics, the concept refers to a strategy that breaks up existing power structures, and especially prevents smaller power groups from linking up, causing rivalries and fomenting discord among the people to prevent a rebellion against the elites or the people implementing the strategy. The goal is either to pit the lower classes against themselves to prevent a revolution, or to provide a desired solution to the growing discord that strengthens the power of the elites.