"Many Americans have a feeling of disillusionment with the world and a belief that the rest of us have taken advantage of the United States over the decades since the end of the Second World War."
Reminds me of a great truth about us humans... we'll exhaust every imaginable cause before looking inward. Americans have been unhappy for a very long time... unhappy people lash out a lot.
Standing up to Trump like Carney is doing will definitely attract the eye of Sauron. Trump is obviously not used to this and very much needs Canada's behavior to be punished so it won't spread. Hopefully the author is right and other nations will stand up also. Not doing so will just lead to the dissipation of Western society. No biggie.
"J.D. Vance, Pete Hegseth, Marco Rubio, and Mike Johnson have all sold their souls for power and position." It's chilling to watch old quotes from Vance and Rubio where they warn about the dangers of giving Trump power. They truly have abandoned their principles. Mike Johnson and Hegseth never had any to start with.
The track record of failure, the ("squirrel!!!!) attention span, self-referential reasoning(?) are all on display. I suspect some strategic analysis (a discipline, a process) ... what the kids call game-theory these days, has been applied to decisions.
Trump is a vulgar, egotistical, self-serving, not very bright bully who has exposed the military and moral weakness of the West more by bombast than design. To be fair, take note that the serving members of the Republican Party like serving member of the Liberal Party readily abandon principle in the interests of holding political power. "These are my principles and I have others should you not like these".
The theory is that America has been fubarred by Trump ( true ) and will take a generation to recover. Canada just went through a decade with the worst and most destructive PM in our history, but " magically " in a year we have been put on the right path and saved by Carney. If we can do it in 2 years why can't the US with the election of a SANE POTUS?
It is very reassuring to hear my opinions of what the US has become confirmed. They're gone. Regardless of what happens in at least the next 6 Novembers, the US as we knew it is dead. Whether it can save itself and reestablish the rule of law remains to be seen. Having destroyed the world order, Trump has now set us on a path to seriously damage the global economy. The world has shifted beneath our feet. We aren't ready for what's coming...again.
American political leadership doesn't need to be as stupid, parochial, and short-sighted as it's been in the 21st century. I grew up seeing presidents like Reagan and Bush who understood the values of allies, trade, and international relationships. They put emphasis on those things because they understood that they benefited America in term of security and economic growth. Then along came Clinton, more interested in the navel-gazing of domestic politics while missing important opportunities to lead and shape a post-Cold War world. Bush slipped into more nativist, chest-thumping, unilateral behavior in reaction to the 9/11 attacks. Obama's oddly anti-American view thought that not only did America not have anything special to offer, American efforts to lead were actually the source of a lot of geopolitical discord. And then there's Trump, who views the world as if he's a mafia don dealing with rival mafia dons in China and Russia.
What Americans have been offered by their politicians is either a poorly-articulated case for continuing internationalism that's largely an autopilot-driven extrapolation of the work done by a previous generation of internationalists running through Bush 41, or a short-sighted jingoistic nationalism that's been gaining strength since Pat Buchanan espoused it to challenge Bush 41 in 1992. The consequences of which policy is followed takes a long time to manifest, and the trends are a lot longer than 2- or 4- year American electoral cycles. Americans have been slow to perceive the negative effects of Trump-style approaches, just like the allegorical frog in a pot of water slowly being brought to a boil.
The fact that Canada is standing up to Trump's approach is making Americans notice what's going on. That's potentially useful for a would-be internationalist American leader who can use it to steer away from the Trump approach and back onto a more positive path. In some ways, Canada is staging an intervention for American politics addicted to a toxic populist approach. Hopefully Europe and others join in to make it easier for America to kick the habit before it does too much damage.
"Many Americans have a feeling of disillusionment with the world and a belief that the rest of us have taken advantage of the United States over the decades since the end of the Second World War."
Reminds me of a great truth about us humans... we'll exhaust every imaginable cause before looking inward. Americans have been unhappy for a very long time... unhappy people lash out a lot.
Standing up to Trump like Carney is doing will definitely attract the eye of Sauron. Trump is obviously not used to this and very much needs Canada's behavior to be punished so it won't spread. Hopefully the author is right and other nations will stand up also. Not doing so will just lead to the dissipation of Western society. No biggie.
"J.D. Vance, Pete Hegseth, Marco Rubio, and Mike Johnson have all sold their souls for power and position." It's chilling to watch old quotes from Vance and Rubio where they warn about the dangers of giving Trump power. They truly have abandoned their principles. Mike Johnson and Hegseth never had any to start with.
Frodo and Sam defeated Sauron at Mount Doom.
The track record of failure, the ("squirrel!!!!) attention span, self-referential reasoning(?) are all on display. I suspect some strategic analysis (a discipline, a process) ... what the kids call game-theory these days, has been applied to decisions.
Trump is a vulgar, egotistical, self-serving, not very bright bully who has exposed the military and moral weakness of the West more by bombast than design. To be fair, take note that the serving members of the Republican Party like serving member of the Liberal Party readily abandon principle in the interests of holding political power. "These are my principles and I have others should you not like these".
The theory is that America has been fubarred by Trump ( true ) and will take a generation to recover. Canada just went through a decade with the worst and most destructive PM in our history, but " magically " in a year we have been put on the right path and saved by Carney. If we can do it in 2 years why can't the US with the election of a SANE POTUS?
It is very reassuring to hear my opinions of what the US has become confirmed. They're gone. Regardless of what happens in at least the next 6 Novembers, the US as we knew it is dead. Whether it can save itself and reestablish the rule of law remains to be seen. Having destroyed the world order, Trump has now set us on a path to seriously damage the global economy. The world has shifted beneath our feet. We aren't ready for what's coming...again.
American political leadership doesn't need to be as stupid, parochial, and short-sighted as it's been in the 21st century. I grew up seeing presidents like Reagan and Bush who understood the values of allies, trade, and international relationships. They put emphasis on those things because they understood that they benefited America in term of security and economic growth. Then along came Clinton, more interested in the navel-gazing of domestic politics while missing important opportunities to lead and shape a post-Cold War world. Bush slipped into more nativist, chest-thumping, unilateral behavior in reaction to the 9/11 attacks. Obama's oddly anti-American view thought that not only did America not have anything special to offer, American efforts to lead were actually the source of a lot of geopolitical discord. And then there's Trump, who views the world as if he's a mafia don dealing with rival mafia dons in China and Russia.
What Americans have been offered by their politicians is either a poorly-articulated case for continuing internationalism that's largely an autopilot-driven extrapolation of the work done by a previous generation of internationalists running through Bush 41, or a short-sighted jingoistic nationalism that's been gaining strength since Pat Buchanan espoused it to challenge Bush 41 in 1992. The consequences of which policy is followed takes a long time to manifest, and the trends are a lot longer than 2- or 4- year American electoral cycles. Americans have been slow to perceive the negative effects of Trump-style approaches, just like the allegorical frog in a pot of water slowly being brought to a boil.
The fact that Canada is standing up to Trump's approach is making Americans notice what's going on. That's potentially useful for a would-be internationalist American leader who can use it to steer away from the Trump approach and back onto a more positive path. In some ways, Canada is staging an intervention for American politics addicted to a toxic populist approach. Hopefully Europe and others join in to make it easier for America to kick the habit before it does too much damage.
To the author...
Thank you for the kind words, Sir!
Nothing makes standing up to an asshole easier than a friend's support.
"...he seems to admire more than anything else (probably because he hankers after the absolute power their leaders have)."
...so he doesn't have to hear the words, "No, Donny", which cause so much emotional dis-regulation and hurt to the little narcissist inside, lol.
HEAR HEAR