Even stronger case could be made that no matter how weak is traditional European feudal system, it is excellent in suppressing peasant rebellions. There is no case in recorded European history of peasant revolt even slightly endangering TPTP (unlike China).
See the ease how even the most extensive revolts were put down. And they were, by Chinese standards, not very revolting at all.
edit: links linked properly
Eetan
10mo ago
Since Iran could not protect its borders, yes Iranian borders do not matter.
When China starts openly sabotaging American military infrastructure and assassinating people on American soil with impunity, it would be clear that US superpower days are over and it is now just ordinary third world shithole country.
Eetan
11mo ago
If you are really wealthy, you do not have to care how you appear to the plebs at all. The middle classes must care about their appearance, bums and billionaires are free.
Eetan
11mo ago
The population decline in Middle Earth in Third Age is explicitly due to apocalyptic conditions - constant war, orc and other monster infestation and plagues spread by Sauron (the Shire is one of few places exempt from this general shithole state).
Not what OP intended.
Eetan
10d ago
I find it weird people don't have those qualms about PTSD. But then again we refused to believe it was a thing for a long time.
There are still holdouts who refuse to believe. Not only cranks, but as esteemed HBDIQ rationalist adjacent people as Greg Cochran (his argument: "There was no PTSD in ancient Rome").
Tartaria
Tartaria is the perfect product of late Soviet and post-Soviet decay and disappointment.
"No, we are not decrepit shithole that is laughingstock of the world! We wuz khans, and tsars, and sultans, and pharaohs, the whole world once belonged to Great Russian Tartarian Horde!"
The fact it is, beyond all expectations, gaining fans in the West, is significant.
tulpas
Nothing mysterious about self induced schizophrenia, and, seen from the outside, nothing particularly enjoyable either.
edit: link
Eetan
3mo ago
Rome succeded in Romanizing the people it ruled beyond the wildest expectation, Gauls and Hispanics speak Latin to this very day. Goths, Vandals, Saxons etc were never ruled by Rome.
Eetan
3mo ago
Yes. Great power should be able to easily overrun small shithole country in three day special operation (and then get bored by decades of guerilla warfare and go home).
The implications of late Eastern European events are:
Either Russia is shithole country too or Ukraine is Great Power too.
Eetan
3mo ago
Those who could fled the country
"Laptop class" from big cities with passports and money, and large numbers of them since then returned, when they were less than welcomed in the West and their cash ran out. Thank NAFO types, well done.
Eetan
3mo ago
I had no idea who Ian Carroll was
Someone with 1,2 M Xitter followers is not exactly nobody.
Here is his Xitter and his Youtube channel
Eetan
10mo ago
'the political structure founded after the War of Independence and the constitution's ratification'
Is long dead. US of 2020's has less in common with US of 1790's than USSR of 1980's had with Russian Empire of 1750's.
But if we define it as 'the Global American Empire's globohomo Deep State as it exists in 2024', the situation is pretty much the opposite.
Yes. The Elite Human Capital overwhelmingly supports GAE, both ideology(as far as we can talk about one) and practice.
Why shouldn't they? The system works for them, life of EHC is as good as it could be. Exact opposite of Soviet elite, who knew they were miserable beggars compared to their Western counterparts.
Open defections are so far rare. The peasants are getting more restive, but what can you expect from dumb rednecks.
This is more like USSR in 1930's, not in 1980's (of course, modern EHC is far from Bolshevik party hardened in revolution and civil war).
Eetan
11mo ago
How the heck does "procuring a shooter" even work? Much less the coordination or the concealment, but I'm still stuck at step 1. Like, if you're going to arrange an assassination, wouldn't you be relying on someone other than someone barely out of his teens, both to be successful as well as to not tell anyone?
If you are arranging a conspiracy, the man with rifle in book depository (or on roof of the building) is a patsy, his job is to be seen and leave a corpse, the real shooter is professional on grassy knoll (or first floor of the building). Of course, successful conspiracy requires successful marksmanship.
Eetan
10d ago
If you want to find most accurate crime statistics, look at crimes people have to report for insurance purposes, and this means crimes against cars.
If someone robs you on the street or burglarizes your house, you can just let it slide. If your car is gone, not so.
Far more accurate metric than murder - many people would not be missed by anyone if they went missing. Very few cars.
Eetan
3mo ago
That’s blatantly not true, though.
This is blatantly true, and getting even more true every day. Ruled based order is order of permanent gangrenous wounds that will never heal.
North vs South Korea. Armenia vs AZ. North vs South Cyprus. Israel vs Syria and Lebanon. India vs Pakistan. Etc, etc. There is no active shooting war for most of the time, but there is no peace either, and no hope there will ever be one.
For comparison, see, for example from 19th century, war of 1870. War ended with great victory for Germans, great humiliation for French. France lost two provinces, lots of cash and honor.
What happened afterwards? Peace. Bad feelings remained, but diplomatic relations were restored, French could travel to Germany and vice versa, no walls and barbed wire on the borders. Not thinkable today.
Not that I would expect Russia to pull out in shame.
Do you expect the relationships returning to normal, do you expect the "international community" recognizing that things are back as they were in 2014, only Russia got little bigger.
No. End of the war would mean permanent ceasefire and permanent DMZ, permanent walls and mine fields watched by killer robots. Good for nature and wildlife, not for anyone else.
Eetan
3mo ago
What does a durable peace treaty look like these days?
Nonexistant. In the Rules Based Order, wars never end, at best you get cease fire and permanent demilitarized zones.
Eetan
3mo ago
Increasingly, Americans won’t do physically difficult low status work at all.
Well, the solution is to make the work well paid, and high status. Let Hollywood make flood of movies about brave and manly construction workers and vegetable pickers.
Yes, Soviet efforts to do this completely failed, but Hollywood is Hollywood. If you can make cool and prestigious as hard, dirty and dangerous profession as cow herder, you can do anything.
Eetan
3mo ago
What is the significance of October 6, 1973?
Eetan
3mo ago
My experience has been that normie conservatives basically all hold that Hitler and Stalin were equally or near-equally bad, and that fascism and communism are equally bad.
Yes, normie cons always held this view, and now normie libs hold it too (even more so due to current events in Eastern Europe).
On the left people will absolutely argue that communism is good
"left" as online people with hammer and sickle (and often rainbow, trans and Palestine flags), not as anyone remotely close to respectability.
occasionally you get someone who will argue that Stalin, while very bad, wasn't as bad as Hitler
Yes, this is the other mainstream respectable academic view. The 50's are over, you will not any more find Stalin's admirers in the academia and respectable professions(excepting Grover Furr)
Including professed Marxists like Zizek, here is his take on difference between Stalinism and Nazism
(most people would see killer who forces you to bow before him and lick his boots before he kills you as not lesser evil than ordinary killer who just does the deed withou any ceremony, but YMMV)
Eetan
3mo ago
In this thought experiment, how do you square 'unprecedented GDP growth' with 'ten bucks per hour'?
In this thought experiment, the growth is unprecedented compared to other white countries. Compared to rich blacks who live in big houses, drive big cars and sit in comfy offices doing nothing, your life of menial labor is rather miserable, always had been and always will be.
Eetan
3mo ago
recipes for Bolshevik revolutions multiple times over
Not exactly. Recipe for Bolshevik revolution is poverty, hunger and unpopular war that is not going well.
Maybe around 2030 in MegaBlackPill timeline, when US casualties in Iran and Yemen get to six figures, while economy crashes and both man made and climate change caused disasters hit major food exporting areas of the world simultaneously you might have a chance to see something.
Eetan
3mo ago
From Red perspective, this makes sense. Not many foreigners or green card holders are involved in Red protests and activities, even if the Blues gained the upper hand again and wanted to use this precedent.
Eetan
3mo ago
Why is LGBTQ so important for liberals in terms of foreign policy?
Good question.
To steelman it in proper hardcore IR realist style, it is about (Blue)American Empire acquiring permanent class of supporters, collaborators and fifth columnists world wide.
What were German minorities for Third Reich, what were Communist sympathizers for Soviet Union, LGBTQ+ are for Global Rule Based Order. And unlike these, they are permanent presence. You can get rid of ethnic minority, you can get rid even of ideological/religious minority if you are willing to get dirty, but LGBTQ+ are born every day. Even most hard core regimes would balk at gulaging/executing 5% of population in every generation, for forever.
Yes, this sucks if you are LGBTQ+ (or suspected to be one) in unfriendly territory, but it rocks if you are GAE.
Eetan
3mo ago
Mainstream? As in, I'll turn on CNN and see it?
When respected university press publishes book by Germar Rudolf, respected reviewers call it "stunning work" "scholarship of the highest calibre" "book that enduringly changes what we see" and the book is awarded many prestigious prizes, you could say that Holocaust revisionism had gone mainstream.
Eetan
10mo ago
why not some volunteer brigades.
There are already volunteer brigades, with no earth-shattering results.
And once the coffins sent back home start being Western Europeeans and Americans,
As long as in the coffins are professional mercenaries who signed for the job, no big deal.
Depends on definition of "golden age". Time of peace? Time of prosperity for average person? Time of great scientific/literary/art creative genius?
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