It would be deeply ironic if Trump's Iran war moves up the worldwide time table to full electrification by 2-3 years. Someone should look at the amount of electric vehicles sold in March vs. February.
Politicians always try to sell us the story that America is just the world's reluctant peacekeeper, only fighting when we absolutely have to. But if you look at our actual track record—from Vietnam to Iraq—it’s pretty obvious that's a lie. Leaders in Washington are just really good at making power grabs sound like noble fights for human rights, all while our wars end up killing hundreds of thousands of innocent, everyday people in the name of "freedom." The mendacity occurs regardless of which administration we have, imperial ambitions never die, only the people we purport to save. Poorer countries will suffer from our actions and for what, an illusion. There are no nukes in Iran there were no WMDs in Iraq and there was no domino that fell after Vietnam. When you stop and look at the sheer amount of death left behind, you realize our foreign policy isn't really about being the good guys; it's mostly just a giant machine that inflicts a massive amount of suffering to get what it wants.
"That will simply reinforce the notion of America as a force for chaos — a bully who jumps in, smashes things up, and leaves others to deal with the consequences. It will be very hard to shake that reputation, even after Trump is out of office."
He was absolutely incensed 4 weeks ago when Bluesky Leftists said something similar.
Trump won't care about what happens to the European or UK economies. He enjoys seeing people suffering when he doesn't agree with their government's policies. And then he blames the policies for the suffering regardless of the evidence that it's probably not them but him that caused it. It's as if he sits down, thinks what the right thing would be to do in any given situation, then works out what the exact opposite of that would be in every conceivable respect, and does that. American contrariness combined with German precision.
It's my sincere hope that American voters realize how the stumbles are self-inflicted, as Noah pointed out. Trump received a goldilocks economy with high employment and rapidly falling inflation near target levels... and then he screwed things up with tariffs and now the ill-conceived war on Iran (not to mention insanity like threatening to invade Greenland). Given Trump's strong disapproval from independents, it seems a lot of people are aware of this now, but I'm still bitter that so many decided to roll the dice and vote for him anyway. Harris would have continued the recovery just fine without the lunacy the whole world has to suffer from now.
In my view, this war was absolutely necessary, but the way that the administration has handled the messaging and diplomatic side of it has been positively shambolic.
I don’t really get the “Iran’s government is as strong as ever!” Narrative. It feels like wishcasting. People started saying this literally on day one. “It’s been hours and the IRGC still hasn’t fully collapsed! *unbelievably smug face*
That article you linked was from March 12. If we were three years into a one week war that’d be fine, but that article is from one week into a barely over two week war, that was supposedly expected to last 4-5 weeks.
It’s disheartening that literally nobody seems capable of being honest about anything that’s going on. Everyone is still stuck in the “if I believe it then it’ll come true” phase.
Of course we will come out of the war O.K.; that's what we do. We sit on here our own, bordered by hitherto friendly neighbors, oceans away from our military adventures and inexhaustible proxy wars. Only the kids we send out to fight get killed and maimed. Our generals don't, and our leaders never do. But we kill a lot of other people, all around the world, in the name of freedom, and I can assure you, human nature being what it is, they never forget, and rarely, I suspect, ever forgive. Would we forget, much less forgive, if someone bombed our town, killing our children and neighbors? Really? America iis a young, incredibly fortunate place, but its lack a history hides the centuries of bloodshed mankind has endured. We have not had to live with the viceral consequences of the likes of the 30 Years War or the Taiping Rebellion, & etc. At least not yet. When we are done killing, we just hop on our planes' helicopters, and ships and come home to safety. The closest we've come was our Civil War war, and damned if we are not heading that way again, figuaratively if not literrally--largely because we didn't learn our lessons in that conflict, and half of the country has neither forgotten nor forgiven its losses nor taken responsibility for its causes. But then again, it appears that this is what we do. God have mercy on us (because no one else will).
It would be deeply ironic if Trump's Iran war moves up the worldwide time table to full electrification by 2-3 years. Someone should look at the amount of electric vehicles sold in March vs. February.
https://www.autonews.com/byd/an-asia-ev-demand-surge-iran-conflict-0324/
Good guy Trump 5d chess to do an end run around the gas car lobby, I guess.
Politicians always try to sell us the story that America is just the world's reluctant peacekeeper, only fighting when we absolutely have to. But if you look at our actual track record—from Vietnam to Iraq—it’s pretty obvious that's a lie. Leaders in Washington are just really good at making power grabs sound like noble fights for human rights, all while our wars end up killing hundreds of thousands of innocent, everyday people in the name of "freedom." The mendacity occurs regardless of which administration we have, imperial ambitions never die, only the people we purport to save. Poorer countries will suffer from our actions and for what, an illusion. There are no nukes in Iran there were no WMDs in Iraq and there was no domino that fell after Vietnam. When you stop and look at the sheer amount of death left behind, you realize our foreign policy isn't really about being the good guys; it's mostly just a giant machine that inflicts a massive amount of suffering to get what it wants.
There may be no nukes, but there's a hell of a lot of uranium enriched a hairs-breadth away from weapons-grade if the IAEA is to be believed.
> So it’s worth asking why we’re doing this war at all.
Oh man, you are so unfair!
"That will simply reinforce the notion of America as a force for chaos — a bully who jumps in, smashes things up, and leaves others to deal with the consequences. It will be very hard to shake that reputation, even after Trump is out of office."
He was absolutely incensed 4 weeks ago when Bluesky Leftists said something similar.
Trump won't care about what happens to the European or UK economies. He enjoys seeing people suffering when he doesn't agree with their government's policies. And then he blames the policies for the suffering regardless of the evidence that it's probably not them but him that caused it. It's as if he sits down, thinks what the right thing would be to do in any given situation, then works out what the exact opposite of that would be in every conceivable respect, and does that. American contrariness combined with German precision.
It's my sincere hope that American voters realize how the stumbles are self-inflicted, as Noah pointed out. Trump received a goldilocks economy with high employment and rapidly falling inflation near target levels... and then he screwed things up with tariffs and now the ill-conceived war on Iran (not to mention insanity like threatening to invade Greenland). Given Trump's strong disapproval from independents, it seems a lot of people are aware of this now, but I'm still bitter that so many decided to roll the dice and vote for him anyway. Harris would have continued the recovery just fine without the lunacy the whole world has to suffer from now.
In my view, this war was absolutely necessary, but the way that the administration has handled the messaging and diplomatic side of it has been positively shambolic.
I don’t really get the “Iran’s government is as strong as ever!” Narrative. It feels like wishcasting. People started saying this literally on day one. “It’s been hours and the IRGC still hasn’t fully collapsed! *unbelievably smug face*
That article you linked was from March 12. If we were three years into a one week war that’d be fine, but that article is from one week into a barely over two week war, that was supposedly expected to last 4-5 weeks.
It’s disheartening that literally nobody seems capable of being honest about anything that’s going on. Everyone is still stuck in the “if I believe it then it’ll come true” phase.
If wonder if Larry Summers was trying to teach his girlfriend pattern matching when he made that graph.
Of course we will come out of the war O.K.; that's what we do. We sit on here our own, bordered by hitherto friendly neighbors, oceans away from our military adventures and inexhaustible proxy wars. Only the kids we send out to fight get killed and maimed. Our generals don't, and our leaders never do. But we kill a lot of other people, all around the world, in the name of freedom, and I can assure you, human nature being what it is, they never forget, and rarely, I suspect, ever forgive. Would we forget, much less forgive, if someone bombed our town, killing our children and neighbors? Really? America iis a young, incredibly fortunate place, but its lack a history hides the centuries of bloodshed mankind has endured. We have not had to live with the viceral consequences of the likes of the 30 Years War or the Taiping Rebellion, & etc. At least not yet. When we are done killing, we just hop on our planes' helicopters, and ships and come home to safety. The closest we've come was our Civil War war, and damned if we are not heading that way again, figuaratively if not literrally--largely because we didn't learn our lessons in that conflict, and half of the country has neither forgotten nor forgiven its losses nor taken responsibility for its causes. But then again, it appears that this is what we do. God have mercy on us (because no one else will).
Fine, you pass, get out of my creative writing class already.
Huh?