They should take control. That's why it puzzled me why they are okay to get deindustrialized, are okay to destroy their nuclear plants, and are okay to rely on imports of natural gas from Russia
The idea might well have come from the Schroeder Government but he did not make the final decision. In fact, the idea of nuclear exit is an idea of the Greens, Schroeder was pandering to the Greens in his coalition government back in the day. (Schroeder being SPD ("socialist"), Merkel being CDU ("conservative") and the Greens being the king makers back in the day - 2002 elections).
One has to remember that it was different times: the Greens were a serious alternative to SPD and CDU, one of their main ideals (since their foundation) has been an exit from nuclear (generally). So once they came into power with the SPD and Schroeder, they were naturally keen on asserting their influence.
Schroeder needed an alternative power source so he started looking to Russia. Russia was a serious partner in Europe, not only for Germany but all of Europe. After the fall of the wall, the policy of Europe was Russian integration into Europe. Why? Because this policy of interdependence of nations within Europe brought peace to Europe. Interdependence is - within capitalism - best achieved via trade amongst nations. Hence Germanys (not only Schroeder but german industry too) decision to accept (more) cheap gas and oil from Russia. The Russians were keen to bypass Ukraine and deliver gas directly to Germany, hence the idea of building the Nordstream 2 pipeline - an idea supported by the Schroeder Government and most probably german industry.
The Nordstream 2 pipeline was completed in Merkels times but it was never brought online. Olaf Scholz (SPD) made the final decision not to take the pipeline online because of Russias official recognition of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions as Russian. It was bombed - destroyed? - by unknown persons during the current war in 2022.
The result of these events has been raising energy costs in Germany. Which has lead to disenchantment in the political system, which in turn has lead to a shift to the right in Germany and a raise in the AFD. Ironically, it has now come full circle with a CDU suggesting an easing (if not removal) of the "Schuldenbremse"[1] ("brake on debt") - meaning that Germany is not allowed to borrow money above a certain limit. A policy that has destroyed investment in the country and lead to an evasion to risk-taking. A policy introduced by the CDU back in 2009.
In the end, it is all rather academic since we're now here and pointing fingers at the past is pointless. We're now facing a populist president in the USA, a populist Kanzler (prime minister) in German and chaos in Europe and the World.
For me, it seems that good ideas are always the success of those that commit to those ideas, never those that actually had the ideas. Bad ideas, on the other hand, are always the fault of those that had the ideas, never those that committed to those ideas. Unfortunately hindsight decides between good and bad ideas.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_balanced_budget_amendme...
(1) Yes, there is the challenge of dark days with little wind, but there are many, many avenues to solve this one (better grid interconnections across Europe, green hydrogen backup plants, overbuilding cheap capacity, …)
Add on top the insane costs of building, maintaining, and waste disposal, nuclear power plants are, without subventions, just not economically viable. But keep on researching, there is interesting stuff happening in this space, and -- who knows -- maybe something moves the equation around.
What hindsight? Everyone knew at the time that it was premature. It was a deliberate choice to bear the burden of increased pollution and to make the country more dependent on the whims of a foreign dictator, because nuclear bad.
The phase out of nuclear had already started. Merkel reversed that, than in the wake of Fukushima reversed that once again, paying the nuclear companies hundreds of millions of damages in the process.
The Nord Stream pipeline was completed in 2011, the same year Merkel decided to accelerate the phase out of nuclear. The US had repeatedly warned against constructing the pipeline because of energy dependence on Russia.
Everyone knew that apart from coal Germany has no energy resources. Given that it wouldn't be possible to meet climate goals with coal the energy would need to come from either the newly constructed pipeline or renewables.
That the newly created energy dependence would give power to dictatorships may not have been at the forefront of the public's mind. But treating it as something unknowable without hindsight lets the politicians who caused this travesty off too easy. If Merkel had been honest to the public about the potential consequences of her decision, perhaps it would've been a part of the debate.
Started? The anti-nuclear movement has been around since the 70s.
You do realize that Germany is not allowed to do any uranium enrichment or waste processing? All of this was outsourced, partially to France, but primarily to Russia.
How is that not "dependent on the whims of a foreign dictator"
That's technically true, but France's representation is completely outsized in that, as the one country which went hard on nuclear it's got more than half the nuclear production of the continent: https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php...
And that's being down 25% from its historical peaks because a significant fraction of the park was offline for unscheduled maintenance due to corrosion issues (I believe the park's been ramping back up and should be back to full).
IIRC France is the number 3 nuclear electricity producer on the planet behind the US and China.
Power in Germany is expensive mostly due to gas and lack of storage capacity. Check back in four years when the storage capacity has gone up tenfold.
And storage is typically something thay doesn't scale, which is why Germany needs coal or gas to complement renewables. Polluting the rest of Europe while doing so.
Even the term of "renewables" is untrue, given the relatively short lifespan of most windfarms and solar panels. After 25 years you have to trash them, with no real way to recycle it.
Grid infrastructure requirements alone likely negates any ecological benefits given the amount of copper needed and the abysmal ecological conditions of copper mining.
If Germany were to split its electrical grid into two (north and south), as economists and the EU demand, things would be clearer.
The northern grid would produce more renewable energy than is required in total (hovering between 120-300% production vs usage). It'd have electricity prices around 10-15ct/kWh
The southern grid would have more pollution than even poland, as it's primarily fed with lignite, and would end up with an electricity price above 90ct/kWh.
The issues in Germany are not caused by technical or economical challenges, but by political ones. The southern states have passed laws to restrict renewables and limit construction of new power lines to gain favors with conservative NIMBYs and newage NIMBYs.
This is a widespread talking point that is more wrong than correct:
Germany did not shut down its nuclear reactors early. In fact, those reactors should have been shut down decades ago. They had been well past their intended shelf lives.
The decision to finally shut them down also dates back to Merkel during the Fukushima incident (2011). So the timeline to shutting them down wasn't exactly short either. The last nuclear reactors were shut down well more than ten years after the original decision was made.
What you can blame Germany for is not building new nuclear reactors. Germany hadn't built new nuclear reactors since Chernobyl - the last reactor to come online was in 1988. The influence of the anti-nuclear protests was strong enough to prevent the construction of new reactors but not enough to phase out the ones that existed. Instead Germany continued extending their runtimes over and over again because this was easier to justify politically (or rather because it was less obvious than building new ones).
So in other words: it took Germany from 1986 (Chernobyl) to 2023 to shut down its reactors. But it did so in an extremely irresponsible way. And it still didn't have proper plans in place like investing in grid infrastructure and storage necessary to expand renewables.
That said, nuclear power is overrated as the one thing it does well is constant stable energy production. But the problem in the modern grid is not not having enough energy, the problem is not having enough energy on demand. Renewables can provide enough energy but they are unstable. You need something to cover those dips and nuclear doesn't work for that because you can't really scale it up and down much. Storage would be ideal but for the majority of time since the reunion Germany has been under a conservative government which doesn't want to spend money on infrastructure maintenance let alone investments (let's see if this conservative government will do things differently as Black Rock Merz has been promising in between his anti-woke populism). But for the time being the only option Germany has is fossil.
All those options are currently non-viable because they are too expensive.
The problem is that the few dark days with little wind cost as much to produce as all remaining days of the year (and may even surpass it). Interconnections added to the problem, with worse long term allocation of hydro storage and increased volatile in the energy market. Market forces has been a direct hindrance, with citizens in practically every EU country demanding government subsidizes to solve the issue of energy shortage, rather then reducing demand.
Looking at a typical energy bill from northern Europe, you almost don't pay anything for hours when wind production is optimal. The cost of those hours are basically a rounding error and all you pay are grid fees. The issue is the average price are more than 20x of that, and the peak price are well over 100x.
The US has benefitted hugely by being the reserve currency, but that strength is also a weakness that can be used against them, but only if the other countries collaborate, which the EU is most capable of.
We have never had a weaker president that caused so many self-inflicted wounds.
This administration is shaping up to be self-immolation covered by the veneer of strength, for people that don't understand what strength is.
The small fraction of Silicon Valley that bent the knee to this narcissist wanna-be-king have shown themselves to be unbelievably weak too. It's surprising. I have lost so much respect for so many people over the past 6 months, but I fear much more for the future prosperity that we have needlessly destroyed.
Congratulations, you've been successfully propagandized to a point where you view people who don't vote the way you do as morally inferior. I'm sure that will help you persuade them in the future.
"This administration is shaping up to be self-immolation covered by the veneer of strength, for people that don't understand what strength is." Oh, so you know what strength is huh? Did you ever serve in the military? Do you even have friends who did?
Interesting that you ignore the fact that the previous president was mentally incapable of the job for increasingly long intervals as his term progressed, and was so incompetent on the Afghanistan withdrawal that he projected tremendous weakness that acted as an invite for Putin to launch a full scale assault less than a year later.
Biden did nothing for Silicon Valley, other than try to regulate AI to a point where only a small handful of massive companies had foundation models. Marc Andreesen didn't support Trump until AFTER the Biden administration bureaucrats met with him and told him they would ensure that they would only allow a small handful of foundation AI companies that they tightly regulated to exist. He was so horrified that he switched over.
The moral inversion it takes to claim that the people willing to stand agains the Valley's intense social conformity "weak" is also revealing about how brainwashed you truly are. You're just part of the mob, and if you lived in a super conservative place, you'd be part of that mob too. Freethinking requires courage, and I see none of it in the typical SV limousine liberal. Just a bunch of millionaires who hate the billionaires they envy.
Having said that, Biden was a pretty crap and useless leader. That doesn't mean the opposite of Biden is doing better. At least Biden did fairly minimal damage with his inaction.
Do I disagree with Biden's take on AI? Sure, but did they actually have any teeth to stop progress? China's progress in AI proves not.
You were very quick to blame others for being successfully propagandized. I suggest you point the same magnifying glass on yourself.
We dislike in others what we see in ourselves.
They are taking from the system, yes. They are people who receive welfare, not parasites. People who emigrate illegally have committed a crime, they are not themselves a crime , they are not themselves illegal. The most we could stretch to would be "illegally present people." But going further and calling a group of people "illegals" removes the human aspect from the conversation and is therefore quite literally dehumanising.
> People who look at such things with "horror" dehumanize the conversation
A conversation is not a human so this point comes across as absurd. Could you rephrase it?
> It is like they bathe themselves in weakness and virtue signaling.
This point comes across as a vaccuous ad hominem, could you rephrase it?
> They hide from how cruel the world is
I can speak for myself and say that I am very much not doing that. I couldn't be more conscious of the fact that the last time language like this was normalised it lead to the deaths of millions of innocent people. This cannot happen again. It is purely the incredible cruelty of this world that drives me to say what I am saying.
I think you're missing GP's point. It's "illegals" that's arguably dehumanizing. Similar to "blacks" or "the blacks" versus "black people".
I'm not saying that I necessarily agree with GP, but I've definitely picked up on racism from people who talk about "blacks" instead of black people, and the homophobia from people who talk about "the gays" instead of gay people.
The things they say consistently ratchet toward justifications for genocide rather than away from it, and that's how it works - one small step at a time, where people explain each one away as not that bad.
But each step is toward the day when you can say "... and therefore we must implement a final solution for the problem of illegals. I wish it didn't have to be this way, but they forced us to by poisoning and invading our country."
There are people who wait decades to legally get a visa, and all of the people who saunter over the border thinking they are above the law make a mockery of the people who do it the right way. While you keep imagining an unavoidable slippery slope to genocide, I will celebrate the return of the rule of law to immigration while making sure that it goes no further.
Where it becomes concerning is when this dehumanising language begins to creep in. When the administration begins talking about people as "vermin" it becomes very concerning.
Where the fear of Nazism comes in is when we see Nazi salutes and plans to move "the illegals" to purpose built camps outside of normal American jurisdiction in Guantanamo Bay.
We are closer than you think. All they need at this point is to start defying court orders and there are no more guardrails. None. They have the authority. They have the social permission structure. They have immunity from laws. They control the police and military. What's left?
If you disagree, please point to what would prevent this administration from carrying out a "final solution" against immigrants?
I'm just pointing out that the most plausible reason your fellow countrymen choose to call themselves "expats" wherever they go, is because the rhetoric in your country has dehumanized or made the word immigrants/illegal "dirty".
Not hard to imagine such rhetoric can lead to nastiness all around, ending even in violence against said group. If you don't mind that and see no problem with that, then of course there's absolutely no common ground for us to have any discussion on :)
Heh I guess you've never been subject to taunts such as "go back to your country illegal" or "you don't belong here!". Must be nice!
If you genuinely want to change my behaviour then please substantiate your claims, give arguments for the points you're making and speak to me like an individual rather than a hologram of whatever group you're projecting onto me.
I've read back on this exchange several times. I see that I am positing something about language and explaining my reasoning, then you're responding with cries about "word games" without saying anything of substance. Do you see the same thing? What are you trying to say and why?
I'm sorry that I assumed you belonged to a group on a political thread where everyone was trashing Trump. It was a dumb mistake to assume you are worried about the rise of the far right.
We don’t fight cruelty by sanitizing language or pretending reality isn’t what it is. We fight it by acknowledging hard truths and having the courage to address them honestly, not emotionally.
Illegals are your bikeshed.True moral and intellectual courage is needed on a different hill rn.
Dismissing an argument as “trivial” instead of refuting it is just a lazy way to avoid addressing uncomfortable realities. If this issue is so unimportant, why are you so bothered by it?
And what exactly is this “different hill” where true moral and intellectual courage is needed? You didn’t even say. Just throwing out vague moral superiority without naming a real issue is nothing but posturing.
If you actually have an argument, please make it. Otherwise, pretending hard conversations aren’t worth having is just an excuse to avoid them.
For example, whatever one thinks about US immigration policy (I think it’s utterly broken to the point of absurdity), a cursory attempt to figure out the approximate net number of illegal immigrants added during Biden’s tenure comes suggests that the net change was pretty small. It seems that there has been a trend toward net addition of illegal immigrants in the last few years that (a) is small compared to the total number in the US and (b) started well before the end of the last Trump administration.
I did find plenty of partisan sources trying to shock me with numbers of border encounters that contain many digits, but there doesn’t seem to be much explanation of why this is a useful statistic or to what extent Biden’s administration had much to do with it. (There was a program derisively referred to as “catch and release” that seems likely to have resulted in a temporary increase in “border encounters,” but I don’t see evidence that it had much effect on net illegal immigration.)
As for graft, I genuinely have no idea what you’re referring to.
In any case, until 2023, the number of asylum applications per year was pretty low.
Since President Biden took office in January 2021, the U.S. has experienced a significant increase in illegal border crossings. Reports indicate that there have been approximately 8 million "encounters" at the U.S.-Mexico border during his tenure, a substantial rise compared to previous administrations. This surge is notably higher than the figures recorded during the Trump administration, which saw approximately 2.4 million encounters over four years.
For graft I was referring to the continual mismanagement of funds by Federal Departments. - An estimated $236 billion in improper payments were made, encompassing over-payments, underpayments, and payments lacking proper documentation. - The DOD hasn't passed an audit in in 7 years! We can not account for our spending or our military assets. - The whole US Aid thing is also part of that graft. US dollars going to questionable endeavors to enrich a few.
There are many more examples from FEMA and other organizations. The examples illustrate a systemic issue with the federal governments financial management.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immigration_policy_of_the_Joe_... https://www.gao.gov/blog/federal-government-made-236-billion... https://www.myjournalcourier.com/opinion/article/commentary-...
You realize that tons of industries directly support illegal immigration by hiring said illegals right? All of agribusiness, nearly all restaurants, warehouses, meat packing etc. etc. Have you ever stopped to wonder why we don't throw the business owners in jail for this? We would stop illegal immigration overnight if we jailed the actors driving the demand but we never do, and this is bipartisan.
Capitalism is addicted to cheap labor, and it benefits from the demonization and criminalization of the immigrants as it makes them even cheaper and easier to exploit. So sure, demonize illegals all you want, you're playing the exact role the oligarchs want you to to deflect attention from them.
He was a good (not great) president in unprecedented bad times. He's no FDR but "inaction" would have had America in a truly awful situation. So where did all his "useless leader" narrative come from? Did people really get that brainwashed from one bad night as the proceeding precedent is spouting nonsense on the daily?
You kinda make a good point regarding Covid, but at the same time, I think the action he took there was basically what any non-lunatic would do. It wasn't like he had some massive amazing plan and he actioned it. He just stopped the ignorance of previous administration.
WRT Ukraine, "letting them stand strong" wasn't strong enough. The delays and lack of significant support is, I believe, what has caused the war to drag on. It's like there being a person with cancer, and rather than giving them enough chemo to kill the cancer, you give them just enough that the cancer has difficulty spreading.
What was necessary was a conclusive coordinated action among allies, so that isn't entirely Biden's fault, but everything did seem haphazard.
Also, being in Australia, I think from an economic standpoint, you are overstating the easing of the economy. Everyone has faced some level of inflation, but when I go to the US, it seems to me that "real" inflation has hit you more than other countries I've visited.
Trump does an amazing job messaging. Sure, 99% of what he says is either a lie senile ramblings, but he’s out there all the time. A social media POTUS indeed.
Another data point is when many other politicians have tried to be like Trump, they have lost. We’ll just have to see what happens in 2 and 4 years.
a16z investments are mostly Cryptos and some AIs.
Andreesen loves Crypto and he hates that it's being regulated like mad (cause tons of scamming going on).
That is the claim from Andreessen, and the way he told it sounded rather far-fetched. Has anyone else confirmed it?
Andreessen also claims (see Joe Rogan interview) that the US nuclear weapons testing program was some elaborate fake complete with fake movies of nuclear bomb tests. When someone makes such ludicrous claims, I tend to doubt anything else they say.
Where did they say anything about moral inferiority?
> I'm sure that will help you persuade them in the future.
Why does this argument only work in one direction? Why can the conservatives mock liberals, "coastal elites", blue cities and states, and more than half of America endlessly and still win? Why
> Interesting that you ignore the fact that the previous president was mentally incapable of the job for increasingly long intervals as his term progressed, and was so incompetent on the Afghanistan withdrawal that he projected tremendous weakness that acted as an invite for Putin to launch a full scale assault less than a year later.
Ironic you talk about "successfully propagandized" earlier and are regurgitating right wing talking points.
> The moral inversion it takes to claim that the people willing to stand agains the Valley's intense social conformity "weak" is also revealing about how brainwashed you truly are. You're just part of the mob, and if you lived in a super conservative place, you'd be part of that mob too. Freethinking requires courage, and I see none of it in the typical SV limousine liberal. Just a bunch of millionaires who hate the billionaires they envy.
It takes special kind of mental gymnastics to end up supporting murderous dictators while talking about "free thinkers", "moral inversion", and "brainwashing". What did they teach you next, whatabouttism?
Embarrassed to be an American today. You're on the wrong side of history.
We all saw when the DNC champagne socialists turned their their nose at Palestinian activists, this is not a serious Left wing movement by any intl standard. It’s overflow parking for elitethink. What good recent policy is even proposed? There’s nothing. Look elsewhere for inspiration because the USA Left is bankrupt intellectually
Which wars?
Ukraine could have been trivially avoided by Russia, as Ukraine did nothing to provoke the war except perhaps by the mere fact of its existence as a an independent country. But I assume you mean “avoidable by Biden.” How would Biden have avoided it?
What’s the second? Gaza? I give Biden approximately zero credit for competent handling of the situation, but that war was started by a surprise attack by one non-US party against another non-US party. Nobody asked the US’s opinion. I very much doubt that the US could have prevented that war by announcing a desire to annex Gaza.
The US is doomed if you seriously believe the crap you spew out onto the internet.
Most Americans would not agree with a 1939 “ascendant dictator in America” narrative and yet you do. I wonder how the “you people” strategy works in your brain? I do not think of HN audience as separate to “my” people. Silly that you do the inverse.
Yes, I'm sure of that. Just as Germans in 1939 would also not agree with an "Ascendent dictator of Germany". `People are pretty good a rejecting inconvinent realities when they're moral compass is on the line.
>I do not think of HN audience as separate to “my” people.
And this is just a dishonest argument. Let's not play coy, thank you.
> was so incompetent on the Afghanistan withdrawal
That was based on a deal Trump made with the Taliban. I don't know if Trump would have botched it too. I would put that on Bush who f*ed up that war completely.
But ultimately it boils down to the moral inability of Americans to fight an uneven war. The problem here is the appeasement policy that unfortunately both sides suffer from.
> projected tremendous weakness
I think that's overblown. There are cases where it was true and others (such as Ukraine) where Biden showed how he can hold back Russia without risking a single US soldier. That was pretty good.
> Biden did nothing for Silicon Valley
The CHIPS act? Intel etc. got a ton of money. Battery manufacturing moved back to the states with multiple factories opening up.
He brought back manufacturing to the USA and gave a lot in that sense. The fact that he kept policies going (no tariffs etc.) was a huge benefit to tech which relies on stability and globalization.
> Freethinking requires courage, and I see none of it in the typical SV limousine liberal.
I think using language like that goes counter to free thinking. I despise Trump as a person, but I accept that some of the policies and stances aren't wrong. Unfortunately, discourse is at a level where we can't even have adult conversations on the issues without name-calling.
If you wish to instead accuse me of propaganda with no basis, thanks for justiying one of the reasons I hate the administration and their supporters. Mud slinging doesn't interest me in this day and age and your entire rant is not only baseless but has so many holes and inaccuracies that I'd recommend reading your history before trying to re-write such statements. .
While there are no European armies in Ukraine, we are not neutral and thus in principle in some way at war with Russia. Presumably this is why our PM here in Sweden has said that we are neither at war nor not at war-- i.e. we're legally at war with Russia, but it's a sort of phony-war á la 1938.
Basically, there's never a sensible reason to use the nukes. Let's suppose the EU invades Russia. We seize Pskov, should Russia use its nukes? Of course not, we will nuke them in turn. If we take Novgorod, should they use them? Of course not, it'll be nuclear annihilation. St Petersburg, Pskov, Novgorod? No. Moscow? No.
There's never any reason to fire the missiles, and if they respond with a limited nuclear strike, we just match it with one causing, let's say, 10% more damage and keep pushing.
As long as you have nukes yourself nukes are irrelevant and won't be used other than in a limited way even as your conventional forces march through your enemy's capital.
Alec I can't respond to your response. But no it wasn't a parody. I don't actually think we are cozying up to Putin. Europe keeps throwing money at him, we are just trying to end a stupid war. The "purge" is more of a fact finding to see who is wasting our money and how. No one is being killed, jailed, or tortured. I would however not mind if many politicians end up in jail. People forget previous presidents have fired over 350,000 federal employees, the sky didn't fall. But the national debt did for a time...just saying...
The war in Ukraine is tragic, but it’s not our war. The idea that we must commit endless resources to it just because it’s happening is not a rational foreign policy stance. A stronger America means prioritizing where we spend our strength, not blindly throwing resources at conflicts that don’t directly threaten us.
You can't force people, you can't trick people.
I may be wrong, but I think enough voters were deceived by Donald that the election was no longer well-informed.
That's how he got into power.
To the extent that's true, USA no longer had genuine elections.
Seems more like "Putin followers"
It would eliminate the "Orban" problem.
You either change your position or your economy will continue to degrade and more of your factories will get closed and you will lose more positions on the market of automobiles and will get higher unemployment rate and higher unrest levels. And given your multicultural policy of welcoming Muslim immigrants - the unrest may get accelerated with just a few more "incidents" where someone rides into a crowd again or decides to start a jihad on some street in one of your cities.
Hungary by no means has a veto on everything. The 27 EU member states vote on most issues by qualified majority (55% of member states = 15 countries, and >= 65% of total population). On a narrow set of issues (foreign, defense, finance, treaties, EU enlargement) they have a veto.
They were doing the bare minimum under Biden, and are now actively helping Putin.
Who paid € billions more in energy costs since 2022? Europe, not the US. [0][1] Germany in particular got crucified, and its manufacturing base fled to China (also in part due to the German Greens' historic Cold-War opposition to nuclear, nut that's a long story).
[0]: https://www.euronews.com/business/2025/02/24/three-years-on-...
[1]: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/feb/24/eu-spends-more...
We need mixed-member districts and eliminate the senate<->state connection and/or repeal the 17th amendment. Bicameral is no longer suited for the world we live in.
Like people thinking killing USAID was a good idea. Guess who is going to pick up to collect the good will USAID gave? China, or possibly some other country that thinks the US hegemony was a bad thing.
How can people not see that Trump is weakening USA?
China is nothing if not pragmatic and there's central party policy vs. China's regulated but somewhat free market here.
It was the US after all that forced the sale of Grindr by the Chinese Beijing Kunlun Tech to San Vicente Acquisition for ~ $600 million. I dare say fear of communists having a direct line to toe tapping Republicans drove that.
Plus that the people doing the cutting have no clue what they are doing. First the 50 millions dollars for hamas condoms and then not even knowing how government contracts work. It is like watching the evening of amateurs, but where the stakes are people's lives and the world order.
Part of NATO's charter is literally "spend minimum 2% GDP on military" and it was just ignored for much of the time.
But honestly I don't know why this entire comment section has turned to NATO NATO NATO. Ukraine isn't in NATO. And if the Budapest Memorandum is what you're referencing, France and UK signed too. It's not as if the US hasn't contributed to the war already.
No, it is literally not. The charter is here[1], read it yourself.
To my knowledge it was first mentioned in 2006, the press briefing [2] states
Finally, I should add that Allies through the comprehensive political guidance have committed to endeavour, to meet the 2% target of GDP devoted to defence spending. Let me be clear, this is not a hard commitment that they will do it. But it is a commitment to work towards it. And that will be a first within the Alliance.
aim to move towards the 2% guideline within a decade
1: https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/official_texts_17120.htm
2: https://www.nato.int/docu/speech/2006/s060608m.htm
3: https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/official_texts_112964.htm
It's much better to acknowledge that the deal the United States signed up for was to cover security for the entire European continent until 2024.
This narrative that all NATO members are just freeloading of the USA is a fiction.
Furthermore, your argument that one partner in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, ie. the USA, is shouldering all of the work falls flat, because the only member of the NATO ever invoking the pact defense clause, ie. article 5, was the USA and ALL OTHER members responded by honoring the treaty, ie. supporting the USA to the best of their abilities in invading Afghanistan and maintaining an occupation force for 21 years. Even if you think not much of the abilities of US' NATO allies, most of the time the effort of the other NATO members at least matched the US effort. The USA couldn't have done it all by itself, just consider the range of transport vehicles. I can't change if you think that's nothing, but that's on you.
>The USA couldn't have done it all by itself, just consider the range of transport vehicles
Not sure how to parse this. No one has the transport capabilities even close to ours.
Frankly, this issue has been percolating for a while now and it's better that we rip the band aid off and get it over with. We should've done this 25 years ago, but 9/11 happened and we got distracted. The AFG Campaign was extremely telling, both in terms of what a post-Soviet Union NATO could bring itself to do and the actual capabilities of the non-US partners. For what it's worth, Robert Gates (SECDEF at the time) was making some similar points back in 2011[1]:
>Today, I would like to share some parting thoughts about the state of the now 60-plus year old transatlantic security project, to include:
>Where the alliance mission stands in Afghanistan as we enter a critical transition phase; NATO’s serious capability gaps and other institutional shortcomings laid bare by the Libya operation; The military – and political – necessity of fixing these shortcomings if the transatlantic security alliance is going to be viable going forward; And more broadly, the growing difficulty for the U.S. to sustain current support for NATO if the American taxpayer continues to carry most of the burden in the Alliance.
>The blunt reality is that there will be dwindling appetite and patience in the U.S. Congress – and in the American body politic writ large – to expend increasingly precious funds on behalf of nations that are apparently unwilling to devote the necessary resources or make the necessary changes to be serious and capable partners in their own defense. Nations apparently willing and eager for American taxpayers to assume the growing security burden left by reductions in European defense budgets.
>Indeed, if current trends in the decline of European defense capabilities are not halted and reversed, future U.S. political leaders—those for whom the Cold War was not the formative experience that it was for me—may not consider the return on America’s investment in NATO worth the cost.
Emphasis added. This was 14 years ago. Pity that it took the reality of a land war in Eastern Europe and the possibility of no American security presence for the Europeans to take this point seriously.
[1] https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/natosource/text-of-spe...
You came out pretty strong, stating that something was "literally part of the charter", and thats just wrong. And sometimes I think it is worth pointing out glaring errors.
Instead of "2%" beeing in the charter, it was a goal to have it done by 2024, and most countries managed. Which is very different from even the most charitable interpretation of your post.
> Europe’s dependence on the United States for its security means that the United States possesses a de facto veto on the direction of European defense. Since the 1990s, the United States has typically used its effective veto power to block the defense ambitions of the European Union. This has frequently resulted in an absurd situation where Washington loudly insists that Europe do more on defense but then strongly objects when Europe’s political union—the European Union—tries to answer the call. This policy approach has been a grand strategic error—one that has weakened NATO militarily, strained the trans-Atlantic alliance, and contributed to the relative decline in Europe’s global clout. As a result, one of America’s closest partners and allies of first resort is not nearly as powerful as it could be.
Honestly, the interesting thing question here is: (A) Does the EU have to political will to bankroll Ukraine. (B) Will the US keep selling weapons the Ukraine, if funded by the EU.
I suspect (B) is a hard YES. Anything would end US military industry.
On (A) I'm less certain, the EU has had a hard time finding consensus. The EU can do big things, even when it's hard, the EU did so under covid.
0. https://www.ifw-kiel.de/publications/news/ukraine-support-af...
I mean, that's true for any democracy. The EU has its fair share of them elected to high offices.
- the EU started getting nasty towards American tech before trump.
- pitching a fit about chicom 5G equipment.
- remember when trump pointed out the iran nuclear deal was really bad and not enforced/verified at all, withdrew, and the EU retaliated by pulling over 200 sanctions against iran?
- ongoing attempts to tariff us more than we tariff them due to their own economic inadequacy, dating back at least to the chicken tax.
etc.
since the inception of the EU, eurocrats got this crazy idea that europe can and should be some sort of great power in a multilateral order. of course, they took none of the substantive actions to build the necessary military and economic infrastructure. they were only too happy to accept all the benefits of letting us shoulder the burden of continental defense and literally couldn't manage the basic first step of not funneling billions per year to moscow in natgas purchases. instead they keep trying to be independent, getting a little friendlier with china, trying to make some sort of point that they're their own people, we don't set their policy, blah blah blah. it reminds me of a teenager acting out for no other reason than to show "he's his own man now" and "you can't stop him".
fine, but europe has enjoyed massive benefits from America, particularly post-wwii. if you want the benefits of a client state relationship, or client continent, be prepared to go along with the foreign policy of your benefactor.
i don't want to rag on just the EU here. there's been a trend of various countries breaking down the relationship of following American foreign policy in exchange for a lot of benefits. but trump's responses were ham-fisted and he was pretty rude about them publicly, so he catches full blame. like fish in the ocean, they ceased to remember they swam in an ocean of American prosperity.
Arguably the US isn’t either anymore . It is pretty clear that Trump won’t enforce Article 5 when Russia is the aggressive party. Which, by itself, might be a preparation to take Greenland. Both US and Russia are already interfering in the upcoming elections there.
It doesn’t sound crazy anymore, considering the shitshow we’ve seen the last four weeks sounded crazy before the inauguration.
Ukraine’s potential NATO membership is one of Russia’s main demands for ending the war. Additionally, Ukraine participated in the coalition that invaded Iraq in 2003.
We need more cooperation for collective benefit instead of cooperation for the sake of profit
China needs to export to the West to survive. The Russian market is not able to absorb what China needs to sell.
China has already distanced itself from Russia. China’s happy to sell Russia what it can buy, but there is no real upside to that relationship.
What collective benefit are you referring to exactly that isn't going to be profit? You think Russia and China care about your ideologies? China will exploit you and Russia will do what Russia always does. They all want to gang up and invade America?? They would have better things to do then that if Europe became their pet.
Look what being an ally with Russia brought.
More like what becoming an ally of the US in 2014 brought.
In this picture Crimea is conspicuously absent.
And you think that will happen with China and Russia as allies? Jesus. This thread is brigaded to hell by trolls.
However, if by "genociding Ukrainian people" you mean eradicating the population of Ukraine that considers itself distinct from Russia, Trump could conceivably stop the war by letting Russia hold onto territories it owns, while having the rest of Ukraine as a protectorate of various European powers that may eventually bring it into the EU.
This might result in a populatin exchange as Russian speakers get sent to the Russian-held parts of Ukraine and vice-versa. This would not be good but it would not be a genocide either. You can also look at the Indian partition for an example of how this could go horribly wrong.
Russia does not care the slightest about the territory, it is purely a war about ideology and influence.
The only acceptable outcome from a Russian perspective is a Russia aligned government in Kiev, or a peace deal where they will rebuild their army and end up stronger than Ukraine followed by restarting the war.
Sides, Russia's got nukes. It's nuke's are the whole reason why the US and Europe has been reluctant to intervene. If, in this scenario, Russia invades Ukraine again and then simple say that it will launch it's warheads at any nation that attempts to intervene, what then?
So, only ethnically cleanse the areas they already started on. Genocide in a limited and specific way is still genocde.
We don’t know what Harris would or wouldn’t have done. But we know that what Trump is doing is not going to end up well for Ukraine.
Dealing directly with Russia as if it was up to the US to decide for everyone else isn’t just callous, it’s extremely dangerous.
So yeah up until now Trump has done _nothing_ to stop this war. He's really only proved to all the US' supposed allies, that the US is not trustworthy. At this point, Trump should just shut up and stop pretending like he's trying to reach some peace agreement. He should just stop sending funds to Ukraine as he obviously wants to do and just leave the discussion because he's really no longer relevant.
How do you have a political discussion with someone whose reality is completely upside-down to your own? With someone whose grasp of reality is also factually wrong?
Facts are usually universal and rarely disputed.
They can be interpreted differently though. And that's when the sides may disagree with each other and have to look for better arguments, while taking the other position into account.
After the yesterdays show in the Oval Office - wouldn't you agree that Zelensky is not a politician at all? A politician knows at least a little about diplomacy and about showing respect to the feeding hand instead of trying to bite it. Even if he realized that Trump is not his ally and would prefer to stop support of Ukraine - this is not how you behave in the world of politics.
Honestly, after that press-conference I rather pity Zelensky. He got played. He got lured into a trap. I don't even deny that the other side (mostly Vance and then Trump) did him dirty, especially after not scolding (or maybe even letting!) a fucking journalist have enough arrogance to ask a president whether he has a fucking suit! That was absolutely disrespectful towards Zelensky, but even more disrespectful was that no one bothered to react properly to that question (that journalist should have been immediately banned from all press-conferences of U.S. officials forever (or at least until they repent)).
The parent poster claimed that Zelensky started the war.
How do you even begin having a conversation with someone who disputes the main fact on how this war started: Vladimir Putin, the dictator of Russia, invaded the neighbouring sovereign nation of Ukraine.
Granted by United Nations - every nation has a right for self-determination, so Russia did some not-so-legal actions by holding a referendum there, just so that the people of Crimea could exercise their right for self-determination. Which they then successfully did and overwhelming majority voted for being with Russia, rather than with Ukraine.
These were just the facts, not opinions.
Now there is the place for some opinions: you think (as far as I understand) that this is when Russia started a war.
And I say I don't see these events as Russia starting war, since the annexation of Crimea was voluntary and happened without a single shot.
I don't know of any examples of wars happening without a single shot.
I think the consequential actions of Ukraine (that got mad by the fact that it just lost some part of their country due to separatism) is when the war started.
That's when a few other regions claimed they'd like to join Russia as well and that's when Ukraine attacked them.
If Russia were serious about self-determination of the Dombas and Crimea regions, they'd have first proposed a referendum audited by international observers, and pressured Ukraine diplomatically to accept.
Instead, Russia chose to invade. They started the war, and they can stop it and withdraw at any time they choose. Every death from the Ukraine war is entirely on Russia's head.
Personally I realized that if you dig deep enough you realize that all those documents, formalities, treaties and agreements - they don't mean much, as we aren't some tenant entities with an overlord above us who could judge us in case of disputes. International (I don't even know what's the right word here) situation happens mostly as a consequence of who's more powerful and who controls what.
U.S. invades other countries whenever it likes.
Why can't Russia do just the same?
> They started the war, and they can stop it and withdraw at any time they choose.
The comic part of the situation is that Ukraine can stop it any time they choose as well.
But neither side wants to stop it THAT way. Each side wants to win in this situation.
If Ukraine feels so lucky as to fight a Goliath - let Zelensky be that David and send as many soldiers to death as he please until the unrest inside his country ends his presidency or the other side's forceful actions lead to the same result. Harsh, but kinda fair. Know your fights. Don't fight with a Goliath alone, if you are a tiny David, and if you are - group up with others and bow to them if the success of your very existence becomes dependent on their help.
Zelensky didn't bow low enough and now gets what he deserves.
It's a fact. A free and fair referendum cannot be held by an occupying force, because their very presence biases the results.
This is true even if the occupiers are honorable. It goes double for a leader like Putin, who imprisons and assassinates his political opponents.
> U.S. invades other countries whenever it likes. > > Why can't Russia do just the same?
In both cases it's wrong. But if you want the realpolitik answer, it's because the US has a competent military.
> If Ukraine feels so lucky as to fight a Goliath - let Zelensky be that David and send as many soldiers to death as he please until the unrest inside his country ends his presidency or the other side's forceful actions lead to the same result. Harsh, but kinda fair. Know your fights. Don't fight with a Goliath alone, if you are a tiny David, and if you are - group up with others and bow to them if the success of your very existence becomes dependent on their help.
David won against Goliath, remember? That's the whole point of the parable. At least find a metaphor that supports your argument.
Besides, isn't finding support exactly what Zelensky's been doing all this time? The US may be withdrawing its support, but European support is increasing. And in terms of population, economy, and military spending, Europe is a lot bigger than Russia.
You say Ukraine should know their fights, but doesn't that apply more to Russia? They expected the war to be over in 3 days, and it's been 3 years. Putin vastly overestimated the strength of his own army, and underestimated the resistance Ukraine would put up.
How much longer can Russia's reserves actually last? Those steadily rising Russian interest rates indicate an economy that's edging ever closer to collapse.
No, facts can't contain undefined properties like "free and fair".
Who should decide whether a referendum is free and fair?
No one.
It's basically the question of whether people of that region agree or disagree with the referendum enough as to defend their position with force.
As you can see - Crimeans are quite content they are part of Russia and not in ruins under a nazi regime.
(That's also an opinion, the fact is that there's just no unrest.)
> But if you want the realpolitik answer, it's because the US has a competent military.
If Russia's military is so incompetent - Zelensky is going to win ~ soon, let's wait.
> David won against Goliath, remember? That's the whole point of the parable. At least find a metaphor that supports your argument.
You missed the point: Zelensky sees himself as a David from the metaphor, but reality is that he is a clown, not a leader, not even a politician, but rather a parody to one.
> And in terms of population, economy, and military spending, Europe is a lot bigger than Russia.
Yep. But Russia is at war and Europe is only cuckoldily fighting right now. Let Europe get into full blown war if they want to participate so much.
> You say Ukraine should know their fights, but doesn't that apply more to Russia? They expected the war to be over in 3 days, and it's been 3 years. Putin vastly overestimated the strength of his own army, and underestimated the resistance Ukraine would put up.
They got Ukraine military in the chokehold at the start of the operation, then Zelensky agreed to proceed with diplomacy and Russia pulled its forces back.
But then Ukraine got some spoken assurances from US and EU of receiving money and military help from them. And then Russia had to start liberation from the border again. It goes quite slow for a few reasons: first of all, Russia isn't in a hurry: it gets really valuable first hand experience in modern warfare, the kind that almost none gets (even US hasn't fought a real war (without bombarding the area to the smithereens first) for quite a long time). Another reason is that Russia successfully mobilized its economy for war time. Just in case it has to go into a bigger war now/later, but it needs time to produce more new weaponry. Another reason for going slow is that Russia isn't really fighting a genocidal war, where everyone on the other side is seen as an enemy, they just demilitarize Ukraine, fighting just its soldiers, trying not to harm civilians, and that's not so simple, actually.
Free and fair are very much defined. It's why in democratic countries we have election observers and secret ballots, to remove or at least reduce possibilities of voter coercion.
> If Russia's military is so incompetent - Zelensky is going to win ~ soon, let's wait.
It remains to be seen whether Russia is incompetent enough to fail completely. They still have 4 times the population as Ukraine.
> You missed the point: Zelensky sees himself as a David from the metaphor, but reality is that he is a clown, not a leader, not even a politician, but rather a parody to one.
He's done remarkably well defending his country for a clown, don't you think?
> Yep. But Russia is at war and Europe is only cuckoldily fighting right now. Let Europe get into full blown war if they want to participate so much.
In that, we agree. Russia's barely making progress in a war with an opponent that, on paper, shouldn't have lasted a week. I'd be very interested to see how they do against a military with 4 times their funding.
> They got Ukraine military in the chokehold at the start of the operation, then Zelensky agreed to proceed with diplomacy and Russia pulled its forces back.
Oh, is that the Kremlin's reason for all those humiliating retreats in the initial months of the war?
> It goes quite slow for a few reasons: first of all, Russia isn't in a hurry: it gets really valuable first hand experience in modern warfare, the kind that almost none gets (even US hasn't fought a real war (without bombarding the area to the smithereens first) for quite a long time).
Ah, I see. So the 700,000 casualties Russia has incurred so far was worth it to get valuable, first-hand experience. Presumably the first lesson is: don't incur 700,000 casualties when fighting against a country a quarter your size.
> Another reason is that Russia successfully mobilized its economy for war time.
A "war time economy" comes at the cost of the civilian economy. Every man sent to Ukraine is one who can't work at home. Every piece of ordinance, every destroyed tank and plane, represents wasted investment that could be used to create civilian goods and services.
You need only look at the steadily rising interest rates to see the signs of an economy that's spending more than it's earning. Russia has poured billions into the Ukraine war; so has Europe, of course, but Europe's economy is 14 times larger. Europe can afford to outspend Russia.
> Another reason for going slow is that Russia isn't really fighting a genocidal war, where everyone on the other side is seen as an enemy, they just demilitarize Ukraine, fighting just its soldiers, trying not to harm civilians, and that's not so simple, actually.
Given the devastation to cities in Ukraine, they're very bad at avoiding civilian infrastructure. I know the Russian army's weapons are outdated and inaccurate, but are they really that inept?
When stopping means the genocide of your people and you personally being tortured and murdered, “stopping” isn’t really an option, is it.
Ukraine had 0 chances from the start? But how come Russia couldn't get Kiev in 3 days as announced in Feb 22? How come Russia needs to ask North Korea for soldiers to supplement its own troops?
As for the 3 days - you seem to be uninformed, just google how fast Russian forces captured Gostomel airport near Kyiv.
Then Zelensky threw white flag and peace talks started, but then Zelensky changed his position and now it's a war to the last militant Ukrainian.
As for NK - they were just on an excursion to learn from Russian battle front, since NK is now Russia's ally and this was done just for the case if/when this war changes into a WW3.
Why wait that long?
JD Vance, Elon Musk, Ron DeSantis, all of these guys who think they'll be able to take over the cult lack the key ingredient - the personality. Musk has a sort of cult among specifically the HN crowd, but we are small and generally people clock him as a weirdo creep.
There is no successor to Trump, his movement dies with him. His age is our saving grace.
If Joe Biden has proven anything, it's that voters will vote for someone they barely like if they think it's helping their cause.
The only issue in play here is how many voters think lower crime, less wasteful spending, less racist hiring practices, and less illegal immigration is something they like. If they decide those things matter to them, JD is more than likable and capable enough for them to get behind.
JD Vance has nowhere near the charisma of Trump. Being "well liked" within the context of Trump isn't sufficient to maintain the personality cult of Trump. Ron DeSantis had more solid conservative support than JD Vance and he also was unable to get control of the MAGA cult.
I've seen the contrary from Germany
Clearly each of the above parties have differing views on Russia-Ukraine, just like Obama/Biden/Trump. That's how coalitions work.
It is of course extremely likely that he'll become the next chancellor in a coalition with the SPD, but technically it could all still fail and lead to new elections. Unlikely, but not impossible.
Out of the parties you mentioned, mainly only CDU and SPD are relevant because it's the only realistic coalition (apart from decisions that require a 2/3 majority like reforming the debt brake). They're both pro-Ukraine although to different degrees (Scholz was dragging his feet quite a bit). Merz in particular has been rather vocal about this and as the chancellor he's probably going to be setting the tone. I don't like or trust the guy particularly, but I believe him in that respect. So I think the video got it essentially right.
And building a simple nuke is not that complicated - when you have the nuclear material. Europe does.
The last we want, are Nazis with nukes on top of it all.
If they don't hate Jews it isn't nazism, just ordinary facism.
Also russia already beat the us to becoming nuclear armed facists.
It is a disgusting viewpoint and essential to understanding American Zionist support of Israel. My (lifelong far-right conservative jack-Mormon) father shared this with me 25 years ago.
The 2024 French legislative (not Presidential) snap election was Macron calling the electorate's bluff that even though they disliked low growth, carbon taxes, inflation, unemployment, immigration, they still wouldn't vote for a FN govt (in the second round; view the first round as a protest vote where some voters for FN are tactically expressing discontent with the govt).
The 2027 French presidential election is a long way away yet and Polymarket doesn't even have a prediction market open for it yet, but Oddschecker puts Le Pen as frontrunner but not "very likely"; and that's before Bayrou emerges as Macron's successor [0]. Macron stands to gain a lot of influence in Europe if he can forge a good relationship with Germany's Merz.
Anyway, obviously a European nuclear deterrent would have to firewall against any of the large member-states or their leaders going rogue. Rutte and NATO haven't commented publicly yet on Trump's recent stance. See what happens at the next G7 summit in Canada, 6/2025. And of course the Ukraine settlement and who provides security guarantees for it.
[0]: https://www.oddschecker.com/politics/european-politics/frenc...
Drones make nukes obsolete anyway. After you nuke a country its generals no longer have any incentive to surrender; they have nothing to go home to when they leave their bunkers.
The effects on a country of 1000 or 2000 radioactive mushroom clouds seem like they'd be quite a bit larger than the one or two we've seen previously. You could see a billion people dead within an hour.
But they're very unselective weapons. The trend toward these sub-megatonne warheads is to make them more selective so they have more strategic value. The US's force of 2800-some warheads costs about US$60 billion per year to maintain, about 20 million dollars per year per warhead. US$200 million will buy you 200 000 commercial drones with which you can kill almost 200 000 individually selected people with grenades. That's enormously more strategically valuable than the million random people you can kill with the warhead.
Instead there is NATO, totally dominated by the US.
I'd openly appreciate Sweden doing a nuclear test, preferably with almost plausible deniability (like Israel).
I'd also count support for this from any of our politicians as a plus for any party in our election this fall.
We have lots of money, the Swedes has nuclear power, know how, industrial expertise and probably a few guys left that still remember last time (they could have done it a number of times) they covertly almost built a nuke.
> After yesterday's events in the White House, Haltbakk Bunkers, one of Norway's largest marine fuel companies, appears to have announced that it will no longer refuel American Navy vessels
https://bsky.app/profile/osinttechnical.bsky.social/post/3lj...
Also, Thomas Nilsson, head of Sweden’s military intelligence service (MUST), said that Sweden must be ready for any eventuality [with Russia from the Finnish border to the Arctic] after a Ukraine settlement.
[0]: https://www.sverigesradio.se/avsnitt/prime-minister-open-to-...
"Swedish nuclear weapons program" - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swedish_nuclear_weapons_progra...
Look at the theatre of the UK giving him the "unprecedented" letter from the King.
Talk of "bending knees" just makes macho idiots think they're winning. It's more like distracting your really drunk friend with something shiny to stop him starting a bar fight or walking into traffic while hoping when he sobers up he'll change for the better, not continue his slide into becoming an permanent asshole.
Many Europeans (too many, in my opinion) have a mentality that someone will take care of them. In the UK, many believe the government must solve all their problems. Eastern Europe depends on NATO for security, and across the East and the South, they expect that the EU's structural funds will solve many of their infrastructure and social issues.
I have lived in all these places and even worked in defense for a short while. Before the Crimean events (even after the Georgian ones), there was little government investment in private security tech. You could start such a company believing that these regions are very concerned about their security, but you would quickly learn that they were concerned mainly with getting the West to secure them for free.
Though it sounds critical, what Trump is doing could benefit Europeans in many ways if they put their ego aside and worked the situation. And by working it, I don't mean bending the knee. Many European industries (especially defense) could be developed, many jobs created, and much GDP produced. There is space for an armed forces technology leader in Eastern Europe, a vacuum even. There is a lot of space for technology in the EU in general. But the mindset has to change. And maybe it's good that Trump is forcing that mindset change. Love him or hate him, if you lay the facts out black-on-white, he does expect international partners to carry their weight - something that would benefit them much more than the US. Discomfort creates culture and direction.
They could've understood this in 2014 when Nuland said "Fuck the EU"[0], and the US pressed on with the coup in the Ukraine setting off the chain of events that has led us all to where we are now.
>Given the American people voted for this guy twice
American people voted twice for George W. Bush, the second time after the illegal invasion of Iraq in 2003. This might have given a hint.
In 2001, the Supreme Court ruled that Florida, counting too slowly yet not carefully-enough, could not fully count their ballots. Every other state had successfully counted, but the Court sat through Florida's legal arguments, even though the state was a poster child for inadequate election planning. So, the popular vote would not matter. Statistically, if you don't count Florida, Gore's districts accounted for 60% of American GDP, and Bush's only 40%. This statistic becomes only more lopsided: in 2024, Biden would lose and election even though Trump represents only 30% of American productivity.
Anyway, in 2004, today's median American was still a minor. Giuliani would give the convention address for Republicans in New York; he re-used then-Senate candidate Barack Obama's catchphrases. It was the highpoint of his career. He would only be noteworthy among the unusually-named group "white ethnics" of the Republican Party from then on.
The only hope I have, is they want bolster their ego with a strong EU.
They don't seem to give an impression of being able to work out a coherent policy or show any initiative.
The EU leaders, include Ursula Von Leyen speak big noble sounding words, but do very little.
Btw, EU spent more than USA, both military and financially.
The point of a democracy is to also have guardrails by splitting up executive, legislative and judicial powers - the U.S. is still not a dictatorship. European leaders know this, and professional politicians know that you can go hot and cold very fast. Today there is drama - tomorrow might rapidly turn over and flip.
European leader are desperate because they realize obvious truth - US will soon implement regime changes all across Europe... European elites are simply not up to task of dealing with this new revolutionary era.
Here's another fact to remember: Trump told Europe to kill Nord stream pipeline during his first term. He didn't want them tied economically to Putin. He didn't want Europe to depend upon Putin! Why? Because he's Putin's ally? Or maybe he is trying to make strong, independent countries that act as a deterrent.
That would be a hell of a deterrent, instead of old people with no kids droning on endlessly about NATO.