Oh thank God for a moment there I thought we might actually do the right thing. Thank God for our global leaders assuring the universe will be safe from the disease that is humanity. /s

This is true, China doesn’t care. I’m actually confused about the narrative around China wanting to take TSMC. Even the most cursory glace at the situation should make it obvious this isn’t one of China’s goals. This is because these EUV machines don’t work on magic. They work on knowledge and spare parts. Even in the unlikely scenario that China somehow invades and these machines aren’t destroyed by either China or the retreating Taiwanese, they aren’t going to be able to operate them and more importantly get spare parts to keep them running. They’d at best be used to disassemble and review.

All of this ignores the fact that China is already at 5nm using their own equipment anyway. For the extra 2nm of difference between TSMC’s 3nm to SMIC’s 5nm isn’t large enough to rationalize anything close to what they’re talking about. It’d be cheaper to just keep subsidizing the Chinese industry rather than invading.

All of this is to say, that China may or may not invade, but TSMC isn’t on the list of reasons. If anything, it’s on the opposite end. China has a LOT of motivation to bomb TSMC to prevent the west from getting chips as if TSMC is gone, then suddenly Chinese 5nm are pretty much the most advanced chips in the world (besides Samsung). Thus, the real conclusion is we need to invest in Samsung, which surprisingly isn’t happening for whatever reason is beyond me.

Actually it exactly resembles stagflation. It’s one of the reasons I said underemployment and not unemployment. During the 90s, Japan’s inflation rate was around 3% and they couldn’t get it under 2%. Sound familiar?

https://www.in2013dollars.com/japan/inflation/1990#:~:text=The yen had an average inflation rate of,82.953%25 of what it could buy back then.

The other part was low unemployment, but mostly government jobs that didn’t do anything. But it did create historically low unemployment and higher than average labor force participation.

https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/14332/#:~:text=The ‘lost decade’ in Japan was a period,when it reached a historical maximum of 5.5%25.

What you are seeing is USA doing exactly what Japan did in the 90s, which is have a target inflation rate of 2% that they can’t reach and hiding the high unemployment numbers with underemployment in crappy jobs.

Edit: just look at this rocketing government employment.

https://usafacts.org/reports/2021/government-10-k/part-i/item-1-purpose-and-function-of-our-government-general/employees/#:~:text=As of the dates shown below%2C there were,local government employees%2C of whom 23%25 work part-time.

More than doubled in a decade.

It’s not a bubble, it’s much much worse. You only hear of it in whispers among the financial world. It’s stagflation. Japan seen this story before, they call it their lost decade that has been going on for nearly half a century. It’s when you deficit spend like crazy to prop up the economy and that leads to high inflation and stubbornly high costs (IE: Housing). It’s coupled with basically no wage growth and high underemployment. Does any of this sound familiar? It buried Japan, it might bury USA.

Bizarrely there are, that’s what black water essentially is, a paramilitary group that can hold off a military. If you think it’s insane that we allow private companies own their own military, well it is. They of course not allowed to operate on US soil, but they exist.

Even Russia has laws against this, it’s kind of nut USA allows it. Of course, Russian law is one thing and wagers existence shows how well that law is followed. But even the Russian founders understood having a private military is insane.

*Edit arguably, Putin flaunting the law and creating Wagner is a reason he became a dictator and what the country was trying to prevent when they made the laws.

This makes me question what it takes to be a super power. Between this and the leading cause of US bankruptcies being medical related, it’s almost as if super powers can only be super powers if they don’t give any of their citizens healthcare. It’s as if working their citizens to death is the only way for them to maintain their hedgemony.

I’m saying this is the farthest thing from a solution. It’s the opposite of a solution. People doing these investments are increasing the problem.

No one using this would be trying to “stick it to the man” by doing this. They’re trying to get some scrapes from the man by doing this.

Well we can only speculate, which is why I said IF I WERE TO SPECULATE. However, Algeria also vetoed, a primarily Muslim nation and Washington is calling them out as representing Arab nations.

https://www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/algeria-takes-seat-un-security-council#:~:text=Twenty years after its last,term that begins this month.

So there is evidence towards but I’m not seeing anything definitive. But again, that’s the definition of speculation.

No, I’m only stating their formal argument to the best of my ability to explain it and ignoring speculation. Now, if I WERE to speculate, I’d say what you’re saying is probably closer to the truth. For Russia at least I’m almost 100% certain that’s the reason. China is very different. I’d argue that China’s stance has nothing to do with Russia, USA or Taiwan. There’s this weird myopia when it comes to China and their interests. China’s interests span far greater than those three little pieces of land.

No, for China I’d argue we’d first need to ask who is their audience for this. That answer is the other nations in the middle east. Saudi Arabia, Egypt, UAE, etc… China has been trying to formulate a narrative that they are friends to Muslims regardless of the accusations of what they are doing in XinJiang. So, it’s almost certain China’s stance comes from conversations with those nations. So technically they are telling the truth in the sense that their saying what others are telling them. Reality is it’s just to win favor over the oil producing nations so they have stable supplies of energy.

*Edit. Essentially what I think China is saying to the middle eastern world is you have a veto with me, the same way India has with Russia.

So I want to be upfront and say I don’t really agree with their argument, but I do understand it. What Russia and China are saying is by tying the ceasefire to the release of hostages is unfair to the Palestinian side. This is because they lose all leverage and then would be easy targets for Israel who doesn’t seem to mind bombing Palestinian civilians.

My issue is that technically the only reason their bombing is because of the hostages and perhaps if they release the hostages peace talks can begin. The opposite of that argument is it will allow Israel to be even more aggressive after the temporary cease fire is ended.

I don’t know, but that’s the argument.

Well, both sides are bad. Your argument is Trump is far worse. Which as an American you should feel that way. Because Trump would be fucking horrible for America. But if you were Palestinian, you’d definitely prefer Trump as he might pull support from Israel.

Thus, the problem today isn’t that there is a good guy, it’s choosing which genocide you support. Do you support the genocide of Palestinians or Ukrainians. Either way, you get to vote for genocide. Clearly the US is a shining example of democracy.

*Edit: Those who are wondering why Trump would support Palestine, it’s simple, he’s a Russian puppet. It serves him to switch sides to get more money from Russia. Obviously, Trump wouldn’t do something that doesn’t benefit him, but when you’re half a billion dollars in the hole, uncle Putin is going to come to save the day. If Trump wins of course.

No, an inflation index only measures necessities. Ironically that’s a reason inflation always goes up as small electronics and other non-necessities actually have gone down significantly. But as I said the inflation index only counts things like groceries, housing, cars, oil and stuff like that.

That all said, it’d be fascinating to know what is the price limit that would stop hotdog throwing and the other question that needs answered is if this increase would make them more or less money.

The funny thing is the electoral college was designed to counter exactly this event. In the case an absolute tyrant is going to get voted in, the electoral college is supposed to be the last chance to challenge it. But with the way the GOP is going, ain’t no one gonna challenge anything.

As they say, the devil will come bearing a cross wrapped in the American flag.

Not the OP but let’s fish for down votes.

The Azov battalion are Nazis in Ukraine and Russia is actively trying to exterminate them.

The Russian military brought peace to Syria while the US funded Syrian terrorists.

We call Iran terrorists while the US actively terrorized Iran by murdering their generals without provocation.

The US actively pirates Iranian shipments.

The US changes the definition of words to fit their needs. US isn’t in a recession because the government changed how we define recessions.

China is actively committing a deathless genocide because like institutionalized racism we are generalizing the concept of cultural genocide to cover all definitions of genocide.

The Chinese economy is bad because they only grew 5%.

The fentanyl issue is blamed on everyone except the US own incompetence. Whether it be Purdue, or Mexico or China but definitely not a US enforcement issue.

And that’s just off the top of my head.

*Edit. I see my votes have turned positive now that I’ve clarified my personal position on the Ukraine conflict. But let me point out that my facts didn’t change only that I’ve pointed out I’m against Russia.

But this is my point. We should stop down voting facts simply because they’re uncomfortable. That’s how we get presidents like Trump.

While that’s true, I would argue the total human cost is similar. Your estimates do not count stolen and killed Ukrainian civilians. Adding those would make the numbers far closer, especially since no Russian civilians are caught in this conflict so far.

Not saying any of this is OK. Just unfortunately the numbers are very similar. War is miserable.

*And yes, the fact that Ukraine is suffering more losses due to the fact that it’s Russia invading absolutely makes Russia the bad guy here. I’m just pointing out that the losses are unfortunately very close.

Yup, most of the world has gendered clothing. But this is China, where for decades they rejected that. Their school uniforms still rejects gendered clothing.

https://www.koreaboo.com/stories/chinese-school-uniforms-korean-students-jealous/

It’s only relatively recently come back from Western fashion.

They’re literally trying to fight against what your talking about to such a degree that even your normal concept of gendered clothing is different. And I know that’s hard to wrap your head around, but that’s exactly why I’m saying, it’s not exactly what you think.

*Edit: Let’s look at this from another angle. China has been trying to enforce gender neutral ideas for some time, like gender neutral clothing. All this push for gender equality has lead China to become the home to the most female billionaires in the world.

https://www.moneycontrol.com/news/trends/wu-yajun-china-has-two-thirds-of-worlds-self-made-women-billionaires-meet-the-richest-8296901.html

The Chinese government is 25% female.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/239113/sshare-of-women-in-chinese-national-parliament/

So it’s in China’s position that while not great now, by constantly pushing gender neutral laws and trying to prevent sex being displayed in public, they’ll create equality.

As you point out though, that often leads to oppression and other terrible side effects.

I’m saying, I do not believe i personally understand the situation enough to make a judgement call. I just want people to be aware of what’s actually happening and not that it’s some kind of governmental anti-LGBTQ+ push. It’s China trying to be China for better or worse.

Yes, but they are applying it equally. They are banning all mentions of sex, not just queer sex. They are censoring anything that shows too much skin, not just queer dressing. This is why I pointed out them censoring a video game made for kids. Basically they said a leotard was too revealing.

The problem isn’t the enforcement. The problem is the reporting. As society there reports against the LGBTQ more than other ones. Again, that’s not the government doing anything unequal or targeting. Which is why I said it’s not exactly an LGBTQ issue. It becomes one because of the older conservatives.

Again it’s not about LGBTQ. It’s anything to do with dressing different or talking about sex. That’s why boy love films are so popular in China. They dress them in fancy traditional garb and have sexual tension but no kissing or sex. Hell some of them got so popular they got onto Netflix.

Here’s the main Chinese propaganda mouth piece promoting it.

https://www.globaltimes.cn/content/1168331.shtml

Everyone is getting prosecuted equally so no it’s not an LGBTQ issue anymore than breathing is an LGBTQ issue.