Commenting on all the stupid (like Musk’s antics) is tiring sometimes.
I was trying to figure out what to write today. There are about a dozen possible posts, all of which amount to “Trump or Musk are flinging poo at the wall.”
So let’s forget all the stupid little details and cut to the chase.
America is in irreversible decline. If you think otherwise, you are living in a fantasy world. China will even take the lead in Pharma away from the US, probably no later than 2030. The US military can’t even keep the shipping lanes open and Carrier groups no longer have a full support group.
Trump is not going to make America Great Again. Even when Trump and Musk do the right thing, they do it the wrong way. There’s a lot of administrative bloat at universities and hospitals, and reducing that is a priority. But simply cutting the administrative grants overnight leaves no time for adjustment and will smash institutions to flinders. This might not matter if it was 1995 or even 2005 and the uS was still in the lead, but right now the US can’t afford the time to do things the stupid way.
Trump is breaking the Constitution. He doesn’t have the right to decide not to distribute money entailed by Congress unless Congress gave him the right. He doesn’t have the right to ignore judges who tell him not to do illegal and unconstitutional things. If Trump’s changes go thru, there will only be one real branch of government, the Presidency.
During The Decline America is Dangerous. America’s era of preeminence is cooked, there’s no question, but decline takes some time. The US is still insanely powerful and that makes it dangerous to anyone weaker than it within reasonable reach. This means, of course, that there’s almost no one in the world who shouldn’t, for purely pragmatic reasons, want the US to go down faster. The sooner it falls, the safer everyone else will be. Well, unless you’re Taiwan, but that’s foreordained already, it’s just a question of when.
America is Canada’s Enemy. No other nation is threatening Canada’s very existence, after all. America has never, ever, protected Canada from anything but itself and the only real threat to Canada has always been America. Trudeau said Trump is serious about annexing Canada, and Trump has confirmed it.
America is Europe’s Enemy. It has been at least since Biden’s presidency, where the deliberate policy was to cut off cheap energy and encourage European (aka. German) industry to relocate to America.
America is all its “allies” Enemy. America wants to cannibalize its allies industry and bring it to America. It doesn’t care what happens to its friends, with the exception of Israel, because of Israel’s massive influence in America, much of it certainly based on blackmail. Every American ally now needs to cut ties and either make a group alliance without the US, or make its obeisance to Beijing and try and cut the most favorable deal it can. Early movers will get better deals.
Europe Needs To Grow Up and Kick Out America. Europe’s weaker than it’s been in generations, and far weaker than it was in 2005 when I first suggested this path, but it’s still got enough industry, science and engineers to reindustrialize and build its own army. Cut a deal with Russia and China, kick the Americans out and stop whining about how you can’t defend yourselves without America. That’s a choice: you still have the ability to create your own arms industry and you have plenty of unemployed youngsters you could put in said military.
China is the next leading Great Power and it could be the next superpower if it wants it. I’d argue it already is the leading great power much of the world. Certainly it’s more important in most of Asia and Africa than America is. It will take the lead in, essentially, every scientific area. It is already the most dominant manufacturing power and that will only decline when it realizes that it, like the US after WWII needs to send more of its industry overseas or there won’t be anyone worth selling to. or any allies worth having.
This is the Era Endgame. This is what I’ve been writing about and towards for over two decades. This is it, this is America in irreversible decline, losing its constitutional government and descending into a non-military from of Caesarism. Maybe Americans will avoid the fate of rule by Imperial Presidents, it’s at least theoretically possible. For everyone but Americans and maybe Mexico and Canada the best outcome would be America breaking up. But no one outside of America should be doing anything but preparing for America’s fall, protecting themselves from America, and positioning themselves for the new era where China is dominant.