Nobody on Hexbear actually believed that Yemen was going to destroy the US Navy

gimme just a few ~~Chinese~~ Russian hypersonic missiles. Putin you coward...

Yeah I mentioned Tropico because its the closest contemporary to the old Sim City games. Workers is definitely better in many ways.

Trump's actions are often just attempts to satisfy his ego through positive media and supporter reaction. The issue with Iran if you recall is that his main supporter at the time, Fox news had a mixed reaction, with Tucker Carlson being extremely critical, something obviously like hell freezing over.

You can go and check back on the entire Carlson arc back then but here for example Fox's Tucker Carlson slammed conservatives for pushing Trump to go to war: 'About 20 minutes ago we were denouncing these very people as the deep state'

His base didn't particularly like that idea, he was MAGA and isolationist and yet he was about to put the US into a war with a nobody-country that wasn't a threat at the time. It wasn't Bush post 9/11 even though he thought that was an easy win.

As soon as the base consolidated into the neutral/negative camp which he didn't expect, he backed off. Right now his base is very much positive towards ending "Biden's war" so he is very likely to do it.

But his base also doesn't like China so that will be the next target.

You fucking lost. But you will never, ever, ever acknowledge it. If any one of you got into a fight that ended with you getting shot in the head, you’d be posting “I’ve won, actually, and here’s why” as you’re floating up up and away from your mangled corpse.

The sun never sets on the British empire.

I haven't played Tropico in a long time but even if that game is very on the nose with the "some are more equal than others" communism, I think in general in that game you have to build all the housing yourself.

Without reading the article the key feature of Sim City clones is the RCI(residential, commerce, industry) demand meter which as it says, the higher each bar the more zoning is necessary. There is a direct relationship between them too as one is meant to drive the others. The point is you just "follow the market demand" and the city grows naturaly with no real planning, just the market tells you what is best to do next.

If you compare to real world Chinese real state development for example, where they build entire towns years in anticipation of real demand, in Sim city clones the most you can do is plan some roads and zones and hope for the best. This is the dev's design intention obviously I think a good player can make good looking stuff too.

I think Cities skylines got a little more control given all the DLC stuff, but clearly the DNA is from the free market ideal presented here. Land value dictates what kind of building model.

I think in all these games land value is seen as the higher the better, with none of the real world downsides let alone the real mechanisms that drive land value up in the first place, its explicitly higher = better. These valuations tend to be realy naive like "oh got all basic needs? Got crime down? Got a few parks? Great now see land value go brrr"

Again maybe CS is a bit better because there are so many laws and government stuff there compared to Sim City. I haven't played in a long time too but again in a game like Tropico usually its not quite the same as that with some exceptions like maybe the best places to place tourist related buildings etc.

If that wasn't the intention they would have considered @[email protected] 's points before hand.

The problem is currency swapping, China effectively put more money into circulation in their economy and assuming a standard capitalist economy that leads to inflation etc. As that money circulates, some of it will sit on banks, may earn interest which will have to be paid in that currency etc.

It obviously isn't a malicious act, it just that China can't realy understand or act outside the current mainstream economic principles or perhaps they simply thought this wouldn't be an issue. Its entirely possible both countries agreed a currency which the borrower has easier access to is better, perhaps that was even Burkina Faso's request we don't know.

I think the best solution would've been for China to directly build whatever is necessary through its own funds and hand over the project once its finished. It would still create local currency(local economy would be involved) but not a massive cash injection, they would repay via direct trading instead.

In the end if Burkina Faso may request to pay in yuan, doubt it though, mainstream economics is omnipresent.

What the fuck do state dinners have to do with genocide other than moral positioning? What the fuck does Blinken's home have to with genocide other than moral positioning? You think seizing Blinken's home in Beijing has a causal linkage to impacting the genocide? Or are you just expressing MORAL OUTRAGE?

Blinken is the fucking Secretary of state or are you like the other dipshit I blocked that think he "some random dude"? He is literaly one of the most powerful people on the planet. Stop trying to pretend he is some guy, its embarrassing. The online left is hilarious. People here constantly cry about how the US is run by absolute demons and ghouls, nazis.

But also these ghouls? Nah just some random dude with no power at all.

Imagine the year is 1939 and you're having state dinners with Goebells. "Actualy that was perfectly fine" no communist would ever dare say with a straight face, specialy not during the hollocaust.

The relationship between Xi meeting with Biden/Blinken, is it not obvious to you? Israel/Palestine is never on the agenda.

Vijay is taking up an important space in the discourse and creating pressure at the international level. You are arguing on the Internet that China's other efforts in anti-imperialism and the development of socialism are to be questioned because they don't meet a standard you have declared isn't morally based but have not actually justified materially. And you think I'm punching left?

You literaly dismissed him as a fucking pundit. Now you backtrack "oh but actualy he is doing important work". Is that because you had to google his name lol.

You seem to think that if China doesn't meet your foreign policy standards then that means clearly they are not up to your standards but you fail to identify those things as moral standards.

That is the point of an ideology and omg you actualy think its a gotcha? You actualy think communism is not a moral ideology? The irony of you trying to embarrass me for having a principled position that maybe compromising with Nazis commiting genocide is not okay.

You bother me.

Yes and? I did not ask for your reply and my initial reply was not to you. This is not your stance.

I initialy admitted China does good things.

But even that is not enough for this garbage Chinese chauvinistic/nationalist stance some people have. You tell me "i have it all figured out" even though its you coming with the novel and power point presentation on why China can't even look at Israel funny otherwise 1.4 billion people will die.

I'll stand with the rest of the global south denouncing nazis and their collaborators. China compromise where they shouldn't and this is costing us.

Yes its a moral stance, but it is also ideological. There is no reason to believe fascists wont turn on you just because you signed a deal. And yes China's lack of action does hurt. I pointed you to a literal global south Marxist making this point and you dismissed him as a fucking pundit.

I am not anti-China but I do prefer when communists don't compromise with Nazis. Its a moral standard. Oh no the horror.

Still not as embarrassing as admitting the Minsk agreements were all just to buy time for Ukraine.

The original narratives about Ukraine no longer matter, the only thing left in the collective consciousness is Ukraine is a democracy therefore the war is about "western values". The good thing is since then even a good part liberals don't care about that anymore, its impossible to manufacture a narrative that Ukraine is winning right now, at best they "resisting" evil Putler and Zelensky does nothing but beg for more aid.

You do realize that a no-fly zone literally means shooting down military aircraft, right? A no-fly zone is a escalatory move against a US proxy. That's not the bare minimum, that's literally violence in a conflict that China cannot win.

You refuse to understand Prashad's point. BTW nice slander calling a fellow Marxist a "pundit". Good job punching left just because they disagree.

The bare minimum is literaly any anti-Israeli resolution at the UN.

If we both admit it wouldn't be enforced than what is the cost here? Literaly what is the cost of proposing this? The fear that this is some watershed moment that now justifies US starting WW3 against China? This is delusional and should be dismissed.

You realized China missed key moments like the student protests. Israel is a pariah state. The ICJ ruled against them. The nazi literaly got the same arrest warrant as Putin. You are ignoring these points to excuse Chinese inaction. Do you actualy believe the world would support any aggressive retaliatory move against China given Bibi is a literal war criminal according to the same liberal western institutions?

Stop making excuses by creating hilariously unrealistic results.

As for China beating the USA on every metric, it's just not true. China is trending towards beating the USA on every metric and will overtake the USA on most metrics eventually. But the USA still has significant material advantages over China, some that China will never surpass. The most important ones to this conversation are:

Almost every point listed here doesn't matter in relation with a war against China unless you think Guantanamo is relevant in WW3 against China.

The US has more nukes but you damn well know you don't need 1000 nukes to destroy any country let alone the entire human race. Literaly 10 nukes from each side is the end of the world. The only relevant point is both countries have large and capable nuclear arsenals therefore MAD is key.

It absolutely has a lot to lose right now that would throw it off the course it has been on to cultivate a socialist experiment that will last longer than the Russian one as we all try to figure out the right path towards communism. You seem to think you have it all figured out. You seem to imagine you can pass judgment on China when you have none of their military intelligence, none of their diplomatic relationships, none of their risks, and none of their strategic analysis.

For someone that started argueing about morality in the end you're the one resorting to a moral argument are you not?

China has a lot to lose? Tell that to the global south being genocided right now. This is not Olympic competition on who is suffering more. Unless it is then it is about morality after all, do you think China importing minerals from Africa is also not a moral issue? Draw a line and stick with it. If the suffering of Chinese matters than so does of every other global south worker.

The only clear point is China refuses to act as an ally when it matters and where it matters. This is all. Keep your own moral judgements to yourself, or don't and embrace you were wrong. You're defending China based on a moral argument in favor of Chinese exceptionalism and I'm arguing against China on the basis they have acted at times as complacent allies of the enemies of the global south.

The most we can agree on is its obviously not their fault. But the bare minimum is

-Some useless UN resolution everyone knows wont pass anyway

-Some BS sanction that wont actualy affect Israel's economy nor military capability

-Some explicit support for Yemen's anti-shipping, instead we get Wang Yi doing a historical major blunder completely misunderstanding the ideological reasoning behind the Houthi's motivation. ~~(careful don't look at Chinese actions in the SCS against Philippines and others, do as we say not as we do).~~

Instead we get

Yellen and Blinken getting state dinners and high level meetings with the CPC

Xi traveling to SF and Paris, both centers of US genocide and imperialism.

-Literaly not a single actual finger lifted against Israel or explicit support for Yemen.

For context 15 billion CFA Franc = 25 million USD. At a state level for China its literally nothing, probably couldn't buy a couple of Mcmansions in any Chinese T1 these days. Its pennies and as you said perfectly on a imperialist backed currency.

If there is any silver lining perhaps it should be taken not at face value but as a sign of possible future cooperation and bigger loans/investments.

Yeah I agree with this, the stocks keep growing exactly because they completely ignore Biden and US politics almost entirely.

The latest growth cycles are based on either

1. the expectation that the Fed will lower interest rates and if you spend even a casual amount of time each week reading these market headlines you'd go insane, they manufacture some absurd rationales and narratives that literaly change from one day to the next. One day its up 2% because some indicator says inflation is slowing therefore "high hopes for interest rate cuts in the future" and then 2 days later another indicator says the opposite and so flip that headline 180 "oh no investors weigh in on dashed hopes for rates cut" and it changes daily.

2. the current AI "boom", I think you know this obviously US tech is now a major grift but NVIDIA also got to keep massive markups from the crypto boom during COVID, there was never a correction from those $1000+ GPUs, that is the permanent standard now for the top end. When inevitably another COVID like supply chain breakup/crisis happens they'll hike the prices another 50% from there and $1500-2k gpus will become the standard etc.

Even if AI boom crashes its almost impossible to see NVIDIA going anywhere now outside of major geopolitical events. And when that crisis happens and NVDIA increases their prices again and repeat.

And then you look at what the market says about Trump oh he will be better because of less tariffs and less taxes and that is maybe true, but the Fed is literaly independent anyway and the current boom will keep going until some major event causes a major anti-AI backlash, though the chances of that are minimal now. Yet Trump gets to benefit as being labelled as the "market favorite" even though his direct involvement is almost zero.

Technicaly ATH under Biden but relative growth Trump still had a sizeable lead, counting both from election day up to COVID and since COVID to election day.

The only thing BIden offers to the market is a relative predictability about future wars specially against China. Otherwise the "market" prefers Trump in almost every scenario.