this doesn't make a lot of sense for trump to be economically bullying our long standing trade partners. europe is not just "not our enemy" but our greatest and probably only real cultural friend and ally in the world. these sorts of measures should be on the table but only find use selectively and used as economic pressures to achieve specific foreign policy goals. the europeans gripe and snoot at americans but they do also fundamentally respect the US and its power and would undoubtedly answer a NATO call to arms against a real threat to Western hegemony and that counts for quite a bit

i get that there's some longer set of objectives in mind and that in the long run it's probably going to spur innovation and industrial growth in the EU (as well as damaging the top-down class warfare of the "green agenda") but i doubt if this is really the best way to go about those aims. increased national investment in european ventures with american interests proportionally profiting off of growth and lessening our mutual dependencies on china and russia seems cr instead

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5674122&forum_id=2).#48614211)

Date: February 2nd, 2025 9:22 AM

Author: "'''""""'"'

You are confusing fringe party shock headlines (imported largely as "push" propaganda for domestic consumption) regarding NATO for actual meaningful political support for disentanglement from the coalition of victors that has defined the post-war era

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5674122&forum_id=2#48614423)

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5674122&forum_id=2).#48614430)

With friends like these

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5674122&forum_id=2).#48614445)

the current arrangement is admittedly outdated and a hold-over in many ways from the marshall plan and its legacy but for trade matters, especially with true allies (which almost all EU nations certainly are, most recently shown in the many actions european nations took upon themselves at cost in defiance of russia and for the benefit of the ill-advised american led efforts in ukraine) you need the delicate touch of a scalpel, not the oafish whacks of the mallet trump seems intent on using

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5674122&forum_id=2).#48614216)

No real changes.

Now we force change. Also, Europe/Canada/Mexico have actively gotten into economic bed with Russia and China against our asking (and we subjected ourselfs to economic pain to distance ourselfs from Russia and Chia).

Now we force change.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5674122&forum_id=2).#48614219)

i'm concerned that there are too many neo-austrian Milei style jingoist advisors in his ear. some of this stuff is needlessly aggressive and agitating, like the "gulf of america" change, which i still don't really understand beyond the barbaric justifications of the id. it's flimsy but i heard it was a simple lawyering way to get around environmental regs regarding drilling in the gulf of mexico (lol) which would also explain why chevron was so quick to adopt the language used in the executive pronouncement

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5674122&forum_id=2).#48614224)

the milei i criticize above is peak israeli puppet and the neo-austrian camp in economics is disproportionately jewish, whereas afaik most of the modern day keynesians are french, german, or politically centrist americans of an old-school progressive varietal. this said jews are often high quality in this field and shouldn't have their perspectives discounted or disproportionately diminished in debate just because of their ethnic or religious background

the distinction is messy but things that are more strictly "of politics" relating to the jews can sensibly have aspersions cast upon them due to distinct and persistent conflicts of interests that clearly play a part in actor decision making but the economic arts and sciences are a different beast for the most part

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5674122&forum_id=2).#48614233)

The European Union imposes a 10% tariff on passenger vehicles imported from the U.S.

Additional regulations and taxes, such as the Value Added Tax (VAT) (ranging from 19% to 25% depending on the EU country), also apply.

Tariffs on EU Cars into the U.S.

The United States imposes a 2.5% tariff on passenger cars imported from the EU.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5674122&forum_id=2).#48614218)

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5674122&forum_id=2).#48614228)

we are doing Europe and Canada a favor by putting pressure on them

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5674122&forum_id=2).#48614234)

nothing cucky about this line of inquiry. it's a hotly debated topic even and especially amongst the more informed portion of the pro-trump right. there are obvious concerns in the short and moderate length about these actions, depending on how they're implemented, creating more price pressures on american households at a time where most average americans are already feeling a very nasty squeeze from inflationary pressures and plain jane pricing exploitation from BIGCORP

the president i supported for 3 electoral cycles lands a lot of hits in this game of battleship but it doesn't mean he doesn't miss from time to time and sincere criticism in the discourse helps to keep the administration focused and honest

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5674122&forum_id=2).#48614236)

but yeah canada is absolutely doomed to a jeetpocalypse and political disintegration without heavy intervention

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5674122&forum_id=2).#48614255)

last innovations they had were Nokia and Skype

it’s a backwater

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5674122&forum_id=2).#48614279)

i don't know if it's sustainable within the strictures of the rapey dog eat dog globalized economy or good for europe long term in-context but as far as i understand it the route many eu nations chose was prioritizing average citizen quality of life and providing domestic stability through stifling the tigerishness of pure unrestrained capital by building out these easily controlled/very politically legible specialized satellite economies with a few niches that serve(s) (a) major trading partner(s) e.g. a hub european nation like germany or france or the US while heavily regulating outcomes and leaning in on the "public" part in the "private-public partnerships" corporatist idea that underpins business-state interactions over there (less so in some parts of eastern europe that seem to be leaning in more and more on some sorts of simulacrum of the american model. this type of thinking seems to be a teutonic orientation)

the metrics they use to define economic success or good corporate functioning are sometimes to often very different from the ones we use to determine these things in the states. they're using a different language while tuning for different outcomes, but we still judge them by metrics their citizens seem to see as abhorrent or irrelevant to the actual thrust of more european notions of political economy

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5674122&forum_id=2).#48614281)

the people also get raped on taxes and in return they get “free” healthcare and education and good public transportation. it’s the return of feudalism but the serfs don’t have to live in a barn

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5674122&forum_id=2).#48614282)

getting raped on taxes isn't actually a big deal when the benefits provided by competent, humane, and often genuinely innovative public services keep general quality of life & quality of government high and the national culture & ethos coherent from all segments of the national polity being well-served and socio-economically pulled upwards. ime, few would complain about the progressive income tax scheme we have in the US at present if the social services that our money went to, you know, actually *worked* and provided successful outcomes at a rate even half as well as e.g. denmark's or norway's instead of being these black boxes of squander and decay that end up metastatizing the very issues they are set out & funded by the public to alleviate and resolve

there's a point where a person really does not individually need nor meaningfully benefit w/r/t a sense of attainment or accomplishment from any more money and labor becomes a relatively low-stress eudaemonic activity due to a lack of profit-squeezing/labor exploiting pressures in the workplace and the visible and ever-present societal dividend being disbursed to the public--- your fellow citizens, countrymen, and ideally, co-ethnics---from the taxes taken by the state

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5674122&forum_id=2).#48614286)

getting raped on taxes isn't actually a big deal when the benefits provided by competent, humane, and often genuinely innovative public services keep general quality of life & quality of government high and the national culture & ethos coherent from all segments of the national polity being well-served and socio-economically pulled upwards.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5674122&forum_id=2).#48614324)

if the State can't afford to hire the best and the brightest, if the State doesn't take a meaningful and effective interest in the welfare of its citizens and produce accountable results to the public from this interest, if Americans can't decisively determine where the collective begins and the individual ends, the country will continue to hurtle towards the darkness of the libertarian exploitation-by-the-ultra-wealthy abyss as it reliably has been for decades now

Europe could learn and apply a lot from the American models, failures and successes, and the US could do the same with even more from the European same-such

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5674122&forum_id=2).#48614374)

I don’t believe this at all. Do you think Belgium or Spain would send troops to defend a theoretical attack on the US? Or even funnier, our new NATO ”allies” Sweden and Finland?

I’m not a fan of unnecessarily picking fights like Trump seems to do, but let’s be real about how utterly full of shit and useless many of our “allies” are.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5674122&forum_id=2).#48614303)

and Canada spends a paltry 1.5% of GDP on defense

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5674122&forum_id=2).#48614305)

The US is not going to be meaningfully attacked domestically but in the event of a war in one of the designated buffer zones against Russia or China the Europeans across the board would undoubtedly send material support and likely troops if requested. A real and unquestionably defensive war against one of our two major geopolitical enemies of the US would be a sobering and emboldening moment for the entirety of NATO imo

Also Sweden and especially Finland (our defense ties are actually pretty solid with the Finns---they signed upwards of ten bases to US military access after their accession to NATO, and the only reason they joined NATO as late in the day as they did was due to a mutual understanding between D.C. and Helsinki that the defense relationship there was better kept at a less formal level to avoid needless agitation of Russia) would be more likely to show personnel support than e.g. Portugal or Spain. The US wouldn't necessarily need or even call on them for real personnel support for stability reasons (economic CBA) but they would definitely open the coffers and send material as requested---within the NATO command structure there have been provisions laid out for a long time for smaller nations to provide specialized defense support (e.g. Estonian armored cavalry, Latvian artillery, and so on) in the event of an outbreak of war with Russia or Chyna

NATO's treaty obligations are serious business. Even France, who was always historically iffy about full NATO CoC integration, has made it very clear that in the event of a real offensive threat to NATO that they'd be providing full support

That said, this sort of conflict would pretty much would never happen, but even with this odd NATO tertiary ghost conflict in Ukraine, broad European support within parameters acceptable to a fair balance between American and European political & economic considerations has been generous and forthcoming without much American coercion or cajoling needed

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5674122&forum_id=2).#48614319)

They should support us for the defense we provide them, not the other way around.

hh

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5674122&forum_id=2).#48614329)

What exactly is Europe doing? Would they declare war on China, sever diplomatic relations, ban Chinese imports, send some ships/troops to help? They would do none of those things. Maybe a strongly-worded statement from some bureaucrat in Brussels.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5674122&forum_id=2).#48614411)

You are confusing fringe party shock headlines (imported largely as "push" propaganda for domestic consumption) regarding NATO for actual meaningful political support for disentanglement from the coalition of victors that has defined the post-war era

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5674122&forum_id=2).#48614423)

the EU is dependent on the american taxpayer for everything. it relies on amrican financing of our tech sector and universities for innovation. Students loans in america ultimately fund R&D at universities here.

for defense spending its even more blatant. its not *just* nato. europe and canada benefit from the huge amounts of research and development and manufacturing in the US. europe benefits enormously from the US's support in ukraine and that has nothing to do with nato. the EU would have been forced long long ago to massively increase its defense spending if the US taxpayer didnt support them.

for foreign aid, the US provides 4 out of every 10 dollars worldwide despite us economy being between 1/4 or 1/6.5 (depending on how you count it) of world gdp. in other words, americans are more generous on a relative basis than germany, france, norway, etc. which instead spend on their own people.

the us doesn't need the EU. the EU needs the us. we can basically manufacture everything here. we don't but we could. why should the EU be able to rely on american spending at home and abroad while devoting their own budgets to their own people? penalize them.

despite all of this europeans have an incredibly unearned snobbery toward the usa. and trump is right to tariff them for the mockery alone.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5674122&forum_id=2).#48614364)

which would be 180, both because it would be good for us as citizens, and also because it would allow them to buy the loyalty of a ton of voters and continue to beat libs in elections going forward

they've been remarkably true to their word thus far on other things. so i'm giving them the benefit of the doubt on this too. we'll see what unfolds

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5674122&forum_id=2).#48614369)

reminds me that i'm living on the pirate ship of state. i get a few different brands but nothing exotic. wasa's rye and their GF sesame are good and skedvi's barley & sourdough

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5674122&forum_id=2).#48614385)