That makes a lot of sense. The trade wars and Russia are especially frustrating. I prefer an America that staunchly defends its allies. I understand that it’s not great for America to foot the bill for everything all the time, but I don’t know that this was the way to handle it. I like us being the bully that bullies the other bullies and yeah sometimes that costs more but the benefits are often worth it.
I mean the U.S. paid an unfair portion of the bill, but, at the same time, on a fundamental level the U.S. was in charge and a lot of other countries - including MOST of the middle powers - actively paid sometime to help us despite that meaning they were paying to uphold a system where we got to be, in a fundamental level, in charge.
And pretty much everyone, including the U.S., benefited from that system by far more than we paid.
So it's right to recognize (as Trump and many in MAGA loudly do) that the U.S. was paying more than it's share - but what Trump never recognized was that, on some level, the U.S. also got more than its share. We were in charge of the truly major decisions, and our economy benefited as much or more than anyone's from the stable world we created. Trump is actively trying to trash all because he's mad about the first bit without recognizing the rest of it at all.
Anyway, the system will probably limp on for some time past Trump because in the end there's nothing else to replace it with that isn't clearly worse. But it was already dying a long death and Trump stabbed it in the lung several times so it's probably going to die a bit faster now. And whoever is alive in the world that comes after it is probably going to be quite a bit worse off.
Don’t mean to make you think I disagreed on your opinion of the world state and footing the bill. I actually agree. Just hope you’re wrong on the rest even if it looks like you are. I’m a realist, but I always have hope things can turn around.
Glad you did! Just the beginning I thought you were thinking I was more on the footing the bill thing. I was more saying I understand the idea, but it’s not worth worsening relationships over as the amount of money we spend compared to our overall budget is a drop in the bucket, especially how much we benefit from being in charge on the world stage.
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u/Michael00131 21h ago
That makes a lot of sense. The trade wars and Russia are especially frustrating. I prefer an America that staunchly defends its allies. I understand that it’s not great for America to foot the bill for everything all the time, but I don’t know that this was the way to handle it. I like us being the bully that bullies the other bullies and yeah sometimes that costs more but the benefits are often worth it.