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posted by martyb on Tuesday February 05 2019, @04:31AM   Printer-friendly
from the hello-ruble dept.

https://www.truthdig.com/articles/goodbye-to-the-dollar/

The inept and corrupt presidency of Donald Trump has unwittingly triggered the fatal blow to the American empire—the abandonment of the dollar as the world’s principal reserve currency. Nations around the globe, especially in Europe, have lost confidence in the United States to act rationally, much less lead, in issues of international finance, trade, diplomacy and war. These nations are quietly dismantling the seven-decade-old alliance with the United States and building alternative systems of bilateral trade. This reconfiguring of the world’s financial system will be fatal to the American empire, as the historian Alfred McCoy and the economist Michael Hudson have long pointed out. It will trigger an economic death spiral, including high inflation, which will necessitate a massive military contraction overseas and plunge the United States into a prolonged depression. Trump, rather than make America great again, has turned out, unwittingly, to be the empire’s most aggressive gravedigger.


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  • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday February 05 2019, @05:52AM (5 children)

    by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday February 05 2019, @05:52AM (#796507) Journal

    The only way to make this country great is to take us back to a time before empire.

    Really? At the time of American Civil War?
    Before that, it was a mild version of feudalism/slavery (no king, but heaps of latifundia), after that it switched to Empire mode (Indian Wars, Spanish war, Philippine war, Banana wars and so on)

    --
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
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  • (Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Tuesday February 05 2019, @06:41AM (3 children)

    by MichaelDavidCrawford (2339) Subscriber Badge <mdcrawford@gmail.com> on Tuesday February 05 2019, @06:41AM (#796534) Homepage Journal

    "Latifundia".

    At first Roman plantations worked by slaves, then more recently in Spain and Latin America.

    Nowadays, they sell slaves in the France- and US-liberated Libya. Quite a lot of chocolate is grown by child slaves, with many US confectionary companies refusing to boycott such chocolate.

    Please buy only Fair Trade Chocolate.

    --
    Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
    • (Score: 2) by FatPhil on Tuesday February 05 2019, @11:50AM (2 children)

      by FatPhil (863) <pc-soylentNO@SPAMasdf.fi> on Tuesday February 05 2019, @11:50AM (#796614) Homepage
      Only buy Fair Trade if you've convinced yourself their operations aren't actually harmful to the local economy. Many humanitarians have concluded that Fair Trade is little more than a protection racket nowadays in some parts of the world.
      --
      Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 05 2019, @07:40PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 05 2019, @07:40PM (#796866)

        but it is still better than the alternative!

        It is just like security systems... it will not stop/detect everything and many are just snake-oil ... but the fact they exist makes robbery harder, make robbers question if it's worth it and may directly avoid in some cases.

        There is no silver bullet, every system can be workaround, but that doesn't mean that it fails always

      • (Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Tuesday February 05 2019, @08:59PM

        by MichaelDavidCrawford (2339) Subscriber Badge <mdcrawford@gmail.com> on Tuesday February 05 2019, @08:59PM (#796906) Homepage Journal

        Fair Trade Coffee is so widespread by now that I find it hard to understand how it could actually be a bad thing.

        --
        Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
  • (Score: 5, Insightful) by Sulla on Tuesday February 05 2019, @09:26AM

    by Sulla (5173) on Tuesday February 05 2019, @09:26AM (#796564) Journal

    I think the tipping point for America that took it fervently in the direction of Empire was the refusal to listen to the warnings of Eisenhower. When WWII ended and we were handed a world in complete ruin, except for us, without any remaining superpowers able to project forces, except for us, we didn't stop to think about what it would turn us into. The Jingos got their Spanish-American war and gave us a taste of Empire, but the people still did not desire it. Through the Sedition Act and propaganda Wilson dragged us into WWI against the general populations wishes. In interwar era Americans still did not want to get involved and were primarily pulled into WWII because the Japanese gave the government an easy in. Truman quickly got us involved in Korea and Eisenhower had to mop up. Ike warned us about the dangers of Empire, that the cost of immediate wealth will be long-term debt, entanglements, and freedoms. Short-term thinking and Jingos in both parties put us in Vietnam to feed the MIC and protect the French rubber trade and we never looked back.

    The post-war leadership in the US feared that a reduction in military spending would return us to the great depression, but rather than eat the hit and go through a depression they continued to spend ever increasing amounts on the military to ensure the money kept flowing.

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    Ceterum censeo Sinae esse delendam