Or perhaps the end of the beginning, if you're a little more pessimistic.
Image is from this Bloomberg article, from which I also gathered some of the information used in the preamble.
While Trump was off in the Middle East in an incompetent attempt to solve a geopolitical and humanitarian crisis, China has been doing something much more productive.
Chinese officials, including Xi Jinping, had a summit with CELAC (a community of 33 Latin American and Caribbean countries). There, he promised investment, various declarations of friendship, and visa-free entry for 30 days for citizens of Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Peru and Uruguay. Lula signed over 30 agreements with China. Colombia is joining the New Development Bank and hopes to gain the money for a 120-kilometer railway connecting the Atlantic and Pacific coasts as an alternative route to the Panama Canal. Even Argentina, ruled by arch-libertarian and arch-dipshit (but I repeat myself) Milei, was uncharacteristically polite with China as he secured a currency swap renewal to shore up their international reserves.
It wouldn't really be correct to say that Latin America is "siding with China over the US" - leaders in the region will continue to make many deals with America for the foreseeable future, and even Trump's bizarre economic strongman routine won't make them break off economic and diplomatic relations. What's significant here is that despite increasing American pressure for those leaders to break off all ties with China, few appear to be listening - and given that China is perhaps the most important economy on the planet right now, that is a very predictable outcome.
As the current American empire takes actions to try and avoid their doom, those very actions only guarantee it. As Latin America grows ever more interconnected with China and continues to develop, America will grow ever more panicked and demanding, and this feedback loop will - eventually - result in the death of the Monroe Doctrine.
Last week's thread is here. The Imperialism Reading Group is here.
Please check out the RedAtlas!
The bulletins site is here. Currently not used.
The RSS feed is here. Also currently not used.
Israel-Palestine Conflict
Sources on the fighting in Palestine against Israel. In general, CW for footage of battles, explosions, dead people, and so on:
UNRWA reports on Israel's destruction and siege of Gaza and the West Bank.
English-language Palestinian Marxist-Leninist twitter account. Alt here.
English-language twitter account that collates news.
Arab-language twitter account with videos and images of fighting.
English-language (with some Arab retweets) Twitter account based in Lebanon. - Telegram is @IbnRiad.
English-language Palestinian Twitter account which reports on news from the Resistance Axis. - Telegram is @EyesOnSouth.
English-language Twitter account in the same group as the previous two. - Telegram here.
English-language PalestineResist telegram channel.
More telegram channels here for those interested.
Russia-Ukraine Conflict
Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict
Sources:
Defense Politics Asia's youtube channel and their map. Their youtube channel has substantially diminished in quality but the map is still useful.
Moon of Alabama, which tends to have interesting analysis. Avoid the comment section.
Understanding War and the Saker: reactionary sources that have occasional insights on the war.
Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict. While he is a reactionary and surrounds himself with likeminded people, his daily update videos are relatively brainworm-free and good if you don't want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. He also co-hosts The Duran, which is more explicitly conservative, racist, sexist, transphobic, anti-communist, etc when guests are invited on, but is just about tolerable when it's just the two of them if you want a little more analysis.
Simplicius, who publishes on Substack. Like others, his political analysis should be soundly ignored, but his knowledge of weaponry and military strategy is generally quite good.
On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent and very good journalist reporting in the warzone on the separatists' side.
Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.
Pro-Russian Telegram Channels:
Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.
https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR's former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR's forces. Russian language.
https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ A few different pro-Russian people gather frequent content for this channel (~100 posts per day), some socialist, but all socially reactionary. If you can only tolerate using one Russian telegram channel, I would recommend this one.
https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.
https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday ~ Patrick Lancaster's telegram channel.
https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ A big Russian commentator.
https://t.me/rybar ~ One of, if not the, biggest Russian telegram channels focussing on the war out there. Actually quite balanced, maybe even pessimistic about Russia. Produces interesting and useful maps.
https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense. Does daily, if rather bland updates on the number of Ukrainians killed, etc. The figures appear to be approximately accurate; if you want, reduce all numbers by 25% as a 'propaganda tax', if you don't believe them. Does not cover everything, for obvious reasons, and virtually never details Russian losses.
https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.
Pro-Ukraine Telegram Channels:
Almost every Western media outlet.
https://discord.gg/projectowl ~ Pro-Ukrainian OSINT Discord.
https://t.me/ice_inii ~ Alleged Ukrainian account with a rather cynical take on the entire thing.
Denmark is deteriorating, their conditions are plummeting, they are cutting social services at a faster and faster pace to militarize. They are becoming increasingly fascistic. I would rather live in China, especially considering it’s trending in the correct direction and has a future.
Sometimes you need a splash of cold water to realize when you sound like a cracker. MoA is correct here. He’s using China as an example because even though they have a long way to go and famously have problems with overwork, they are STILL better than the new status quo in Denmark. It would be even more of a stark contrast to compare Denmark and say Cuba
No offense, I’ve lived in both the West and in China, I’m pretty sure I’ve got a better perspective than most people here, even though you are welcome to call me biased.
I don’t think you realize that being in close proximity to the USSR dictated how much better the working conditions are in the soc dem European states, even 35 years after its collapse and most of those countries are declining and have fully mutated into neoliberal imperialist states as you’ve said. The whole point that is in spite of all this, welfare is still so much better than China that claims to be socialist.
Also, very much doubt that most people here who have lived in the West and say they prefer to live in China will easily survive the 内卷 (involution) in China. When you hear “expats” talk about China, know that they usually work for some multinational corporations that automatically place them among the top 0.1% income earners in China and are essentially living like kings there. Their kids go to international schools and do not have to compete with the rest of the kids for gaokao.
I get that many people here are cynical or just want to be contrarian, but seriously think about trading away free healthcare and social safety nets and one month of vacation every year, just to work like a dog with little to no recreation time in your 20s and 30s, having to report to your supervisor on every Sunday instead of having the luxury of switching off for the weekend.
Maybe you enjoy the hustling and grinding, in which case, good for you, but I assure you that most people don’t. Call me lazy or whatever, I don’t care lol!
The point is these things will cease to exist for Denmark and the west within the decade, meanwhile China is continually improving. All future trends indicate that China will continue to be a better place to live.
Would have agreed with you if it weren’t for the fact that the retirement age is also being raised in China starting January 1st, 2025.
You probably have seen my writings before, still too neoliberal brained, will do anything other than raising wages and giving welfare to people, etc. I won’t repeat all of that lol. So we’ll see how much longer China is going to keep up with these policies.
China’s life expectancy has sky rocketed, so too does the cost of pensions for the remainder of their lives. Some moving back of the retirement period is only natural to account for the massively increased lifespan of recent years. Whereas in Denmark the life expectancy has not been increasing, in fact it decreased for the last 2 years and before the at has been flat for decades. So they are burning at both ends, whereas China is shifting one way.
You say you have lived in both China and the West, but what does that have to do with this conversation? You have never been a retiree in Denmark under the new rules, in fact nobody has because it hasn’t yet occurred, it’s a removal of future benefits. What do you know of the plight of a 68 year old in Denmark in 2059? You think they will have healthcare? Lmao. Look at the numbers here presented by Moon of Alabama, they are pointing at a real thing. Work:retirement ratio is important.
China's is now also suffering from this same population crisis, life expectancy is not increasing therefore the working age population is decreasing.
This is fundamentaly part of the reason why China is increasing the retirement age. Its a mainstream neoliberal reaction to the same crisis faced on industrialized countries. You're trying to separate Denmark as if their situation is that much different but it is not. There is no "increased lifespan of recent years". This is at least 15 years out of date. Chinese life expectancy peaked in 2010. The working age population(15-64) has been stagnant for 15 years.
Please understand this is mainstream news in China even. SCMP: China population: with 20 million fewer people projected by 2035, will the retirement age have to be raised? This was before the CPC announced the current reform.
You're also just saying that pension cost is some fundamental universe law that must be accounted for, this is neoliberal budgeting theory you should know about it. Even though @xiaohongshu@hexbear.net 's infactuation with MMT or whatever is silly and MMT is almost entirely anti-marxist, its still strikes along at least one correct principle here.
Neoliberal budgeting of social welfare is not an excuse to curb worker rights, period. Any society can afford retirement @60 and universal healthcare etc. The issue is the strength of the collective working class, not some economic nonsensical argument about "paying" for pensions. Come on dude, China can afford retirement @60, all it takes is Xi to get off his ass and point the PLA's at the Tencent offices and their Jack Maos.
Government budgeting is not and will never be an issue. It becomes an issue if we resign to the fact the working class got no strength to impose these concessions.
No in fact it is not "natural" to progressively lose your working class rights, every industrialized country including China can afford proper social welfare. You're sadly just copying mainstream rethoric about government budget to justify adjusting worker rights. I do not know how Hexbear arrives at these strange positions honestly, no neoliberal reforms are not justifiable under any circumstance.
If these reforms are necessary for the CPC to keep the line going up maybe they need to take a look at the mirror, the US's line is also going up yet that doesn't justify anything so why do you need to copy them?
Yes I agree with you China may well be the better place to live, how much does that matter if China keeps doing neoliberal reforms though? Much of this progress will be lost and your pragmatic calculation will look vastly different even 10-15 years from now.
"A developed but declining imperial core socdem country with the population of a mid size Chinese city and sickening accumulated wealth per capita is in some ways still a preferable place to work and even exist than a developing (and constantly improving QoL wise) socialist asian nation of 1.4 billion people 70 years removed from feudalism" is really eye oppening analysis. It was also easier in some if not most ways to be a worker in some random european social democracy than in the USSR for most of the latters existance. Guess everything is lost
Exactly. Furthermore, the EU in general is just a giant, neo-liberal dictatorship that was carefully designed to prevent the European working classes from seizing power and building socialism in their countries. European workers can learn a lot from the Chinese revolution and the PRC. The EU, on the other hand, must be destroyed.
Also, retiring at 70 is complete ass. Per WHO data, healthy life expectancy for Denmark is 71, so your average Danish worker can only enjoy a year of retirement before being hit with debilitating illness. HALE for China is 67.2 for men and 70.0 for women. That's 7.2 years and 15 years of healthy retirement respectively.
Retiring at 70 is essentially just removing retirement.
I know someone who dropped dead right when they turned 70. They would've enjoyed a week of "retirement" if they were in Denmark.