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The value of stability to who? Other nations? America has ample military resources for defending its own shores, and I fail to see how we'll be negatively impac

• hsitz 10y ago
  Are you unaware that Trump wants to increase military spending?: http://www.cnn.com/2016/09/06/politics/donald-trump-defense-spending-sequester/index.html http://www.cnn.com/2016/09/06/politics/donald-trump-defense-...
  • trendia 10y ago
    > History shows that when America is not prepared is when the danger is greatest. We want to deter, avoid and prevent conflict through our unquestioned military dominance My suspicion is that he wants less direct military involvement and a greater threat if military involvement is required. That is, he's proposing that we replace the "World Police" model with the Swiss model.
    • eru 10y ago
      That's a somewhat rational reconstruction of his argument. I am not sure that's the only possible reading. (At least one other one is that he was or is simply not coherent.)
      • cloakandswagger 10y ago
        It goes hand in glove with his push for nuclear rearmament. Trump wants a strong, military deterrent but wants to stop nation state building and proxy wars. I don't think those two things are mutually exclusive.
        • serge2k 10y ago
          They aren't. I just don't understand why people were convinced the US military is so weak and shitty and needs rebuilding.
          • eru 10y ago
            Nostalgia perhaps? Russia has it even worse---they went from world wide (perceived) number 2 and scary antagonist to `also-ran in decline'.
    • 7952 10y ago
      There could be some detterant benefit in having someone like Trump. With Obama enemies always knew that he would take a rational approach anf try and avoid war. An irrational President is potentially more scary. He will attack even when logically it is a bad idea.
      • jessaustin 10y ago
        Sort of like Luo Ji as the "Swordholder"? That's kind of scary, but actually it's less scary to imagine a single person making occasionally irrational decisions, than a slow inexorable buildup of media hype and intelligence service bullshit with no obvious cause but one possible result. Actually it feels like the election interrupted one of the latter, and I'm glad because I'd prefer we not go to war with Russia.
  • braveo 10y ago
    That doesn't really go against what he said.
  • SwellJoe 10y ago
    Every Trump supporter seems to see exactly what they want to see of Trump's candidacy. I just had a conversation with someone who believes Trump will be great for LGBTQ equality. No awareness that the campaign has specifically, and emphatically, said, it would roll back almost every bit of progress that has been achieved over the past eight years. Trump, apparently, won because Trump is whatever people want him to be, even if he has clearly and repeatedly said he is the opposite.
    • unimpressive 10y ago
      >No awareness that the campaign has specifically, and emphatically, said, it would roll back almost every bit of progress that has been achieved over the past eight years. Source?
      • SwellJoe 10y ago
        Here's one, pretty well-cited, article on the subject: http://www.hrc.org/2016RepublicanFacts/donald-trump-opposes-nationwide-marriage-equality http://www.hrc.org/2016RepublicanFacts/donald-trump-opposes-... And, look at the legislative record of the people he has chosen to be part of his team. They are among the most anti-LGBTQ legislators at the national level (and his VP has been a nightmare on LGBTQ and women's issues). I guess it is Trump's lack of legislative record that allows people to make him a grab bag of whatever they want to see. But, when you check the history of who he's got on the team, the story is pretty clear.
    • ajross 10y ago
      And meanwhile those of us in the centrist technocrat left are dodging post-election spitballs thrown by progressives and hoping beyond hope that what Trump ACTUALLY wants to do is just sit on his ass in the oval office and play emperor and DOESN'T try to actually get anything done.
      • SwellJoe 10y ago
        The spitballs are because what America (and the world) desperately needs right now is an opposition party. The centrist (actually, center-right, or even just right wing, compared to European politics) Democratic party has no power against right wing extremist ideologues. If the response of leading Democrats, thus far, is any indicator, there will be literally no effective opposition to Trump and the GOP leadership. This is why progressives hate the Democrats so much lately.
• qaq 10y ago
  US military dominance is what makes USD the world's reserve currency which in turn drives 30-40% of our GDP if we start to withdraw it will start to affect USD standing as a world's reserve currency.
  • trendia 10y ago
    These kinds of economic predictions are nearly impossible to prove or verify. I remember approximately 1 week ago that Trump being elected would cause a global economic meltdown. Krugman himself said the stock market would "never recover" if he is elected. And already stocks are up, and have been the last few days.
    • ojbyrne 10y ago
      Bond market is getting hammered though, because it believes he'll revive inflation.
      • selimthegrim 10y ago
        If he lets the Tea Party horsemen of the apocalypse loose on Yellen and the Fed, he just might http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2016/02/25/infrastructure-country-breaking-down/ http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2016/02/25/infrastructure-co...
  • cylinder 10y ago
    This is just one of those myths that gets bandied all around the web. It's a reserve currency because it's a huge balanced economy, and the dollars are freely floated and available. And it's not exactly proven that a strong dollar benefits the US altogether.
    • qaq 10y ago
      You are confusing the exchange rate with our ability to basically control word's money supply. The Middle East is basically economic preferences in exchange for security type of setup. One of the consequences of that is that's world's oil trade is denominated in USD. Putin's wet dream is changing that.
• akanet 10y ago
  In so much as America is a "global cop", it's because we actually directly benefit the most from "continued peaceful existence of the world". We do the most trade, we are the largest economy. We have the most to lose.
  • cloakandswagger 10y ago
    We're also sitting on an abundance of natural resources. In stark terms: We only rely on continued world peace because of globalization and our reliance on international trade. It isn't inconceivable that we could return to total self-sufficiency if we wanted to.
    • tzs 10y ago
      http://www.drishtiias.com/upsc-exam-gs-resources-Distribution-of-Mineral-Resource-in-the-World http://www.drishtiias.com/upsc-exam-gs-resources-Distributio...
    • aggie 10y ago
      We more than 'rely' on world peace and global trade, we thrive on it. Could we be self-sufficient in isolation? Maybe. Would we be better off? Unlikely. Comparative advantage is a real thing.
      • jessaustin 10y ago
        Yes, unskilled factory workers in China really are cheaper than unskilled factory workers in USA. That's why the Rust Belt voted for Trump, isn't it?
  • devonkim 10y ago
    Michael Hudson summed it up a different way - in exchange for military protection, use our currency and open your companies to ours. Oh, and we'll win the guns at you next if your military gets big enough to challenge ours.
• smacktoward 10y ago
  > It's about focusing on improving our own citizens' lives before pouring trillions into wars, offshore military bases, NATO defense payments and UN programs in the name of globalization This is literally the exact same argument the first group of people to use the "America First" slogan made: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/America_First_Committee https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/America_First_Committee And what those people ended up accomplishing was making sure that when the U.S. finally did enter World War 2, it did so more or less unarmed and with its Pacific Fleet sitting at the bottom of Pearl Harbor. Which meant that it took longer to defeat the Axis than it should have, and a lot more Americans (and people, both military and civilian, in all the other nations that struggled against fascism) had to die to make that happen. In the age of rapid transit and telecommunications, the world is even smaller than it was then. Which makes hiding behind the oceans that sit between us and the rest of the world even less viable of a strategy today than it was.
• ajross 10y ago
  The point to the post you're replying to is that "defending its own shores" is not the only value derived from American dominance. A free and unimpeded military environment in the middle east is one where, say, Russia feels justified in blackmailing Saudi over OPEC disputes. A withdrawal of forces from ROK and Japan means that they now have to turn to China for protection from the lunatics in the North. A world without NATO means that Russia gets to annex Russian-speaking regions of Estonia whenever they want, just like they ALREADY DID to the Ukraine. It's tempting to believe that there are no militarist nuts with guns in the modern industrial world, but it's not true. What is true is that they've been largely suppressed in the post-cold-war era by American military dominance. Until now. I'll actually put this prediction down in writing: before the end of Trump's term, there will be at least one shooting war involving one of the players mentioned above.
  • sushiwarrior 10y ago
    Absolutely this. You can't just absolutely do a complete 180 on the principle of US's place in the world Post-WW2 and not expect bad things to happen. There is a reason things are the way they are. It's because we have let America always think they are the greatest and have some sort of God-given right to be the best in the world. They absolutely hate Muslims and can easily quote the fact that Islam dictates global dominance, hence it is wrong. When the US says it comes first and should have global dominance, everyone else is supposed to roll over and conform to all their demands? They just elected a strongman into office who has a clear pattern of misplacing blame for all of the countries problems on the out-groups, including immigrants, Muslims, LGBT, liberals, politicians, the "upper class", and all kinds of other things. What will happen when his misplaced blame doesn't solve the problem? He will double down on the out-groups that gave him such easy support... It is DANGEROUS to have the principle of America first and everyone else second when you don't understand the consequences of America's actions and what it has inflicted on the world. It started the globalist capitalist elite, and now it doesn't want to be on the hook for them while blaming IMMIGRANTS for problems that were clearly caused by big corporations. So he wins by promising to cut taxes for those same corporations... I just don't get what he thinks his end-game is. Mostly WW3, I suppose.