[amiga_500]

The USA won't even have most of its supply chain under domestic control by 2035.

The response to the virus was typically disorganized and indicative of wider issues. The last 40 years have seen a huge slide in power and credibility, what is going to stop that?

[david_w]

I don't agree with any of your characterizations.

[david_w]

Recapturing the supply chain is not hard to do. Even the cheerleaders from the 90s for neoliberalism, which lead to "that great sucking sound" Ross Perot warned about, now admit they made a mistake.

Formerly, before COVID-19 and China building up outcroppings of rock into military bases, and declaring the whole of the South China Sea to be their personal property, and the genocide of the Uyghurs the details of which are far far more horrifying than the average Westerner is aware of (proof on demand), before the bellicose anouncements about the upcoming "China Century" before all that... the conventional wisdom was the growing propserity of China would lead to a burgeoning middle class, which in turn would demand their human rights causing a reform of the Communist regime. That and giving China MFN status would make them behave like other nations with respect to IP laws and pirating and currency manipulation etc. etc.

It didn't happen. Instead what we got was a blustering, expanionistic kleptocracy provably willing to murder their own people, other people's people and anything else that stands in the way of the mighty Century of China, where China takes its "rightful place" as the undisputed world leader.

So now, Plan B.