[elforce002]

Interesting. Will the term "self fulfilling prophecy" apply here? I mean, that's how the stock market work, right? Something or someone introduce fear (impending war, possible crash of the dollar, etc.), get people talking about it causing more uncertainty, and the cycle continues, thus fulfilling the original premise.

I'm not a geopolitical expert by any means, but if there was a time to make a move against the US, this would be it for sure.

I mean, by the looks of it, the Western doesn't "feel" that hopeful. Just look at the US alone:

- Patriotism is on an all time low (per NYT);

- Social divide is on an all time high;

- Highest inflation in +30 years;

- Afghanistan's debacle;

- Proxy war with Russia got the American people basically divided between spending that money at home and striking a deal between RU & UA. vs helping Ukraine defeating Russia;

- US culture is getting a pushback from other countries (mainly in the African continent) that think the US is trying to impose their morals upon them (it's not that far fetched if you think about it). This is affecting US relations with those countries to the extent that they prefer to align with US "frenemies" instead of the US per se;

- US foreign policies pushing together countries that were/are still enemies, bringing forward the old saying `the enemy of my enemy is my "friend"`.

This decade will be really interesting, to say the least.

[onlyrealcuzzo]

Fun exercise, do the same thing - but for positives:

- We'll be basically energy independent in 10 years

- Manufacturing is being decentralized and re-shored

- Our domination in tech is not slowing

- Despite the news, violent crimes are near all-time lows

- Education is at an all time high

- Low income wages are at recent-history high

- Working hours are declining, PTO is going up

- Gay rights are at an all time high

- Turns out, Russia isn't much of a threat

- etc.

You see what you want to see. It's a good idea to at least try to see things from the positive and negative sides.

[elforce002]

That's the thing, isn't it? Fear sells, everyone (at least MSM) is stating negative views. "Independent" outlets are stating we're approaching to a global conflict, major economic shifts, etc...

What you stated is interesting since you have to dig deeper to look for these news and even doing that, you'll have the majority of people disagreeing with you. Reality is 99% of the world atm is only looking the bad things and forming their conclusions based on that. We're literally watching the power dynamics being "shuffle" and the general perception of the US being shifted right before our eyes. These news have embolden part of the world to take action and move against the US (which is scary if you think about it since the ramifications will affect everyone) and we can say it makes sense since no country can fight all fronts at once (US and Africa, US vs EMEA, US vs China/Russia, etc..).

I'm hopeful things will get better and the western world will get its "things" together.