Subj : Re: Recession to Depression
To   : Andeddu
From : Kaelon
Date : Sun Jul 10 2022 08:45:01

  Re: Re: Recession to Depression
  By: Andeddu to Kaelon on Sat Jul 09 2022 03:11 pm

 > I find it amusing that Western leaders were criticising Putin for refusing
 > to sell energy for USDs when the US sanctioned oligarchs and Russian
 > businesses by freezing their dollar denominated bank accounts. The lack of
 > basic awareness or understanding from our ruling class is astounding.

The arrogance is astounding, especially when humbler and well-informed economists were pointing out really basic facts that most second-year undergraduate college students would understand: Russia is isolated and silo'ed from the entire global economic system, and despite the collaspe of the Soviet Union and the following almost-gleeful pillaging of Russia as a country by the West, the Russian Elites skillfully manipulated foreign markets to borrow money ceaselessly on extremely favorable terms, but never integrated institutional safeguards, controls, or many of the other systems that ensure Russia would become integrated.  The end result: Russia is its own entity, and very little that the globe does to force Russia economically will have much bearing, considering just how isolated Russia is.

China, on the other hand, is a very different story.  China gambled big on essentially joining the U.S.-led economic world order -- a fact reinforced by the countless times that China has invested in, and bailed out, the United States as the titular leader of this order -- while concurrently preserving its authoritarian political systems.  It has really worked to China's benefit, considering that by and large, China's greatest asset - its population - is also it's largest liability.  China would have to contend with five distinctively hostile societies that are eager to tear each other to shreds and resolve centuries of disputes that would fracture the country, if it ever adopted anything resembling a consensus-driven liberal political system.
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-=: Kaelon :=-

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