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Comment by Loughla | Hacker News Reader

You took out the comment about people howling about change. Why? That seemed the central thesis of your statement.

I would argue that it's not practical to burn the current system down without a plan at all for the next system (like the ACA a few years ago. . .)

My concern isn't change. My concern is the complete lack of concern for consequences. Like it or not, the US is and has been on the decline in terms of world authority. Leaving a power vacuum, like dismantling the UN, will just open the door for places like China to step in. You think that country has any amount of give a crap about humanity as a whole? Not even a little, I would argue.

So, again, for many people, it's not that the UN is perfect (or even functional in my opinion). It's that there is, has been, and seems like there will never be an actual plan. Am I wrong?

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> Leaving a power vacuum, like dismantling the UN, will just open the door for places like China to step in. You think that country has any amount of give a crap about humanity as a whole? Not even a little, I would argue.

If China wants to foot the bill, let them. As I pointed out, the US hasn't been getting anything in return for the last 25 years of footing the bill, basically since 9/11. China cares about its people. They are currently fighting back against privilege and conspicuous consumption by the elites [1]. The CCP knows that an open revolt would destabilize their grip. After all, they themselves rode a populist wave into power.

I think of it like the Tour de France. Sometimes to win the race you need to move into second place, conserve your resources, and let someone else face the headwinds.

The comment about change felt like an ad hominem attack.

[1] https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cvg7827pwlro

> As I pointed out, the US hasn't been getting anything in return for the last 25 years of footing the bill, basically since 9/11

You pointed this out but provided no evidence.

"I'm paying for these traffic lights with these taxes but all they do is slow me down"

Would you really liken the recent US approach to international relations to a peloton? Seems rather more like the race leader stopping his bike, chucking it off a cliff whilst hurling insults at all the contestants a lap or two behind, including the teammates offering him an alternative bike

Thoughtful, conservative isolationists don't mix up their questions about how important soft power is really with threats to annexe Canada or attempts to get the Brazilian Supreme Court to drop a case through tariff policy. Or indeed rant incessantly about how much of a threat China is whilst doing everything possible to drive the rest of the world into their arms.

Throughout much of its history, the US has been conservative and isolationist. The post-WW2 era was an aberration, not the status quo. I see these actions as the US returning to its roots. Whether the US annexes Canada is up to the US and Canada. Other parties only get an opinion when either of those two decides to involve them.

And the Tour de France is not a Peleton. You are being disingenuous.

> Throughout much of its history, the US has been conservative and isolationist

Even if this were true - and Commodore Perry, Manifest Destiny, and our zealous pursuit of trade among other skeletons of history fly in the face of this - why would we want to return to a status quo when we are so far removed from it now? The global landscape has changed, and we were the primary motivator of that change. After decades of assassinations of political leaders abroad and shock doctrine economic policies, we are to pack up our bloody toys and go home? The moral objections aside, this is a foolish and shortsighted policy that leaves only chaos. We will not preserve anything about our way of life, because it's been spliced with the genes of a globalized, post ww2 administrative world we created.

> And the Tour de France is not a Peleton. You are being disingenuous

A peloton is a line of cyclists with riders taking it turns to voluntarily relinquishing the lead to conserve energy. Happens a lot in Tour De France. Pretty much exactly the situation your analogy attempted to describe. (If you're only aware of the branded exercise equipment, maybe don't use cycling race analogies and definitely don't confuse people possessing knowledge you lack with disingenuousness)

Got to enjoy the irony of someone accusing me of being disingenuous for knowing slightly more than zero about cycle races, whilst simultaneous arguing that a mad child shouting about annexing Canada is either isolationism or the "US returning to its roots" though.

I mean, I guess the US did have a mad king once and, separately, an attempt to annex Canada. Neither of those had anything even slightly to do with the principle of isolationism either, and I don't think either of them were successful enough for any sane Americans to want to return to them :D

China especially cares about its Uyghur people, providing them with paternal supervision, excellent vocational camps, and even providing guests to live with families.

That's called whataboutism. China's internal problems are for China to solve. If you have an opinion, why not go over and advise them on what to do?

Sure, and it’s usually more conducive to do so under the aegis of an international body that can claim some measure of neutrality, rather than as a private individual from a rival nation-state.

> Leaving a power vacuum, like dismantling the UN, will just open the door for places like China to step in.

The UN has no power, so dismantling it cannot leave a power vacuum. The US abandoning its overseas policies, that'd leave a power vacuum, because the US has power and projects it. But the UN has no power - it's some UN member states that have power.

Case in point: the general assembly demanded Russia withdraw all military forces from Ukraine. But what are they going to do about Russia ignoring that demand? Nothing, they're powerless.

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