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Comment by rayiner | Hacker News Reader

Why should we control the world? It’s very expensive running an empire, and all it has accomplished is getting people around the world to hate us. Do you know how much people in my home country hate Reagan and Nixon (who opposed our independence because of some stupid alliance with Pakistan against Russia)? Much more than they hate Trump.

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I remember you trying to defend the tariff policies as a defense against China. Do you still honestly perceive China as a threat to American power and livelihood? If so, how do you square this stance of conceding global power to China at the same time? At the very least, surely you can see the importance of global supply chains to American manufacturing that you want to protect?

I'm asking these questions specifically based on your arguments in the past. I don't understand how you can believe America can thrive in a world without allies and trade partners.

I believe in the pre-World War I Republican policies that led to a highly developed industrial economy with few commitments to international security. We are at risk from China because we outsourced our industrial capacity to China. The U.S. used its industrial capacity to build the largest air force and navy in the world overnight when it entered World War II. Today, China is the country that has that capacity.

Ok. So if we really did care about building that industrial capacity, then why are we randomly and capriciously taxing the resources needed to build that capacity? Including the critical resources that we don't have in America? Why are we making it so hard for domestic production companies to make short, medium, and long term plans by repeatedly changing our trade policies on whims?

The globalized supply chains needed to get the natural resources alone should be enough to answer your question about why we should care about America's global relationships.

From outside massive wealth extraction and exploitation of less powerful countries. Worked long enough, but cracks are starting to appear.

I think folks in my home country could at least understand wealth extraction. But what wealth has America extracted from Bangladesh, Vietnam, Iraq, etc? The Chinese got the oil contracts in Iraq.

What’s insane about America’s foreign policy is that it costs huge amounts of money, pisses off most of the third world, and doesn’t even seem to result in any flow of wealth to the U.S.

Will I see you at the next protest against military adventurism in Venezuela and Trump's murder of people in international waters?

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