Late Stage Capitalism

Loaded as well.

I see this talking point all the time and I have no idea why anyone would think it matters at all.

Country A has a population of 200 million people and each one has X tax dollars going to the military. Country B, which is directly threatened by Country A, only has a 20 million people and each spends 2X dollars on the military. That means Country B's spending per capita is twice that of Country A's, but Country A's military spending is five times that of Country B. Obviously, Country A is more deserving of criticism for building up a five times larger military with no legitimate threat, while Country B's spending is more reasonable, and might even need to be higher, despite the fact that it's already twice as high per capita. Per capita is almost entirely irrelevant in the discussion.

The British Empire wracked up a ton of war debts and tried to levy taxes on its colonies and that kicked off the Revolutionary War. France spent so much money assisting the colonists to own the Brits that they wound up with their own debt crisis which is what kicked off the French Revolution.

Debt is a big problem but generally the way countries acquire debt is getting involved in a bunch of military entanglements. The US dumped a truly absurd amount of money into the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and nobody really acknowledges that aspect of them. We are well and truly spent, massively overextended, and we desperately need to stay out of military entanglements. We simply don't have the capacity for them. There's tons of domestic crises which have just been festering while to government goes galavanting around the world looking for glory and plunder.

There are two paths forward for the US: one where we make massive military cuts, refocus on addressing domestic problems and addressing the material conditions that have given rise to the far-right, and we start trying to play nice and win countries over through diplomacy and investment the way China does, gracefully managing the decline of the empire and leaving the door open to revitalization and possibly even becoming a positive influence on the world. The second is that we keep pouring more and more money into ensuring we have the most lethal military in the world, we continue trying to dominate the Middle East and elsewhere through military force, we ignore rising costs of living and other domestic problems, we keep becoming more and more of a global pariah, and as extremism gets worse and worse we won't have anything going for us but the military and as our only tool we'll apply it to more and more situations, losing more and more ground until we probably wind up nuking the world rather than accepting that we're no longer "number one."

It is virtually certain that we will follow the second path and avoiding that is really the only worthwhile political goal there is.

Tonight on VICE

"I and my camera crew arrived in Mexico, we're being told the border to America is protected around the clock by armed machineguns, and trained attack dogs 24/7. They're known to imprison journalists and torture dissenters, and I've signed up to live here for a week... we may not make it out alive."

Except, you know... independent journalists interviewing North Korean deserters.

See, they want you to think it shares a border with South Korea.

Even the satellite photos?

No need to. His buddies in office are already gerrymandering the fuck out of his district. The rest is up to Russian and Chinese social media bots getting enough brainwashed deplorables to vote against their own interest. Just lean back and enjoy the ride. We've automated the whole process for ~~our own benefit~~ your convenience.

Click on in the little arrow that's pointing upward