49 pointsby lysace3 hours ago10 comments
  • soegaard3 hours ago
    Nato - Article 2

    The Parties will contribute toward the further development of peaceful and friendly international relations by strengthening their free institutions, by bringing about a better understanding of the principles upon which these institutions are founded, and by promoting conditions of stability and well-being. They will seek to eliminate conflict in their international economic policies and will encourage economic collaboration between any or all of them.

  • beardyw3 hours ago
    These tariffs must be becoming self defeating. If they get imposed on a whim what is the point of avoiding them, only to be told you need to jump higher next time. Surely the answer must be to trade with anyone else and write off the USA.
    • mynti3 hours ago
      You cannot negotiate with a bully. The EU should have never backed down so easily before. I hope someone will soon find some balls and not let the US walk all over everyone
      • bigbadfelinean hour ago
        > You cannot negotiate with a bully.

        You can and you should, in order to make your case known, it's simple politics. Huffing and puffing while drowning in moral indignation isn't much different from the other side's approach. And don't jump the gun just because of some silly post somewhere on silly soc media.

        I have never seen an official EU statement about US-EU-NATO relations that actually makes sense. What I see is kicking the ball back and forth moving in the same general direction.

      • blibble2 hours ago
        if they back down on this one then orange-adolf will go after canada
      • istanbulbebesi2 hours ago
        EU politicians like Merz and von der Leyen are pushovers.
      • an hour ago
        undefined
    • lysace3 hours ago
      It's inevitable that an "almost-anyone-but-the-US" free-ish trading coalition of countries will appear. The EU will air drop their tried, tested and scaled up trade negotiation teams worldwide during the upcoming weeks.

      US spelling bee kids will be great at spelling P-A-R-I-A-H though.

    • catlover762 hours ago
      [dead]
  • blibble2 hours ago
    think this is a pretty obvious demonstration that the 1776 republic is no longer fit for purpose

    why is the congress allowing this to continue?

    in any parliamentary democracy this cretin would have been gone by now

    • hilbert422 hours ago
      "in any parliamentary democracy this cretin would have been gone by now"

      Right. The West's not seen anything like this since the Reich's march into the Sudetenland.

      One can only hope Europe has enough gumption to confront the bully long enough for US citizens to awake and correct the situation.

      The last thing we need now is gutless Appeasement from European states à la Chamberlain.

  • 472828472 hours ago
    Useful for context (individual submission was flagged):

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_hybrid_warfare_agains...

  • 0xCE0an hour ago
    I feel this is a major turning point for how entities can/will behave from now on towards Trump's wants/decisions. Now it is publicly proved, that you cannot trust deals made with Trump, because they can be just invalidated at a moment's notice. Only bad deals to be made, so why would any reasoned entity agree to those. World will not take threats seriously any more, and will defend themselves.

    Maybe missions in Venezuela, Iran etc. was accomplished so easily, that it blurred the judgment of what could be done. But those countries are different than a conglomerate of 450 M people / 27 countries. And now military and economic thinking/domains/threats were also mixed. "Weak EU leaders" can and are now forced to unite as one strong resistance.

    • mongol39 minutes ago
      Yeah, I see it as a kind of "jumping the shark" moment. There is simply no way to compromise with a neighbors territorial sovereignty to avoid tariffs. It is not going to happen. We may as well regard the US as a black hole that we no longer trade with.
  • shlip3 hours ago
    Didn't they already have tariffs ? Also, why should we care, what do the US have that's made domestically ?
    • lysace3 hours ago
      We do. This would presumably be added on top of the existing ones. The only communication so far comes from a Trump Truthsocial post with its typical lack of clarity. Lots of bed ads though.

      Funny, we are are beginning to think the same, why do we need you? (The truth, of course is that everyone wins when trade is open/free.)

  • 7bit3 hours ago
    So more financial burdens for US citisens? Poor Americans. Why did they vote for this lunatic?
    • geremiiahan hour ago
      Americans wanted change so they didn't want establishment politicians. When this usually happens the far-right and far-left come into view and typically what happens is that the far-right get first dibs because they always promise the impossible so their proposals are at first glance more attractive to the electorate. In the case of this election, the Democrats didn't even allow the progressives to contest the election so there wasn't really a choice at all.
      • an hour ago
        undefined
      • fritzorino34 minutes ago
        Oh look it's that pathetic thing that some Americans do where they blame the Democrats for Trump being in power.
    • lysace3 hours ago
      He won because he promised to deport illegal immigrants. His voters thinks he is delivering.
      • toomuchtodo3 hours ago
        It appears to be a combination of racism, “crabs in the pot” mentality, tribalism and in group motivations, and people looking for another group to look down on because they have no opportunity ahead of them between now and death. Happiness is reality minus expectations.

        His supporters still say “It’s not great but I’d vote for him again.” Well, the unfortunate news is he’s near end of life and they footgunned their own economic opportunity light cone. The global economy is going to route around the US accordingly, because it cannot be trusted to trade as an adult vs a bully. They will continue to have their vote and mental model regardless of rationality and logical reasoning. All you can do as a nation state counterparty is defend against military action and disconnect economically.

        Same vibes as "If you can convince the lowest white man he's better than the best colored man, he won't notice you're picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he'll empty his pockets for you." —- LBJ

        (derived from first principles)

    • bigbadfelinean hour ago
      > Why did they vote for this lunatic?

      The policy isn't decided by one person or one party or the two parties for that matter. Trump is just an actor going thorough the script, as much as he can make it.

    • bediger40003 hours ago
      Trump did racist dog whistling, and the US mass media has been captured by oligarchs, so it wasn't reported honestly or completely. A surprising large portion of the US electorate is racist, and the US voting practices amplify exactly those voter's influence.
      • ta90002 hours ago
        It was a bad election cycle for incumbents worldwide. Many Americans are hurting from the cost of living and wanted a change. I know many who are definitely not racist (in interracial marriages/relationships even) who voted for Trump just on the hope for an improved economy.
        • mindslight26 minutes ago
          That goes to the exact point about the media. Trump trashed the economy during Covid with trillions in new dollars so that that all important Line would continue to go up rather than reflect the reality of a global pandemic. The Biden administration did a decent job getting the price inflation from that under control, but rather than giving credit where credit is due, the oligarchic media continued to agitate against the incumbent who wasn't all-in on corporate rule. Cue a whole bunch of low-information voters for the New York con artist on vague "hope" for improvement, when everyone using at least half their brain knew that the policies Trump was promising would be highly destructive to our economy.
          • ta900019 minutes ago
            Do you know what they call the dumbest person at the polling place? A voter.
        • catlover762 hours ago
          [dead]
  • mixologistan hour ago
    It seems he is really desperate for media to avoid Epstein discussion.
    • 4 minutes ago
      undefined
  • lysace3 hours ago
    Denmark, Germany, Norway, Sweden, France, the UK, the Netherlands and Finland to face a 10% tariff beginning February 1. Trump said tariffs will be in place until "a deal is reached" on Greenland. [...] Trump added that if no resolution is reached until June 1 this year, the tariffs will jump to 25%.

    These are most of the countries that sent military forces to Greenland during the past two days for https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Arctic_Endurance. The US was also invited.

    • madspindel3 hours ago
      As I Swede, I must say this list of countries are the countries I love the most in Europe (well, I like the weather in Spain and Italy, but I mean politically).

      I would like our countries to integrate more, maybe with a common army. In the Nordics we already have begun to integrate our Air Forces to a common Nordic Air Force. Why not extend that to UK, France, Netherlands and Germany? These countries together could form a quite powerful army, air force etc. that could safeguard Europe against external threats.

      • pseudony3 hours ago
        Same, though, as a Dane, I must express preference for Norway, Sweden and Finland (and Iceland), obviously :)

        I hope his antics do nothing except push us closer together.

        • lysace3 hours ago
          At the same time we need to realize that the US actions are clearly meant to tear the EU apart.

          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Arctic_Endurance

          The Italian Defense Minister Guido Crosetto found the operation superfluous and ridiculous, calling it a joke, and urged that it be carried out under NATO coordination.

          It's just that I also want that split (north vs south, sort of). The EU of today is dysfunctional, largely because of this immense cultural split.

          Now I want to delay this split though. At the moment we need EU unity.

          • pseudony2 hours ago
            Oh absolutely, I adore most every country of the EU, maybe except Hungary and recently... Slovakia.

            But in principle, I think the EU, some voting forms, and a federal army is necessary if we desire any degree of self-determination.

          • bigbadfeline39 minutes ago
            > At the same time we need to realize that the US actions are clearly meant to tear the EU apart.

            Generally true with one small but very important correction - the US actions are clearly meant to bait the EU into breaking itself apart.

            > It's just that I also want that split (north vs south, sort of).

            You've been had. Trump is smarter than you, you've bitten his bait and you're hanging on his hook... and you were doing so well initially.

            > The EU of today is dysfunctional, largely because of this immense cultural split.

            There's no cultural split, there are only politicians on varying levels of corruption and the leading EU countries are in the center of it all. That's the problem that needs addressing.

        • jdmoreira2 hours ago
          You guys are all really purist with your shade of white.
          • bigbadfeline31 minutes ago
            > You guys are all really purist with your shade of white.

            That's the major goal of all the theatrics you see in political space - to have very similar peoples get at each other's throats. It was wildly "successful" in provoking the idiotic war between Russia and Ukraine.

            It's telling that I don't see any politician in the EU addressing that threat. You'd think EU politicians would know better given the long and bloody history of idiotic intra-European wars.

          • Sabinus25 minutes ago
            What do you mean?
          • 2 hours ago
            undefined
      • geremiiahan hour ago
        A two-tier Europe would deepen the divide that already exists.
      • UncleEntity3 hours ago
        Maybe something like a constitutional republic of independent states?

        The only way to ensure one political party doesn't seize full and complete control over the entire thing and bend its will to exclusively their goals.

        • fifilura2 hours ago
          Yeah maybe some system with checks and balances.
    • jleyank3 hours ago
      Willful misunderstanding of NATO. The US is committed to defend Greenland as it is now or if it’s theirs. So, I guess, they’ve left NATO just didn’t leave a forwarding address.

      Time to tell the bully to do quaint anatomical actions with mobile baked goods.

  • pfannkuchen2 hours ago
    I don’t understand where Denmark’s claim to Greenland comes from in the first place.

    Can someone who is unhappy about this fill me in on why Denmark should have it?