Comments by "Tony Wilson" (@tonywilson4713) on "Macron Tries to Reason with a Failing China || Peter Zeihan" video.

  1. As an Australian I love how you put as "America's Deputy" we prefer to call ourselves the "51st State" although we might have to change that if DC or Puerto Rico gets statehood. There is one major difference we have in the South China Sea. China has become our top trading nation mainly because we export a staggering amount of iron ore to China. In the year 2000 we were the #3 producer with 169 Million tons that year. By 2010 we had jumped over Brazil to 416 million tons. In 2017 it was 870 million tons. Almost all of that growth is to China. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=emm5aHAifMg On the other hand South Korea and Japan are our #2 and #3 trading partners. So that Sea Lane up the middle of the South China Sea is pretty damn important to us. And for reference India is #4 and America is #5 on our trading partners list. So if anyone tries to start some sort of SHlTFEST in the South China Sea its at the top of our agenda. In a twist to that. America's foreign policy (as Peter has pointed out numerous times) was ridiculous under Bush, almost non-existent under Obama and completely off the rails with Trump. Mid-2017, around 18 months after trump took office it was reported here in Australia that we had a major problem. Since the end of WW2 our #1 foreign policy was basically "What does America want now?" With Trump even that didn't exist, so DFAT (pronounced dee-fat, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade) which is basically our equivalent (in some ways) to the US State Department, had to start thinking for itself. That was a serious problem because DFAT hadn't had to think for itself in decades. The report at the time (mid-2017) was that DFAT had made it past the worst of that as was starting to actually do its job. So yes Australia is still America's deputy in SE Asia, BUT America better not be of the mindset that we will just do what America wants. As for those subs wait for the shitfight that is about to start. Despite the current government we have in power having partisan support the cost of that program is so idiotically ridiculous that IT WILL BE MODIFIED or CANCELLED. Once the Australian population realises that the American Military Industrial Complex is trying to take us to the cleaners EXPECT a backlash.
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  2.  @dennishassler605  Buddy I am an engineer and don't be stupid. You have to compare like for like. Houses are affected by land prices so the same house in different locations are different costs. Different cars cost different money. These aren't different anything THEY ARE THE SAME ITEM. Estimating projects and managing them IS WHAT I DO FOR A LIVING. Nothing makes sense in this stuff unless you include staggering incompetence and Everest sized fraud. We are being taken to the cleaners, like we are with other projects. The Frigate contract we have with BAE has just jumped 50% form $30 to $45 Billion without any explanation. There hasn't been a 50% change in the cost of anything. What we have are clowns going down the options list ticking boxes and the sales monkeys laughing as the costs explode. Its not just military projects either its civilian infrastructure and private industry projects that are blowing out. I am aerospace engineer but have been working in the mining industry because we looked like going to the moon to mine it a while back. I have watched world class mining companies waste money by the billion all of it on stupidly poor management and mountains of advice from greedy consultants. We have a plague in BAD project management in Australia. Mostly caused by consultants, but also by the Think Tank brigade.
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  3.  @dennishassler605  If you are talking about America's Foreign Policy then go back and watch Peters commentary on that. If you're talking about Australia's foreign policy then sorry but that was how it was reported back in 2018. As for the submarine deal that we have been massively screwed on. That backlash is coming no matter what you think. The US Navy pays the equivalent of Australian $5 Billion per Virginia class sub plus operational costs. We are being asked to pay over $20 Billion per sub before we even get to use them. Yes there are people on our side who need to be charged with treason/fraud/piracy but we'll deal with that. Would you buy a car for 4 times the price you can get it down the road? Would you pay 4 times the price for ANYTHING if you can just go down the road and get it somewhere else?
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  4. ​ @jeffyoung60  I spent 4 months in Saskatchewan building a water treatment plant back in 2017/18 so I am fairly well aware of how Canadians feel about America. They especially made those feelings known when trump tore up NAFTA and smacked them with tariffs. YES - I was there when that happened. But I agree on the 51st state thing. Its a joke Australian's like to tell regarding Australian foreign policy. A few years ago when Australia was nominated for a 2 year stint on the UN Security council those who opposed it simply said "Why should we bother they'll only vote how America tells them to vote!" Our answer to that was "That's outrageous the American's never tell us how to vote. Our diplomats sound out suggestions and then wait for the Americans to nod." Actually we knew full well we had been annexed during the war. There was actually a lot of tension at times between American servicemen stationed in Australia and the local population. There were a lot of Australian men overseas fighting and a lot of American's here chasing their wives and girlfriends. It didn't go down well. Its not something you hear much about these days except from older people. As for NOT bullying Canada and Australia please go and check out trade negotiations. When NAFTA was re-negotiated the Canadians were very seriously bullied into accepting the deal. It wasn't that Canadians were against re-negotiating the deal. When I was there and Trump tore up NAFTA they weren't upset with that. They were pretty logical abut it. They knew American industry was hurting and their needed to be re-negotiation of the trade agreements. What they objected to was being made the scapegoat. Right now if you are not aware of it there could be a monstrous backlash from the Australian population against America. There's a lot of American soft influence going on. Its mainly through consultants like McKinsey, EY and KPMG. Right now PwC has been outed as having screwed Australia and that should end up in criminal convictions. On top of that its been revealed that a bunch of retired American Navy men have been here since 2012 consulting on the submarines and other Navy purchases. Most of them have salaries over $$$ million and their advice is turning out to be the same sort of worthless shite that American 60 Minutes recently showed regarding the US Navy procurement system. Right now it feels like every Australian issue involves overrated overpaid American consultants for crap advice. We do need to accept responsibility for hiring them but the backlash is coming.
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  5.  @re1v3r  Yeah but getting a score of 2 out of 10 might be better than 1 out of 10 but its still a fail. And a score of 49 out of 100 might be even better but its still a fail. You can get a score of 98 out of 100 and it can still be a fail if the passing grade is 99. I'd take Australia over many other places but that doesn't mean we get a passing grade on anything.
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