Comments by "Archangel17" (@MDP1702) on "Good Times Bad Times" channel.

@thirstyserpent1079 In France a little over 50% or a in favor of the EU, the lowest of all members, but definitely not as low as 25%, otherwise parties like FN (or whatever they call themselves now) wouldn't have shelved their Frexit rhetoric. Now, any federalisation would happen overtime and overall the youth are more favorable to a USE than the elderly, so as time progress you'll already get a shift in thos polls. Also if the major powers (China, Russia, US) keep getting more challenging and trying to exert their influence, more and more people will want Europe to be more unified. The idea that people would lose a lot of power is quite moronic, considering most people already have so little power over their governments actions individually. There is a reason people vote for political parties: to unify in an ideological group. This won't be different in a USE, people would still vote for ideology, not specifically region (though an ideology can be more prevalent in one region vs another). Also that Germany as the greatest would be in control is bullshit, that would be like saying Germany is controlled by Bavaria or North Rhine-westphalia. You always have bigger and smaller/wealthy and poor regions in a country, unless the country is very tiny, and even then, you have these dynamics even in large cities. In the end it wouldn't be regular people losing power/sovereignty, it would be national governments and those in it. And even then it would be limited. Many powers would still remain 'regional'. People already live in federal society, how many people live in a city state? Very few. People already often have a communal government, a provincial/state government and a national government. The EU is one more or could even replace national governments with regional powers going to the provinces/states. I wonder how many people that are fearing for their sovereignty would advocate for essentially city states where they truly could have a larger impact on their sovereignty, few most likely.
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@shahidhassan3492 I don't see how any of that is relevant. You'll still need to secure the overland route too and the part across the indian ocean. The European parts of the travel are pretty safe, only around Somalia and further might need more security, which doesn't really change with this plan (just moves it from Somalia to Jemen etc). Only the actual connection between Iran and Russia can be more easily secured from foreign intervention, but that is overall the less interesting part of this plan. And yes, this overland route will be much less efficient and more costly.
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@gideonmele1556 I don't think Lukashenko is thinking about actively joining the war in Ukraine, only in strengthen his own position at home and maybe more independence from Putin.
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@ngutumpuennutu2836 Apparently, you think you're smarter than Russians, Iranians and Indians Obviously the Iranians want it because it will give them more power and influence. Russia wants it to circumvent potential sanctions from the west/EU. India is only interested if it reduces cost, which it theoretically might do, but theory is often wrong. You often have quite a lot of cost overruns on big projects, despite them being done by people who should know what they do. So Russia and Iran are interested for political reasons and India for economical only, but they aren't a main partner in this, their role isn't at all crucial. They'll just sell/buy their goods to where it is most interesting, through the Suez canal or this new route, they don't care. I believe that when the Suez Canal was planned, people like you pointed out its exorbitant cost. Probably, except its advantages also were very clear and big, much more than this project. And Suez also was as much a political as economical decision, ie to allow British forces/ships could to much more easily reach their colonies in the east. In any case, everything that can be done to circumvent the harmful effect of american thalassocratic power must be implemented. If it is purely for a political idea like this, sure it could work. Then again it also give Iran more power being able to threaten to close it if Russia doesn't pay enough to use it etc. It just shifts from one entity to another. And it isn't like the US can't stop shipping to Iran if it really wants to. If it doesn't really wants to, it likely also wouldn't stop shipping towards Russia around Europe. It is also in this logic of bypassing the power that the United States of America exercises on all the seas of the world that the BRI was imagined by the Chinese. Yes, and so far the BRI is an abject failure that hasn't achieved anything in regards to this political goal while costing a shitload of funding. And this executed by an economical much more powerfull nation. If China's sea routes get shut off, it will suffer big time and overland routes will never be able to make up more than tiny fraction, not without investing massively oversized amounts of funding on these overland routes. This saves China from embarking on a ruinous arms race for its economy, China is investing massively in its armed forces though?
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I don't know. I don't see how Putin would gain anything by portraying Lukashenko as a fake intermediator, it only made him seem weaker when he had to thank Lukashenko for his help. Imo it might be very possible that Lukashenko took the opportunity to gain influence by being a mediator, promising Prigozhin safety in Belarus, while saving Putin by preventing the fall/battle of Moscow. Not only does he gain influence with and thanks from Putin, but if he plays his cards right, he can also use what is left of Wagner to maybe secure his own position at home, by having a more loyal and dependable fighting force on his side. Apparently Lukashenko and Prigozhin also have a pretty good relationship, which also might have helped. Obviously Putin and Prigozhin concluded the final deal, but with the help of Lukashenko.
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@Afrologist Polling (also independent ones) disagree with you. Support for the EU is growing, however the anti-EU/eurosceptic voices are usually much more vocal and get much more coverage, which gives the impression that EU support is shrinking. Nationalist parties are on the rise, but this isn't due to EU hate/euroscepticism, but overall more due to immigration and such and disillusionement with the established "normal" parties. These nationalist parties also changed their policies due to this: instead of calling to leave the EU, they talk about EU reform, often not even agreeing on what that reform should really look like other than some talking points.
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You just show how little you know. 1. European nations resisted against Nazi occupation, they just weren't strong enough militarily. Just like was the case with the initial Japanese invasions in pacific area's (like Indonesia) 2. There were resistance movements in Europe, they just aren't generally much portrayed in movies etc. They also more limited to sabotage and support for allied forces (intel, evacuations of stranded soldiers, ...) because open resistance was just crushed hard with meaningless results. 3. Resistances are almost always fractions of the populace, most people always just try to survive and keep their family safe, this is true all over the world and throughout time 4. The british just protected themselves and freed European nations because that was needed to defeat the Nazi's, there were troops from all occupied nations fighting along the Brits after their nation got taken over and many also (tried to) join the allies after being liberated. The US only came into the conflict with more than just material support after Japan attacked them and Germany declared war on them. Just like the French aided them in their independence fight against the british for selfish reasons. I don't see why you are talking about Surrender so prominently, it has no place here.
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@ngutumpuennutu2836 I don't know what are the elements that you have in your possession to affirm that the BRI failed. So can you name part of it that is successfull? There are many parts of it that saw a lot of funding for no really gain. While it is only at the beginning. At the beginning and already a lot of useless funding down the drain. At the moment, many countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America are interested in the project. This will boost their development. Well, yeah, why wouldn't they be interested in Chinese investment? It is in this perspective that China has struggled to bring about a peace agreement between Iran and Saudi Arabia. There is even talk of concluding a peace agreement between Israel and Palestine. All of this peaceful diplomacy is aimed at driving the United States out of the Old World. Meaningless since it has nothing inherently to do with the BRI, rather China wants to increase its political cloud and status in the world. I also advise the Chinese to go further by convening a major asian conference on territorial disputes where everyone will have to make concessions. Never going to happen since China will need to give up the most concessions of them all. Because the "raison d'être" of the american presence in Eurasia, it is the conflicts. 🤣
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@thegrandlord2914 No, it isn't. There is no popular support for separation (only 10-15%) and there is actually even slightly more support for status quo/more federalism than confederalism/splitting.
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@thirstyserpent1079 More than likely several of these defence industries would either join together or specialise and become best in one field or just compete with eachother. It is isn't like there aren't multiple defence contractors in the US at this point. I doubt the larger countries defence industry would just get it all like that, considering neither of these countries have a majority in a EU government and most members would likely support a more competitive driven decision. Now, if these companies offer the best products, then it would be fine that they get most and others get only scraps or dissapear. If this is already an issue, nothing will happen, But I'd doubt that would be anywhere close to the main issue. yet were suppose to believe that everyone in France 100% supports the eu I don't think anyone claims that at all.
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@moritamikamikara3879 Once you reach a certain amount (for example like 1 million voters), any increase isn't really going to matter in terms of democracy, 1 million vs 500million isn't going to matter. Because when we are talking about such numbers, people are voting for an ideology, a larger policy and become part of a large voting bloc. Their vote isn't going to have less or more meaning being 1/10 000 000 or 1/100 000 000, since their voting bloc also scales up with that. The only reason this would be different if you have for example a centrist region joining up with a right or left (extreme) region really changing the outcome, but then this also isn't about numbers because this can even happen at township level.
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@RubieBG DHL, UPS, ... are not the big transporters of goods oversea, not even close and definitely not towards Russia. Also railroad transport is never going to financially win out against sea transport if it isn't covering a much shorter route (ofcourse this is about routes that can be done by both). Also 1000% increase in 2 years sounds extremely high, where did you get this from? I haven't experienced any price increase even remotely similar to this in my area.
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@ngutumpuennutu2836 initiated by three countries 2 countries, India is only along as a potential supplier, but has no real reason to be involved, they could as well keep using the normal routes. We wonder why you feel so concerned. Concerned? 🤣 I wouldn't lose a single seconds sleep over this. I don't really care if it would happen. All I am saying is that this doesn't make financial sense, but that it is a purely political project (which isn't exactly certain to reach its objectives anyway). Even if this project increases the cost of transport, it is the problem of these three countries. Problem of Russia and Iran, India is going to sell at the same price, the other 2 will just need to pay more in total. These countries are also concerned by the strategic problem posed by the american anaconda which surrounds all of Eurasia with its military bases and warships. I understand that concern considering their international stances, but this project isn't going to do much. The US could also block trade in the Indian ocean, never even letting it get to Iran. If it really wants that ofcourse. You'd need an overland route all the way from India/China to Russia to prevent US naval dominance from executing a potential blockade of specific seaborn trade in the future.
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@laszlozoltan5021 If Wagner nukes Kiev, Russia will lose all its remaining allies. China has nothing to gain by allowing nukes into the active theater, neither does any other country. They essentially already made clear that is a line that can't be crossed. And obviously everyone will see it as Russia's fault, either by not properly securing their nukes or even organising it themselves. Also a more likely nuclear counter-reaction would be another large city, or even better an important military installation, like the naval base in Vladivostok, Sevastopol or some other important installation. The goal being to react forcefully enough, but not so much that Russia immediately retaliates in kind and to avoid civilian casualties as much as possible. Though I don't think an immediate counter would follow, rather using it to pitch everyone against Moscow, a complete worldwide embargo on Russia by everyone and diplomatic isolation and pressure to retreat from Ukraine and compensate them.
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Belgium isn't anywhere near to collapse.
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@casey203 Even from the very start there was talk of an "ever closer union", that this was portrayed differently in eg. the UK doesn't change this. And the UK was also not misled by European countries in this, they literally were refused the first time they wanted to join. The UK joined the EU because it at the time saw no other choice, though mostly from an economic standpoint, which is likely where the talking points came from. To put it bluntly, the UK was an opportunist trying to get as much out of the EU while giving as little as possible.
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