Comments by "Luredreier" (@Luredreier) on "Whatifalthist" channel.

  1. 22:37 The analysis here leaves quite a bit to be desired as far as its evaluation of the economy is concerned. It's not the economic trade terms that's hurting the middle class in America, it's poor governance. As for the trade imbalance... In reality USA is just very successful in selling one of its most valuable products, the US dollar, a currency backed not just by purchasing power inside the US but also around the rest of the world. There's huge amounts of it out there, so it losing value would be horrible for the rest of the world, ensuring that we have a wested interest in keeping you guys going. As for your debt. As long as your economic growth is higher then your increase in debt it's ok to take on more debt as a proportion of your total economy. The trade imbalance is greatly favoring Americans as far as living standards is concerned. Trump and Sanders becoming major players has more to do with the electoral system in the USA, it just isn't flexible enough to deal with nuances. It discourages voting for other political parties leading to two parties that's both encouraged to go at each others throats and antagonize each other. Instead of encouraging politicans that are open for compromises and that's constantly searching for allies among multiple different political parties all vying for power. A multiparty system with more then one path to power (no major party being reasonably sure that they can come to power on their own but their potential allies also not being irreplaceable) is often too complicated to allow going out too hard against others and you keep getting nuanced views as minor parties either on the sides or in the middle always can play kingmakers if the major parties fail to play by ear with their populations enough to remain popular. So you don't risk having the major parties essentially highjacked by one faction or another within the parties, and views that's at odds with both major parties can be expressed without dominating anything or being ignored. The major parties plays a big part in shaping what people discuss and therefore how they think. As for your idea about the US not needing the rest of the world... Yeah, no... The US economy isn't stable at all and relies entirely on the rest of the world to stay afloat... It's just as brittle as you describe Russia or China being. Just like any other country there's some things that USA just can't find within its borders (some are not even found in its sphere of influence). Look how all of the US needs of the following minerals where covered in 2018: Arsenic, asbestos, cesium, fluorspar, gallium, natural graphite, indium, manganese, natural sheet mica, nepheline syenite, niobium, rare earths, rubidium, scandium, strontium, tantalum, thorium, and vanadium. Likewise there's technology that just doesn't exist within the US used to make products that American companies rely on in their own supply chains in order to produce their own products. USA can't maintain anywhere close to its current economic output without the rest of the world. Yes, the US could go isolationist if it wanted but that would be just as harmful for USA as it was for China or Japan when those countries did the same thing. Also, the international world order doesn't entirely depend on the US either. Yes, USA invented it and benefits greatly from it (we're already paying the tribute you mentioned in the form of the rest of us propping up your currency, without the US military and economic alliance the motivation to do so would go down), but we are able to maintain the international world order without the states, although I'll admit that it won't be easy... The majority of nations in the world are democratic by now and we're linked by a number of intricate relationships of various kinds, diplomatic, economic etc. And while losing American influence will upset a lot of those there's still too many incentives to keep it for most nations. Or at least their elites. There's only so much that China or Russia can do. Yes, there might be some wars. But overall we've all had a taste of a world where you don't have to pay for a huge navy on a nation by nation basis and where wars isn't the first choice of action in times of conflict. War and large armies just aren't economically sound.
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  2. ​ @100percentSNAFU The idea that the US is best for Americans just isn't accurate. It's best for wealthy Americans. But even for upper middle class it's just equivalent to Europe, better in some areas, worse in others. And for the majority of Americans the country is quite frankly failing them. You're right that there's no such thing as a perfect society. But a Nordic model would have worked better for the US then what you currently have. So would many other systems. Americans are so convinced that the US is the best place in the world that the continent has become blind to the advances made elsewhere and the continent is falling behind socially, and its economic prosperity is not sustainable, not just from a environmental point of view, but from a economical one... Relying on economic patterns within the US that just can not continue.
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  3. ​ @Stockbrot_ Few as much as the US does for your average citizen... Now rich people and well educated people can do extremely well in the US. But your average American... They'd be better of elsewhere, depending on their background often in Europe...
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  4.  @HackerArmy03  Actually, in ancient times that whole annihilation thing wasn't common at all, it was mostly the Romans that introduced that... It was normal for nations to negotiate terms when losing, unlike what the Romans did...
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  5. +GluttonousDragon Regarding the Finns, that's not correct. The people of Finnland have a distinct culture and language and genetic background that does not originate in Swedish or Sami culture, language or even genome. They've likely pushed into what's now Finland from elsewhere, possibly Estonia replacing the people that used to live there (the precursors to the sami people). I suggest that you read up more on the history of Finland... That said, Sweden and Russia have both had a lot of influence on Finland given the activities of those two empires in the country... You might find this video interesting: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6jaeSHfNTuQ Yes, the guy behind that thing has a ton of weird opinions I don't agree with, but his sources for the background of the people of Finland seem accurate enough. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aXzqI1r11eg This might also be of interest.
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  6.  @brianlong2334  May I ask why you prefer the Carthaginians as a equivalent to the US?
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  7.  @calebemerson9317  Actually that upwards mobility is fairly low in the US. That American dream of going from rags to riches is mostly a myth in the US but true in much of Europe. If you look at Scandinavia and at the US you'll find that way more people whose parents where in the bottom 25% of wealth end up in the top 25% in Scandinavia then in the US as a example. Scandinavia also have way more truly rich people pr capita then the US does, despite our taxes. Having a government that provides free education and health care means lower costs for companies and increased social mobility for citizens as a example.
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  8.  @calebemerson9317  As for comparing countries with 10 million people vs a country of 300 milions, that just doesn't hold water. You have plenty of states that's comparable to us. And Europe as continent is actually bigger in terms of both land and population then the US, yet we have better social mobility here. There's 26 countries with higher social mobility then the US. Most of them in Europe. As does the continent as a whole, even with Russia etc dragging us down... Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Japan are other countries ahead of the US in terms of social mobility... You're not horrible though... At least the US is ahead of Russia... And regarding migration from South America, you have more social mobility then Brazil, Mexico, Venesuela etc. Basically all of South America... And to be fair, when it comes to social mobility it's actually a statistics where the US isn't dead last among western nations for a change, and you're beating some western nations like Spain and Italy according to some studies on social mobility... (Although not by much)
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  9.  @geraldmeehan8942  Far advanced probably isn't accurate. But in social matters it helps being multiple countries instead of just one as you get more room for experimentation, trying out new things. While with the US being unified people there ends up being less exposed to other ways of running a country, both good and bad (because trust me, we have some poorly run governments too in Europe) But having those allows us to learn from our own mistakes as we can see when others are doing better. The US is slowly catching on. Biden has changed some laws slowly incentivizing more mixed zoning for instance, that should help with many problems long term. But it's going to take decades for that to have a effect.
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  10.  @SampoLähteenaro  That's pretty much how I feel too... It feels like we're backsliding a bit in the nordic region. And the US has so much potential. And like, I genuinely love many of the typical personality traits of the Americans like their resilience and determination to get back on their feet even when life pushes them down for example. Heck, I even used to have a US girlfriend... The US has so much potential, but seeing her and others suffer needlessly just because of the US being the way it is honestly makes me angry. The US changing or lot doesn't make a huge amount of difference to us here in the nordics. But it's painful to see all that needless suffering over there... And frustrating...
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  11.  @EPK123  Yeah, there where things that was deeply wrong in the US back then and a lot of things have definitely improved since the eighties and earlier. But while there has been improvements like less discrimination based on race and gender (to some degree) your average American still would still probably have had a better life prior to Regan then after...
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  12. 14:42 Again you're underestimating the technology in question. We're getting closer and closer to a general intelligence.
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  13. 4:35 Actually if you look at evolution and darwinism you'll see that it's genetic diversity that is the most important factor in ensuring that your genes survive because you increase the chance of the genes you have being paired with good genes increasing the survival chances of yours. Nazism only makes sense if you ignore that evolution acts on genes not individuals. If they acted on individuals it wouldn't make sense with most ants or bees never having offsprings. Or how we humans sometimes sacrifice ourselves to save others. Other personality traits like homosexuality or aspergers makes sense in the same light. Having more ways to think and more different genes represented increase the survival chances of a population even if it might harm the individual or the individuals chance to procreate. There's no need for any talk about souls at all needed to argue against genocide. Just pure logic
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  14.  @geddon436  Thank you. Honestly workers voting with their feets and leaving the US might improve the situation long term. There's also a increase in unionization rate in the US now, something that might help in the long term. The US is a bit like a tank ship. It has started to turn the rudder in the right direction. But there's an awful lot of inertia to overcome before it'll change direction.
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  15.  @lan4756  You're American to being with I assume? As for how good or bad the US is compared to other countries, it depends on a lot of factors. But even in poorer countries you'll see that health care is generally a bit more accessible to a majority of the population then it is to your average American even if there might be certain drugs or operations that's in short supply. People usually have more time to recover after giving birth with even third world countries having paid maternity leave. And don't get me wrong, people are paid less then in the US. But their quality of life is often still higher. For instance the smaller European houses isn't smaller because we have less money, but because we prefer another lifestyle where we are within walking distance of everything we need. Even when walking you'll probably spend less time for everyday chores like buying groceries, taking your kids to the kindergarten, getting to work, doctor etc in Europe then you would driving in the US because the distances are smaller. Likewise although Asian countries are often a lot less walkable you'll have street restaurants and stores everywhere and can get most things done without going far.
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  16.  @walkingcontradiction223  That's good. But I hope that you'll try to live somewhere else. Because the thing is that a lot of Americans might ask about how much a European earns after taxes, see a smaller number, and a smaller apartment and think that our quality of life is lower, failing to see why those things actually ends up improving our quality of life. We have fewer working hours in order to earn what we earn, and because of our smaller more urban apartments that lasts longer we can live closer to all the services in walkable cities meaning that we spend less time in traffic. And once taxes are paid we have a whole bunch of services that if paid for by a American would actually end up leaving you with less money then us despite you working longer hours. Food is usually slightly cheaper in Europe. (although my country, Norway is definitely a exception to that rule of thumb) A German built house would probably survive tornadoes that US houses wouldn't because it's heavier and more solid. Using airing instead of an AC for cooling and building the building with windows on the opposite sides to encourage airflow saves money on electricity there. Being stationed here you probably saw the activities on the streets, cities being walkable and people living in the middle of them makes them more alive for the most part. But something you might not be aware of is how city planning here tends to encourage neighborhoods and even individual buildings with a mix of different classes,and shared services also leads to people from different classes mixing. You won't see rich people and poor people growing up separately and resenting each other because of it as they're often friends. Something that also leads to higher social mobility.
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  17.  @samuelroselli138  Not endless... Europe is propping up the dollar quite a lot. But Europe and other nations that's propping up the Dollar only have so much economic power, too much harm done to those who use it and it'll stop being used... It's already falling in popularity. But as long as the US stays somewhat responsible it's going to be a slow decline. And the US will have a lot of time to adjust.
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  18. Very well. I'll look into this matter more later. I still believe your previous comment is false, but we'll see what additional and hopefully more reliable sources says.
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  19.  @zerefsunlimitedshipworks  You claim that the Nordic countries essentially didn't have to spend resources on their military. Yet if you look at the facts that's not true. Finland still has a larger army then most EU countries, including Germany. And during the cold war Sweden had one of the largest airforces in Europe. If you are claiming that we only work due to the EU economy then how is that different from US states depending on each other economically? I'm not claiming that Europeans are inherently better than Americans, I'm claiming that having a unified top down goverment structure has left you with too little social experimentation to keep up with the rest of the world in that area. US states can try things out separately too to some degree, but the overarching framework is limiting that quite a bit.
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  20.  @AfricanMaverick  May I ask what that means?
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  21. 42:14 The US has long has less freedom then Europe now... I'm the fifties you actually used to be looked up to, with the exception of your race relations that where horrifying seen with European eyes... We've long since surpassed you there though...
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  22.  @brianlong2334  While whatif is way of with most of his analysises I do think that he's right about there being quiet a few parallels between the Roman Republic and the US. There's a lot that he's way of with though...
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  23.  @brianlong2334  I don't think that the US is a trendsetter here. The US is and Europe is struggling for different reasons. Both has issues with the use of artificial intelligence and modern technology leading to people ending up in echo chambers causing increased political polarization. But while that's legitimately threatening the US democracy it doesn't seem to do so in most of Europe. Yes, it has caused fringe groups like the ones trying to start coup recently, but those have no real political power base and remain a minority with a low amount of relevance. No, in Europe it seems like it's our demographics, our relationship with Russia and to a lesser degree China, our raw materials situation and our bureaucracy that's posing challenges. Our laws and lack of unity is making it hard to be competitive in several fields like technology, and like the US we depend on microprocessors from Taiwan, combine that with a low amount of natural resources remaining due to our long history of exploitation and that poses challenges for our competitiveness. This isn't insurmountable, but it's something we'll have to deal with. Demographically we have a aging population leading to a reduction in working age people pr pensioner. That's posing challenges that we're partially countering with increased immigration, something that while I think that is a positive has caused some tensions due to the changes being a bit too rapid for our more conservative citizens, a portion of our population that's growing as our population is aging... Although that trend of people getting more conservative with age seems to be slowing down somewhat in Europe with people staying left wing for longer. Militarily we can't rely on the US anymore and while Russia is weaker then the US they're still potentially a serious threat to most of Europe. Indeed we where lucky that they attacked Ukraine as they where among the nations in Europe most capable of repelling them. If Russia where fighting another European nation and we didn't have the backing of the US then we'd probably struggle... And since we've depended on Russian gas and Chinese goods and markets for our economies it's going to take time for us to adapt. India is a potential new market that we're trying to explore but the Indian goverment is highly nationalistic and they've historically had a lot of red tape and restrictions holding back our companies there. Africa is overtaking us all, but that's taking time, and once they do we'll stop getting new people to replace those we lose from our low population growth... The US is increasingly growing hostile, so that's a market we can't rely on. South America is a mess of left wing populists and centrist populists that just makes any kind of economic activity on the continent challenging... Asia is promising, but there we'll have to deal with China and Russia, and to a lesser degree India and Turkey as local powers that don't necessarily want our presence to grow... It's just in general a challenging geopolitical climate. Thankfully this proxy war with Russia lowers the risk of a conflict in the Arctic as Russia is being drained of resources in Ukraine... And maybe it'll open up a path to the Stans so we can start acting there. The economic woes of Turkey may change the political climate there, if it does we'll be able to act more in the Middle East and grow the economies in the southeast. Especially since Serbia seems to be warming up slightly towards the west perhaps opening up the Danube. All countries near the Danube could benefit from increased trade along that river. And so would several nations near Europe. I don't know...
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  24. 18:19 Only in the south. Germania was more decentralized then now and in that second map.
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  25. 13:57 Yep, you*really* don't understand Europe, nor socialism.
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  26. Ok, if that's the case then perhaps you can provide a better source?
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  27. 8:51 Not really true. The USSR failed because of its antagonistic relationship with the western world who cooperated with among others middle eastern nations in sabotaging the income sources of the USSR. The economy of the USSR would have failed even if it was capitalist due to this antagonism. Also, too much was being asked of what was still a smaller economy then the west. The USSR and DDR and the other eastern block nations where still limited in economic capabilities after the second world war due to starting out as mostly agricultural economies that was further damaged to a large degree by the second world war, a war faught on the soil of the eastern block nations. This also didn't exactly help the eastern block nations demographically... And I suspect that there probably was quite a bit of mental health problems after such a traumatic war too... The percentages of the population lost in the eastern block nations makes western losses seem trivial by comparison. As for the assumtion that the Euro isn't competitive with the Dollar, well it seems like a lot of people dissagree with you there... Because it's growing in importance.
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  28. 14:26 There's no fundamental reason why it can't read thoughts other than insufficient research and development. Imagine a supeconciousness, brain cells in different brains interacting over a form of internet shaping the though patterns of both brains at both a conscious and supeconcious level, potentially to the point of removing individuality in favour of a group consciousness, greater than the sum of its parts. A suoerbrain with the intelligence of billions of people. Political systems ends up being irrelevant.
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  29.  @Tethloach1  True, but if you put up walls governing where the river may flow it may become rigid. You'll lose the silt left behind on the fields as the river wanders and overflows. And if you build new channels diverting the water the river may vanish entirely. You need some changes to grow.
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  30.  @assim2213  Um, most people in this thread are using English. Many of us don't speak Spanish (I had German as my third language, not Spanish, not that my German is particularly good) so perhaps it would be more useful to use English if you wish to communicate with us?
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  31. 16:19 That's unlikely. Sooner or later new humans will be created. Possibly to help deal with the dangers of space travel. I don't believe that conservatives will be able to halt progress, good or bad. 17:02 Just no.
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  32. 36:45 Jeez, you got the parties flipped in that comparison... It's the republicans that's populists... Yes, it's the democrats that's supporting redistribution, but redistribution is the establishment value (look at the US in the 70s as a example)... And if there's any party that's hostile towards basic democratic principles it's the republicans... I'm European by the way...
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  33.  @soul-heart  No. Yes, the US and UK has a lot of influence due to the English language. But that's not what we're talking about. We're talking about the world following in the negative fotsteps of the US, and we're just not. Regarding birthrate, the US had a high enough birth rate to keep the population stable without migration as late as 2009, and you're still more then high enough to easily replace the losses with migration. Malta had 1,13 births pe.woman in 2020, in the same year the US was at 1,64. And enough women still remember families with multiple siblings for a fertility increase to still be achievable with measures like subsidized daycare centers, increased unionization to give US workers negotiation power in order to raise wages etc... This can be turned around for the US. As for the illegal immigration, it's mainly there because passing the border legally both for migration and to commute to work has become harder. But migration has been falling recently. Mexico has more jobs then in the past, and crossing into the US just isn't worth all of the racism and discrimination anymore. That migration wasn't undercutting the US, it was enabling economic growth. Wages where low not because of migration but because of anti-union laws from Regan and onwards. As for the bureaucracy, it's not a issue of it being "slothful" but underfunded, and working with poorly designed laws due to the US electoral system and outdated constitution... The dependence on eastern Asia isn't really a problem in my view, the dependence on China might be however because of the course they've decided to take...
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  34. 23:00 Americans the best engineers? Highly debatable to put it mildly...
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  35. 40:31 Sorry, but your right wing bias really is blinding you here... We're seeing the same slide into authoritarianism, but it's the political right that's been pushing in that direction for years now... And it's the republican party that's easiest for a antidemocratic populist to take control over...
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  36. 6:27 "Gnostic" is a term used for several different religions. What generally the reason they're compared is that they're all based on a single nature of God. Never heard of one believing that Satan and God is the same entity. I've heard of some that thinks that the physical world is evil and only the physical one is real and pure or something along those lines. It's kind of hard to get all the details since they're generally considered heretics and their beliefs attempted eradicated...
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  37. 6:56 Remember New Sweden was mixed in there too. And mixed well with both the Dutch and the Quakers culturally.
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  38. 14:48 You started so well with the ethnic groupings...
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  39. 8:52 That analysis doesn't explain the incredible positivity of many shamanistic religions with just that kind of nature spirits. It's not about fear at all, but seeking allies and cooperation through mutual respect with the world around us... They're not antagonistic entities.
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  40. 41:41 Traditional values of "freedom". The US was built on inequality and indeed slavery from the very start, freedom in the US probably peaked in the seventies to nineties and has been going down since 9/11, starting with the "war against terror" launched by Bush...
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  41. End of video comment... Okay, so a lot of your video and overall higher level ideas are actually relatively sound. But some of the things you're saying is also a reach. And your leting your political biases and confirmation bias colour the conclusions you're making. Things are far more complicated on both ends then your analysis is trying to portray. And you end up with essentially the exact opposite conclusions in some cases of what reality suggests, actively encouraging people towards the very populists that you think that you're warning people against... Your whole idea of civilizational values is also off and making huge assumptions that's just plain wrong... Don't get me wrong, there's a kernel of truth here and there in your work. But you're adding so much more to it in your various videos that you end up leading people astray and becoming one of those very populist you're warning against. There's even a element of demagogy in there although you're at least trying to base your work on some real history and analysis.
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  42. 3:44 That's highly debatable... And you believing that is rather typical of the political right with its pessimistic/negative view on humanity and human nature... Psychology is not Newtonian physics. If you're going to refer to natural scientists it's quantum physics, chemistry and biology...
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  43. 24:16 Quakers religious fanatics?
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  44.  @GrigRP  That's not true. The US definitely have problems. But peoples perception of exactly how dangerous it is is warped by two effects. The media has a natural negative bias because everything working well just isn't news. And that the US is a large country. So even if the risk of being victim of a crime is low in any given area you'll hear about crimes every day somewhere in the US even though sager parts of the US is comparable to your average part of Europe, possibly even a touch safer. Sure, the safest places in Europe is safer then the safest parts of the US but it's not like Europe doesn't have some areas that's dangerous. The change from using the justice system to punish people and over to using it to reform people in northern Europe has helped a lot, but British crime rates (they still focus on punishment) and US ones are actually fairly similar, except for the gun violence. The US definitely needs reform. But calling it a "shithole" is lacking just as much nuance as what we usually accuse the Americans of doing.
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  45.  @shahinkianpour  Thank you for mentioning my favorite Greek philosopher. :-) And yeah, his comment reminds me of that.
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  46.  takethetrashout7195  What is?
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  47.  @walkingcontradiction223  True, but being in a US military base outside the US is basically like being in the US itself. Your experiences of those countries while in such a base is limited. You'll still be dealing mostly with US services like the US postal service, US fast food chains etc... A better example is those who genuinely have tried to live elsewhere like civilians. Look up the black forest family as a example. They're Americans living in Germany, not due to the military, but working there as civilians, for better and worse. Being well educated they're actually the kind of people that could live decent lives in the US too.
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  48.  @orktv4673  Exactly. When it comes to societal change the biggest advantage of Europe is probably that we are able to try things out and make mistakes that we can learn from because we do have more countries and therefore ways of running a country.
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  49.  @AngryNegativeHistoryProject  What are you trying to convey if I may ask?
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  50.  @chickenfishhybrid44  I don't know anyone who haven't ever been outside the continent above the age of 18 personally. Don't get me wrong. Usually when traveling we'll go to other European countries. Leaving the continent is expensive and often a rare treat. But myself I've been to New Jersey, New York and Florida. And I plan on visiting Pennsylvania, Arizona and Colorado I've also been to Egypt (together with my most of my school class), both Cairo and further east in Sinai (the rest mostly traveled to China) As for driving distances. It depends on the country. The country I live in, Norway is both further west then Luxemburg and about as far east as Istanbul. And driving the whole length of the country would actually take about as long time as driving across the US or Australia from east to west. A big part of that is of course that the country literally is a mountain chain, so progress is naturally going to be slower then say when flying. But even so if you where to overlay Norway over the US and tilt it we'd still cover the whole US-Mexican border. And sure, there's countries in Europe you can literally stroll across on an afternoon without a problem at all the continent is actually bigger then the US. Yet the average European hasn't just traveled more within the continent then Americans have, we've traveled more outside it too. Europeans also tends to know as much or more about the US as Americans do about their own country (you'll of course find individuals in both continents that knows more or less, with Americans intimately familiar with Europe, Asia, South America etc, and Europeans that doesn't have a clue, but on average you'll find that what I've said is true, although there's definitely differences between countries in this regard) So I do believe that it's accurate to say that Europeans are indeed more cosmopolitan them Americans and more aware of the world around them. Mind you, we have gaps in our knowledge too. Usually they're regarding the African or South American continents in my experience. We tend to lump them together as a single entity in our minds a bit although we're of course aware that it's not really true...
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