Singapore PM chilling warning regarding Trumps reckless actions

[Jetboogieman]

jetboogieman:

There is another possibility and not a pleasant one by any stretch of the imagination. That is that the US Federal state collapses and fragments by balkanization in the wake of a global trade meltdown at the same time as a global uprising against US Military and Economic hegemony occurs by states and blocs opposed to the US domination which challenge its power everywhere and do so simultaneously. In that case there might be some opportunities to trade and grow while the super powers weaken each other in a global turf war and can no longer police the oceans and seas. All it takes is the sinking of between ten and 14 carrier groups by the warring titans while the rest of the world's countries watch and build the means to protect themselves during and after this trade-breakdown triggered bloodbath. The aftermath might open opportunities.

We can but try to rebuild a rules-based trade system and figure out along the way how to keep the sea-wolves at bay. To do nothing is to consign our countries to imperial servitude and ruthless exploitation.

Be well and be safe.
Evilroddy.

Didn’t say anything about not trying.

But the waters are rough and full of sharks.

It’s going to be… difficult and dangerous and those words do not do the situation justice.

 

[CLAX1911]

Trumpists of course are completely and totally blind to the dangers of what they are doing.

Singapore is an incredibly well run country and for them to say such chilling things…

Is unbelievable.

Hes 100% right.

Singapore tariffs the US at 9%.

 

[multivita-man]

Even if we accept this narrow minded nonsense as true.

What Trump is doing will not address any of what you are talking about.

And in the meantime it sets up a more dangerous, unstable and less prosperous world for EVERYONE.

There's a version of this that I want to post, but I'd get banned.

 

[Felis Leo]

Right now, even among liberal democratic nations, China has more credibility than the United States. They are regarded as a more stable nation than the United States, and this is among nations who have no illusions or misconceptions about the risks China poses in its own right.

The Sino-Fascist government of China is far, far, far more stable than a capricious American autocrat.

 

[Evilroddy]

Relative GDP size should have nothing to do with trade balance. Counties with a small GDP size should also have a small amounts of exports regardless of how many consumers America has. That should be the limiting factor.

dmpl:

Take a few days to learn how the modern 21st Century American economy really functions. Its not a goods-based, manufacturing economy anymore because that is not as profitable as tertiary and quaternary level dominated economic activity. Trump is trying to go back to the future but that will not work and will lower US economic growth and standards of living. the jobs he promises will not come because even if he can strongarm investors to invest, thus investments will build capital intensive (AI directed and robot executed) and labour-averse production lines, which are far more profitable than labour intensive production systems. Information, processing and packaging information and the ability to force others to pay for it is the gold-rush today. Data mining, data farming and controlling information flows are the money makers today, not resurrecting the widget industry.

It sucks and it's counter-intuitive but it is also true today until the next disruptive technology makes us humans redundant.

Be well and be safe.
Evilroddy

 

[dmpi]

Diamonds.. Lesotho. Imbalance because a tiny country produces a commodity in high demand.. now tariffed at 50%

What goods will we send their 2.3 million people in a land locked country with a mostly subsistence based economy that would offset the 300 million in a luxury good that they export to the US annually?

I will reiterate the above poster: take Roddy's advice

A country can choose to be an exporter nation, just like American can choose to even the score through tariffs.

 

[marduc]

A country can choose to be an exporter nation, just like American can choose to even the score through tariffs.

Huh?

That does not follow with what I posted.

 

[Ishm]

Relative GDP size should have nothing to do with trade balance. Counties with a small GDP size should also have a small amounts of exports regardless of how many consumers America has. That should be the limiting factor.

Let's test your statement for sanity. I will use the very poor, very small, very isolated nation of Nauru way out in the middle of the Pacific ocean as an example.
Nauru has a pop of 12000 people. The average Nauru worker gets a disposable income of around $600 per month. So they aren't buying a whole lot of consumer goods. Just trying to keep everyone housed and fed. But Nauru does have something very valuable to share with the rest of the world. It has massive natural deposits of fertilizer. Something that the world, and the US desperately need to keep our crops growing. Not something that the world has an abundance of.

So by your argument, if Nauru only imports very little because it's people survive mainly on catching their own fish. building with local resources etc, then they shouldn't be allowed to ship their natural fertilizer to the world. And especially not to the US who manufacturers almost nothing they can afford to import. Does this make any sense at all?

On a larger scale, US companies have made $trillions from Asian consumers, and without Trumps trade war they would make $trillions more. Most of that money ends up in American pockets either by company disbursements or growing share values. That money the feeds into the wider US consumer market, growing American wealth. Your argument would have never seen China, Vietnam, Sth Korea, post WW@ Japan, any of the ex soviet Euro nations etc etc grow and develop a middle class that American companies can sell to. Your argument is that we just stop the world, and wealthy nations, who previously got wealthy from trading with other nations in the same way, hold all the wealth and everyone else stays poor. Do you even know that for 100 years up to 1970, America was China, running huge trade surpluses to make American wealthy and grow the American middle class????? But after it made America wealthy, you think that the system is now unfair??????

 

[multivita-man]

The Sino-Fascist government of China is far, far, far more stable than a capricious American autocrat.

Indeed, it is more stable. And what China-hating MAGAs need to understand (but won't) is that this is the CCP's propaganda: Western liberal democracy doesn't work. Too much freedom doesn't work. People need to be controlled, especially if you have a nation-state with complex demography. Every last propaganda point that the CCP pushes not only to its own people but all of its trading partners in resource-rich continents...we check all the boxes, and not in a good way. The United States in 2025 is becoming what ancient Greek democracy was some 2300 years ago, a cautionary tale about how people can't be trusted to govern themselves.

 

[dmpi]

Let's test your statement for sanity. I will use the very poor, very small, very isolated nation of Nauru way out in the middle of the Pacific ocean as an example.
Nauru has a pop of 12000 people. The average Nauru worker gets a disposable income of around $600 per month. So they aren't buying a whole lot of consumer goods. Just trying to keep everyone housed and fed. But Nauru does have something very valuable to share with the rest of the world. It has massive natural deposits of fertilizer. Something that the world, and the US desperately need to keep our crops growing. Not something that the world has an abundance of.

So by your argument, if Nauru only imports very little because it's people survive mainly on catching their own fish. building with local resources etc, then they shouldn't be allowed to ship their natural fertilizer to the world. And especially not to the US who manufacturers almost nothing they can afford to import. Does this make any sense at all?

On a larger scale, US companies have made $trillions from Asian consumers, and without Trumps trade war they would make $trillions more. Most of that money ends up in American pockets either by company disbursements or growing share values. That money the feeds into the wider US consumer market, growing American wealth. Your argument would have never seen China, Vietnam, Sth Korea, post WW@ Japan, any of the ex soviet Euro nations etc etc grow and develop a middle class that American companies can sell to. Your argument is that we just stop the world, and wealthy nations, who previously got wealthy from trading with other nations in the same way, hold all the wealth and everyone else stays poor. Do you even know that for 100 years up to 1970, America was China, running huge trade surpluses to make American wealthy and grow the American middle class????? But after it made America wealthy, you think that the system is now unfair??????

If Nauru is making so much on exporting fertilizer, then why is its people so poor? Profits should roll back to the people so they can afford to import from the same countries they export to. A country can choose to be an exporter nation rather than build up its own consumer class, but importing nations like America can also choose to even the score through tariffs.
No doubt counties in Asia got rich exporting to America, but America is now saddled with trillion dollar debts by buying all the imports. That's not sustainable. Corporate American is a money making machine but now 40% of its stocks is own by foreigners. The trend is not good for America. Trump is trying to do something about it.

 

[Tangmo]

There is another possibility and not a pleasant one by any stretch of the imagination. That is that the US Federal state collapses and fragments by balkanization in the wake of a global trade meltdown at the same time as a global uprising against US Military and Economic hegemony occurs by states and blocs opposed to the US domination which challenge its power everywhere and do so simultaneously. In that case there might be some opportunities to trade and grow while the super powers weaken each other in a global turf war and can no longer police the oceans and seas. All it takes is the sinking of between ten and 14 carrier groups by the warring titans while the rest of the world's countries watch and build the means to protect themselves during and after this trade-breakdown triggered bloodbath. The aftermath might open opportunities.

We can but try to rebuild a rules-based trade system and figure out along the way how to keep the sea-wolves at bay. To do nothing is to consign our countries to imperial servitude and ruthless exploitation.

That's quite the erection you have there. In the thawing North. In a lifetime that includes hating the United States no matter.

That's a perfect storm of a diverse and divided world that couldn't agree on the time of day in their own time zone of the world's 24 time zones.

Look for Trump or whoever is in charge to use a big nuke on some unpopulated and isolated island in the north Pacific to settle things down.

From 1946 to 1996 the US, UK and France detonated 318 nuclear device tests along the Bikini Atoll and the Enewetak Atoll in the Marshall Islands. One more won't be anything new. I remember these from the time I was a kid in the 1950s still early on in the Cold War won by the US as leader of the West.

You don't want to go any further than tests -- or an imminent warning/threat -- if it ever gets to that point. Just give a thought to the fact the US used nukes in 1945 and it will use them again. The only question is when, where, against whom, and under what specific circumstances. Or Trump could just go ahead and press the button (so to speak of course, "the button") and watch Ottawa vaporize live on his tv.

Indeed, your posts aren't thinking outside the box in the way things would actually occur if. If this wet dream might come true which it will not.

 

[Bodi]

shrug...

It's fine that he would rather rely on the WTO. But the Globalists control the WTO. His country is small enough that the Globalists don't care about Singapore, but the same cannot be said about the US.

Bottom line is that Trump MUST pay attention to what's best for the US...not what's best for Singapore.

What is best for the world is what is best for the US.

It is not some conspiracy.

 

[Tangmo]

Indeed, it is more stable. And what China-hating MAGAs need to understand (but won't) is that this is the CCP's propaganda: Western liberal democracy doesn't work. Too much freedom doesn't work. People need to be controlled, especially if you have a nation-state with complex demography. Every last propaganda point that the CCP pushes not only to its own people but all of its trading partners in resource-rich continents...we check all the boxes, and not in a good way.

Amen.

CCP evil is systematic and predictable.

Except for during the unity and coherence of the Cold War American culture and civilization is self loathing and willful. It's long been likely that without the Bill of Rights first ten amendments the US could have become Russia during the industrialization in second half of the 19th century -- and there would not have been a civil war.

Beijing itself never allows a single bad thing in China to go public. (Covid getting away from 'em is predictable too given globalization.)

The CCP presenting a false face of Chinese calm, order and everything is smooth and under control -- and always -- is for the saps and suckers in the West to eat up and run with which they do exactly. This succeeds easily as there's a CCP sucker for this stuff born every minute. China cultists.

 

[Anagram]

Singapore tariffs the US at 9%.

As far as I can tell they do not. They have a FTA with the U.S. that puts tariffs at zero. They do have a Goods and Services tax at 9%, but that appears to apply to imported goods and local goods equally, and is not a tariff any more than any US state sales tax is a tariff.

And we have a trade surplus with Singapore.

 

[CLAX1911]

As far as I can tell they do not. They have a FTA with the U.S. that puts tariffs at zero. They do have a Goods and Services tax at 9%, but that appears to apply to imported goods and local goods equally, and is not a tariff any more than any US state sales tax is a tariff.

And we have a trade surplus with Singapore.

Singapore levies an 8.0% Goods and Services Tax (GST). This will be raised to 9.0% from January 1, 2024. For dutiable goods

Singapore - Import Tariffs

Includes information on average tariff rates and types that U.S. firms should be aware of when exporting to the market.

www.trade.gov

 

[Anagram]

Singapore levies an 8.0% Goods and Services Tax (GST). This will be raised to 9.0% from January 1, 2024. For dutiable goods

Singapore - Import Tariffs

Includes information on average tariff rates and types that U.S. firms should be aware of when exporting to the market.

www.trade.gov

I know. I mentioned that in my post. It is not a tariff. That’s why the beginning of that link says it applies a zero percent duty on nearly all tariff lines.

The GST applies to local goods and imports. Tariffs are applied to imports only.

 

[Sweden]

shrug...

It's fine that he would rather rely on the WTO. But the Globalists control the WTO. His country is small enough that the Globalists don't care about Singapore, but the same cannot be said about the US.

Bottom line is that Trump MUST pay attention to what's best for the US...not what's best for Singapore.

Destroying the World Trade Organisation is not "best for the USA" it is the act of an economically illiterate imbecile.

 

[Aristaeus]

Singapore tariffs the US at 9%.

No they don't. And America has a trade surplus with Singapore.

 

[Aristaeus]

If Nauru is making so much on exporting fertilizer, then why is its people so poor? Profits should roll back to the people so they can afford to import from the same countries they export to. A country can choose to be an exporter nation rather than build up its own consumer class, but importing nations like America can also choose to even the score through tariffs.
No doubt counties in Asia got rich exporting to America, but America is now saddled with trillion dollar debts by buying all the imports. That's not sustainable. Corporate American is a money making machine but now 40% of its stocks is own by foreigners. The trend is not good for America. Trump is trying to do something about it.

So you want the government to dictate to private businesses what countries they have to import goods from? Because that's the only way you can guarantee an equal trade balance.

 

[Lursa]

Trumpists of course are completely and totally blind to the dangers of what they are doing.

Singapore is an incredibly well run country and for them to say such chilling things…

Is unbelievable.

Hes 100% right.

Having the clout of the mammoth US economy behind him…which he did not build…allows him to be a bully and as said in the video…this administration is "trading only on their own preferred terms." This makes mango MAGAt magnet feel big and powerful…he doesn’t care about the impacts on other nations or his own citizens. He just likes having that power.

 

[Lursa]

Usual stupid shit from you.

You don’t understand what he’s saying.

MAGA loves believing it's part of the biggest bully on the block's "gang."

While mango MAGAt magnet happily uses them and they'll suffer the same fate as everyone else. Sorry kids...his game is only with the new oligarchs and while MAGA got him there...he doesnt have an ounce of respect or pity for you.

 

[Lursa]

Thank you for posting that, although the possibility and reality is chilling, it's comforting to hear someone who is speaking with intelligence and reason. Something which is greatly lacking in what used to be known as the United States of America, now it seems to be an isolated foreign hellhole.

LOL Someone who speaks like an intelligent adult and not speech filled with repetitive, simplistic cliches and bragging.

 

[Lursa]

Good God, why can't we have a President like that rather than Trump (or Biden). Someone smart, articulate, and knowledgeable.

Betas resent that in other males, they dont respect it. So they reject it.

 

[Juks]

shrug...

It's fine that he would rather rely on the WTO. But the Globalists control the WTO. His country is small enough that the Globalists don't care about Singapore, but the same cannot be said about the US.

Bottom line is that Trump MUST pay attention to what's best for the US...not what's best for Singapore.

Who are the "Globalists"? Please specify

 

[CLAX1911]

Who are the "Globalists"? Please specify

European leaders WEF, WHO that sort of thing.