MAPB

🇺🇸🇸🇳#binational #border passionate.

[Agustín Antonetti @agusantonetti]

Histórico discurso del presidente francés Emmanuel Macron. Se planta ante el dictador ruso Vladimir Putin y anuncia en cadena nacional el posible envío de tropas francesas a Ucrania.

“No hay que ser débil. Elegir abstenerse o ir en contra del apoyo a Ucrania no es elegir la paz, es elegir la derrota”

“Ya negociamos todo lo que pudimos, pero ya no queda nada de qué hablar con Putin. Ucrania tiene que ganar”

“Estamos dispuestos a utilizar todos los recursos a nuestra disposición para lograr nuestro objetivo, que es que Rusia no gane”

Finalmente, se acaba la tibieza de la Unión Europea frente a las dictaduras del mundo. Con los dictadores no se dialoga, ni se negocia. En momentos duros, hay que tomar decisiones difíciles. Este es el camino.

[Alfredo Corchado @ajcorchado]

THE BORDER made news today, again. But it wasn’t a crisis, chaos or conflict. This was the 10K International Run in which 2,000 runners crisscrossed the border, one of a kind event, and biggest along frontera. (Thread)

[MAPB @MarioPorrasB]

‘There Are a Lot of Mexican People Looking Forward to Trump' https://t.co/8uXo1tc6aP via @politico

[Arnaud Bertrand @RnaudBertrand]

I just finished reading “Sub-Imperial Power” by Clinton Fernandes, a former Australian intelligence officer and now professor of international and political studies at the University of New South Wales.

Full disclosure, Clinton sent me the book and wrote a nice dedication on it, calling me a “public educator”, which is a nice way of saying I tweet too much 😄

But I wouldn’t write this if I didn’t really like the book, which I actually believe is essential reading if you want to understand Australian geopolitics, or are interested in geopolitics generally.

The book makes one of the best descriptions of the “rules-based international order” that I’ve read, describing in details how Australia isn’t a vassal or a client state of the U.S., like many believe, but rather a “sub-imperial power”. What this means is that Australia, as well as other “sub-imperial powers” like Israel or the UK, are essentially the henchmen of the US’s current “imperial” rule, tasked with preserving it in their respective regions. Which means that as henchmen they aren’t so much victims of an hegemonic US rule but instead feel that they derive such disproportionate benefits from it that they’re willing to go to great length to help the US preserve this rule against the actual victims, those who disproportionately lose out from the order.

One of the most interesting aspects of the book is how it departs from the theories of realism, championed by the likes of John Mearsheimer or Stephen Walt, who assert that all states - regardless of culture, religion, social hierarchy or political system - will act in the same way because they all prioritize survival and security above all else. They assert that given that maximizing power is the best way to survive in the international system, if they had the opportunity all states would seek to become hegemons like the US is today, or imperial Britain was yesterday.

Fernandes makes a very different case, which I actually think is a far better explanation of how the world actually works, and of the historical behavior of various states. His point is that there’s something unique about US geopolitics, and that of Western colonial states before it, in that they have these extremely aggressive characteristics - the impulse to subjugate and pillage others - that actually often harm their security rather than safeguard it. And he explains this with the undue power the moneyed class has over the state in those systems of government. Which is hard to deny if one looks at things historically: for instance it is the East India Company that initiated the colonization and pillage of India, not the British state that only came afterwards to essentially pacify growing rebellion in India so as to perpetuate the ongoing pillage. Or take a more recent example: the war in Iraq. It makes very little sense from an American security or survival perspective but it makes eminently good sense from a US oil company or economic hegemony perspective. Or again the current conflict in Gaza, which is extremely negative for American security as it generates busloads of hatred throughout the Muslim world against America and diverts American attention from more consequential geopolitical challenges. But it makes sense if you look at it from the standpoint of perpetrating a hegemonic system.

In other words, Fernandes’ point is that the key characteristic of the “rules-based international order” relates to the actual structure of the American (or British, French, Australian, etc) social and economic system, which seeks to enforce an order where the whole world is open to the penetration and control of their respective national moneyed classes. Which is why the order is about hegemony, and not about security, and why the former so often comes at the expense of the latter.

It’s interestingly something that John Mearsheimer often laments about if you listen to him: “why would the U.S. act in such foolish ways that go against what my realist theories recommend?”. He was adamantly opposed to the war in Iraq, warned for many years about the risk of a clash with Russia in Ukraine if we expanded NATO, and keeps speaking out against the U.S.’s unequivocal support of Israel. And by doing so Mearsheimer actually admits that realism doesn’t quite explain the behavior of states and that his theories are therefore not quite right. Fernandes here offers an explanation that better predicts the actual behavior of the US and its “sub-imperial powers”: you cannot understand states’ behavior if you limit yourself to a state-centric view, you also need to look at the unique characteristics of their political, social and economic system.

A last interesting point is that, given the fact he argues that states’ political and economic systems play a key role in defining their geopolitics, Fernandes’s book implies a prediction that as China’s power rises, it will behave in vastly different ways than the U.S. and its imperial henchmen. Given the Chinese system, it will undoubtedly seek to maximize its power but this time it will actually be for its own security and survival, and not to serve the interests of its moneyed class, and as such will behave in much less aggressive ways than the US. Again, interestingly Mearsheimer kind of admits this too because he repeatedly says “when I am in China, I’m amongst my people”: as in they follow his realist theories much more faithfully than the US. We can already see the contours of this: it’s absolutely obvious that the Chinese state isn’t at the mercy of its moneyed class, quite the contrary, China is not exactly a country where billionaires have an easy life 😂 Same thing with respect to hegemony: China just doesn’t do military alliances (it doesn’t have any), foreign interference or coups d’états. In fact they haven’t as much as fired a single bullet abroad in over 4 decades. On the contrary, it seeks to create an order with indivisible security and mutual respect embedded in the system, where it’d ideally be the most powerful state - sure - but not for the purpose of pillaging or subjugating others but because this guarantees its security and stability. Which is exactly how it behaved for 1,800 years when it was the most powerful state on the planet before the industrial revolution: it never went around trying to colonize and pillage the world as it believed this would eventually come at the expense of its own security, much like it comes at the expense of American security and interests today. Instead it sought relationships of trade and mutual respect that maximize security and stability over the long term.

Anyhow you should really read the book, it’s all too rare that such a book gets written by Western academics. You typically get the usual utter bullshit about the inherent superiority of Western values and various ill founded theories as to why we should rule the world. This gives you a peak outside the matrix.

[Max Kaiser @MaxKaiser75]

Que el ejército ruso, que invadió criminalmente Ucrania, desfile en mi país en el día de México, y salude al jefe del estado mexicano, es quizá uno de los peores escupitajos, mentada de madre, ruindad y bajeza del obradorato, a mi país y a la comunidad democrática internacional🖕🏼

[gaut @0xgaut]

I think about this every day

from @waitbutwhy

[Arnaud Bertrand @RnaudBertrand]

The more I think about it, the more the I realize how huge this news actually is, how big a win it is for China, and how big a loss for the US.

In one simple move, China basically proved that the enormous years-long efforts the US put to destroy both Huawei and the Chinese semiconductor industry have been defeated.

In typical Chinese fashion - words are cheap in China, you prove yourself with deeds - they didn't make any announcements about it. Huawei didn't even communicate on the product launch, the phone just showed up in their store. And that was coincidentally on exactly the same day as the visit of US Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo, who had vowed to "slow China's innovation rate". Talk about symbolism!

People had to look inside the phone to find out it is equipped with Huawei’s in-house Kirin 9000s processor, which is apparently made by Chinese semiconductor firm SMIC using a 2nd generation 7nm-class fabrication process. Less than one year ago, when the US introduced its sweeping set of sanctions against the Chinese semiconductors industry, "experts" vowed it would kill the industry or at least freeze its technological progress at the 28 nm chips China were at back then. Fast forward to now: China can evidently mass-produce 2nd generation 7nm chips entirely indigenously. The iPhone 14 Pro has 4nm chips so China is now almost on par, maybe just 1 or 2 years behind but catching up at an insane speed.

So what has the US managed to do? They've transformed Huawei into an incredibly more resilient company and have made China build an entirely indigenous semiconductors ecosystem, which wasn't the case at all before the sanctions, and which I am sure will prove to be a formidable competitor to other semiconductor companies out there.

Because other countries have been paying attention here. They now know that it's super dangerous to source semiconductors with Western firms as the US won't hesitate to weaponize the industry for geopolitical ends. So they'll turn to Chinese firms...

What about Huawei's new phone? You can absolutely bet Huawei will end up eating a significant market share from Apple - as was the case before the sanctions. Especially in China where patriotic Chinese will undoubtedly rush to buy the phone, now a symbol of China's technological might.

So it's lose, lose, lose for the US. Much more loss than if they hadn't done any of their aggressive actions against Huawei or China's chip sector.

Which again goes to show just how utterly pointless this new "cold war" is. Had the US decided to remain in engagement mode instead of "extreme competition" mode (as they call it), they'd have been much better off.

In a word: hubris.

[MAPB @MarioPorrasB]

@ThinkEarnBig Family
Money
Connect

[MAPB @MarioPorrasB]

@Tesla , @elonmusk request: 1. Can you add date next to the clock on the screen. 2. I live on the US-Mexico border and I cross to the south border very often, connectivity is not goo or none as soon as you get 1-2 Miles into Mexico. PLEASE fix it with @Starlink or something else

[Jon Erlichman @JonErlichman]

Steve Jobs discussing the internet in 1995:

[Brian Winter @BrazilBrian]

“Brussels is hoping to woo the Latin Americans with promises of investment in green energy, infrastructure and social projects, though it is unclear how much new money is available.”

Yep sounds familiar. https://t.co/q7QeSHyGaa

[MAPB @MarioPorrasB]

@Val_Koziol @elonmusk @DesfluraneEd @AmyMek I agree. My wife and I too!!

[MAPB @MarioPorrasB]

@RonFilipkowski Hahahahaha what a freaking joke!

[María Corina Machado @MariaCorinaYA]

Una INÚTIL “inhabilitación” que sólo demuestra que el régimen sabe que YA está DERROTADO.

Ahora votaremos con más fuerza, más rebeldía y más ganas en las Primarias.

Aquí quién HABILITA es el pueblo de Venezuela.

Hasta el final es HASTA EL FINAL!

[MAPB @MarioPorrasB]

@therecount Cómo este pajarito? @JimenezRadovich

[MAPB @MarioPorrasB]

@JimenezRadovich @jorgeramosnews Y usted como chingados sabe eso?

[MAPB @MarioPorrasB]

@elonmusk Maybe we don’t need social media

[MAPB @MarioPorrasB]

@BrentBeshore @elonmusk @Twitter You are so right with this post that I even got it without following you on the top of my For You. I totally agree with you with the clickbait and degradation. Hopefully @elonmusk fix this soon, if not it will just be another “National Enquirer”