Luca
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Posts posted by Luca
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Moving Video!
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Bought more PDD
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15 minutes ago, Sweet said:
You are mostly pleasant Luca, to your credit.
It is a good discussion and I could be wrong, though something is suspect here to me in this war, we will see how this develops and of course: discuss!! LEARNING MACHINE
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5 minutes ago, Sweet said:
The war is dragging on because the Ukrainians don’t want to be dominated by the Russians, and the Russians would like to take over all of Ukraine.No further explanation is required.
When I say it’s irrelevant who the war benefits I’m specifically referring to your insinuation that it’s the US causing the war to drag on because it suits America. Bullshit.
It would suit America and Europe just fine if Russia didn’t start the war in the first.Plenty of people cared about Ukraine before the invasion in 2022. I remember a tense meeting with Obama and Putin after Russia invaded Ukraine about a decade ago at a testy meeting.
It’s convenient for you to ignore such concerns but it’s also ironic that people it’s like you that also claim it was the West’s meddling in the Ukrainian’s Orange revolution that started all this. You can’t have it both ways, the West not caring, but also caring enough to meddle.
Well, we have to disagree on our analysis but I appreciate the pushback
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On 2/6/2024 at 1:54 PM, Luca said:
Its the year of the dragon folks, Xi aims to beat SP 500 this year...;-)
On 2/7/2024 at 9:22 AM, Parsad said:That might be tough. Cheers!
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/china-facing-us-financial-crisis-234945940.html
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On 4/29/2024 at 5:47 PM, Sweet said:
That’s a lie. The drafted document did not contain anything regarding territory.
“The talks had deliberately skirted the question of borders and territory. Evidently, the idea was for Putin and Zelensky to decide on those issues at the planned summit. It is easy to imagine that Putin would have insisted on holding all the territory that his forces had already occupied. The question is whether Zelensky could have been convinced to agree to this land grab. Despite these substantial disagreements, the April 15 draft suggests that the treaty would be signed within two weeks. Granted, that date might have shifted, but it shows that the two teams planned to move fast.”
Your insistence that an agreement was reached in principle but not signed. This is utterly wrong. It’s Russian bs.
I reread the document, you are right that discussions about the regions are not included but its clear that they wont be returned. I talked with a good friend of mine who is russian and from st.petersburg, also has multiple ukranian friends who have their own little community here in Germany. He also has friends from the annexed regions. In general he said that these regions were looking to Russia for a long time, the regions were shitholes, with no jobs, and bandit kind of local government. The people who didn't like Russia either left before or fled to Ukraine after the war but its not as material as the west might want it to look like.
On 4/29/2024 at 5:49 PM, Sweet said:A stalemate is when either side are unable to make significant ground. Ukraine has had a weapons shortage for 6 months and how much has Russia gained? Time will tell if Russia can break the stalemate.
Ukraine tried to break through russian lines but miserably failed because they lack man power and weapons. They went on offense and lost and have to grab more and more man that become also more and more unwilling. My russian friend said that in russia/st Petersburg the atmosphere to this war is surprisingly positive, there are many who want to fight and they get paid very very well. But of course, as with China, we only hear how oppressed and miserable their population is.
On 4/29/2024 at 5:55 PM, Sweet said:It’s irrelevant who it benefits.
Absolutely not. At least its relevant if you want to understand why this war gets dragged on so much and why the west is so heavily invested. Did they care that the eastern regions in ukraine were criminal shitholes? Noone cared. But now ukraine is THE media topic in the most positive light.
On 4/29/2024 at 5:55 PM, Sweet said:The US tried to prevent the war by publicly releasing classified material in troop build up and Putin’s plans to invade in the hopes Putin would see sense.
The US also hoped that the Russian population would go against Putin and their government would crumble together with the sanctions...all of this didn't materialize.
On 4/29/2024 at 5:55 PM, Sweet said:Putin launched it anyway. He has only himself to blame. He didn’t want NATO in his border, Sweden and Finland are now NATO counties. Putin the master strategist.
Well, the Russians certainly learned a lot during the war and look pretty well positioned considering the situation.
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Looking forward to the results later.
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1 hour ago, Dinar said:
Buy a farm with a supply of water, learn how to raise animals and fruits & vegetables, source of energy - ideally hydro and solar (both) and far away from civilization yet close enough so you can get it from your house.
Pretty much what Zuck is doing right now haha!
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13 minutes ago, nwoodman said:
I think you are being awfully kind. Perhaps if I had started 10 years earlier. Agree though Cho Oyu would be the starting point. At this stage I feel quite content gazing at the giants from a distance
Yeah, i also think just staring at em from distance is great too and I cherish life too much too take any extra risk which you do with 8ks...himalaya 6ks are wonderful too from your pictures so...maybe some day the time for me will come too but I had some acclimatization issues on 3200m while skiing already so I think my body is not made for it sadly...at least we have your pictures!!
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1 hour ago, nwoodman said:
Two come to mind
1. Everest Base Camp Trek - probably the most popular. The Khumbu Valley/Sagarmatha Nationa Park is truly stunning but busy.
2. Annapurna Circuit - not done this one but used to be the “go to”. Apparently not as popular now, as like a lot of Nepal, now have roads cut through to the villages.
3. if I was to do another trek there I would be looking at potentially a base camp such as Makalu or Kanchenjungain in the East.
We really enjoyed the trekking portion of this trip because it was a little off the beaten trek. The rural areas we passed through were stunning. A father and son working together to build their house was particularly memorable.
Nepal is full of the friendliest and most beautiful people on the planet. You will find it hard to go wrong
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Great stuff, when will you do your first 8k? Maybe Cho Oyu? Seems to be the easiest one
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How can people not see that this war is brilliant for the US? The perfect excuse to weaken russia perfectly legal and approved by all the western courts etc. China weakened too. PLEASE don't negotiate ukraine but drag this on as long as you can so russia wastes as much military as possible. The US is surely also hoping for more Russian inner destabilization so they can sponsor pro-democracy movements that are US focussed and remove the current leadership.
Now if you ARE that leadership that sees these moves by the west via your own secret service, what would you do?
Is the western media telling us the full story? Why does no one care about nordstream? Why are we only hearing the same one dimensional pro war arguments on the telly?
The western populations were perfectly prepared to accept this war and the media sector for the most part played perfectly along. Dudes like tucker etc will be removed and called nuts, right winger whatever for even talking to putin...
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17 hours ago, Sweet said:
Over a few rural regions - really Luca? Putin tried to take the entire country but was stopped. He is still trying to take the entire country. What the heck are you smoking?
Two of these regions wanted to leave ukraine quite some time ago and see themselves closer to russia, the rest were annexed illegally, yes. But still, why risk this war and your people if peace agreements were in reach?
17 hours ago, Sweet said:The West did not stop peace negotiations. There was no deal, no agreement on territory, or what a post war Ukraine would look like. Ukraine was at the table because of weakness and walked away when they kicked the Russians out from large swathes of territory, and because they didn’t agree on Russian demands.
They did. The peace agreement was already drafted, and agreements on territory were also made. Ukraine was convinced to not agree and follow Boris Johnson and western pro-war arguments which led us to today.
17 hours ago, Sweet said:Putin for his part has been sending mixed messages. Last month he said he wouldn’t negotiate, this month he said he was open to negotiating. Again though, why would you trust Putin? He has broken so many agreements that his word means nothing:
Again, negotiated peace is better than this war, what else is an option for Ukraine?
17 hours ago, Sweet said:Why shouldn’t a post war Ukraine join NATO or the EU? It’s only a problem for Russia if Russia intends to attack Ukraine.
Because Ukraine is sitting next to a nuclear power that will not have its security impacted. The US would not allow anyone doing the same to them and would retaliate similar to russia if China or Russia would do the same at Canadian or Mexican borders...that's just the empire game.
17 hours ago, Sweet said:For what it’s worth, I also think a negotiated settlement is the way out of this. The two sides are stalemated. But just accepting Putin’s demands would be dumb.
Ukraine is not in a stalemate, they are in a way worse position by manpower, intact infrastructure, inner political stability, weapons. They are kept alive by US and western support and also we have to realize that we need negotiations and not further escalations with more and more damaging weapons.
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35 minutes ago, Xerxes said:
I went in 2023 to Japan, my second time after a 15 year hiatus, my first time was in 2005. I missed seeing both times Nagasaki.
I have a thing for old Portuguese colonies. You can add Gao, Macau to that list. I did see Malacca and Penang in Malaysia.
it is interesting how memory works. I went to see the Shogun palace in Kyoto in 2005. And I had good memories of my visit for +15 years. when I visited again in 2023 the exact same location in Kyoto, the museum of course had not changed, but I have no longer access to my 2005 memories. They are now superseded by 2023 of the same location.
Great country...I miss it...
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8 hours ago, nwoodman said:
We are just back from trekking to Mera Peak (6476m) in Nepal. Despite its reputation as the highest but easiest of the “trekking peaks,” we still only got three out of our party of 12 to the top. Two dropped out on the way to base camp (5200m), and the rest made it to high camp (5900m), but a combination of cold and altitude took its toll. I considered our acclimatisation route to be very conservative, but altitude just affects everyone so differently.
I set out with my two boys and a friend’s son around 2am. Unfortunately my oldest son turned back due to the cold (-16C) but the youngest (16 YO) made it to the top. It was a great experience but reaffirmed that anything over 6000m is always going to be a challenge.
Absolutely phenomenal! Congratulations.
Your family is fit as f***!!! And brave too...can be proud of yourself!!
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27 minutes ago, Sweet said:
Ukraine is fighting for freedom from Russian domination, Zelenskyy has made that clear many times and the Ukrainian people are mostly behind him.
Yeah sure, which leader would not try to negotiate peace here? Why is zelensky sacrificing 100k people+ which are either dead or permanently injured just for a couple of rural regions? Why is the west sponsoring hundreds of billions of dollars for these regions but was unwilling to fund anything in their own countries for other reasons (infrastructure investments, schools, energy etc)? The west escalates this war together with zelensky, the west stopped peace negotiations that could have saved ten thousand people and many damaged regions in ukraine.
27 minutes ago, Sweet said:Who in their right mind would trust Putin and the ‘security guarantees putin is willing to offer’? He cannot be trusted.
Negotiated peace is better than war, Putin was and still is willing to give security guarantees but Ukraine has to agree on not joining nato, no foreign military trainings, forbid nazism etc considering that zelensky by now literally IS the west and already sees ukraine joining nato, inviting all the US capitalists over, having US military training, maybe even US military bases close to the Russian border? Which independent and security-orientated country wouldn't interfere or invade here? What would the US do when China does the same to Mexico?
27 minutes ago, Sweet said:Many countries have punishments for trying to dodge a draft, Ukraine is no different. To date Zelenskyy has resisted a general draft hoping to prevent young Ukrainian men from being sent to the front. The average age of military men is 43. Zelenskyy has been very reserved when it comes to army recruitment.
This is horrible, similar to what Russia is doing.
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1 hour ago, Irv72 said:
In MANY countries, including the US and many European ones, leaving the country at time of war would be considered desertion, and punished with long prison terms. One wouldn't be denied consular services; one would be arrested on the spot.
The Ukrainian government is so nice it's downright populist.
3 hours ago, Spekulatius said:What do you think happened when you dodged draft during during Vietnam war or even Germany during the Cold War?
I am from Germany, Article 4 of our constitution forbids to force people against their own conscience to fight with a weapon in war. Now in Ukraine, they literally grab young guys who know they will end up dead from the streets and drive them badly trained into a battle they can not win.
Even worse, now the guys who fled because they knew it was game over for them are denied consular services to try to force them back into the country that will just grab and sacrifice them at the front lines.
It's a pretty sad state of affairs and the pope is right, negotiated peace is better than a war without end. Zelensky should stop his meat grinder, be the bigger man, ignore the West that uses him to fight a proxy war, and take care of the few remaining guys at the front by restarting the negotiations for a peace agreement and get the security guarantees putin is willing to offer. For what is zelensky fighting here? What is there to save that justifies hundreds of billions of dollars to keep this front-line sustainable--> Blackrock etc are all ready to buy up the land, and build the country up so it acts as a satellite and extended market for the US...that's surely bringing putin to withdraw and allow even closer US sphere expansion to their borders...nuts...
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45 minutes ago, backtothebeach said:
Just received this:
Nigerian Warren E Buffet with a T missing haha
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19 minutes ago, Luca said:
At the same time, investments in basic services outside of the private sector are really inefficient, and public schools are not good often. Subways are dirty and broken, deteriorating social fabric in society.
I don't mean that investments out of the private sector are inefficient in general. In the US/west these investments are subpar, too little, not well meant, resulting in an almost sort of ghetto system.
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The US became so expensive due to the market power of these services and that all of this is in the control of private hands that you need 10-50x as much money to live the same lifestyle I could live in a tier 2/tier 3 city in China. The privatized schools, the privatized healthcare, the privatized daycare for kids, The housing sector. At the same time, investments in basic services outside of the private sector are really inefficient, and public schools are not good often. Subways are dirty and broken, deteriorating social fabric in society.
And then imagine how China looks like 10 years down the road, running a mixed public and private economy and not walking into the financialized economy trap...when the sky airs up due to EVs, the automation of production that is not far away on a different continent. The scale of their city design...next decades going to be very interesting, especially in China.
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25 minutes ago, John Hjorth said:
I will
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On 4/25/2024 at 4:39 AM, Parsad said:
Define what you mean by "real economy"? Manufacturing today is an extremely commoditized industry with lower margins compared to yesteryear. If that is what you define as the "real economy" then most of the Magnificent 7 would not exist. China excelled at manufacturing for several decades because they had the cheapest labor.
The real economy is the traditional form of capitalism where profits are made through the production of goods by expanding the economy through tangible capital formation and productive investment. Employing labor to produce and sell commodities at a markup. What the US developed into is a financialized economy where manufacturing mostly moved away to other countries while they engaged in wealth extraction through financial channels rather than production and investment. GDP growth in the US literally includes the insane 20% credit card debt US citizens are getting delinquent on now, which has 0 productive value to the economy. Then you have all this housing speculation and appreciation, investment speculation/services which are big parts of GDP, rent-seekers and high rents that push up GDP, banks that don't provide money for tangible investment but do speculation on loans which led to the financial crisis, etc. Thats 30% of the US economy...crazy.
Yes, the US has a few shining star mega-cap companies and worldwide financial services providers, those are all basically monopolies. Looking at the US GDP, you can see the impact of this financialized economy, monopolies for healthcare that rip off US citizens, end-game housing market with prices unaffordable for most, and further shrinking manufacturing sector.
The point is, China has been building out the real economy and owns the largest labor force worldwide, the most efficient supply chains worldwide, and now slowly the best products worldwide for a cheaper price the US could ever have. Looking at the SP 500, if the market doesn't develop in this western protectionist and war economy against the uprising economies, China can replace many of these businesses with cheaper prices simply because of the low-cost infrastructure the government provides and the fact that their economy is not controlled by these mega-services monopolies that are just very expensive for doing business. That's why the US needs tariffs and trade blockage because their companies can not survive and they arent willing to invite Chinese companies either. That's why the US can only attract manufacturing with huge subsidies. The economy with the cheapest labor pool, most efficient supply chains, and best products wins. BYD, XIAOMI, TEMU, Commodities at cheaper prices, food at cheaper prices...its only a matter of time...
On 4/25/2024 at 4:39 AM, Parsad said:That isn't the case any more. It is why capital is flowing to other countries, including even the U.S. Combine that with political risk, property seizures, non-transparent accounting and reporting, difficulty moving capital out of China and lack of an equitable court system...no wonder capital is fleeing China. Cheers!
At this point chinas economy is self-sufficient enough to develop internally. Yeah, these deflows are providing headwind but the core of china is a powerhouse and they arent bad finding partners globally either with russia, saudis, BRICS etc. Meanwhile the US faces highly inflationary forces with their derisking so I think the incentives over the longterm are pointing towards a "with China" than without. Biden playing a deficit and subsidy game but that's not sustainable. The problem is an uncompetitive manufacturing basis and dependence on foreign countries producing their expensive high margin products. I don't think it can last over time.
On the other hand, things like alphabet and Microsoft will and can last but how many Americans work there...alphabet has 150k employees globally...most Americans wont feel the impact of their success, at max in their retirement funds.
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On 4/24/2024 at 6:16 PM, cubsfan said:
This is the typical Marxist response. Everything is the framed in the lens of "oppressor vs oppressed". Every social problem in the world is viewed as a problem with "oppressive US Capitalism".
The powerful US, with its capitalist system is corrupt and US business is nothing but oppression. Once you buy that nonsense, then it easy to paint the picture of how the "plan" of the West is to keep the whole world down.
Utter nonsense. You should be more careful with your sources.
Again, zero arguments in this response.
On 4/24/2024 at 6:23 PM, Sweet said:Can you provide examples of how the West’s development relied on corporate espionage?
What non-Western nation where these corporate secrets stolen from?
There is a good book about this, kicking away the ladder by economist Ha-Joon Chang.
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Microsoft and Alphabet are up 4% and 13% each after Q1 reports, I guess the rally can and will continue!
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