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this post was submitted on 12 Feb 2024
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Why the heck and when was the United States considered reliable?
Reliable in what context?
Oh I see defensively reliable.
It might not make a lot of sense to overwhelmingly rely your national defense on a partner separated by an ocean.
I'm glad the EU is taking more responsibility for their own defense, and I'm also surprised to see so many European leaders acting surprised that they should have to, or the idea of a European defense as a novel idea.
The US was considered reliable because, until Trump, both parties had identical foreign policy.
And had credible defense too.
Which is actually a bad thing, because it doesn't give voters a choice.
Whith only two parties there isnt much to choose between anyway
There's more than two parties to choose from. There's only two realistic choices because as a population you all choose to make it that way.
Don't get me wrong, the US isn't alone here. We have the same problem here in the UK. I usually vote for a third party that more aligns with my own views, not one of the main two, and people tell me I "wasted my vote". My response is: Did I waste my vote, or did you?
Simpsons of course parodied the situation best when the two aliens both ran for president.
Technically true, but there is no real choice. The US doesn't have a proportional voting system but uses first past the post voting. This by default will result in a two party system. If one party splits up or loses voter to a third party, the remaining party will utterly dominate the politics until one of the other party comes up on top again.
Sane countries do have a proportional voting system which allows several parties to flourish.
That's the point I (and the simpsons) is making though. If people didn't vote for one of the two parties because "anything else is a wasted vote". Even with FPTP you'd get a more varies result, at the very least in the upper/lower houses.
But that doesn't happen, and that's how they have us all by the balls.
Well that's very easy when one party openly is working to destroy the whole democratic system.
Very specifically, in the upcoming US election. Going to say, yes you need to stop a certain tyrant from getting another term. But as a general comment this happens regardless.
Even all the years, at least in the UK, for quite some time a decade or so ago we had two parties, one that was 1mm left of centre and the other 1mm right of centre. If people didn't like the fact they had a choice of Kang or Kodos, they did. But, everyone voted that way anyway.
That's great in theory but there's this thing called the collective action problem that pretty much explains why that can't / won't happen.
Boomers make it that way. They've made it that way for decades.
No they didn't.
At least, I can't think of examples of democrats and Republicans having similar foreign policy, outlook strategy or execution.
You mean specifically in the interests of defending Europe?
As an outsider, the US was always very reliable for exporting unfettered liberal capitalism, and exporting "democracy", whatever the party in power.
I can see how the broader export of capitalism could make the us political scene look homogeneous from outside the fish bowl, thanks
Not sure if that's sarcasm or ppl down voted you for nothing 🤷♂️
Ofc outside of the USA, internal politics is not our focus, even though we see regressive policies hurting the population (eg. Abortion). How the us handles foreign policy (not just war and conflicts), it pretty obviously only has its capitalist overlords best interest in mind.
That was a genuine response.
Down votes or upvotes whatever votes.
I'm trying to relate and understand.
I don't agree with the simplified absolutist perspective you've put forth, but I understand how you could come to that conclusion and how it would circumstantially appear to be a uniquely American endeavor.
I agree that's not a full view of America, but for the general population that only hears about the USA through conventional media, I'd say that's what most people will see and remember.
And of course this is only my perspective from my country and my neighbors may very well have a different outlook.
the worse political export the us has is the bi-party system. it does way more damage to any political system than the liberal capitalism. lobbying comes a close second.
EU was basically following US orders to be a vassal under the big military umbrella of the USA and join NATO instead of forming their own strong military. It only started shifting after 9/11. The 2% rule was only introduced in 2014. The 60 years before, USA and Britain were rather pleased certain EU members were not building big armies, it implied promise of peace within...