Thoughts from the Universal Geek

Short answer: 100% Long answer: Strap in, a bit of a deep dive coming up. This is, as always, a bit of an oversimplification of a complicated concept. But, here goes First things first, let’s get one thing out of the way: the “debt ceiling” is not about restricting spending. It’s about paying debts that we already owe. The entire idea of the debt ceiling is fairly absurd, as it’s effectively saying that, while the Congress + President may well agree to spend $X amount, putting ourselves into $X of debt, we’ll stop paying after an arbitrary point. It’s like saying that your family will keep spending on the credit card, but refuse to pay anything beyond $10,000 (or some equally arbitrary point). US debt, in the form of T-bills and bonds, is historically seen as literally the safest investment in the world for the simple fact that the US pays its bills. A T-bill or a bond is, in effect, the US issuing a promise that, in return for $X now, we’ll eventually pay the buyer $X+interest. And, u...

Short answer: “Separate but equal” was the law from 1896–1954. Long answer: Separate but “equal” was the law of the land from Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) through Brown v. Board of Education (1954)   I put “equal” in quotes because the so-called “equal” facilities offered to white and black students in the south made a mockery of the word. Behold so-called “equal” water fountains:  A white school in Halifax County, VA, during the 1930s: And a black school in Halifax, VA at the same time: In Brown v. Board, the public school district in Topeka, Kansas refused to let Oliver Brown’s daughter enroll at the nearest school to their home - a white school - and instead required her to enroll at a black school further away. He participated in a class action lawsuit against the School Board of Topeka, KS, When U.S. District Court for the District of Kansas ruled for the School Board, relying on the Plessy precedent, Brown and the NAACP- represented by future Supreme Court Jus...

TL:DR: would never work, tried it before, from 1861–1865, you may have read about it, since it made all the newspapers. Longer answer: How would you suggest said separation be made? What would be the borders? Does this separation take into account that even the reddest states, have deep-blue pockets, while even the bluest have ruby-red areas? Let’s say you mean that the “south”- a wobbly definition there, as the former Confederate heart of Virginia votes pretty consistently blue these days- should once again secede from the north. What would be the status of trillions of dollars of federal property in said states? What, do you really think that the Federal government will just have over all its military bases, aircraft, ships, vehicles, and personnel? What do you say about the Interstate highways? Federal office buildings? National Parks? If you retort that the portions paid for by southern dollars should stay in the south, then, consider balance of payments. Given tha...

Short answer: the rules-based international order means transnational bodies, largely established by the victorious allied powers after WWII. These center around the United Nations. Longer answer: after WWII, the US, especially, did not want to see the “war guilt” such as after WWI. They saw that the imposition of financial punishment on Germany by the UK, and France, especially all but guaranteed the rise of fascism and the Nazis, + therefore the even bloodier WWII less than 30 years later. As such, the US supported the establishment of an international order, centered around the United Nations, to do its best to prevent international disputes from developing into shooting wars. Of course, the outbreak of the Korean War less than 6 years after the end of WWII drew the value of this entire enterprise into question. But, the establishment of such bodies as NATO- organising western Europe against a common enemy in the USSR**- and the European Common Market- predecessor ...

Is it possible? Sure, just as it’s possible that I’ll be able to swim the English Channel in the next few months. That the US became “so strong because the federal government was limited for a long time” is, however, as unlikely as my English Channel swim. The US is as powerful as it is for three main reasons. The first is that the US takes up most of a large continent, and one that is richly blessed with diverse natural resources. The second is that the US was effectively shielded from conflicts in the rest of the world by two enormous moats known as the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. Third is that, after the end of WWII, the US was literally only major economic power that hadn’t been blown to smithereens. Combine these three reasons, and you get a perfect situation for the US to be in its current position of strength. It has virtually nothing to do with the size of its Federal government. One could actually argue the exact opposite: that the strong Federal government,...

TL:DR: education Longer answer: lack of education. A main reason for the US’ rise to prominence and power in the 20th century was that, in addition to an embarrassment of riches in natural resources, we had arguably the best-educated general populace in the world. As such, after WWII ended, the US had the enviable combination of a resources, the only first-world infrastructure that hadn’t been blown to smithereens- that had, actually, been helped by war production- and a workforce ready to exploit all of these. Unfortunately, my lifetime (b. 1970) has seen a long-running, elite consensus to misfund public education. It works something like this: “you want lower taxes?” “Sure!” “Let me cut your property taxes, then!” “Sure!” Given that property taxes are the primary funding source for public education in the US, this results in many students receiving less education. Their kids, therefore fall for this con the same way, and are easier to trick into repeating it. Poorly-...