"and I thought geez this commenters [ie mhaze] making sense"

Always go with your first thought AC. :)

The fact that I disagree with you AND Paul over your love of the various totalitarian regimes, just reinforces my view that I'm on the right track.

This is how it works

Totalitarian = Sovereign. i.e 'not a vassal state of the US'
Democratic = Tow the line on US foreign policy, and;
Be part of a gang against any other 'Totalitarian' nation to maintain the 'Rules Based Order' (US makes the rules) and Western Hegemony;
With the ever present threat of promoting one leader over another
(someone who will bend the knee to Washington)
- and the tools they use are - threats, blackmail, regime change and military intervention
- Under the guise of claimed 'human rights' and 'democracy',
And using sanctions to impose collective punishment of the citizenry on an entire nation;
- With a desire to cause civil unrest and that the people themselves will rise up against their government;
(no matter the human cost)
- So that they can control other nations without having to go to the extremes of putting their own peoples boots on the ground;
(usually the poorest amongst them)
- Which if they do will result in making US senators and representatives richer;
As they are all invested in the Military Industrial Complex and are thus themselves all on the take and profit from said wars.
- And once a nation becomes a 'vassal state', US companies move in to exploit the wealth and resources of said country like a vampire drains a victims lifeblood;
- And all the while the US prints these worthless bits of paper called 'US Dollars' and trades them with people in other nations,
- And in return gets tangible goods, i.e the fruits of all those peoples hard labours.

Trump isn't all he's cracked up to be, and you know why?
- Because he appointed warmongering deep state all around him.
The US is in 32 trillion in debt, and in just 4 years Trump racked up 7.8 trillion of that debt, and couldn't even build a damn wall or protect the nations borders, let alone upgrade the nations infrastructure in any significant way as previously mentioned.

He may not have started any new wars, but in the case of Russia he merely was only able to postpone it, he never actually 'drained the swamp' or stopped the neoconservatives and their neverending war plans, but he did completely screw up their timetable; which allowed Russia time to get stronger, and we can be thankful for that.

He didn't make America great, that's for sure.
More like the deep state put him over it's knee and smacked his ar$e.
Should we expect more from him, or different if by miracle he wins a second term?

But of course the Feds job is not to help create prosperity and see an increase in the value of the nations citizens wages.
It's a private company, and wants more immigrants, a larger pool of employees and thus lower wages, and the average person working 2 jobs and never getting anywhere.

Thanks AC,

Your "This is how it works" comment is so on the mark, yet a bloke like mhaze can't see it. I think he's watched too many John Wayne movies.

mhaze that distorted CIA Factbook view of Taiwan is ridiculous. Granted over the millennia various dynasties and war lords etc have competed with each other for control of the Island, but they've all been Chinese. Even the most sycophantic US toady like you should know that.

My friend in Sydney, the most staunch Taiwanese, very anti CCP; "Paul, I am Taiwanese, not Chinese, don't call me Chinese", she will say Taiwan is ethnically and culturally Chinese, but not withstanding that, her priorities are firstly, safety for her family, and secondly to see Taiwan as a independent country, free from outside interference.

BTW, my friend tells me her family have relatives living on the mainland, and they hope on day to be able to freely visit them.

Just a question, What do you see as America's roll in the World? Do you believe it is as claimed, the "World's Policeman" and that's the function it's carrying out, or as AC and I believe its only interested in self interest and uses its power to achieve that end and stuff the rest of us.

Just a comment from me, America has done a lot of good things in the World, and they can be rightly proud of their achievements, but there is a dark side there as well, and its very troubling and dangerous.

"Totalitarian = Sovereign. i.e 'not a vassal state of the US'"

Wow...there's wrong, there's spectacularly wrong, and there's whatever the hell that is.

Go here to educate yourself on totalitarianism... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Totalitarianism.

and bear in mind that's just scratching the surface.

Paul is utterly ignorant of the history of Taiwan/Formosa but, obedient to the CCP, really really wants to believe its been in Chinese hands for millennia. He's about as wrong as its possible to be (perhaps even wronger that AC on totalitarianism - and that's saying something).

Not that Paul cares about the facts, but for the sake of clarity, Taiwan was originally settled around 2000BC by people that weren't at all Chinese. The were in fact ethnically related to those who settled Polynesia, the Philippines, Torres Strait islands and New Zealand. (Paul's always going on about his Maori kinship but it seems these distant kin have to be sacrificed to the needs of Xi).

Some Chinese settlers began arriving around 1400AD but Chinese government control didn't start until the mid-17th century and came to an end in 1895AD as part of the Chinese defeat in the Sino-Japanese war.

So this island that the CCP lovers will assert was always part of China was part of China for 200 yrs in its 4000 yr history. European control over Australia has existed for longer than that but we are assured that doesn't matter. Hypocrisy reigns supreme.