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0 sats \ 10 replies \ @Solomonsatoshi OP 14 Nov \ parent \ on: Some Soft Porn for @Cje95 and @Undisciplined - Enjoy! econ
When WW2 ended NZ politicians went to Washington and signed us up.
The British Empire was dead and the US was the new empire.
Bretton Woods was the monetary part of it and military alliance was the other.
The US had protected NZ from Japanese capture- the power and significiance of the US was undeniable after Hiroshima and Nakasaki.
Since then we have been monetarily and militarily subservient tribute state to the US just like Canada, Australia, Japan, S.Korea, the EU and UK.
NZ is part of the 5 eyes US surveillance network and gained the codes to the USSRs comms via an embassy in NZ.
NZs banking system is 80% dominated by US majority shareholder owned banks.
Those banks gain capital funding via tax havens intermediaries and channel billions back to their US owners tax free.
NZs military is highly derivative of the US and what we buy in terms of hardware is prescribed by the US.
The US military, petrodollar and US hegemony are all part of the same empire of global power projection dominance. It pasy to be aligned with that- or at least it has done until recently when US went Trumpian/Isolationist/Insane - denying climate change and siding with autocrats. Trump knows the empire is in trouble but his population are still mostly ignorant of the true challenge China now represents.
Antway, when NZ declared Nuclear Free in the 1980s the US cancelled our membership to the ANZUS military alliance and closed access to key US markets. Not allowing US nuclear powered and armed warships into our ports was explicitly punished...and still is.
There is no doubt the US uses its military and monetary hegemony to advance its own interests...and that NZ and the others are subservient tribute states.
It's still an independent government. You socialists always act like withholding cooperation and aid is some kind of oppressive threat. New Zealand is free to side with communism if they want.
US went Trumpian/Isolationist/Insane - denying climate change and siding with autocrats
I don't even believe that you're genuinely gay enough to buy into this narrative. The Trump administration runs on the same policies as Bill Clinton. But ok, if you just want to keep calling him Hitler go ahead. It never worked domestically but maybe you can convince the UN to kick us out. Please do.
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It is precisely and exactly subservient tribute status.
Trump realises the US empire is in terminal decline- he is no fool- his myopic deluded MAGA followers, not so much.
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Really? If you can't survive without access to US markets that makes you "subservient" to the US? Just trade with someone else.
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You are repeatedly disingenuously misrepresenting what I have actually written.
Because you cannot refute what I have written.
Strawman.
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Nothing that you wrote includes any demand for tribute. Access to favorable trade deals with the US is a privilege, not a right.
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You are not making a logical argument.
You are a strawman troll.
USD-SWIFT-petrodollar hegemony is a global system of forced tribute imposed on all trading nations...imposed by the USA/Jewish bankers imperialists.
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How is it "forced"? It's not America's fault that every other government currency is even worse.
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it is forced via threats of tariffs or US military attack upon any nation that tries to settle trade outside of the USD/SWIFT hegemony.
"We are going to require a commitment from these seemingly hostile Countries that they will neither create a new BRICS Currency, nor back any other Currency to replace the mighty U.S. Dollar or, they will face 100% Tariffs," Trump said on Truth Social in a statement nearly identical to one he posted on Nov. 30.
Amid rising tensions over global trade and currency supremacy, US President Donald Trump has sharply criticised the BRICS alliance, calling it a “little group” trying to dethrone the US dollar. While pushing for the GENIUS Act to regulate stablecoins, Trump issued a 10 per cent tariff warning to BRICS nations and doubled down on his stance that the dollar must remain the world’s reserve currency “for generations to come.”
The cases of Saddam and Gaddafi fit into a broader pattern of Western interventions targeting leaders who challenge US economic interests. The petrodollar system, established in the 1970s through agreements between the US and Saudi Arabia, ensures that oil revenues are reinvested in dollar-denominated assets, such as US Treasury bonds, sustaining demand for the dollar. Any move to trade oil in alternative currencies threatens this arrangement, as it could reduce global demand for dollars, weaken the US economy, and diminish America’s ability to finance its deficits through foreign capital.
Both leaders’ actions were perceived as existential threats to this system. Saddam’s euro switch was a direct affront to the petrodollar, while Gaddafi’s gold dinar aimed to create a regional alternative that could bypass Western financial institutions entirely. Their defiance was compounded by their geopolitical stances: Saddam’s hostility toward US allies like Israel and Saudi Arabia, and Gaddafi’s support for anti-Western movements, including the Palestine Liberation Organization and the Irish Republican Army, made them convenient targets for regime change.