What If Trump Wins Again?

Written By: advantage - Date published: 9:25 am, January 14th, 2024 - 65 comments
Categories: China, Donald Trump, Economy, Free Trade, global warming, International, trade, us politics, war - Tags:

One of New Zealand’s best strategic analysts, Dr David Skilling, recently set out the risks we need to prepare for should Donald Trump win the U.S. Presidency again.

As he sets out the obvious reduced United States willingness to provide security guarantees to Taiwan, Japan, and South Korea, Dr Skilling also sets out that AUKUS may be renegotiated as Mr Trump seeks to show he is a better negotiator. The North Korean leader will be emboldened to attack Korea. In Europe, a rapidly withdrawing United States military presence would likely force a settlement in Ukraine favouring Russia. Xi and Putin will be delighted.

“In other words, a second Trump Presidency would lead to a substantial reconfiguration of the global economic and geopolitical system – accelerating some dynamics (global economic fragmentation) and reversing others (a coherent Western alliance). These are not implausible events, but simply assume a more disciplined implementation of actions and statements in the first Trump Administration.” – Dr David Skilling, January 12 2024, Substack

A Trump administration withdrawing from NATO would not be easy to achieve. Democratic Senator Tim Kaine and Republican Senator Marco Rubio introduced legislation passed the Senate, designed to block any U.S. president from withdrawing from NATO without two-thirds Senate approval or an act of Congress. Kaine told me he feels “confident that the courts would uphold us on that and would not allow a president to unilaterally withdraw,” but there would certainly be a struggle. A public-relations crisis would unfold too. A wide range of people—former supreme allied commanders, former chairmen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, former presidents, foreign heads of state—will surely rally to make the case for NATO, and very loudly.

For us this signals that just as the European reliance on United States military bases and expenditure has sustained European security for over 80 years and would require continued sustained military expenditure from the EU to ward off Russia, so it is with New Zealand, Japan and Australia. An Australia less protected by the United States would need New Zealand to step up and spend more on its defence capability so that we in turn can protect our own sea lanes for trade (and those of our Pacific neighbours).

Other Trump policy positions would be easier to achieve. Bloomberg analysed truckloads of speeches and videos to distil his policy positions into some clarity.

In international trade, Trump has floated the idea of encircling the whole of U.S. industry with a 10% tariff, which would bring a fresh wave of disruptions to supply chains. If we can recall the impact to New Zealand of massive supply chain disruption across most of our manufacturing and construction base, under Trump prepare for it again.

Trump and Biden have been in lock step when it comes to a hawkish position on trade with China. The question is whether under Trump it will get to the point where New Zealand’s economy is damaged by providing ingredient or component parts for products and services with China, when U.S. trade with China is seriously curtailed with anti-trade legislation even more than it is now.

Sweeping executive orders to restrict immigration look likely if Trump regains the Oval Office, along with an order to end automatic citizenship for children of undocumented immigrants born in the US, though that will likely face legal challenges. “They want to feast off the sweat and savings of the American taxpayer,” Trump said at a rally in November 2023. “We’re not going to let it happen. I will end it all immediately.” Any Kiwi thinking they will still be able to emigrate to the United States should consider their plans carefully.

Trump would spurn Biden’s climate policies via measures that include rescinding energy regulations such as fuel economy and emissions standards. He’d also pull back out of the Paris climate accord, a move he made while in office last time. So the idea of sustaining COP accords would get very hard.

“When I am back in the White House, I will bring back a pro-American energy policy at long last,” Trump said in a video message released in November. If re-elected, he’s promised to remove all obstacles to massively ramping up drilling in the US for oil and natural gas. Another priority: doing away with incentives towards electric vehicles and clean energy.

Dr Skilling and Bloomberg are reminding us that New Zealand’s network of an international rules based trade-focused order that enables the free flow of capital and labour and goods will under Trump quickly crack. This a set of risks that New Zealand businesses should as much as they can prepare for. Sustaining disputes by law rather than by might may also be at risk.

New Zealand has gained prosperity over 40 years within a free flow of trade under peacetime supported by minor attacks to shipping and planes, low international trade costs such as tariffs, and confidence that international trade disputes will be settled by law rather than by might is at risk: all of that required a United States President prepared to support that.

New Zealand itself is remarkably crisis match-fit having gone through serious crises about one every two years for the past two decades. So a Trump II Presidency doesn’t necessarily mean we enter some kind of polycrisis doom loop. It means that business and the New Zealand government must broaden its trade base away from the United States and China far faster than they ever have, accelerate our energy independence into electricity, confirm a broad set of materials supply lines, and prepare to secure our own sea lanes with stronger military capacity than we have now.

Preparing for the worst should be our default position in our trade, our savings, our immigration plans, our defence commitment, and in our relationships other than with the United States.

So New Zealand, prepare.

65 comments on “What If Trump Wins Again? ”

Comments are now closed

Tricledrown 1

14 January 2024 at 9:56 am

Trump would demand NZ and Australia become dictatorial fascist states just like what Putin is doing to former soviet controlled countries and dependencies like Cuba , Venezuela, Hungary 'Assad Syria the Yemen, Iran, North Korea and it's close ally China.

We would have someone like the Reversnd Brian Tamaski installed another Malignant Narcissistic fwit.

Donate to the democrats influence any US voter the only chance we have.

Democracies are in the worst danger since Hitler came to power.
- Robert Guyton 1.1
  
  14 January 2024 at 10:22 am
  
  Many New Zealanders support Trump.
  They believe he’s the voice of reason.
  - Peter 1.1.1
    
    14 January 2024 at 10:56 am
    
    I enjoy watching the ‘out in the field’ interviews at Trump rallies. When questioned about why and how Trump is so great, how he is the ‘voice of reason,’ his supporters are quite entertaining.
    
    They all know how wonderful he is, how brilliant, and how he has done all these amazing things for America. When it gets down to “What do you mean” and “Explain that,” they’re not so good. The “But that happened under Obama,” only sometimes flummoxes them.
    
    In that sense, here and in the US he is seen as the voice of reason whatever that voice is saying. And in that sense it is a cult. Whatever he says is gospel.
  - Morrissey 1.1.2
    
    14 January 2024 at 11:05 am
    
    Trouble is, Robert, look at the alternative to Trump. Is Biden, or Schumer, or any of the other "Democratic" Party leaders either reasonable or moral?
    - Ad 1.1.2.1
      
      14 January 2024 at 11:50 am
      
      Biden is more moral and more reasonable than Trump. By a long measure.
      
      The US doesn't get third party choices because their system is FPP.
      - Morrissey 1.1.2.1.1
        
        14 January 2024 at 1:04 pm
        
        Biden is more moral and more reasonable than Trump. By a long measure.
        
        In what way could Trump's conduct possibly be worse than Biden's conduct during this genocidal rampage in Gaza?
        
        As terrible as Trump is, how is Biden in any way better, leave alone "by a long measure"?
        
        Macro 1.1.2.1.1.1
        
        14 January 2024 at 2:26 pm
        
        🙄
        
        Now I agree that Biden needs to stop the export of war material to Israel immediately, but if you were to actually open your eyes to what Biden has attempted to do within the US for ordinary citizens – but largely thwarted by a republican dominated house/senate you would see that he is vastly different to that buffoon Trump.
        
        Even though Biden has fallen short on some major items, many progressives give him good grades, often noting he can achieve only so much with a 50–50 Senate and Republicans’ frequent use of the filibuster. “Biden has been the most pro-worker and pro-union president in my lifetime, and I’m almost 50,” said Aaron Sojourner, who recently left his job as a labor economist at the University of Minnesota to become a senior researcher at the Upjohn Institute. “You’d have to go back to F.D.R. to get anybody close.”
        
        https://tcf.org/content/report/what-biden-has-done-and-still-can-do-for-workers/
        
        Morrissey …
        
        14 January 2024 at 6:19 pm
        
        Quite right, Macro, Biden and the Democrats at least have a notional commitment to the public good—in the United States if nowhere else—while the Repugs, both the Trump Repugs and the Never-Trump Repugs, are a purely destructive organization. Noam Chomsky several years ago said the Republican Party is the most dangerous organization in the world today.
        
        My problem with Biden and every single one of his political colleagues and advisers is the point you mentioned first: his failure to "stop the export of war material to Israel immediately."
        
        Ad …
        
        14 January 2024 at 6:43 pm
        
        There you go, it wasn't that hard.
        
        Morrissey …
        
        14 January 2024 at 7:27 pm
        
        Note, Ad, that the Democratic Party's commitment to workers is notional only. They're still dominated by the likes of Charles Schumer, who came up with the brilliant notion in 2016 that Hillary Clinton didn't need working people's votes, and should target donations from Wall Street instead.
        
        Very bad move.
        
        mikesh …
        
        14 January 2024 at 10:17 pm
        
        Note, Ad, that the Democratic Party's commitment to workers is notional only.
        
        I believe he is recognizing that in order to maintain USA's economic dominance he has to reestablish its manufacturing base, which, decades ago was handed over to China and other low wage countries. That's probably the reason for his apparent favouring of the workers.
        
        Green Hammer …
        
        16 January 2024 at 1:43 pm
        
        Biden favouring the workers by telling them to go back to work 😂😂😂
        
        weka []
        
        16 January 2024 at 1:54 pm
        
        given you are posting with a pseudonym, if your email address is genuine, I suggest next time you comment you use a fake one (which is fine to do on The Standard).
      - Adrian Thornton 1.1.2.1.2
        
        15 January 2024 at 12:11 pm
        
        "Biden is moral and reasonable than Trump"….this is actually said without the slightest flinch, about the primary enabeler of the most violent, brutal, disgusting genocide….and not after the fact, while it is still actually happening…how many children, men and woman do you think will die today Ad? …because of Biden and the Democrats..and not Trump.
        
        Here is your morality in full display….
        
        ‘Not seen since Vietnam’: Israel dropped hundreds of 2,000-pound bombs on Gaza, analysis shows
        https://edition.cnn.com/gaza-israel-big-bombs/index.html
        
        …these are just a small part of the munitions rushed to Israel. by Biden… and you still offer this moralless cover for a party of murders..I mean this seriously, what the fuck is wrong with you liberal's?….the way you people torture and flay the skin off logic, right out in the open, to somehow make the sick fantasy that a moral Western democratic world even exists in your own heads, even in the face of what everyone in the world can see and read in broad daylight is astounding, and shocks the senses…..
        
        Trump the Republician Party, Biden and the Democratic Party are both one in the same as far as Geo-Politics go….the scourge of the entire planet, there will never be peace while these bloodless goons remain the hegemony…..
        
        When one reads your comments and cuts away all the froth…what you are left with is defending a ongoing genocide, defending the violent, undemocratic iron fist of Western hegemony, because it is supposedly good for world trade and most especially for people like you and your class.
        
        SPC 1.1.2.1.2.1
        
        15 January 2024 at 12:35 pm
        
        Trump and Biden agreed on leaving the women of Afghanistan to their fate.
        
        They are both messing with the WTO, one as an isolationist, the other as pro American worker.
        
        They have a similar at arms length with China approach, with an American industrial revival aspect.
        
        But Biden actually ended the bombing of Yemen of SA and facilitated a truce within Yemen (to enable aid and deal with a famine). This lead to China brokering Iran and SA talks.
        
        One takes GW seriously, the other not so.
        
        Biden's diplomacy as per Israel in Gaza is most likely firmer than Trump's would have been (who was the most pro Israeli POTUS in history).
        
        Trump is less likely to support aid to Ukraine and thus expect the EU to carry the burden or take in Ukrainian refugees. If the GOP blocks supply in the House, the difference is insignificant.
        
        Neither has a policy to manage the South Korea, Taiwan and South China Sea issues of our region – thus the regional arms build-up.
        
        Ad 1.1.2.1.2.2
        
        15 January 2024 at 12:44 pm
        
        Maybe Trumpian US military support withdrawal has any bearing on Gaza – but I doubt it – and indeed so does Netanyahu as of yesterday's statement.
        
        How might one measure the use of the US as a military threat? On balance how many regional wars across the world one would expect to occur as a result of that?
        
        Regions at risk of civil and then international war in a major US withdrawal would be:
        
        – Strait of Hormuz, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Gulf States, and its primary oil access for the whole of Asia and Oceania
        
        – Taiwan, Japan, China
        
        – South Korea, North Korea, China
        
        – Iraq, Turkey, Syria
        
        – Golan Heights, Israel, Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Egypt
        
        – Turkey, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Russia, Ukraine, Moldova,
        
        – Philippines, China, Vietnam, Malaysia
        
        One might ask how much worse it can get.
        
        The answer is: very very very much worse.
        
        Adrian Thornton …
        
        15 January 2024 at 1:02 pm
        
        You are quite mad.
        
        Ad …
        
        15 January 2024 at 1:26 pm
        
        It's not just me thinking like this.
        
        https://www.politico.eu/article/can-europe-survive-trump-ii/
        
        “It’s a form of sleepwalking,” said Ulrich Speck, a foreign policy analyst based in Berlin. “We have [French President Emmanuel] Macron’s form of sleepwalking, which dreams of autonomy and sovereignty. We have German sleepwalking, which is denial. And then we have British sleepwalking, which is detachment.”
        
        And we have Oceania sleepwalking, which is Chinese cash helps us sleep.
        
        Tiger Mountain …
        
        15 January 2024 at 2:00 pm
        
        US Imperialism remains the lead enforcer and enabler for Capital and international Finance Capital. There is no good spin that can be put on that.
        
        Ad …
        
        15 January 2024 at 2:59 pm
        
        You call it spin when it's the measure of how the world already rotates.
        
        Morrissey …
        
        15 January 2024 at 2:43 pm
        
        Ulrich Speck. He sounds like he could be related to Richard Speck.
        
        Adrian Thornton …
        
        16 January 2024 at 9:05 am
        
        "It's not just me thinking like this"…..this is the best your thinking partner can offer on Gaza…
        
        "Many are calling for a ceasefire in Gaza. Haven't seen any calls on Hamas to surrender."
        
        Maybe you need to find yourself a slightly smarter 'thinking' buddy there pal.
        
        It's interesting that you both use sleepwalking as your analogy…..you obviously don't or more likely can't see yourself, that to still regard western hegemony as the higher form of world rule at this point in history, could only be maintained by remaining every day in some sort of strange daydream state of unreality yourself.
        
        Morrissey …
        
        16 January 2024 at 9:17 am
        
        Thanks for that, Adrian. My hunch was correct, it seems: Herr Speck might well be an incarnation of Richard Speck.
        
        Tiger Mountain …
        
        15 January 2024 at 1:58 pm
        
        SPC 1.1.2.1.2.3
        
        15 January 2024 at 12:45 pm
        
        When one reads your comments and cuts away all the froth…what you are left with is defending a ongoing genocide, defending the violent, undemocratic iron fist of Western hegemony, because it is supposedly good for world trade and most especially for people like you and your class
        
        What double speak.
        
        What on-going genocide?
        
        It uses a pretence of a class basis for rejecting collective security (as per Ukraine) when led by a coalition of democratic nations.
        
        But no problem with the Vietnam level bombing on urban centres of Syria by the Russians in favour of a one party rule continuance in an internal civil war.
        
        World trade is practiced by parties who want it.
      - Jenny 1.1.2.1.3
        
        16 January 2024 at 6:31 am
        
        Biden may be more moral than Trump. And yes a Trump administration will be worse than a Biden administration. But genocide can not be forgiven. And Biden and the Democrats will be punished for it.
        The question for this country's politicians, 5 Eyes military and intelligence leaders, will be will we continue blindly following behind the dystopian neo-fascist Trump administration as we have blindly followed behind every other US administration since the end of the British Empire as the world hegemon?
        
        Or will we; Instead of kowtowing and forelock tugging to the biggest bullies on the planet, chart a more independent foreign policy?
        
        https://www.teaonews.co.nz/2023/02/09/maori-party-adopts-swiss-neutrality-policy/
Morrissey 2

14 January 2024 at 10:04 am

confidence that international trade disputes will be settled by law rather than by might is at risk: all of that required a United States President prepared to support that.

A U.S. President prepared to support international law? If that were ever the case, then we would not have had the six decade long illegal blockade of Cuba, nor the undermining and destruction of democratic governments from Haiti to Brazil.

Neither would the U.S. have spent the last seventy years funding Nazi groups like the Azov Brigade in Ukraine and honouring the memory of collaborators like Stepan Bandera, and genocidal regimes in Saudi Arabia and Israel.

A U.S. President prepared to support international law? Which one was that again?
- Ad 2.1
  
  14 January 2024 at 10:30 am
  
  The one that has propped up the UN and all its components institutions with massive funding and diplomatic support for 7 decades.
  
  Also the one that enabled GATT from which our dairy experts flourished.
  
  Also until Trump supported international trade dispute resolution, which we have done very well from.
  
  If you're grumpy about Brazil, Brazil are doing fine.
  
  You'll only notice US absence if Trump gets in unrestrained. Cuba will be but a wry smile.
  - Morrissey 2.1.1
    
    14 January 2024 at 10:34 am
    
    If you're grumpy about Brazil, Brazil are doing fine.
    
    No thanks to the United States.
    - Ad 2.1.1.1
      
      14 January 2024 at 11:07 am
      
      Brazil exports US$75.7 billion per year to the US and its going up fast. No trade isdue except upside.
      
      The only issue in the last decade was dealng with the Trumpist Bolsonaro. But sure you're likely to get more autocratic in Brazil and elsewhere if Trump gets in.
      - Morrissey 2.1.1.1.1
        
        14 January 2024 at 11:17 am
        
        The Washington regime was relentless in its rhetorical and diplomatic onslaught against the democratic governments of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, and of Dilma Rousseff. Washington was unwavering in its support of the Temer coup regime which ushered Bolsonaro's horrific reign.
        
        Ad 2.1.1.1.1.1
        
        14 January 2024 at 11:44 am
        
        Dilma Rousseff was even in South America's standards one of the most corrupt politicians we've yet seen, and was appropriately chucked out for being essentially bought and sold by Petrobras. That didn't need any help from the US.
        
        US-Brazil relations have been excellent since 1995 and has been a strong ally since 2019. Clinton loved Cardoso. Bush 1 loved Cardoso. Bush 1 was annoyed by Lula, but Bush 2 loved him. Obama adored Lula. Trump loved Bolsonaro. Biden loves Lula.
        
        No shortage of love for several decades, with appropriate ups and downs for an independent country with its more neutral international relations particularly as a BRICS member.
        
        Morrissey …
        
        14 January 2024 at 12:02 pm
        
        Your broadside against the democratically elected Dilma Rousseff and your rehearsal of those entirely specious right wing talking points could have come straight from a Bolsonaro, or a Temer, speech.
        
        US-Brazil relations have been excellent since 1995….
        
        U.S. government relationships with Brazilian governments were strong after the U.S, military dictatorship it helped to install in 1964. The U.S. political establishment was startled and affronted by the election of Lula in 2003, just as they were by the elections of democratic governments around the same time in Bolivia, Venezuela, and Ecuador.
        
        You claim that Obama "adored Lula." Lula himself did not agree. Even the dependably servile to power Grauniad had to admit that….
        
        Lula himself has frequently said the United States under President Barack Obama deliberately sought to hurt him politically because it favored the deference and promises of economic privatization made by his opponents. There is no smoking gun that the Obama administration orchestrated events that led to the lowest moment in Lula’s career, but there are lingering resentments that Lula can and should work to transcend as he has during this campaign with many of the key figures who supported Dilma’s impeachment on specious grounds in 2016.
        
        https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/nov/03/us-brazil-relations-americas-lula-election-victory
        
        Ad …
        
        14 January 2024 at 3:42 pm
        
        You've gone in 3 paragraphs from "the undermining and destruction of democratic governments from Haiti to Brazil" …
        
        … to "Lula himself did not agree" about liking Obama as much as Obama liked him. It just turns you into a trite schoolyard US-hate-reflex. Please.
        
        Rousseff was part of the largest corruption case in South America. She stank. She went down for it. Lula himself was sent to jail for corruption, and after several years in jail his case was only quashed not because of lack of evidence but because the convicting court lacked the correct jurisdiction. There's whole books on it; not just the "Car Wash" scandal but also the corruption of office itself.
        
        https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-35810578
        
        Don't ever try and make out that South American politicians are somehow more innocent than US politicians. They ain't. Even if they are left leaning.
        
        Now you can check out which trade institution the US didn't essentially create, which have in total stabilised world trade to the direct benefit of New Zealand:
        
        IMF
        
        WTO
        
        G20
        
        APEC
        
        the World Bank, and in particular for us:
        
        The FDA
        
        The entire political economy of world trade is predicated on US structural funding and presence.
        
        Morrissey …
        
        14 January 2024 at 6:09 pm
        
        In trying to bolster your charge against Dilma Roussef, you have not made a wise choice by quoting the notoriously biased British state media organ. Its coverage of Dilma Roussef was, and is, about as fair and ethical as its treatment of Jeremy Corbyn and Julian Assange.
        
        Don't ever try and make out that South American politicians are somehow more innocent than US politicians. They ain't.
        
        That is quite correct, in the case of the South American politicians that the US armed and diplomatically and militarily supported—Trujillo, Pinochet, Galtieri, and the democracy-hating lunatics in the Venezuelan extreme right.
        
        Even if they are left leaning.
        
        No, the left leaning politicians are all democratically elected. They got there because they were popular, unlike the monsters foisted on them by Washington.
        
        Ad …
        
        14 January 2024 at 6:42 pm
        
        The term for Rouseff's crimes are called "fiscal pedalling". The sources are numerous if you don't like the BBC. She was Chairwomen of Petrobras from 2003 to 2010. Some of those years at the same time as running Lula's office.
        
        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impeachment_of_Dilma_Rousseff#:~:text=In%202011%20and%202014%2C%20Rousseff's,an%20example%20of%20fiscal%20pedaling.
        
        Maybe you prefer The Guardian.
        
        https://www.theguardian.com/news/2016/aug/31/dilma-rousseff-impeachment-brazil-what-you-need-to-know
        
        Or Al Jazeera.
        
        https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/9/6/rousseff-lula-charged-in-petrobras-corruption-probe
        
        Or Reuters.
        
        https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSKCN1BH00T/
        
        Failing that read the books. There's multiple of them to go into the detail. Or the case notes themselves. Really not that hard.
        
        And disabuse yourself of the idea that the left are less corrupt than the right. They just have better policies on average.
        
        Morrissey …
        
        14 January 2024 at 7:03 pm
        
        … if you don't like the BBC
        
        It's not that I don't like the BBC. I loved Dad's Army and all those Dennis Potter dramas, and Pennies From Heaven, and The Glittering Prizes. The Beeb used to do some brilliant documentaries as well: an outstanding one I remember was Alan Yentob's thoughtful and exhilarating series on modern architecture.
        
        The part of the BBC I don't like is their thoroughly discredited political wing. They bowed to Thatcher's demand in the 1980s to silence Sinn Fein spokespeople and have actors speaking their words instead. Their disgracefully biased coverage of the latest Israeli onslaught in Gaza is just the latest example of its craven submission to power. The great Tony Benn, one of the few British politicians with integrity, called them on their cowardice in 2009…
  - Jenny 2.1.2
    
    16 January 2024 at 6:43 am
    
    "The one that has propped up the UN and all its components institutions with massive funding and diplomatic support for 7 decades."
    
    The one that will soon be rewarded for this massive funding investment, when the UN International Court of Justice delivers a grotesque judgement in favour of Israel continuing its genocidal war against the civilian population of Gaza.
SPC 3

14 January 2024 at 10:26 am

New Zealand itself is remarkably crisis match-fit

The three headed hydra confabulation has no contingency fund to respond to emergency (climate change related) events

Auckland Super City – floods this year (what do comms do and when)?

Wellington Trains on too good a summers day?

What Cook Strait bridge (floods in the north could na get SI vegetables across the bridge)?

We’ve survived stuff because we do not plan to prevent …consequences of heavy trucks on roads, allow low bid bus contracts and wonder why we do not have enough bus drivers,
- Ad 3.1
  
  14 January 2024 at 11:47 am
  
  Western Auckland had been preparing for flooding for three decades and still got smashed: Project Twin Streams had stabilised and increased floodplain capacity but nowhere near enough. East Coast got smashed for nearly a year and would have been the case no matter what they'd done.
  - SPC 3.1.1
    
    14 January 2024 at 12:04 pm
    
    Then again it is already a known about how much there was to work on.
    
    Link, after link, after link.
    
    https://newsroom.co.nz/2023/05/23/aucklands-anti-flooding-plan-now-on-steroids/
    
    https://www.stuff.co.nz/auckland/local-news/300891625/auckland-council-in-talks-on-moving-floodprone-roads-to-safer-ground
    
    https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/auckland-floods-tens-of-thousands-of-homes-across-auckland-prone-to-floods-water-and-wastewater-constraints-and-coastal-erosion/WI735MJYGVA6VBLQBPDO2YDVLI/
    
    https://thespinoff.co.nz/society/17-02-2023/why-do-we-still-build-homes-on-flood-plains
    
    https://www.auckland.ac.nz/en/news/2023/01/31/smarter-design-to-mitigate-auckland-floods.html
    
    https://ourauckland.aucklandcouncil.govt.nz/media/je3potln/auckland-flood-response-review_january-27-29-2023.pdf
    - Ad 3.1.1.1
      
      14 January 2024 at 12:14 pm
      
      There sure is plenty to do in Auckland, agreed.
SPC 4

14 January 2024 at 11:18 am

He will cite the winter under Joe Biden, as reason to isolate the US from global warming action, saying America is the land of exceptionalism.

https://www.1news.co.nz/2024/01/14/ferocious-us-winter-weather-could-see-low-temperature-records-set/
- Tricledrown 4.1
  
  14 January 2024 at 2:08 pm
  
  These sort of events you would think would change people's minds but it seems to do the opposite.
  
  People turn inwards and don't work as a community to fix the problems but rather go I am OK Jack forget about the rest.
  
  So that feeds into Authoritarianism.
  - Macro 4.1.1
    
    14 January 2024 at 2:39 pm
    
    U.S. carbon emissions shrank in 2023 for the first time since the coronavirus pandemic. Last year, U.S. greenhouse gas pollution from energy and industrial activities fell by 1.9% despite the economy growing by about 2.4%. To put that into perspective: in 2023, the U.S. emitted as much carbon as it did in 1991, when the economy was about a quarter of its current size.
    
    https://www.nbcnews.com/science/environment/good-news-bad-news-us-emissions-shrank-last-year-slowly-rcna132932
    
    Had Biden got the support for his Build Back Better plan in the early years of this current administration, there would have been even more progress made on the climate front.
    
    Blame Manchin for that
    
    https://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/4302952-five-times-joe-manchin-changed-climate-policy-senate/
    - Ad 4.1.1.1
      
      14 January 2024 at 6:45 pm
      
      I'm in the middle of a book on how far we have come in such a short space of time to address climate change. I'll do a review of its optimistic tone once I'm done but it's a useful corrective to the usual doom lop.
Corey 5

15 January 2024 at 12:02 am

There's no what if's, Trump WILL win this year. Trump wont just win, he'll win the popular vote this time if Bidens on the ticket the democrats are going to be obliterated

Biden is lowest polling first term president in history.

Trump beats Biden with voters 30, independents, Latinos and Bidens lead with black voters is dissolving

Bidens age is one of the top 3 concerns of all voters.

Americans of all ethnicities and ages don't wanna fund Ukraine or Israel's military or pay for illegal immigrants and refugees while their services get cut in funding, they keep saying this and Democrats just cold heartedly screw over their voters

The economy is really bad for ordinary people and that's all that matters.

The dems are gonna lose all three houses.
- Tiger Mountain 5.1
  
  15 January 2024 at 6:42 am
  
  Best President the Yanks never had was “Boynie” Sanders thanks to the DNC and collusion on the campaign trail in the Democratic primaries and Candidates like Mayor Pete and Elizabeth Warren with their staged withdrawals that helped elevate Joe from initial also ran.
  
  AOC just qualifies by age to stand but the DNC would not go there! And Alexandria was badly shaken by Jan 6, narrowly escaping death in her office. Biden is a major impediment for the Democrats and voters.
  
  Trump should be in a cell not the White House, and would only win by default.
  - Ghostwhowalks 5.1.1
    
    16 January 2024 at 10:12 am
    
    " thanks to the DNC and collusion on the campaign trail in the Democratic primaries"
    
    Laughable nonsense very similar to Trumps denialism that he lost the election. Other candidates withdraw from the primaries all the time, always about no money coming in. Winnowing down to last 2 or 3 is how its supposed to work
    
    Warren pulled out because she lost in her home state – to Biden
    
    Look at the votes cast in the primaries , which the DNC cant 'manipulate' LOL
    
    Clinton 16.9 mill
    
    Sanders 13.2 mill
    
    But no doubt any evidence to the contrary to you is proof of the opposite conspiracy
    
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Results_of_the_2016_Democratic_Party_presidential_primaries
- SPC 5.2
  
  15 January 2024 at 8:24 am
  
  Unemployment is low and wage growth is strongest at the low end, thus less wage inequality. Inflation is going down, without a recession.
  
  The GOP is using the term Bidenomics as a negative, leading many to presume a recession, high unemployment and inflation is getting worse – and yet none of that is true.
- Res Publica 5.3
  
  15 January 2024 at 8:25 am
  
  It's nearly a year to go until the election, and any polling is entirely based on a theoretical Trump vs a theoretical Biden as neither is their party's nominee yet.
  
  It'd be wise to take those numbers with a large dose of salt.
  
  Yes, Biden has some problems. Some of them related to perceptions around his age. Others around the average voters' feelings about the economy.
  
  But people also said his primary campaign was doomed, and now he's president. A lot can happen in 10ish months.
  - Tiger Mountain 5.3.1
    
    15 January 2024 at 11:43 am
    
    Turnout is king–a huge non vote, FPP/skewed electoral Collage, and voter suppression/gerrymandering are three complicating factors in US Elections.
    
    According to various polls on women's health, minimum wage rise, union & gay rights etc. MAGA supporters are in the minority now, but, they do tend to vote like Natzos and boomers here.
    
    It is way too soon to pick. Trump could yet get an orange jumpsuit, or Joe Biden drop out etc.
    - SPC 5.3.1.1
      
      15 January 2024 at 11:55 am
      
      Yes.
      
      Turnout was high in 2020 – easier mail voting. Woman sometimes have issues with voting on a working day – family, work and queues. About half the states have the vote on a working day.
      
      Gerrymandering allows the GOP to get a House majority on a minority of the vote.
    - Morrissey 5.3.1.2
      
      16 January 2024 at 11:24 am
      
      Biden's burned off almost all support from young people, and indeed any older person with a conscience.
- Kokako 5.4
  
  15 January 2024 at 12:08 pm
  
  America is a country of immigrants, with the exception of the locals that were already there when the now established immigrants recently arrived. Americans aren't "paying for illegal immigrants" because the border is not an open free for all. This is a tired trope. No social security number = no medicaid, no welfare, and no federal benefits. So what exactly are Americans paying for with this mythical boogeyman? Visa-mandated labour goes through the appropriately regulated channels and is not illegal. Have you had your place at Harvard triaged for an illegal immigrant, or your application to investment via a hedge fund 86'd by a refugee family because of affirmative action? Come on…
- David 5.5
  
  15 January 2024 at 8:22 pm
  
  There's still some hope he won't.
  
  New poll shows Nikki Haley could beat Biden by more than Trump (msn.com)
  - UncookedSelachimorpha 5.5.1
    
    15 January 2024 at 9:07 pm
    
    And now this very weird reason – an ad hominem attack to which Trump might be especially susceptible.
    
    Will Americans Vote for a Man Who Is Now Widely Reported to Exude a Rancid Odor?
    
    I remember reading about the conservative tendency to be more easily disgusted – be strange if it came back to bite Trump.
    - David 5.5.1.1
      
      15 January 2024 at 9:24 pm
      
      I knew there was a certain 'stench' around Trump, but that is all too weird.
      - Morrissey 5.5.1.1.1
        
        15 January 2024 at 11:03 pm
        
        Remember that dread feeling you had in November 2016? Get ready to feel that way all over again this November…
        
        David 5.5.1.1.1.1
        
        16 January 2024 at 10:15 am
        
        Dread? Not really. Despite my feelings about Trump, I had a sense of relief that the US dodged having Hillary Clinton as President.
        
        Morrissey …
        
        16 January 2024 at 11:22 am
        
        It was the classic choice between two evils. Or perhaps it was Demonstably Evil versus Insane Clown.
        
        https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/matt-taibbi/insane-clown-president/
        
        David …
        
        16 January 2024 at 11:26 am
        
        Yep. There are some quality people in the US political scene, but apparently none of them mad or corrupt enough to be elected president.
Thinker 6

15 January 2024 at 5:24 pm

https://youtu.be/H3zN4-n8ZWg?si=UtJ_MKIfhTpLxZW8
Adrian Thornton 7

16 January 2024 at 10:56 am

BTW Ad…here is the type of person you seem to be happy to align yourself with in the defense of NATO….but then again brutal illegal sanctions in service of Western interests never seem to bother the Liberal Imperialist class conscious….as it turns out, nothing much does.

Countries dropping dollar neutralizes US sanctions, complains neocon Marco Rubio

"China and Brazil signed an agreement to de-dollarize their trade and use local currencies. US politicians like neoconservative Florida Republican Senator Marco Rubio are furious, because it means they can no longer destroy countries' economies with illegal unilateral sanctions"
- Morrissey 7.1
  
  16 January 2024 at 11:39 am
  
  Rubio is a truly repellent individual, as well as profoundly ignorant. Look at the contemptuous way he behaves when confronted by Jewish peace activists…