dpberr

Vietnam has signed defense pacts with the US (isn't the irony heavy?) and France (isn't it heavier?) in recent years, so the transfer of technology has already begun. I think it goes up significantly because there's no love lost between Vietnam and China and they don't trust the Russians to supply them if China tries to invade them again. I'd expect if the West were to pull manufacturing out of China, they'd go to Vietnam. Vietnam has beaten three world powers in battle, isn't that something? (colonial French, US, Chinese)

Great time for gun manufacturers. I saw a S&W MP-15, a basic AR, "on sale" for $1,050. In January 2020, that rifle was probably mid $550s.

"Problem with China it that they’re not going to back off the Uyghurs until they are satisfied with the result. They just won’t. They didn’t in Tibet. They didn’t in Hong Kong. When it comes around to Taiwan they probably won’t stop, either. I wouldn’t expect to see a UN coalition anywhere near China since they’ve got veto power (not that the UN is willing to do anything in any event). I’m not sure whether China could be expelled from the WTO or not (and I don’t know what that would mean). " Taiwan is the equivalent of the Polish countryside of 1939. I'd expect the US to significantly spend money on the Vietnam navy over the next decade. If there is a country that hates China the most in that area, it's Vietnam. Won't be surprised to see a lot of Western naval hardware with the Vietnamese flag on it by 2030.

The Chinese aren't the world's newest form of Nazis, but they are probably the first in the 21st Century. It's alleged the "world" doesn't care about genocides if countries genocide their own people, and there is some truth to that as Cinga pointed out. There's been countless genocides in Africa and South Asia through the 20th Century. I'm convinced NATO only got off their ass in the former Yugoslavia because the Serbs walked right in and mass murdered nearly 10,000 people in Sreberenica due to the utter cowardice of the Dutch who were there to protect the town. What has surprised me about the Uyghur catastrophe is where is ISIS, al Qaeda, Hezbollah?

The scary thing is as poorly as the federal and state government has handled the response to this virus, can you see a President HR Clinton doing anything uniquely different besides possibly a lot less tweeting that would have presented a better outcome today? Do you still get all the same poor decisions in that alternate 2020? Is government just incompetent, no matter whos at the podium? My fear is that we've reached a level of incompetency where there's no hope for a vaccine. We, as in the human race, no longer possess the chops to get it done, no matter the money we throw at it.

Brooks Brothers in recent times failed to make a man feel like a million dollars wearing one of their suits. Their salespeople became too obsessed with the result (the sale) instead of the process. The older BB sales guys would give you a suit for you - not the most expensive one or perhaps the trendiest one, but a suit that fit your body and made you look amazing. Same thing happened at Victoria Secret for women. Once upon a time, Victoria Secret had knowledgeable employees who knew the product and more importantly, knew how to advise women on what to buy. Women would shop Victoria Secret exclusively because they knew they could go there and get sound, and free, advice. Then, VS started hiring your average teenage girl who probably wasn't wearing a properly fitted bra herself, and it just became another mediocre apparel store.

I don't think there will be an NFL season, or for that matter, an NBA or MLB one either. 2020 is cooked. Today's announcement had nothing to do with football IMO. The Ravens were sending a message to the state, city and all the vendors that they should plan on making a lot less money from the Ravens, and in terms of all the payments the Ravens make to the government and businesses, setting up the case for extensions on those payments or renegotiating contracts.

Njoku is 95% amazing athlete, 5% professional football player. He excelled in college because of his athletic qualities. He doesn't run routes or block particularly well. Is there talent there? Yes. Will the coaching staff have to teach him how to play football? Yes.

I hope the Redskins do not change the name this year. Do it next year or never do it. "Cancel culture", rule by mob and the corporate pandering to it has to be stopped. Otherwise, it's a slippery slope to tyranny to whatever voices are loudest at the time. Today you might agree with the loudest voice. Tomorrow you may not. Throughout history, appeasement never fixed anything. It only encouraged the loudest voices to want more.

Very dangerous situation for everyone involved. The couple were likely within their rights under Missouri law to discharge those firearms if they felt threatened by those protesters and those protesters came on to their property. Among states, the state has some of the stronger castle doctrine shooting in self defense laws. That being said, everyone involved is so criminally stupid and weird and they should be jailed and billed for the time the town had to spend sending the cops to sort it out. The couple, for an absurd lack of firearms training and situational awareness. For the protesters, not being aware you're not on a public street, and you don't get to break down gates and protest on private property, and putting people's lives in danger unnecessarily.

The only way Joe Biden snatches defeat from the jaws of victory is a VP choice that puts the fear into moderates. Biden's fragile mental capacity will be put on display in the debates and America is ultimately choosing between Trump and that VP.

The Jerry Hughes trade was a great example of excellent pro personnel evaluation by the Bills FO at the time. The Colts played Hughes out of position. Hasson Reddick in Arizona is the modern day "Colts era Jerry Hughes". By the time the Cardinals figure out it's not bad having Reddick being an above average pass rusher, they will try to play him at every position on the defense because "scheme."

Lisa Bender and the City Council will be stopped by business and surprisingly, the churches. No insurance company that cares about money is going to insure a square foot of real estate in a city without law enforcement. No business is going to open itself to untold liability by operating in a city without law enforcement. You hope cooler, practical heads prevail there.

Community policing or COPS was all the rage in LA post 1992. It's not that it hasn't been tried across the US and it's had success in places. It's just an awful lot of political will, work and money, and it takes years. If the people driving it leave, or are replaced by more Parker/Gates theorists, it can disappear as quickly as it arrives. Do the police need reform? Yes, nationwide. For at least 50 years now. Would I disbanded local law enforcement in a pandemic/civil unrest/election year? No. I'm not that rash. You're putting all your residents in a lot of unnecessary danger, and I wouldn't want to give these governors or this President an excuse to send in the troops.

Those with cooler heads will use them. Neither Mattis nor Trump are the type. I don't disagree with Mattis but whenever these retired generals who were let go by Presidents speak out, you can't help but hear the ax grinding in the background.

He's losing the 2020 election to a possibly senile (generously...."very forgetful") Joe Biden, who isn't even campaigning. It's not because Biden is any good. He's not. Biden will likely pick a terrible VP that'll pander to the crisis of the moment and pitch a mediocre Obama years vision as an alternative. It's just that the voting public, weary of crisis after crisis this year, will want a break from the Trump spectacle that's increasingly showing its neither smart nor shrewd in *the* moment when it counts, and its just part of the political and leadership rot. And the Obama haze might sound good to some.

He just wants them on record asking for it because unfortunately that's who he is. The LA riots only stopped when Bush federalized the guard. That was just one city, with the nation's second largest police department (at the time), replete with SWAT, air units, etc. Many of these cities do not have the capacity or capabilities of the LAPD or NYPD to control looting in multiple wack a mole flare ups across a city. For mayors of these cities, how many nights of looting is enough before the gloves come off?

Right....as they didn't in Baltimore two years ago either...

It's sad how nothing has changed since 1992, which at the time, felt like a moment when things might change. Cops in the US still don't know how to police, and remain either poorly trained, poorly led, or lack the skill to properly police. The black community still can't organize and protest without destructively burning their own neighborhood and economy down.

The flip side is January 28, 1986. NASA was under extreme pressure to launch Challenger that morning because kids would be in school to see the launch. It was on all the major news networks all morning. If NASA would have waited even an additional hour for the ground temps to warm a little, the shuttle would have launched without issue.

I don't understand why these cities let the looters flex for a few nights burning their own neighborhoods down. Baltimore did that a few years ago. The Minneapolis mayor looks like yet another elected official in over his head. This pandemic has revealed many an elected phony, and it looks like he's another one.

Once the weather gets warm... Unfortunately the situation in Minneapolis will be used as justification for looting in other big cities. It's coming. Most of these cities have closed all the pools, parks, summer programs and are filled with unemployed young people who've been under lockdown.

I agree. If so, he should direct the CDC and NIH to issue guidance that masks are unnecessary. Either way.

He (Trump) needs to quit it with the Scarborough stuff. Even for him, it's a terrible look. Trump fatigue will hand a possibly senile Joe Biden, of all people, a Presidency. I bet that keeps HRC up every single night.

Yes. He's the President. Lead by example. You wear a suit and tie every day because that's what Presidents wear. From a purely political strategy viewpoint, his base is statistically....the elderly. Even if he personally thinks wearing a mask is the dumbest thing ever, its an election year and you want to show them that you are caring about not only them, but their children and their grandchildren. And...never give the opposition easy layups. He hasn't figured out yet that when he does something presidential and not Trumpish, the media doesn't care.