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China’s economy is structurally weaker than it appears and overly dependent on government-subsidized exports.
On the surface, China is on track for another year with a trade surplus topping $1 trillion. Exports surged last month by 24 percent year-over-year, according to data published Friday.
But the domestic economy is showing prolonged weakness. China's growth dropped to 4.3 percent in the second quarter of 2026, the lowest in three years, even according to the government's suspect accounting. Home prices have slumped, and developers and local governments are reeling under piles of debt. Youth unemployment has remained stubbornly around 15 percent.
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fun fact: China's debt to GDP ratio is about 6 so per capita debt is more than an American despite wages being about 20% of USA levels. Actually probably worse than that since the China's self reported GDP is likely inflated.
Posted by: Lord Garth ||
08/13/2026 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[194 views]
Top|| File under: Commies
#1
I've been reading reports about China's imminent economic collapse for 20+ years.
[PositionAndDecision] And what it means for the Republican Party.
The average white Democrat is more animated by Black grievance politics and the like than they are about bread-and-butter dinner-table issues like gas prices from the Iran war.
The long-term changes that have taken place in the Democrat Party since the election of Barack Obama in 2008 have finally come to fruition, and we are now in a position where the DSA, or the Democratic Socialists of America, cannot not win — at least within the Democrat Party. The discussions about this ‘radical’ shift within the Democrat Party, at least on the Right, often focus on the rise of demographic blocs of young voters due to immigration. The DSA wing of the party often takes on the moral framework of third-worldism despite not being comprised of many third worlders. You can airlift every Muslim from Dearborn out of this country tomorrow but democratic primary landscape would not change at all. While a shifting demographic landscape certainly has huge consequences for America, especially in elections, the rise of the DSA actually hinges most on the changing electoral preferences of White Democrats, which will likely affect the internal debates that currently roil the Republican Party.
Does anyone believe they don't think they are getting something for their money? Direct interference and propaganda investment are one thing, but this is the longer influence game. https://t.co/2ZGdeaHVYf
🚨 BREAKING: A LIFELONG DEMOCRAT JUST EXPLODED ON MSNBC Chris Matthews — 50+ years in Democratic politics — looked straight into the camera and called the DSA platform pure CRAP. He listed it out, one by one: “We’re going to get rid of ICE. Not just ICE… the border too. No more… pic.twitter.com/J4L1VMTJ8u
Not just ICE… the border too.
No more controlling who enters or leaves the country.
Get rid of prisons.
Get rid of the Pentagon.”
Then he dropped the hammer:
“What happens when your diplomats get taken hostage, like under Carter?
You need an army. You don’t like having one… but you NEED one.”
On AOC’s “big tent” fantasy:
“The problem is every Democrat has to defend this crap from the left.
You’ve got to say ‘I’m not DSA’… and make it crystal clear.”
Matthews just joined James Carville on the growing list of lifelong liberals who say they no longer recognize their own party.
Gallup numbers don’t lie:
66% of Democrats now view socialism positively.
Only 42% still view capitalism positively.
The party of FDR and JFK is gone.
What’s left is something else entirely.
Share this before they try to bury it.
So the DSA has captured the Democratic Party, skinned it, and is now wearing it like a coat. But will the disgusted 42% vote D in November? How many will vote R, how many will stay home in disgust with both sides? Except for the blue states and cities, Republican voters already had a numerical advantage before the voter rolls were cleaned up, so how will the 42% of disgusted Ds tip the balance… and even in blue cities and states how will losing almost half of their voters — after cleaned up voter rolls, reducing the ability to cheat — impact the November outcome?
#8
...Anyways the real strength of the Democratic Party is the like-minded people in most white collar positions. And now, when they understand that DSA is a danger to them ...
#9
Ever notice that the support for the Democrats never goes below the mid thirties percent or so?
It’s about the same for the Republicans as well, no mo uro. All the rest need to be persuaded each election.
But it will be very interesting to discover what the real numbers are as the voter rolls are cleaned up, the ability to cheat is reduced by reversion to old practices, and federal donations to NGOs increasingly curtailed.
#10
FWIW
polling on 'free enterprise' typically outperforms 'capitalism' by 20-40 points
and we never have a question,
"how do you feel about a hybrid economic system with robust safety net programs a progressive tax rate and markets ordered where necessary by laws and regulations"
Posted by: Lord Garth ||
08/13/2026 20:35 Comments ||
Top||
#11
DSA must flop hard before the Dems can retake their party and rebuild.
[YouTube] In Kandahar, faces vanish from screens, women disappear from public life, and Taliban decrees shape everyday existence. Discover how this city became Afghanistan’s ideological heartland.
Welcome to Pashtunistan central. Set aside about 45 minutes to watch.
1:30 - Chapter 1 - A City Where Faces Vanish
4:15 - Chapter 2 - Welcome to Pashtunistan
10:25 - Chapter 3 - The Students Take the City
14:00 - Chapter 4 - The Cloak & the Commander
20:05 - Chapter 5 - Bullets & Blood
25:40 - Chapter 6 - A State Run by a Shadow
30:05 - Chapter 7 - Men: Beards, Prayer, Barbers
33:30 - Chapter 8 - Women Removed from the Map
38:05 - Chapter 9 - What People Still Say Improved
[IsraelAlma] This week, it was reported in Lebanon that Hezbollah divides its infrastructure in the south of the country into three levels of importance, according to their operational value and its ability to replace them should it be forced to relinquish them.
This division may shed light on a possible course of action by Hezbollah aimed at countering the implementation of the agreement between Israel and Lebanon: creating a hierarchy of concessions that would allow it to hand over certain assets to the Lebanese Armed Forces, while at the same time preserving the infrastructure essential to its continued existence as a military force in the south.
Based on our understanding of the relationship between Hezbollah and the Lebanese Armed Forces, if such a handover takes place, it will only be possible as a result of a Hezbollah decision, and not because of an initiative or demand by the Lebanese Armed Forces.
True. It’s long been clear that, like Pakistan and the Gaza Strip, Lebanon has become a terror group (or in Pakistan’s case, an army) with a country attached, rather than the other way round. And like Hamas, Hezbollah couldn’t care less about the fate of the civilian human shields around them. In fact, the more civilians harmed, the better the propaganda payoff as far as they are concerned. The Pakistani army prefers their civilians to be orderly and get out of the way instead of rioting underfoot, but since their country is Pakistan they’re out of luck on that count.
According to the report, the lowest level consists of assets that Hezbollah is capable of relinquishing at a relatively low operational cost: small positions, limited weapons depots, observation posts, and facilities that were already exposed during the war and have lost their importance. Handing them over to the Lebanese Armed Forces may allow the organization to create a false impression of unwillingness to confront the Lebanese army (which is regarded as a consensus institution),
What is a consensus institution?
without significantly impairing Hezbollah’s core capabilities. In all likelihood, although these assets contain only limited and basic weaponry, it will be returned to Hezbollah through a “revolving door” arrangement.
The second level includes ammunition depots, maintenance and supply facilities, staging points, launch positions, and short underground infrastructure. Hezbollah may be willing to relinquish some of these assets after removing their contents. In other words, transferring a site to the Lebanese army does not necessarily indicate that the capability it housed has been dismantled: the equipment can be relocated while preserving the option of restoring the site or establishing an alternative in the future. Alternatively, through the “revolving door” method, the site may later be “returned” to Hezbollah.
Or Israel can strip it and blow it up, as they have been. The Lebanese complain about destroyed houses and other infrastructure, but when the alternative is to leave it available for reacquisition and reuse…
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
