Compared to the West, China has very little appetite for expansionism. Except for South China Sea, China only wants to conquer areas they deemed to be historically theirs. For the most part, China's current foreign policy is to recreate the tributary system for the modern era to make foreign nations beholden to them.
Yes, CCP is authoritarian, but the party has long term vision for the country. Because they don't want to revert back to the so-called century of humiliation when China became technologically behind and had been carrion feeds for outside powers. The country had been isolationist which made Imperial China weak, but the CCP decided to open up and use international free trade to assert their own influence, instead of being controlled by it like before. Much of CCP's decision making is influenced by historical trauma, as well as from Confucian idea of mandate of heaven-- that the ruling government is only legitimate so long as they can deliver for the people.
So even though Xi cracks down on dissent, he is open to ideas when it comes to technological advancements and pushes his subordinates to keep up. And as we can see, Deep Seek had beaten Western AI development at a fraction of the cost, and China is leading in manufacturing electric vehicles and battery and other renewable technologies. Millions of Chinese had been lifted out of poverty, and the older generations still remember the hardship and the war so many Chinese feel grateful. Xi wants the CCP to prove to the population that only they can deliver progress. But as you pointed out, there is a cost to all of this.
I may not like the CCP, but you have to give credit to where it is due. The government is run by pragmatic technocrats with long term vision. These are the characteristics that America has lost long ago. It is so ironic and funny that it is China who is the promoter now of international free trade.
Why would they want to win anyway? When they are already winning from so much corporate donations???!!!
In Batman Year Zero, his very first act was confronting the rich. And in The Dark Knight Returns, he simply talked to a corrupt general, and said general resigned in an unusual yet honest way afterwards, shall we say.
By appeasing the centre, they mean the rich donors.
We live in the best era possible in the best places of the world.
That's what people thought during the so-called Roaring Twenty's before the Great Depression and World War 2 happened.
History repeats itself. People enjoy the highs; rest on their laurels; become too greedy and decadent; wealth inequality grows; the masses become pushed to extreme poverty; a demagogue comes claiming to save them; civil unrest happens; conflict happens; people learn and tell themselves never again; new wealth is generated; people become greedy again; wealth inequality happens again; demagogues reappear-- and the cycle continues. We have seen this happen from the ancient Chinese empires, the Roman empire, to the French, Germans, and now the USA. Just because it is good for now, it doesn't mean the bad won't ever come even if the tell-tale signs are present. It is the calm before the storm after as they. If the wealth inequality is not stemmed in the USA like what happened under Franklin Roosevelt, the situation that happened in Germany might happen instead there.
I don't condone what Luigi did, but I understand. Whether he is rich or not, what Luigi did is a symptom of a broken society, just like someone who has to steal a diaper or milk for one's baby. And sure, even Trump getting popular is a symptom as well, not the cause. Many people are getting sick of an increasingly injust society regardless of background.
What we are seeing is a bottle gradually going to pop. We have been warned years ago of the growing excesses of a society becoming greedy and too individualistic, but we did not listen. We want to see how bloated and fat we can get before we all burst together.
when you knew what he was going to do, he told you what he was going to do - why are you now in any way surprised or disturbed?
My guess is that people's reaction is more like: "I thought politicians lie? Why would they do this?"
I know Musk is not technically a politician, but the same confused reaction and bewilderment that you mentioned is applied to Trump's current actions as well.
As far as I know, Renault sales is ramping up.
And unfortunately lemmy.ml is getting more online traffic recently.
Ignoring the lack of updates if the game is buggy, games back then were also more focused on quality and make gamers replay the game with unlockable features based on skills, not money. I can't count the number of times I played Metal Gear Solid games over and over to unlock new features playing the hardest difficulty and with handicap features, and also to find Easter eggs. Speaking of Easter eggs, you'd lose a number of hours exploring every nook and cranny finding them!
Judges could have biases of their own whether they realise it or not.