It also depends on what "two state solution" actually means. Traditionally, Israel has made such solutions impossible. The "you go your way, we'll go ours" has been off the table because Israel doesn't want that, they want the entire land and the expulsion of Palestine entirely.

A two-state solution, where there's a kind of federation between them might actually work. The federation would have to abide by international committees and violations by either state would be subject to some kind of punishment (be it trade deals or even military action in severe cases).

The first problem, though, is the weapons supply and military training from the West. If that were cut off, it would take maybe a year of bloody gorilla fighting, but the playing field would be relatively equal at that point and then it'd be anybody's guess who'd win out. Getting the USA to slowly wean away support would mean negotiating partially on their terms.

In other words, Xi could just be giving the USA a peaceful "out" here, if they take it. The USA can save face and support a ramp down of the situation instead of escalation. I don't see that happening near-term, but lots can change in the next few years and this play by China might just be the thing that allows a better situation to happen here.

A rehash of "the devil made me do it" trope.

Why not ask the Chinese government?

To be clear, capital - the value produced from society that is cycled back into society to develop further surplus - isn't the problem, it's capital within capitalism. Capital doesn't have the "insatiable appetite" but rather capitalists, who control most of the capital, do. How we handle capital is a large part of what defines the system.

"What? Me? On equal ground with the dirty commoner? Good heavens, no!" - bourgeoisie

Don't assume the readers/hearers of the propaganda all believe it. The military must maintain recruitment numbers and they'll spend a lot of money to do so. So we'll hear a lot about how great they are. The DOD even spends a lot of time and money providing props and such for Hollywood movies. They even help edit the scripts to ensure the US military isn't put in a bad light.

It's not that the brainrot runs deep. It's more that the propaganda does. Don't blame the people for the stuff they didn't consent to.

However, we must remember these people are people

Correction: these people are proletariat. We have the same enemy. Mostly, the only difference between us and them is that we're a little better at identifying the enemy than they are.

And those bears ain't even hexed!

I have two dogs (a big one and a little one) and some training from a dog trainer. There's no "getting even" with dogs. If you pee on their bed, they won't care. They'll smell it, and because their sense of smell is drastically more evolved than ours, they'll figure out what you ate a couple of meals ago and what you're current mood is. They will not interpret your pee as an act of vengeance.

There's no punishment you can give. Instead, you need to hack dogs' psychology (which is easy, actually) and train them to pee outdoors only. The way you do this is to by POSITIVE motivation. Each time they pee outdoors, give them a treat. You have about ~2 seconds to give them that treat though, so keep treats in your pocket at all times. Treats you know they like.

What will happen is that they'll pee exactly where you want them to pee to get the treat. It takes multiple times, but they'll make the connection. They just want the treat. Only after they've made the appropriate connection between peeing where you want and getting a reward can you begin then to not always give them the treat. Instead, affirm with a simple "good boy" and maybe a pet. Slowly (over weeks) retreat the reward until you're just giving a verbal "good boy". And maybe not even every time.

What they will do is just pee outside because "that's the way they always do it". That's it. That's all their brains will tell them. And they might bark or ask to go outside even when they need to go because, in their heads, it's "weird" to go inside. It's not what they did the last 20 times so they don't want to.

Anyway. Take it from a random person on the Internet: punishment won't be effective. Just hack your dog's love of food and love of routine. Keep it positive and you'll, eventually, receive the fruits of your labor.

I love how, with the Snowden leaks and more, we know definitively that the US government is collecting all our data but people are super scared right now that China might be spying on them.

One thing's for sure: capitalism seems to be miles ahead of any socialist country when it comes to propagandizing their citizens. Because the best propaganda is the kind that you don't even know is there.

McCarthyism. It was basically like the Soviet Union purges but for capitalists (against communists).

My personal view is that the first mass wave of communism and socialism (19th and then 20th century) took the bourgeoisie by surprise. They learned their lesson and now spend a lot of effort on building and maintaining liberal ideology and squashing any real socialist movements quickly. Meanwhile, the proletariat doesn't even know who they are so there's no class consciousness building and they're constantly stuck in the spectacle that is the labor/consume cycle.

I would say yes. It was incredibly common in his day and just because you weren't a member of the Communist party didn't mean you weren't a socialist. I can't really see anything about his politics that isn't socialist so I'd say yes.