Political Memes

But surely we should shun the free energy we get from the sky

Pedophile is a filtered word on a lot of social media. They are just making it so their meme can meme the most.

Germany here, around 9$/gallon. I'm just glad I made the switch five years ago, currently the etron is sipping leftover electrons from the roof. Compared to something equivalent with a 300hp TDI, im paying 30% of the fuel costs. And the etron is an ultra thirsty luxobarge, any reasonable ev with the same power would be more like 20%.

~$10.40/gal in the Nordics (diesel). So that's roughly $0.25 per mile in my case.

Ours is still hovering around 3.80

Or if they cared about a convicted felon pedophile.

No one gave a shit until it came down to the price of gas. And they wonder in amazement when the world hates them.

"Appear weak when you are strong and strong when you are weak" - Sun Tzu

Both Russia and the US were thought to have very powerful military capability. Both made a strategic mistake when they decided to show everyone their hands.

I wouldn't say either nation is weak, but the power of deterrence was actually bigger than either one's true military power. Deterrence can be even better at protecting your people than actual military power. But you don't win offensive wars with deterrence.

Now, nobody's going to attack Russia or the US, so they can afford the loss in deterrence... But at least for the US, the middle eastern allies are now vulnerable to attack (particularly from Iran) and if China's willing to show their true hand, they might try Taiwan now. Though I imagine that perhaps China's leadership is wiser and won't repeat Putin's and Trump's mistakes. After all, their military might also be less powerful than we all think. Because it's very beneficial to have everyone think you can't be fucked with.

At the end of the day, it's hard to make efficient use of a large military. And the people protecting their own homeland have an advantage in morale. Invading a moderately weaker country is pretty stupid. Invading a moderately weaker country halfway across the world is even more stupid. To have an "easy" time conquering another nation, the power balance needs to be HEAVILY in your favor because of all the disadvantages of being the invading party.

TL;DR: Trump and Putin are idiots who gave away a huge advantage their countries had by showing how they are weaker than previously thought.