Yeah, that’s a lot worse than OP implied.

Yeah. My previously covered medication now has a $10 copay.

I think there are some natural monopolies where it makes sense to let them be run as monopolies with some form of government control. The energy grid is a good example, you can different suppliers providing electricity but the transmission of it should be within one company/system.

And the first part is why a lot of content creators are on it.

At a certain point, a blog becomes more than a hobby. When that happens, a platform like Substack helps people transition the hobby to a job

It seems like a descendent of the Shah is currently involved, but I imagine that the replacement government would likely be a constitutional monarchy or a revised republic.

In either case, I expect transfer of several executive powers to elected bodies including control of the military and police.

EU countries did underinvest, but the US is able to invest in multiple weapon platforms and logistics capabilities that wealthy but small countries can’t possibly afford on their own.

The Libyan War was a good example. The EU nations that wanted to intervene in the war needed the US to provide ATC duties and provide supplies after the countries’ missile reserves ran out.

There has historically been a correlation. However, this bubble doesn’t require a lot of labor so wages have been stuck.

Hell, if it weren’t for the AI bubble, it is likely that the US economy would be in recession.

Part of the problem of creating a non-American NATO is that the USA provides a ton of capabilities and logistics that other countries can’t possibly afford.

It is the reason why there has been a push to create an EU military instead.

Public performance in general can be stressful; people get stage fright all the time.

White college educated males were considered the default in a lot of early and mid 20th century experimental psychology due to the availability of test subjects and biases of people running the experiments. The definition of neurotypical behavior came from a subset of the population.

ADD and ADHD are known to hinder progression through the education system. So, the cohort of people on that part of the spectrum were underrepresented. The bounds for being normal were skewed.

Also, medical intervention is typically only looked at when the mental condition causes a reduction of quality of life. Over the past generation, the need for a formal collegiate education has become greater in developed countries due to shifts in economics. A kid which would be considered energetic and absent minded a few generations ago would have a far greater chance in being economically successful compared to now.

It feels less like “one big problem” and more like death by a thousand cuts.

A lot of sci-fi was generally written to play with a few ideas. I think it would be difficult to create a narrative around several problems with different causes and solutions.

China has sanctions on several US companies.

Iceland would be better for data centers because it also has a steady supply of geothermal energy.

As for ramifications, I can see a lot of changes to American buildings as they have to survive more extreme weather events.

It is estimated that there are a lot of rare earth minerals there to create fancy electronics.

Unless the USA invades, I imagine the process won’t be fully controlled by the USA.

Currently, the Venezuelan Vice President, Delcy Rodríguez, is in Russia. She would likely be acting as President Anna isn’t at risk of being kidnapped by the USA. The question right now is whether the Venezuelan government can maintain its chain of command as the USA attacks it.

The USA is likely hoping for a coup where the current government falls. If that happens, the successor will likely be a choice of the Venezuelan military and internal security ministries.

It was centrally located for the time, but it was still established with the idea it would have coastal access.

And it was a decent location that followed the European model of having the capital not on the coast but inland enough to defend. Caracas matches that location as well.

Moving the capital is a major logistical hurdle in peace or war.

In war, it is usually a bad sign if a government has to abandon the capital. The only cases I can think of where a government had to abandon the capital but ended up winning the war was the United States in the War of 1812 and Mexico during the French installation of a Mexican king, both cases where the war ended in part because the war became too costly to the occupier and the occupied could trade massive amounts of land, someone Venezuela can’t really do.

In peace, there is a massive amount of infrastructure that needs to be built to support the administration of a government. Germany chose to keep several government agencies in Bonn during unification given the large number of government buildings available. South Korea’s attempt to move the capital to Sejong has been slow and has only moved some ministries. Indonesia and Egypt are having issues funding their relocation attempts. Venezuela, in contrast, is fucking broke.

Trump has admitted that there are a lot of CIA agents in Venezuela. It was also suspiciously easy for the USA to get Maduro out of the country.

My guess is that the USA likely expects a coup to happen which will install a friendly regime.

I don’t care enough to have one.