As much as I tire of Doctorow's style, I feel you have a level of pessimism that would prevent anyone from trying anything innovative.
Dead wrong. I’m a risk taker. I wanted to see Doctorow’s argument because I respect him and would love if the numbers allowed for constraining Washington.
Dismissing a stupid proposal for being wrong isn’t rejecting solutions in general. In this case, it’s pointing out that Europe escalating a trade war for copyright reform doesn’t make a lot of sense unless you’re rallying folks to that cause.
The US has been escalating non-stop for a year. This would be Europe responding for once. Constraining Washington is in their interest as Washington is a malign actor now.
Shredding a trade agreement outright is absolutely an escalation relative to tariffs. It’s both more comprehensive and includes raising tariffs.
> The US has been escalating non-stop for a year. This would be Europe responding for once
Sure. By escalating.
> Constraining Washington is in their interest
Agree. But there are smart and stupid ways to do it. It’s in America’s interest to constrain China. Nuking its own oil production to raise oil prices, as an extreme example, would be a stupid way to do it. Ends not justifying the means is more than just a moral argument.
"WE can dishonor any part of any agreement but YOU have to fulfill all of your obligations according to our interpretation and under our direction... OR ELSE"
I don't know if these are real people or bots but I pity them for their lack of basic reasoning abilities.
Once one side starts removing obligations from themselves they will never stop, especially if the other side keeps being in compliance, it's just an incredible opportunity to corner the compliant side and drain it completely... and then it'll experience the "OR ELSE" part anyway but at the most damaging time and in its worst form.
There's only one choice when an agreement is broken - act as if it never existed while positioning yourself for a fair renegotiation.