Peter Zeihan on China: "they are going away"

There's no version of this where China comes through looking good.  And the challenge for the rest of us is to figure out figure out "how do we, in as smooth and quick as a process as possible, figure out how we can get along without them?"  Because they are going away.  And they're going away this decade, for certain.

~ Peter Zeihan, interview with Joe Rogan, The Joe Rogan Experience, January 7, 2023

My comment: 

The big reveal with Peter Zeihan is that he has an agenda: decouple with China.  If you press him on this, I'm pretty sure he welcomes US government policy to expedite the process.  There are several problems with this line of reasoning: 

1) If Zeihan is correct, the decoupling will happen naturally. 

2) Trade is mutually beneficial, i.e. cutting off the second largest economy in the world will inflict massive pain on the US economy, not just China's. 

3) Interfering in trade leads to conflict. 

I'm not suggesting China doesn't have its flaws (as do we), but if Zeihan actually cared about the Chinese people, he would encourage diplomacy and trade, not vilification and ostracism.

Joe Rogan on mask wearing

Masks are like the Democrats’ MAGA hat. You wear it to make people feel comfortable.  I know it’s illogical, and I’m fine wearing it if it relaxes people, and makes them feel better.  But if people want to argue that they do something, it just doesn’t make any sense man.  It doesn’t make any sense.

I don’t even know if they work.  I don’t think they do.  I mean maybe they stop spittle from getting into someone.  If you can get your finger in the side of it, and air is coming out.

I just feel like it’s one of those things where we accepted early on.  And now we’re just pretending it’s somehow or another protective.  But at the end of the day it’s really just a piece of paper over your mouth and you’re breathing perfectly through it, so like how does that work?

~ Joe Rogan, "Video: Joe Rogan And Guest Highlight Environmental ‘Senselessness’ Of Masks," December 24, 2021

Joe Rogan on kindness

The one thing I know for a fact is that the nicer we are to our fellow human beings, the nicer the universe is to us.

~ Joe Rogan