345
US national debt is now bigger than the economy for first time since World War II
(www.independent.co.uk)
this post was submitted on 01 May 2026
345 points (99.7% liked)
News
37431 readers
1220 users here now
Welcome to the News community!
Rules:
1. Be civil
Attack the argument, not the person. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Good faith argumentation only. This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban. Do not respond to rule-breaking content; report it and move on.
2. All posts should contain a source (url) that is as reliable and unbiased as possible and must only contain one link.
Obvious biased sources will be removed at the mods’ discretion. Supporting links can be added in comments or posted separately but not to the post body. Sources may be checked for reliability using Wikipedia, MBFC, AdFontes, GroundNews, etc.
3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.
Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.
4. Post titles should be the same as the article used as source. Clickbait titles may be removed.
Posts which titles don’t match the source may be removed. If the site changed their headline, we may ask you to update the post title. Clickbait titles use hyperbolic language and do not accurately describe the article content. When necessary, post titles may be edited, clearly marked with [brackets], but may never be used to editorialize or comment on the content.
5. Only recent news is allowed.
Posts must be news from the most recent 30 days.
6. All posts must be news articles.
No opinion pieces, Listicles, editorials, videos, blogs, press releases, or celebrity gossip will be allowed. All posts will be judged on a case-by-case basis. Mods may use discretion to pre-approve videos or press releases from highly credible sources that provide unique, newsworthy content not available or possible in another format.
7. No duplicate posts.
If an article has already been posted, it will be removed. Different articles reporting on the same subject are permitted. If the post that matches your post is very old, we refer you to rule 5.
8. Misinformation is prohibited.
Misinformation / propaganda is strictly prohibited. Any comment or post containing or linking to misinformation will be removed. If you feel that your post has been removed in error, credible sources must be provided.
9. No link shorteners or news aggregators.
All posts must link to original article sources. You may include archival links in the post description. News aggregators such as Yahoo, Google, Hacker News, etc. should be avoided in favor of the original source link. Newswire services such as AP, Reuters, or AFP, are frequently republished and may be shared from other credible sources.
10. Don't copy entire article in your post body
For copyright reasons, you are not allowed to copy an entire article into your post body. This is an instance wide rule, that is strictly enforced in this community.
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
Arguable, depending on your definition. But Iraq is nearer to Europe and it's been labeled "middle east" without objection for decades.
It is not arguable, Iran is the near east. That you are unfamiliar with the definitions does not make it arguable, it just makes you ignorant, and what is the word for refusing to recognize you do not know what you're talking about? That word.
It's both akshually. "Near East" and "Middle East" overlap in standard accepted meanings (in the eurocentric view of things at least). Iran is generally included in both definitions.
I think you owe somebody an apology.
I wouldnot because Iran is the near east, turkey is Asia Minor, and Mesopotamia to Egypt is the Middle East, west of there is North Africa. I did not make these definitions, but if you actually read any fucking books you would know it already.
You are profoundly ignorant of how language functions. You are not smart, you are grand standing in an argument of semantics. Ridiculous mate.
You did though. Because those are your definitions.
Being "confident" is not the same as being "correct". You've added bullshit to this conversation.
Did it occur to you that different countries have different definitions? Not everyone uses the euro centric definitions. No one in my country would use the term Near East for Iran, given that it's Very Far West. Southern Asia here is more likely to mean Indonesia, but South Asia in UK means India. Fanny means bum in USA, vs cunt in UK. Are you going to argue this as well?
The near/middle/far east terms are all eurocentric, yes, but I don't think anyone uses them as geopolitical terms in reference to other regions, especially in English.
Funny cause the US definition for what's considered middle East is as follows (and you would know this is you just looked it up); Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, and Yemen.
Are you quoting, citing the United States government is a source? Haha, hahaha. Jesus fucking Christ
If you knew how to read i didn't provide any source at all, all I said was I looked it up. These are the common countries that are referred to as the middle East. I'm sorry that your made up definition isn't what's standard in America.
Whether you found some dumbasses online to incorrectly refer to Iran as the Middle East is not in question.
Oh my apologies, I didn't realize everyone i know, everyone in the state, and anyone who looks it up is wrong. My apologies, ill leave you be, clearly you can't do anything for yourself besides insult people :).
Interesting how nasty someone can become when so overconfidently incorrect. Im wondering how that happens? How would you become so convinced you know what the middle east is when you simply dont?