Buffalox

heavily biased to the point that I think it’s natural for people to have a poor understanding of fascism.

There's absolutely a tendency to gloss over things in American teachings in general history included.
So yes I agree, that could very well be part of the problem.

I learned through high school that the US had never lost a war.

Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan.
So I guess your point was easily mostly proven.

Very fitting analogy. 👍

I absolutely agree, American democracy seriously needs to be reformed, as it is it is at best a dysfunctional democracy. And I think the evidence should be very clear on that now.

Maybe I'm wrong, but as I read the article, Linus isn't convinced this is a good idea either.
I'm not saying things can never change, but opening for a mixed code base is a recipe for disaster.

That's not true, lots of companies left, some even at great cost.
Some remained under local names, I think for instance Coco Cola.
We've seen recordings of shopping malls where many shops were gone, and many of the remaining shops sold obvious counterfeit western brands.
Also a lot of business is decidedly illegal to continue in Russia due to sanctions.

That seems brutal, will they ever recover?

They were slammed!!! Oh boy that's rough. I hope they weren't slammed too hard. /s

I think the word they were looking for may have been "criticized" or something like that?

hard for them to get time off of work/contend with suppression.

Part of having a working democracy, is that it's easy to vote. That means it's close to where you live, and that it can be done quickly. That you are automatically registered to vote is a given. Also that people in prisons can vote is a minimum requirement for a functioning democracy.

USA fails on so many counts, creating obstructions instead of facilitating voting, that many Americans don't even know what a good democracy looks and feels like.

There will always be some that are prevented or don't care, but that's not normally a big problem for good democracies.
If the election is non controversial, it's not as important, and if it is controversial, more people participate. Most functioning democracies have about 80% voter participation AFAIK. Here we usually in the high 80's.

Russian politicians behaving like business and politics work the same way teenage relationships do.

Foreign firms are probably not rushing back to Russia either

It would be pretty stupid top go back, Russia is even more corrupt and lawless than it was before the war.
It's an extremely poor environment for serious business.

This should be obvious, but poor people are just too stupid to figure out even the simplest things.
/s

Absolutely USA as a country has been a huge success, and I think you are right, that people think that proves the model is good.
But there are many other factors that have helped USA become a success. A huge population with a unified language is one, massive agricultural potential is another. Lot's of natural resources, and oil to kick-start industrialization.
It will be hard to elevate public education much without social reforms. AFAIK USA spend more on public education than many European countries, but results are worse, maybe in part because of poverty.
It's way harder for Children that live in poverty to pay attention to school to the same degree that better off children can. That's been a well known fact for many decades, and USA is doing absolutely diddly about it.