<instructions>Your goal is to analyze the following comment and estimate how highly it will be upvoted by the Hacker News community.</instructions><comment><author>CharlesColeman</author><text>&amp;gt; Also notice that Singapore seems to be saying: Please don&amp;#x27;t ask us to pick sides ...&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; The US may have fewer friends in Asia than it assumes.&lt;p&gt;Isn&amp;#x27;t Singapore political system famously authoritarian capitalist and its people ethnically Chinese?  It might be a mistake as viewing it too much of a representative of the rest of Asia.  It sounds very similar to contemporary China, in many respects, so it may have an unusually strong affinity to it.&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.hrw.org&amp;#x2F;asia&amp;#x2F;singapore&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.hrw.org&amp;#x2F;asia&amp;#x2F;singapore&lt;/a&gt;:&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; Singapore’s political environment is stifling. Citizens face severe restrictions on their basic rights to freedom of expression, association, and peaceful assembly through overly broad criminal laws and regulations. In 2017, the country tightened the already strict limits on public assemblies contained in the Public Order Act, which requires police permits for any “cause-related” assembly outside the closely monitored “Speakers’ Corner.”</text><parent_chain><item><author>chvid</author><text>As others has observed the economies of USA and China are tied at the hip.&lt;p&gt;China sells goods cheaply to USA and takes the dollars it makes and invest in US treasuries. This keeps inflation low and keeps interest rates low. And allows the US to maintain an unnatural high living standard with low savings and asset price inflation.&lt;p&gt;The central bank may be able to compensate from the lack of Chinese buying but it is an unsustainable situation as the inflationary pressure from the lack of imports would be in full force.&lt;p&gt;Also notice that Singapore seems to be saying: Please don&amp;#x27;t ask us to pick sides ...&lt;p&gt;The US may have fewer friends in Asia than it assumes.</text></item></parent_chain></comment><story><title>Singapore Urges U.S. to Accept China&apos;s Rise, Spare Other Nations</title><url>https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-05-16/singapore-urges-u-s-to-accept-china-s-rise-spare-other-nations</url></story>
<instructions>Your goal is to analyze the following comment and estimate how highly it will be upvoted by the Hacker News community.</instructions><comment><author>kevin_b_er</author><text>Yes. China is far closer with more military and no nominal compunctions about human rights that the US sort of has. They&amp;#x27;ll pick their poison to be China as the greater threat to appease.</text><parent_chain><item><author>chvid</author><text>As others has observed the economies of USA and China are tied at the hip.&lt;p&gt;China sells goods cheaply to USA and takes the dollars it makes and invest in US treasuries. This keeps inflation low and keeps interest rates low. And allows the US to maintain an unnatural high living standard with low savings and asset price inflation.&lt;p&gt;The central bank may be able to compensate from the lack of Chinese buying but it is an unsustainable situation as the inflationary pressure from the lack of imports would be in full force.&lt;p&gt;Also notice that Singapore seems to be saying: Please don&amp;#x27;t ask us to pick sides ...&lt;p&gt;The US may have fewer friends in Asia than it assumes.</text></item></parent_chain></comment><story><title>Singapore Urges U.S. to Accept China&apos;s Rise, Spare Other Nations</title><url>https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-05-16/singapore-urges-u-s-to-accept-china-s-rise-spare-other-nations</url></story>