Hokusai

> Putin is intelligent, no doubt

Russia was a super power with some of the best engineers in the world. Today it needs to use war to keep another Slav country on its side. Even the UK keeps the commonwealth in place even with very diverse countries that used to be forced colonies.

To not have a conscience does not make you intelligent. Russia should be economically and socially way more developed that it currently is. To sell gas is not high tech.

> There needs to be liability established for publishing private and personal information;

Europe has the General Data Protection Regulation.

Is not that the nord stream 2 pipeline? Germany was able to buy Russian gas without problem. Why build the new pipe?

It seems that Germany thought that Russia was a rational player interested in growing their economy, but it seems that it was just power play for personal aspirations.

That happened in the Spanish civil war. Guernica famous painting depicts the bombing by Italian and German aviation of the city of Guernica.

The United Kingdom didn't wanted to be part of it, thou.

Ironically, I think that more countries intervention would have make the Spanish war bloodier but it could have stopped World War II.

"Learned helplessness is behavior exhibited by a subject after enduring repeated aversive stimuli beyond their control."

The key part is beyond their control. As a society we are being trained to see software beyond our control. "The algorithm" decides. Many non software engineers fail to see that behind each software decision there is a company that can change it.

Learned helplessness is dangerous even just because improvement becomes impossible when people just accepts software like if it was the physical laws of the universe.

This reminds me of each time people criticises the European Union for "condemning" something. Big organizations do things step by step. First you talk, then you act. Even Russia prepared a prerecorded pantomime of a discussion before acting. This are the gears moving and is no small thing, it sends a message and prepares for the worse.

Americans talk in hyperbole. Average is an insult. Any experience less than life changing is boring.

And most people in other countries are not aware.

I see how much money goes to American companies like Tesla meanwhile European companies like Mercedes-Benz get less investment and no media attention at all, even when they outperform their American counterparts.

We live in the age of the attention economy. I hope that advertising on the web is forbidden and we go back to good products over flashy newspaper press releases. Less memes more information.

> Our obligation to enforce crimes against the nation’s financial systems includes both informing the public on how digital assets work and partnering with them to identify, arrest, and prosecute those engaging in crimes involving digital assets. The Secret Service will continue to expand its capabilities, collaboration, and effectiveness related to all financial crimes investigations.

TLDR; it's the end of crypto currency as a refuge for criminals.

So, people will have to pay taxes, register exchange of value between parties, wallets will be trazable to individuals, etc.

Crypto currencies are the new home bubble derivatives. A complex economic vehicle to hide the absurdity of its valuation. A pyramid scheme, a hot potato game. It is bad that we have learned so little from previous crisis.

My understanding fits with the dictionary definition.

megalomania /ˌmɛɡ(ə)lə(ʊ)ˈmeɪnɪə/ noun: megalomania. obsession with the exercise of power. delusion about one's own power or importance (typically as a symptom of manic or paranoid disorder)

> can help you get a lot done

That is survivor bias. I have worked with such people and they destroy companies and make employee life miserable. It is impossible to get anything done in the company that does not help the megalomaniac ego. And they usually sabotage efforts that benefit the company but not themselves. It looks cool in movies and from far away, up close it is a train wreck.

> Ali is not guilty, marketing is purely scam these days, he is just following the trend.

Following criminals is not a valid justification in front of a jury. Crime is a common occurrence, it does not make it not crime. Everybody is the same is just an excuse for criminals to not feel guilty about their acts.

In many parts of the world that goes against labor laws. You cannot harass or ostracize someone to make them leave. That is not just a toxic environment but way worse as there is intent to make the employee leave.