Wait until Le Pen or Bardella comes into power and remake the deal with American tech oligarchs, undoing Macron’s push for strategic autonomy. As long as the right in France isn’t killed, any attempt of decoupling will only be coupled back to US, because fascists have internationalise their ideas and coordination.

Even though hunter gatherer societies are generally egalitarian, they still do material transactions.

As far as I’m concerned, the people demanded Jesus to be crucified because of mob justice. And as a leader, Pontius still has to answer for the people he is governing. I mean, he himself asked the people what did Jesus do wrong.

Not to be that guy, but if there wasn’t money, we’d be trading ten chickens for a table, or two tables for a cow. The concept of money is merely making the logistics of trade transactions more convenient, which barter trading doesn’t allow.

Well like I said, Trump is stupid administratively, but he’s a good conman. Einstein might be good at physics, but he is the last person you would ask on ecology. So to repeat what I said in my original comment: there is no one type of intelligence. It’s not “just world” fallacy, one could argue that it’s “unjust world” fallacy for someone idiotic could con an entire world. To deny that happened is burying one’s head in the ground.

As it happens, Trump did squander his inheritance, but managed to claw back his fortune, first by money laundering for Russian mobsters, then by using his political office for personal gain. Fake it until you make it very much applies here.

It reinforces my point that he is not as stupid as he looks, still having been able to persuade and manipulate people despite having little to no resources. If you have seen the movie Catch Me if You Can, it does take certain skills to get away with so much scam.

Well, call me naïve, but they are pretty cautious around this kind of stuff in Germany, I doubt the US government has access to these kinds of records.

That’s fair enough. But Trump’s Project 2025 buddies have the intention to undermine Europe. Unfortunately, when America sneezes, everyone catches the cold.

I used Putin as example because any sleazy jobs require the same Machiavellian instincts as with being a devious salesman. Not every dodgy salesman becomes millionaire or CEO with political leverage, because they may either happy with their gains or not ambitious enough and comfortable to remain in their stations. However, those ambitious enough beat their competition with ruthless efficiency. I’m sure there are hundreds of millionaires and billionaires who started as lowly deceptive salesman, but we just haven’t heard of them because they’re not publicly prominent.

Going back to Putin, it wasn’t really a chance on how he came to power. He was a colonel of one of the most feared spy agencies. I mean, what would you do with that much access to power if you are as ambitious as Putin? Sure, luck and happenstance also play key roles, but luck is a residue of preparation. Knowing how to take advantage of those lucky opportunities to forward own’s agenda takes certain skills to mobilise and pull the necessary levers.

A lot of people of dismiss the likes of Musk and Trump’s ability on how they got into power as being the result of being silver spooned. But people conveniently forget that it still requires knowledge, skills and experience to maintain the high status. Plenty of famous intergenerational wealthy families eventually lose their status because their descendants squander the fortunes handed to them. If Trump and Musk are stupid, they would be poor and not have gotten to the White House. So, they still have some intelligence but not about being empathetic.

I’m talking about in general on the anti-Trump camp as underestimating his stupidity. Authoritarian bodies eventually fall because of corruption and stupidity, but that’s not what is happening at the moment. The Trumpian America is just getting started and him and his cronies are smart enough on how to gain power and secure it. You may not be politically active, but they know already that you’re possibly anti-Trump because they took your social security details and other public records, and fed it into their surveillance system. Sorry to be so gloomy but I’m gonna be frank, they’re not stupid for having just robbed you, a nobody Lemmy while they are the ones in charge and spying on you.

I don’t know, I came from a former dictator run country and know how to call a spade a spade. So I will be blunt say Americans are still making heads or tails, on whether or not they are in a fascist state, because they never experienced what dictatorship is before. Constantly calling authoritarians stupid, while you and I are relying on supply chain run by them and could pressure us to conform, maybe we’re the stupid ones. Calling them stupid is coping for not accepting the fact that the inferiors outwitted us and manipulating our means of living.

Putin wasn’t the only KGB colonel before he became the president of Russia. He had peers and were given equal footing as him. But he had proven to be more cunning and ruthless than them so he gained power. Those low level conning salesmen you mentioned, they probably weren’t savvy enough. However, if they had been as savvy as the most successful con salesman, Elon Musk, then their fates would have been different otherwise.

There are those who started from the bottom, quite literally. Stalin was a pure thug who robbed banks for the Bolsheviks. He was also ridiculed for being intellectually inferior on the communist theory, especially by Lenin. And well, who lived until the ripe old age of 70, while the other was murdered in cold blood with an icepick?

I neglected to mention before and what I’m trying to say now, is to not underestimate the opponent. Once the person underestimates the opponent, is when that person loses. It’s the basic of art of war. I’m gonna be blunt, who is dumber? The person whose social security details were robbed in broad daylight, and that data is sold and fed to the private digital surveillance to train AI? It’s certainly not the dumb ketamine addicted CEO of a conglomerate of grifting companies, nor the dumb orange president who could push the red button at any notice. To think you and I are not dumb, whose details were already put into surveillance AI, are wishful thinking and coping.

Never underestimate the opposition.

Hasn’t it been revealed that Epstein is coordinating with oligarchs to promote conspiracy theories to dumb people down?

I also want to say I noticed Americans seem to promote idiot kinds of conservatives like Jordan Peterson, Ben Shapiro and Charlie Kirk. I’m not conservative, but there are far more intelligent conservative pundits, such as David Frumm and Roger Scruton, who make more sense. Oligarchs promote idiot individuals to control the narrative which, in turn, control the masses’ perception of reality.

The mainstream should re-think what intelligence is because experts already said there are different types of intelligence. Are math prodigies with autism not intelligent? Are biologists dumb for struggling with quantum physics? That said, someone who may be unempathetic and lack emotional intelligence may have high intelligence on how to persuade and manipulate others. Many would call this Machiavellian (although personally, I don’t see Machiavellianism as inherently bad). It takes certain skill and intelligence to become a mob boss despite doing poorly in school, or even a leader of a country.

A lot on Lemmy scoffed it when I said Trump and other dictators are not as dumb as they might seem to be, because they ended up in charge, not someone on Lemmy with PhD. It possesses a certain kind of intelligence to be a demagogue and take power.

You might be joking, but i think only the older folks will get the joke. After all, apparently, when Justin Timberlake was arrested for DUI, JT asked the police officer if he knows who he is. The police officer, being younger, unironically said “no”.

I have to say, seeing the outdated CRT screen and the classic white wired mouse grinds my gears 😐

For as long as I can remember, I’ve always thought you become what you hate.

That’s a good interpretation from the Chinese point of view. Ancient China is obsess with “heaven”. Their philosophy and mythology is chock full of reference to heaven, like the “mandate of heaven”.

It’s the libertarians and retails investors, who root for the ruthless billionaire-owned businesses they invested in, who say that.

WoW raid experience doesn’t exactly translate to expert on international relations.

They learned that cooperation is perfect…to coordinate and conquer those who are deemed weaker.

For me it was Saints Row 2. When I first saw the game, I was like “what is this GTA knock off?!”. But when I finally played the game, I was hooked and went “Haha! It’s so funny spraying shit on buildings!”

If we include many other countries, USA will be among the developing nations for high homicide rate due to guns. And I hope you get I’m trying to say because USA is supposed to be a safe and prosperous country. If the gun crime and homicide rate is on par with poorer countries…well…it’s not something to proud of or known as, for the self-declared best country in the world.

I’ve been thinking of creating a new account through Tor, so that I could reconnect with my former communities who are still active there, since unfortunately, Reddit is still bigger than Lemmy. But with this new stupid identity verification rule from Reddit, I don’t think I will come back to the site.

I guess I will recreate the communities I’ve been missing here in Lemmy instead, which I have been thinking of doing for a long while now.

My only problem are the authoritarian types, namely tankies and fascists. Anyone who are pro-democracy are okay in my book.

I was going to argue against this, but then you’re right. There has been regulatory capture of socdems as they became neoliberals; who keep chasing the magical “centrist” unicorn. But in reality, who they are trying to appease are the property owning base who want their property value to keep going up and up, at the expense of the youths, families and homeless, and to appease rich donors.