Trump is a terrible president and person. Unfortunately, Trump derangement syndrome is also a real thing. We are a country full of fools of one persuasion or another.
I mean this is just silly. If anything, America was more communal than most countries during covid, as churches, clubs, gyms, continued to meet, even if in secret. Except for the extremists, no one really cared to be honest.
If anything, it made me realize how uninterested in being governed Americans are, and how pervasive this attitude is. Lest you think it's all 'MAGA' types, consider my brother who lives on the Central Coast of California in a heavily hispanic enclave. We visited a few times.
Despite California being one of the strictest states, I don't think there was a single sign or signal that anything was going on. My sister-in-law's large hispanic family continued to hold every family event indoors or at parks, without masking, or anything. We had a great time with the cousins.
Our church continued to meet in secret, flaunting the spirit of the law, if not the letter, and people were fine. COVID ran through once at the beginning, and then we were just there laughing at the government. Great bonding time honestly.
Individualism means voluntary cooperation. Collectivism is state-imposed forced cooperation. Decentralized vs. centralized. It's a common misconception that individualism means no cooperation; actually it means that each individual can choose who they want to cooperate with.
Partially this is because of the strength of the dollar. I lived briefly in England in 2013ish and everything was expensive. I went back last year and it seemed cheaper, but only because the dollar has increased in value. Thus, if you've been visiting from England, you're probably seeing a huge increase in price due to the pound weakening.
They still are bringing power to the people. Including people like Musk on this list is frankly ridiculous. Sure the man has issues, but before his takeover of X, it was impossible to say anything online without threats of government intervention for 'wrongspeak'. Yes yes yes, I know there still are government threats for wrongspeak with the new administration, but luckily, no one is going to take down your post right now
They still are bringing power to the people. It just turns out a lot of the media types don't really like the people. And honestly, I can't really blame them... a lot of people are awful. However, if you claim to want to return power to the people, then you should want to return it to all people. Otherwise, just be honest and admit you're a believe in oligarchy and aristocracy -- there is nothing wrong with that; most countries are aristocracies.
Dubai has cracked down on anyone reporting damage in the city from the war with Iran. That incident about their "7 star" hotel being hit is being played as "minor damage". That the hotel has now closed for an 18-month renovation is just coincidental. Trump keeps trying to sue media organizations. He's trying to prosecute a member of the U.S. Senate for insisting that US troops obey US laws of war. China has severe Internet censorship, of course. So does Russia, although it's less well organized.
I think phrases like 'love China' set this up as an emotional argument when it isn't one.
I have no idea what China or Chinese leaders are like. I have no relation to China.
However, I can say that their policy choices on these technical issues are better than ours. The only emotion I feel when saying this is disappointment in my own country, rather than pride in China. I wish America had more energy production. Almost all American problems are the result of lacking energy production capacity.
Recall that funds like this are one of the largest owners of the hedge funds that drive up property values for American homes via their reckless speculation. The state (well states really -- CA is not alone) desperately needs to make more than market returns to guarantee their unfunded pension liabilities.
current LLM progress suggests theres probably several operating in parallel and theres some executive harness that coordinates attention and processing.
Also, the optical nerves are in the hind brain and likely process information before awareness.
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