A paternalistic, technocratic, party not shying away from authoritarian measures getting re-elected and re-elected does not a dictatorship make. Bavaria does the same but replace technocratic with wiley and corrupt.

but then malicious servers can lie about numbers of votes.

They already can do that by pretending to have users they don’t have. It’s definitely a quick way to get defederated.

Wenn die 1/3 Unentschiedenen sich jetzt alle nicht zwischen Links und Grün entscheiden können aber am Ende lieber ne Münze werfen als nicht wählen zu gehen… ich kann die “Wahlfälschung!!11”-Rufe der AfD schon hören.

I can’t disprove that I’m part of the Romanian government without revealing personally identifiable information. This is called arguing in bad faith and violates the rules of this community. Read the tab on your right. Furthermore, this is an attack on my character, not my argument.

Dude, you’re speaking as if you’re representing all of Romania. IDGAF if you’re in government or not, I assume, and assumed, you to be not.

The point stands, though: “Romania is complaining that there should be a EU summit, well then Romania should bloody call one”.

You are speaking nonsense. If we had to have a plan precooked before we could be invited, what’s the point of the brainstorming session? Did all those 8 countries have a fucking plan too?

Before you can do A EU summit. This 8-country one is not a EU one. At a EU summit, actual results will be expected, not everyone wailing, in chorus, “oh, what should be done, what should we do”.

If it’s just about signaling that the UK is in the fray, why invite a bunch of EU members to the backdoor meeting? We would have seen each other in the regularly scheduled summit, right?

How close are your ties with the UK? I presume France prepared the list together with the UK, those are the ones the UK would want to be on one page before getting serious. In particular, the UK wants boots on the ground, Poland doesn’t want to do that themselves – to, honestly, my surprise. They’ll have to at least agree on a rationale for a difference in stance that doesn’t look silly.

It was never about strategic relevance, because then Romania, Bulgaria and Greece would have been invited.

Strategy is not just military tactics.

We’re brainstorming, right? If America isn’t selling drones anymore, gotta get 'em from somewhere. You’re just arrogantly writing off a supplier.

America is very unlikely to stop selling: Their military-industrial complex is already worried about losing arms sales, blocking arms sales now would cement that, they’d never get the market back. Generally speaking the EU also doesn’t need suppliers to defeat Russia, wouldn’t even have to switch to a war economy, just tax some billionaires.

OK if they’re a dime a dozen, then why not drop a dime and call a god damn EU summit?

I just invited you (well, presumably, the Romanian government) to do that. And also mentioned how that’s kind of a foot in the mouth moment:

The agenda is pretty fucking clear, no? What are we doing about Ukraine?

You can’t decided on a “what” question, only on a concrete proposal. A plan. Can you field such a thing? Do you have it somewhere in a drawer? Why have a prominent, high-stakes summit if there’s nothing to decide. Press will be there, expectations high, results are expected. So make sure you can deliver results. Things must be hashed out beforehand using the usual diplomatic channels.

The fact that the UK is invited but Eastern EU isn’t is so fucking insane.

Do you want UK boots next to EU boots on Ukrainian ground? Then include the UK. It can’t be a EU summit because the UK is included. It must be done before the EU thing so we know what the UK is ok with, what not, what its whole idea of the thing is. Outside perception wise, this summit (as opposed to diplomats having a zoom call) is about signalling: The UK is in the fray.

Why wasn’t Turkey invited?

Oh. Good one. But the reason is simple: Because Turkey is a giant PITA both-sides’ing the whole thing. You’ll never get a firm stance out of them, for the simple reason that they don’t do firm stances. They juggle. “Zero problems with any neighbour to bring about the justice that Allah commanded” and they do consider Russia a neighbour.

but I’m betting those Bayraktar drones would prove pretty useful during wartime, no?

Not terribly relevant right now, no. It’s not like Turkey wouldn’t be selling them… or that Ukraine didn’t, by now, have actually equally capable to superior drone tech themselves.

If you want a united EU, then stop treating us as if we’re just a buffer zone between Western Europe and Russia

No you’re a drunken land bridge to Greece with a language based on whims instead of grammar. If you want to be useful right now, yes, do summit with EU neighbours and Moldova and non-EU Balkans, then bring that to the EU table as France will bring the UK’s stance to the table.

Argh. That Chinese guy at the MSC gave me a headache about that one. Paraphrasing: “China does consider the Russian invasion a result of NATO expansion: The Russians think that you’re stepping on their toes, they think in influence spheres, and neither we nor you can change their mind about that”.

More or less “you bumped into a stupid drunk, now they’re hitting you, what did you expect, the drunk to not be stupid?”

The EU is deciding jackshit at that meeting since when are the Brits part of the EU. The foreign affairs council has a regular meeting on the 24th. General affairs, informally today and tomorrow, 25th formally… EU summits are a dime a dozen.

Go, call for an emergency EU summit. What you’ll hear back is “what is the agenda, what precisely are we talking about, what are the proposals you’re making”.

Which is why I said brainstorming: They’re figuring out, in a non-EU format, because the UK is supposed to be part of this, what to propose at an actual EU summit.

Noone said anything about Romania not being invited that’s you reading into things. Anyone not attending might just have something else urgent to do and/or understand that it’s a brainstorming session of specifically France looking for a direction.

Getting France, Germany, Britain and Poland onto one page is important in any case, if those don’t find a common line nothing will happen.

It’s a language family. How the fuck did you manage to think of biology.

Nah pretty much any country should have regulations about things like max power allowed, deliberate interference etc. anywhere on the spectrum. Just because the law says “these bands are for everyone to play around with” doesn’t mean that you can just EMP the whole thing.

ok change 18 to 20, same argument

Not really, the one number at least implies “I don’t want to go to prison”, the other is “these are too young for me”. Anyway:

don’t tell me there aren’t any single 40yo women interested in him lol

How many of those 40yolds are jealous, and what what kind of social narrative could they be pushing to make him stop dating that young. Also, how many of them would themselves have dated him with a 30 year age gap, given the opportunity.

Those are good approaches, I would note that the “90% is written” one is mostly about code comprehension, not writing (as in: Actually architect something), and the requirement thing is a thing that you should, IMO, learn as a junior, it’s not a prerequisite. It needs a lot of experience, and often domain knowledge new candidates have no chance of having. But, then, throwing such stuff at them and then judging them by their approach, not end result, should be fair.

The main question I ask myself, in general, is “can this person look at code from different angles”. Somewhat like rotating a cube in your mind’s eye if you get what I mean. And it might even be that they’re no good at it, but they demonstrate the ability when talking about coffee making. People who don’t get lost when you’re talking about cash registers having a common queue having better overall latency than cash registers with individual queues. Just as a carpenter would ask someone “do you like working with your hands”, the question is “do you like to rotate implication structures in your mind”.

Maybe, instead of not asking those questions, he answers them in a way that you do not agree with? Maybe even based on factors that you overlook?

I’m not quite as old as Leo but that frontal cortex thing is a very hard cutoff. You seem to be very focussed on the “18” thing, that’s not how human development and attraction works. According to the chart he has not dated an 18yold since he was 26, and hasn’t shied away from 24yolds.

And, yes, he doesn’t want to found a family, doesn’t seem to want anything really long-term, at least not yet. Not for me to judge.

When you suddenly stop things can clog, yes, go to a doctor. It might also be a muscle in your neck or something, giving the impression of things being clogged.

If you shove it up there with your q-tips yes a lot will be in it, in clumps, instead of coating the walls. Don’t take my word for it, visit an otorhinolaryngologist those are the only people who should ever stick things into ears.

So you’re not blaming the women, you’re not saying that they don’t know what they’re getting into, either, everyone knows what Leo is up to, so you’re calling Leo creepy for – not questioning decisions the women make?

There’s also a weird characterisation of agency, here. You’re only characterising Leo as an active participant, not the women, you’re saying what Leo does is use things that he has, passively (fame, wealth), to actively “get” women. I’d be much more convinced if you said he’s a good flirt. Are women such passive creatures that when they see someone rich and famous, they just cannot help themselves but spread their legs? I find it hard to reconcile such a narrative with feminism, it’s absolutely regressive.

You should, in fact, not be using any at all. Ears are self-cleaning, the wax is precisely what transports gunk to the outside all you’re probably doing is pushing it back in. Some soapy fingering of the outsides while showering is all you need to finish that task.

The frontal cortex matures from roughly 14 to the early 20s, characteristic of that age is to be both impulsive and confused, while the cortex is already fully functional you’re still figuring out what to actually use it for.

That is: In the early 20s you become fully adult. Not in the legal sense (that’s usually 18), but biologically. You’re a grown-up. To argue that they can’t make their own decisions is highly infantilising.

So there you have a guy who’s a bit older, but very charming and generally fit, probably good in bed, a gentleman all around, he’s famous and you have a modelling career that could take a bit of a boost. You get along well with each other. You enjoy the interplay between a fresh outlook on life and some more settled experience, it’s invigorating both of you. Is there a transaction in that arrangement? Sure. But it’s one that 20yolds are adult enough to enter with full awareness of what they’re doing. Is it for you? Probably not, from what I gather. Is it your place to judge? Neither.

Not in any way a new phenomenon, there’s a reason fizzbuzz was invented, there’s been a steady stream of CS graduates who can’t code their way out of a wet paper bag ever since the profession hit the mainstream.

Actually fucking interview your candidates, especially if you’re sourcing candidates from a country with for-profit education and/or rote learning cultures, both of which suck when it comes to failing people who didn’t learn anything. No BS coding tests go for “explain this code to me” kind of stuff, worst case they can understand code but suck at producing it, that’s still prime QA material right there.