How to Think Like a Roman Emperor
If you have anger issues, this one is a great tool (h/t mindyourbusiness)
Discourses and Selected Writings
Disclaimer: I’m not your Supervisor. These are my opinions after reading through these books a few times.
Traveling for work again, so I am having trouble with formatting my usual book, so anyone that actually reads these are getting some of my quotes from earlier posts.
These are pulled from Stoic Fridays 57-67.
It is easy for most people to get sucked into believing a person because they are “charismatic”, or “a great speaker” but it is more important to actually listen to the words being spoken and look at the person’s actions.
I have known people that had a mindset that their pleasure was the most important thing to them. None of them had a good life from what I could see. It looks exhausting to be that self absorbed.
It is too easy anymore to not do your own thinking. Which is somewhat counter intuitive, because most Americans have access to the internet all the time now. Somehow this fact has made it easier to cherry pick which information to be exposed to. When I see “Critical Thinker” in someone’s bio, I can usually assume they are anything but that.
Good and evil are simple concepts at their cores, but it is easy to get lost and make justifications when you aren’t sure which is which. If I stick to seeing the simpler sides and keeping it to what I can control then it is harder to get lost and feel like I need to make excuses.
If my own life is disordered, it makes any advice or opinions on how to live a good life easy to dismiss. I have known people that love to give advice on things that they do not do well at. That doesn’t necessarily make them hypocrites, nor does it automatically make the advice wrong.
I know that I would sacrifice myself to save my kids or wife, but I am certain my father would not do the same. I believe my step-dad would however. Blood relations are no guarantee of character. While I do not control the types of people my brothers and kids are, I am unusually fortunate on that side of my life.
People with a conscience do not like to be doing things against what is right. People can do a crazy amount amount of rationalization. This is how they justify their actions or beliefs and actually convince themselves that they are in the right.
When I was in the Marines, sometimes I had to tell junior Marines harsh truths that they didn’t want to hear. Most of them didn’t do anything different afterwards but there were some that took it as intended and improved themselves. Just trying to be nice to them would not have improved them and they would not respect me.
If I never told them the truth about their actions and just let them carry on, eventually they could realize one day that I had let them down. They could wonder if I was just a bad leader, or maybe think I had no hope in them and never tried to correct them because of that.
Good advice is good advice, whether the recipient listens or not. Even when I was convinced I was wasting my breath in a particular circumstance, I still tried to give the best advice possible, maybe he would recall it later, or maybe one of the other young Marines would follow it on their own.
Although I have long hair, I have never been dainty and the most styling I do with my hair is to tie it into a ponytail for work or working out. I have never understood men trying to appear feminine. It seems like that is the majority of people I see on TV and in commercials. Softness seems to be celebrated, instead of being something to be embarrassed by.
Being a man is the best way to raise sons. I see soft men with sons and it makes me cringe inside. What kind of example do they have?
If the message is correct, it doesn’t matter where it comes from. Recognizing the wisdom in it can be difficult if it comes from a source I don’t like. When I was a teenager, I remember my Step Dad teaching me many things about farm life and life as a man. At the time I was non-receptive to the life lessons, but after I grew up, I realized that everything he had told me was correct and it was in my best interest, in spite of my assholishness at the time. I have been on the other side of that with my own kids, and they seem to have had the same revelations.
I will be driving home from New Jersey on Friday and will be back to normal next week.
Missed that on my first read through. I went “Wait, this doesn’t sound like a translated roman…”
My Dad (and my Mom) taught me many things.
Not so much what to do but how to do it. Get up early, get to work on time, be prepared with necessary tools and put in a solid day’s work. Don’t be afraid to ask for help if necessary.
Along the way I got lots of remedial training from supervisors, as required.
I find that since I hit up Twitter in 2008, my attention span, which was never good to begin with, has just gone completely. I used to be able to think in long form, organize my thoughts, vomit it onto paper, edit a little, and boom, done. Now, no. I used to be able to do a proper fisking, but nobody reads those anymore anyway. The things I feel/think are nebulous and I’m trying to even just organize them so as to be able to deliver a 140-character chestnut that will make sense. Social media is just brain rot.
Sometimes, if I just can’t anymore, I will stop, breathe, and say to myself, “God is not a god of chaos. God is a god of order.” It helps, amazingly enough.
A quote from a friend of mine re something I wrote: “You sure do give good advice you can’t take yourself.” Well, I mean, accurate.
As I’ve gotten older, I’ve seen how bullying actually improved my life. Harsh, yes. Fair? Probably. Malicious? Almost always. Clarity? Never. But I still got socialized somehow.
No. I barely remember the ones whose bullying/correction I responded to. I can’t remember all the people who just let it slide.
It’s fine until you’re giving the same advice to the same person over and over and over again and nothing ever changes.
It may have been given in my best interest, but about half the things my dad told me/advised me were just flat wrong and I suffered. Now, looking back, I see that really wasn’t his fault, but if you’re a kid wanting to please your father and take his bad advice, it lets you in for a world of hurt.
Being a man is the best way to raise sons.
Also the best gift you can give them. I made plenty of mistakes but the boy is an independent and capable man in all aspects.
(And bringing me some venison from the deer he shot this week up in MT)
Safe travels, Ron!
Being a man is showing your sons what to do, how to be. Teaching them how to do things is good also, but even when you do that, you are still showing them how to be a man, at some level.
If the message is correct, it doesn’t matter where it comes from.
As I used to say, “I’ll steal a good idea from anybody.”
I called that “cross fertilization”. I would take employees from one store to another store to see how things were being done. Employees enjoyed 2-3 days of meeting with their peers, sharing the benefits of being out of town and getting paid and on the company credit card. All in all it was a cheap morale booster.
I know the stereotype of a state worker is the do-nothing job where you arrive late, leave early and take a long lunch, and where the individuals are rabid stickers for procedure following.
But in all honesty, how much of a stigma does seventeen years of state employment carry when looking for employment in the private sector with people who don’t do business with that state?
It’s not awesome. If you can get an interview and focus on achievements for your customers you might could overcome it. You seem to work in tech so that is easier. If you just shuffled papers for 17 years it would be a hard road. Having pronouns in your bio, or being fresh out of college with a liberal arts degree is technically a larger knock out.
If you go to work for a private sector company that does lots of public sector work it can be a plus.
The idea is that you can explain what goes on behind the scenes and how to best sell and support the good or services. It’s the lower on the food chain version of the DC revolving door between the private and public sector.
Agreed. That is a better option than trying for a company that is fully private and doesn’t deal with government. Those will seem like the wild west to you.
But I don’t want to deal with the government anymore. I want to leave this state and move to a free state, but I do have this rather strong attachment to having food on the table and a roof overhead.
Missouri.
Right now, Red states have growing economies, which translates as Job Hungry. There are other state jobs in those locals, there are people looking for interface work (private industry to gov’t), big business and so on. Start by sending resumes out and see what bites. Remember, you don’t have to take the first thing that comes along.
Also, stating that you don’t mind in-person work might be a good messaging technique, as too many people are looking for remote jobs.
You should do as many job interviews with small companies as possible. Don’t go in with the thought you are going to get the job, get in there and ask questions about how they run, what they look for, and get feedback post-interview. Be curious. You will figure out what to give them and how to jump to 100% free private enterprise.
I was at my happiest working small business. Obama ruined that for me with Obamacare. He crushed an entire industry and made it a quasi-government industry. I may never get out. I hope you do.
My brother went from a government IT gig to a hedge fund compliance team. I think if you’re a tech person it’s a lot easier.
Unfortunately my work translates directly into private companies carrying large government contracts. I guess I could try and find some TV station that has their own weather radar, however that limits prospects terribly. I guess medical equipment repair wouldn’t be bad.
While I am a sysadmin and security admin for the system I work on; its done in the context of A: I am limited on how much of those functions I am allowed to do. B: We don’t create or set any protocol, the vendor does and we just enforce it.
Ironically, being shoved into straddling the line between tech lead and management might have increased my options. Out of boredom I poked at a few job sites for neighboring states, and spotted one that is well within my skillset. shame it’s a tex department tho…
Yes, one of your options would be to seek a job in the state government of a red state as an intermediate step to the private sector.
OBE, start looking at MRI machine repair. The guy across the street from me did that before retiring, made mass bank. The machines are becoming more and more part of regular diagnosis, but finding techs to work on them, and program them, is hard.
Make it clear that the reason you are applying is that you are looking for a different work environment. Something more dynamic, more opportunities to learn/grow/advance, that you want a change, that kind of thing. Yeah, I think there’s a stigma, but recognize it and take it head on.
I agree with this. Focus on both your IT and management experience. Make it clear in interviews that you want to get out of the environment you are in and into a place where you can have a personal impact.
Thank you guys. (And everyone who provided feedback)
I just wish This job posting included a salary range. It’s basically one of my technical areas now just on the vendor’s side of the fence.
Apply and take the interview, regardless of whether a salary range is listed. I don’t know if I’ve ever had, or posted, a job with a salary range.
If you get to that stage and the salary doesn’t meet your requirements, you’ve still got good experience in working the job market.
Lot of open positions where I work. On the high side, the culture in the IS organization is great. No back biting or sniping, the mangers and directors work well together and the CIO is a genuinely nice person. On the down side… well, there are issues for the freedom-minded. I’ve survived by keeping my head down, but there are times when I think “I need to get out of here.” You’ve got my email if you are still curious after that.
Good luck in our People’s Republic!
As well as crossing the commonwealth.
Well, if you guys ever repaired your darn roads…
What do you mean UCS? My experience with PA is that there is never a road that isn’t partially closed and being repaired, but the job is never completed.
Exactly, I’ve never met a significant span of smooth pavement when there.
I once drove a 5 ton M939 with a trailer from my Army Reserves unit in Fort Worth to Tobyhanna Army Depot. I vividly recall seeing the “Welcome to PA” sign and immediately falling 2 feet from the Maryland pavement to the Pennsylvania “pavement” at 55 mph. My back hurt for months after that.
Crossing from Wyoming into CO is always a shock. Both in the condition of the roads and the caliber of driver. The Colorado DOT needs to sit down with the Bobs.
Tundra:
Here, in winter, there’s distinct county lines with how they plow their roads. There are some real fun transitions, such as the county that scrapes the road clean and deices/salts it and the neighboring one that runs the plows with about an inch of clearance, so there’s a nice hard pack of compressed snow and ice that gets salt and cinders put on it.
Well, if you guys ever repaired your darn roads…
We are taking our cues from Maryland and I-695. IYKYK
Local news: Freedom Convoy protester Pat King found guilty of mischief in Ottawa
Dissent will be punished.
10 years for mischief.
He should have just murdered somebody. He would be out on parole in 6 months.
On a small side note, this kind of shit is what infuriates me about many of my friends on the Left. They’ll gnash their teeth at Trump’s victory and cry that we are ushering in an age of fascism but yet will applaud the Canadian government’s actions towards the Freedom Convoy and even wished we had that happen to the COVID protestors here in the States.
With exception of people like Taibbi, Shellenberger, and Gabbard, many on the Left don’t hate fascism in itself, they just hate what they perceive is the Right’s brand of fascism and not being able to have their fascist in power.
@Ed: I don’t even think the distinctions between Left and Right are relevant anymore. The people you identified are from the traditional “Left”, but it doesn’t exist any more. The world is realigning into those who are for broadly “American” or “Western” values, and those who aren’t.
It’s pretty eye opening that these people who want to destroy other’s freedoms never consider that this power they are using will eventually be turned on them someday. It’s kind of like how the Old Bolsheviks had no qualms at all about using terror as a means to gain power and killing their enemies, until Stalin during the Great Purge, used the same tactics against them.
Almost every one of Trump’s picks so far has been a hard liner on freedom of speech. He could have easily picked up the ball, announced he’s creating an anti-disinformation board, and assigned Alex Jones to head it. But quite the opposite, and this greatly benefits the left. Yet not a single one of them has mentioned it.
Citation Needed.
They crave censorship because they tend to lose on the marketplace of ideas when they can be challenged on their assumptions and conclusions.
UnCiv, to clarify, Trump is not saying he needs “total control” like Hillary, so while they’re out of power the left is fortunate the tables aren’t turned on them.
Ed Wuncler:
That’s because they never consider that they won’t have the power going forward. Once they get the power, they can crush their enemies and reforge the world in their glorious image. To consider that you may not be the good guys also means you need to consider that your ideas may be wrong.
Freedom means the government is free to enact change. Just ask John Kerry.
Ed, someone once used the terms Somewhere people vs. Anywhere people, which seems in many ways to cover the realignment that is going on right now. I always felt that Progressives and Reactionaries summed it up best, in that those are the two real groupings. People who want change for changes sake, and those who do not want anything to change. And in the mushy middle are those who really aren’t into politics, but go from one to the other depending on the rate and type of change.
An easier way of describing it is the old philosophy canard: Is/Ought Problem.
Misfortune
Robert Bosch said on Friday the company plans to cut up to 5,550 jobs, the latest sign of struggle in Germany’s creaking auto sector, which is grappling with competition from cheaper Chinese rivals and weak demand.
Bosch, the world’s biggest car parts supplier, said it is planning to cut 3,500 jobs by end-2027 in its cross-domain computer solutions division, half of which will be at German sites, flagging weak demand in intelligent driver assistance systems and solutions for automated driving.
It also plans to cut around 750 jobs by 2032 at its Hildesheim plant, in Germany, 600 of which are planned by the end of 2026.
Further to that, Bosch announced cuts at its steering division at a plant in Schwaebisch Gmuend, near Stuttgart. The company plans to axe up to 1,300 positions there between 2027 and 2030.
Those pesky Chinamen.
“grappling with competition from cheaper Chinese rivals and weak demand”
Not mentioned: insane Net Zero requirements from the EU.
Gaetz is not coming back. I really gotta know, what did he do?!?!
https://thepostmillennial.com/breaking-matt-gaetz-will-not-return-to-congress-plans-to-still-be-in-the-fight
Dead girl or live boy?
Dead girl didn’t stop Joe Scarborough.
It is awfully curious.
Didn’t he blow the whistle that Congress really is a den of scum with orgies, coke parties and the like? Tin-foil hat says “You might wanna just go home” was uttered to him.
My guess, the whole ‘underage’ relationship has JUST enough legs that it would be 4 years of investigations and even heading back to Congress the news, with them dying, will be a dog with a bone.
You may be thinking of Madison Cawthorn.
Although Ben Dreyfuss isn’t wrong about the impracticality of a wheelchair at an orgy
Ah yes that guy.
Don’t waste a stamp inviting me. I would be the wet blanket unless there were some really woke ladies that have something to prove.
I’m not an orgy guy
Although Dreyfuss check with our very own TOK, in case there’s a whole roller derby orgy scene I’m unaware of.
(I’m guessing “no”)
As Scott Adams likes to say, everything you hear about these things is false, and you and I will never know the full truth. I’m assuming that is the case here.
Happy birthday to Eugene Stoner (Born 1922, died April 24, 1997). He was the designer of the AR-7, AR-10, AR-15, AR-180, the Stoner 63, and several other firearms.
A good for something Stoner.
Bosch’s works council and the IG Metall union expressed their opposition to the layoffs in a statement.
“We will now organise our resistance to these plans at all levels,” said Frank Sell, deputy head of the works council.
You can kill off the company completely if you really put your mind to it.
Germany is in serious trouble.
No coincidence on today’s news.
https://apnews.com/article/germany-merkel-president-trump-handshake-e74e410c08633855b13e84bf37b5c2fb
See this?
https://x.com/energybants/status/1855308860090695920
It’s really amazing how organizations can destroy themselves from within. Major corporations like Disney have killed themselves. Even countries like Germany do as well.
Germany in trouble? What could go wrong?
They just need a little room to expand for their glorious fields of windmills and solar panels. Probably a lot of open land for that in Poland.
And I hear the French have a lot of nuclear power plants, too.
“Probably a lot of open land for that in Poland.”
They could split it with Russia.
What it takes to build something that works is the right person. As an organization grows it will fill up with ‘the less you know about something the easier it looks’ people.
I cant count the number of people in business I have met who were very offended by ‘You aren’t here to do what you like or what you think is right, you are here to make money.’
I played https://squaredle.com 11/18 (Weekly Subscriber Puzzle):
*116/116 words (+43 bonus words)
📖 In the top 1% by bonus words
https://www.foxnews.com/media/msnbc-contributor-warns-we-should-all-fear-trumps-new-ag-pick-pam-bondi-because-shes-competent
College professor and MSNBC contributor Jason Johnson warned that President-Elect Donald Trump’s new pick to lead the Justice Department should spark “fear” among the left because she could actually execute his agenda.
Trump announced Thursday evening that he’s nominating former attorney general of Florida Pam Bondi as the next attorney general of the United States. The latest cabinet pick replaces former Florida representative Matt Gaetz, who withdrew as nominee for attorney general on Thursday after the “distraction” his nomination had caused due to a swirl of allegations about paying underage women for sex.
Johnson told MSNBC host Ari Melber that this is bad news for those concerned about Trump.
“Occasionally, attorneys general try to behave like they are not the personal lawyer of the President of the United States. That is completely out the window. Pam Bondi is exactly what I was saying in the last segment that we should all fear, because she’s competent,” he said.
don’t fear the reaper
He continued, “She is a dangerous and effective pick, and that’s frankly worse than what we would have got with Matt Gaetz, even with the deplorable moral background that he has.”
Stated as fact:
“the deplorable moral background that he has”
I must say, though, that I applaud the left using the term “deplorable” (and “irredeemable”). Make sure to remind the people who just voted against you why they did that, and should probably keep doing so.
Not just Germany.
https://x.com/lisaabramowicz1/status/1859900559156998256
Yikes!
Holy crap. That’s around a 7% drop in 7 weeks. For a major currency, that’s a chart of collapse, indeed.
And “Trump is only 30% priced”!?!
Matt Gaetz, who withdrew as nominee for attorney general on Thursday after the “distraction” his nomination had caused due to a swirl of allegations about paying underage women for sex.
Frequently seen trolling middle school playgrounds in his “Puppies and Candy” van.
The real reason OMWC had it in for him.
That’s around a 7% drop in 7 weeks. For a major currency, that’s a chart of collapse, indeed.
Fire up the printing presses.
Jerome Powell probably have a woody right now.
Powell is trying like hell to be the last CB standing. Collapse in Europe would send a lot of money this way.
We do not deserve this man.
https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1860037420710080687
What is he talking about? I only see his post, not anything he might be referring to.
He was talking to Winston’s Mom.
Thanks
Scroll up. Don Jr. posted that MSNBC was for sale.
Those of us without accounts cannot scroll. I just see his one comment.
Ah, sorry about that RJ.
I have to admit, having Elon in charge and posting things makes me interested in getting an X account for the first time ever.
I not convinced yet, but I am not wholly against the idea anymore.
I took a break for Lent that lasted until this month. No regrets about jumping back in.
Waaaaaaaay more information than anywhere else. And if you are judicious about who you follow you can avoid most of the shit.
I not actually interested in following anyone.
And, I have deep concerns about logging into systems like X from a work computer.
And, I do not need any of that shit showing up on my phone. 😉
But, Elon is pretty intriguing all on his own.
I agree with Tundra. If you choose decent people to follow it’s been very good. Kind of like a build your own newspaper. I don’t get into the comments much (the only good comments are here), so I’m not really seeing any people hating on each other.
The only complaints I’ve seen are regarding getting tons of views and such, but I don’t even pay for the blue check so I don’t really care about all that.
If you have to ask, Elon, you can’t afford it
Journalism, Jalopnik style
Car companies across the US have plowed millions into electric vehicles in recent years: updating factories, expanding battery plants and rolling out a raft of new models designed to encourage America to turn to battery power. If Trump gets his way and scraps EV tax credits or slashes strict emission rules, all that investment could go to waste.
To try and prevent that from happening, EV makers have banded together and plan to campaign Trump against backtracking on America’s electric vehicle targets, reports Reuters. Brands including General Motors, Toyota and Volkswagen have all urged the incoming president to retain key tax credits for electric vehicles, as the site reports:
The Alliance for Automotive Innovation in a previously unreported Nov. 12 letter to Trump also raised concerns about vehicle emissions rules citing “federal and state emissions regulations (particularly in California and affiliated states) that are out-of-step with current auto market realities and increase costs for consumers.”
The automakers did not specify how they want the rules revised but said they support “reasonable and achievable” emissions regulations. The Trump transition team did not immediately comment.
How does “…raised concerns about vehicle emissions rules citing “federal and state emissions regulations (particularly in California and affiliated states) that are out-of-step with current auto market realities and increase costs for consumers.” equate to “Keep the rules just the way Joe wanted them” as the headline implies?
The government (US and California ) have set rules forcing millions if not billions in misdirected R&D for vehicles the majority of consumers do not want, much less need. Want the manufacturers DO want is consistency and predictability, and realism.
I’m not a genius, but let the consumer decide what sort of cars they want, and the rest will follow. If the consumer wants electric cars, then the car companies will create them.
That hasn’t been the case for more than 50 years.
1967: CARB
1970: NHTSA
1970: EPA
1975: CAFE
Regulated to death.
CAFE would have been a response to the oil embargo, and that would have nothing to do with “climate change” mania.
The embargo ended, and CAFE still remains. It has been repurposed as a bludgeon to keep the serfs inline as the elites rebuild the world.
Trump’s team reportedly wants to ax the $7,500 tax credit that’s available for electric vehicle purchasers across the U.S. Automakers have warned that doing so would stall the adoption of battery-powered models across America, however Tesla boss Musk says it wouldn’t harm his company as much.
Without support like this in place, car companies would fall well short of the targets set out by the current administration, which require 35 percent of new car sales across the country to be made up of EVs by 2032. This is thought to be the EV mandate that Trump keeps talking about, but that was also placed on the chopping block by the convicted felon.
The person who wrote this should be put in the stocks and pelted with rotten vegetables and horse dung.
let the consumer decide what sort of cars they want
Haha, you slay me.
There’s something you don’t see every day!
https://bringatrailer.com/listing/1952-m5a1-stuart/
Brooksie, it’s perfect for your compound!
Pass.