In England, Great Britain and then the United Kingdom on the other hand the peers of the realm the aristocracy as independent powers against the crown was somewhat sidelined or for some reason seems rather loyal from the 18th century onwards. Which makes a strong crown, even if the strongness shows itself in the absence of strong regulation.
Why the strong crown? Maybe the british peers lost their appetite in the civil wars (Anarchy, Roses, Long Parliament). Or maybe something different?
]]>Correction to the correction:
Both GSG9 and BFE+ are units of the german federal police, under federal and somewhat limited jurisdiction (borders, transportation, coast guard, international organized crime, "terror"). And the BFE+ seems to be a lot less swat-ty.
Normal policing is organized on the state level which have their own swatting teams, the SEK. This was the southern SEK of the Land Hessen.
]]>Uhm. Why do you think that I advocated "no family life" if I wondered in my post how it could be integrated? (And why the harsh tone?)
]]>Of course monasteries leaned on influx of new members from the outside and had no family life on the inside. Maybe that could be integrated, Kibbutz-style. And the big question is the one of the adherence of ideology. Monasteries had one in Catholicism and the Order of St. Benedict. I don't see a modern equivalent, apart from a religious like devotion to life support systems.
]]>Thinking about the finance industry and their (non HFT) networks:
There is this theory that in case of a Brexit major finance institution will move to EUrope which means mostly Frankfurt. Frankfurt is also the major internet exchange point for Germany and central europe. A side effect of the Snowden revelations is a parliamentary inquiry in Germany into cooperations between the BND and the NSA. Something which came to light were the continuing traffic sniffing at this internet point.
Thinking from a NSA perspective interested in financial traffic: Who would be the better local partner, the seemingly frightening efficient GHCQ, also a five eyes partner or the bumbling bureaucratic Germans which do dumb stuff like parliamentary inquiries?
]]>The picture displayed looks exactly the type of person who would march at the protest and counter-protest against the far right on saturday in Cologne. Who was then interviewed by a hapless foreign reporter who dropped her context because (s)he just needed a sound bite. If that's a long con that con is in the making for over thirteen years. If you hear hooves, they aren't zebras. Maybe it's your hearing.
And the chan conspiracy theory? Yes, Germany has a local chan, Krautchan. And of course it has its own disgusting brand of misogyny and in-group-speak. But no sign of social media campaigns, organized attacking or even replaying viewpoints. Mostly just self-loathing, there.
Also: Hanning retired years before Edathy fell. And still years before Edathy got somewhat famous be being the chairman of the NSU. The german intelligence apparatus btw. is not a monolith. Hanning was BND, Edathy looked into the BKA and BfV operations. The major difference between government/intelligence vs. Bundestag is the NSA committee. Which is largely scandal-free – apart from its subject being a scandal, of course.
(The live protocols of the NSA committee are btw. a masterpiece in mind-dumbing intelligence bureaucracy, hundred times worse than the Laundry. Mr. X. Y. of the BND doesn't remember, Mr. Z. only can talk behind close doors …)
]]>Simply put the looser dress codes are still codes, they're just more complicated and confusing. The right jeans, the right shirt with the right print, the right band shirt, but only from the right bands in the right temporal span. Shoes are even worse. And that's still outside of the peacocking of subcultures and before postmodern irony and the memefication of everything.
As an introvert the option to express oneself is the daily terror of having to express oneself. Thousand decisions before breakfast and still the experience of failing all the time. And that's only the cis-male experience, women with similar sentiments have it a thousand time worse. There is no neutral clothing, no , the neutral zone died in the sixties, whatever other good changes they have brought.
I dreamed sometimes of some sort of soviet science fiction scenario where everyone dresses in jumpsuits. Classic suits would be better, since they're made for making the wearer looking good or at least decent. But of course you'll judged wearing a suit today as a member of a subculture and in nerddom actively as an enemy, whatever else is in your brain.
The best hope of dressing unobtrusive and without sending too many false signal would be creating some form of a new uniform out of some basic scraps the current trend allow you like the protagonist in that Gibson novel. But of course you'll need to update it every n years. You'll never have peace.
]]>