Technology tends toward avoidance of risks by investors. Uncertainty is ruled out if possible. People generally prefer the predictable. Few recognize how destructive this can be, how it imposes severe limits on variability and thus makes whole populations fatally vulnerable to the shocking ways our universe can throw the dice.

Blood is thicker than water, but politics are thicker than blood.

Kindness is the beginning of cruelty.

My lungs taste the air of Time,Blown past falling sands.

We accept too damned many things on the explanations of people who could have good reasons for lying.

A popular man arouses the jealousy of the powerful.

The mistakes (of leaders) are amplified by the numbers who follow them without question. Charismatic leaders tend to build up followings, power structures and these power structures tend to be taken over by people who are corruptible. I don't think that the old saw about 'power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely' is accurate: I think power attracts the corruptible.