Lex Berezhny

Software Engineer, served three terms as legislator in the New Hampshire House of Representative. From Kyiv, Ukraine.

[Lex Berezhny @eukreign]

It’s easier to fool people than to convince them that they’ve been fooled.

[Lex Berezhny @eukreign]

@irvinebroque that's really cool! you may find my python-to-javascript transpiler useful: https://t.co/cqUi3t90dH the goal is not 100% Python, but just enough Python to be very productive and build cool stuff (checkout the example apps)

[Lex Berezhny @eukreign]

Where does the analogy fall apart?

[Lex Berezhny @eukreign]

Closest practical analogue to AI is money.

Most people have access to money; everyone has an opportunity to invest it and become a millionaire.

Some people use money in a way that compounds value, others pay the bills or fulfill their short term wants and needs.

AI is like money in the sense that it's a fungible resource with great power, you can use it in a way that compounds its impact or you can use it for quick hits and convenience.

[Lex Berezhny @eukreign]

The belief that AI will replace work is the same as saying in the 1920 that buying stocks will replace work.

The reality is that making money compound, takes effort in management and planning; similarly, making AI produce real value, also takes effort.

[Lex Berezhny @eukreign]

open source frameworks, libraries and tools can now make money by selling markdown files targeted at AI agents to make them efficient at understanding how to use the project correctly, how to handle edge cases and how to write good unit/integration tests. the what is open, the how/why is premium.

[Lex Berezhny @eukreign]

Yes, this! Although I don't agree that Embark necessarily benefits from grifters pushing away normies. I very much expect that in their weekly patches they will add some ways to balance the PVP.

Returning to politics, how would you balance things there? How to reliable help normies overcome the propaganda and disinformation onslaught.

Just as in games, there is the simple solution of just getting better at playing the game, or in this case, better at discerning the political BS from substance.

[Gummi @gummibear737]

Analysis: Trump’s First 50 Days

Today marks the halfway point of Trump’s critical first 100 days

On the whole it’s a net positive, but it’s been a mixed bag…it feels worse now than it did a couple of weeks ago because of the stock market

Important to note: Trump’s current administration isn’t leaking

The Good: Executive Actions, DOGE, Border, Deregulation, Anti-woke agenda (DEI, antisemitism, college funding), $1 trillion investments announced

The Bad: Foreign Affairs (tensions w/allies), Ukraine, Tarrifs, Stock Market, Economic prospects

Risks: Legal challenges to executive orders, lofty expectations for DOGE, internal self-inflicted chaos, economic downturn

I think there’s room for optimism, but there’s also a lot of concern over tarrifs and foreign affairs even within his own coalition

The next 50 days will be critical for defining this ever important first milestone

[Senator Mark Kelly @SenMarkKelly]

Just left Ukraine. What I saw proved to me we can’t give up on the Ukrainian people. Everyone wants this war to end, but any agreement has to protect Ukraine’s security and can’t be a giveaway to Putin. Let me tell you about my trip and why it’s important we stand with Ukraine.🧵

[Rep. Don Bacon 🇺🇸✈️🏍️⭐️🎖️ @RepDonBacon]

We want a just peace. Blaming the victim does not accomplish a just peace. Moral clarity and honesty are needed.
https://t.co/X3xn6rm4nT

[Ben Hodges @general_ben]

I am having a hard time understanding how withholding intelligence and early warning from Ukraine advances our strategic interests or helps make America great.

[Paul Graham @paulg]

When you consider that you could run a fleet of 100,000 Twitter accounts with blue checks for less than $10 million a year, a foreign power that wanted to influence US politics would be pretty slack if they didn't try to create one.

[Preston Stewart @prestonstew_]

"The security system of a strong state is not only its own weapons, army, etc. It is also every citizen. Who knows how to use weapons, provide first aid, fly a drone. But has, first of all, the moral readiness to apply these skills if necessary. Attacking such a country will be much more dangerous."

-Maksym Zhorin, Ukrainian 3rd Assault Brigade

[Preston Stewart @prestonstew_]

I see a lot of confusion today about NATO's Article 5, bottom line: the US cannot be forced by others into fighting a war.

Article 5 states that an attack on one member state is an attack on all. Essentially collective defense. However, the alliance built in a few steps that are often overlooked in today's media.

Article 5 isn't automatic, to be invoked it required unanimous consent by all 32 member states. I'm not sure all 32 could agree on a color change in the HQ right now, let alone going to war together.

Even then, if all 32 are on board, it's up to each member state to determine how they are going to support. This isn't limited to combat troops on the ground in a war. It could be a training mission, medical support, overflight rights, or any number of other items that go into large scale military operations.

So what good is Article 5? That's actually a more valid debate right now than it's been in a long time. Historically it was the threat of a unified response to Russian aggression against a member state. Today there's some concern that the alliance is too fractured for this to carry the weight it once did.

[Gummi @gummibear737]

Europe needs change…and fast

Like him or not, at least America has leadership under Trump. Europe has zero leadership where it matters and what leadership they have had, built a burdensome continental bureaucracy, under-invested in defense, crushed free speech and opened up the continent to millions of muslim migrants that can’t be assimilated or integrated

Maybe Trump’s message is “shape up, and come with us or we’ll leave you to your own fate with Russia and the invading migrant hordes”. And even if it isn’t, and he just DGAF, that’s the conclusion Europeans should draw anyway

I’ve been very hard on Trump et al for how they’ve managed things in the past weeks, because I think they’re being heavy handed, arrogant, and short sighted. But that doesn’t mean he’s not fundamentally right about his main criticisms.

Europe needs a strong, but politically moderate leader/leadership that can pragmatically bring the continent together. Extremism in other directions is not the solution, but they have to understand that at least those people are promising strength, not weakness.

So long as they continue with weak leadership, they will only embolden the extremes because people will feel they have no other choice. And some of these changes will be unpopular but they are necessary. One way to overcome political pressure to not do the unpopular is for left and right parties to unify as moderates vs extremist parties. But “moderate” as in non-ideological…“moderate” as in pragmatically looking to fix those problems mentioned earlier. Not moderate in terms of let’s continue the status quo

In other words: Europe, it’s time to change or that change will be imposed upon you in ways you can’t control and will certainly not like

And screw your green policies or you’re not going to last long enough to realize you weren’t accomplishing anything anyway

[Gummi @gummibear737]

So long as Russia has the FSB and China has the MSS, the US still needs a CIA

The people saying burn it all down are either naive, dumb, or working under the guidance of some other country’s 3-letter agency

We need reforms, but be measured…you don’t know what you don’t know

[Elon Musk @elonmusk]

To be clear, what the @DOGE team and @USTreasury have jointly agreed makes sense is the following:

- Require that all outgoing government payments have a payment categorization code, which is necessary in order to pass financial audits. This is frequently left blank, making audits almost impossible.

- All payments must also include a rationale for the payment in the comment field, which is currently left blank. Importantly, we are not yet applying ANY judgment to this rationale, but simply requiring that SOME attempt be made to explain the payment more than NOTHING!

- The DO-NOT-PAY list of entities known to be fraudulent or people who are dead or are probable fronts for terrorist organizations or do not match Congressional appropriations must actually be implemented and not ignored. Also, it can currently take up to a year to get on this list, which is far too long. This list should be updated at least weekly, if not daily.

The above super obvious and necessary changes are being implemented by existing, long-time career government employees, not anyone from @DOGE. It is ridiculous that these changes didn’t exist already!

Yesterday, I was told that there are currently over $100B/year of entitlements payments to individuals with no SSN or even a temporary ID number. If accurate, this is extremely suspicious.

When I asked if anyone at Treasury had a rough guess for what percentage of that number is unequivocal and obvious fraud, the consensus in the room was about half, so $50B/year or $1B/week!!

This is utterly insane and must be addressed immediately.

[Paul Graham @paulg]

Prediction: Most of the participants in the worst woke excesses of the 2010s will forget they were participants. Not because they're deliberately lying, but because when people join mobs they're not themselves, and such things are easy to forget.

[Gummi @gummibear737]

@elonmusk I wish more people understood this very simple concept

Money is just the grease that oils the clockwork mechanism which is the economy of goods and services

The clockwork needs grease to function up to a point, but beyond that grease is superfluous and only the gears matter

[Lex Berezhny @eukreign]

@gummibear737 @here_not17066 Part of the solution to reducing the volume of propaganda is some kind of KYI, Know Your Interlocutor. A decentralized web-of-trust / reputation system, where people can be held to what they say.