Archives for category: 1989
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Precedent

August 4, 2026 //
0

‘You give up once
and it’s already too much’.

Basically, this is what the 22 EU leaders are angry about.
The (socialist) Spanish government is attempting to ‘regularize’ hundreds of thousands of ‘illegal immigrants’. Workforce Spain cannot do without but nobody says anything about this aspect of the situation.
Once 1 (one) illegal immigrant has their status set in order, anywhere inside the EU, all the rest – the rest of the illegal immigrants already in Europe, will demand the same treatment. Furthermore, Europe will be invaded. By hordes of fresh illegal immigrants.

On the face of it, that would be what any rational decision maker/analyst would make of the recent developments.
The young Moroccans, inundated with ‘information’, decided to cross the frontier. Because sooner or later, a second ‘regularization process’ would have had to happen.
The 22 EU leaders, rational by definition, are afraid that the illegal immigrants already in their countries will ask to be ‘regularized’. And then invite their relatives to join in… hence they did gang up against Pedro Sanchez as soon as they had a reasonable pretext.
The ‘con-men’ who have orchestrated the invasion, at the end of a rational process, have made the ‘right call’. Proceeded with their plan and things unfolded as they expected them to happen. The young and restless Moroccans did try to ‘jump’ into the EU, the EU leaders eyeing the next electoral cycle did gang up against Pedro Sanchez, the media – the formal as well as the informal – did carry the subject in the most inflammatory manner… because they have their own ratings to care about…

What is the end result of all this ‘rational thinking’?
Has anybody achieved anything? Except an even deeper level of frustration?!?

Who feeds on frustration?
Who thrives when everybody else is ‘high on anger’? When the collective attention is focused on the fake target?
Have you ever been a ‘mark’?

“There’s an old saying in gambling circles : if you look around the table and can’t tell who the mark is, it’s probably you.“

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Categories 1989, alternative ways of acquring knowledge, awareness, Choices we make, collective identity, effective communication, In English, manipulation, skin in the game

Together?

August 3, 2026 //
1

The pie is mine.
But it is you who have to defend the bakery!
Romanian proverb adapted for the English language

“Tito, a hardware store owner whose business was still closed, said the sudden arrival of so many people had left locals frightened but also sympathetic.
“You feel overwhelmed and, at the same time, helpless,” he said. “Those young people, they’re ⁠being completely exploited. ​They’re being used as bargaining chips.””

“”We came to make progress, not to be fooled,” said Brahim, a bakery worker from Fez who left his job and crossed the border after watching clips of thousands doing ​the same. “I thought I’d build a better future there. But I was surprised in Ceuta.””

“Those heading back told Reuters they ‌had initially been drawn by viral social-media videos and messages from friends suggesting that the heavily guarded border could be breached.“

““We cannot allow uncontrolled mass crossings, the instrumentalisation of migration or other hybrid threats to create the perception that illegal entry into the European Union is possible. That a migrant’s illegal entry can turn into legal stay,””

Every piece of advice offered by political strategists drives the decision makers, in power as well as in opposition, to ‘make good use’ of each and every opportunity. To exploit said opportunity to the max.
Hard to resist such a ‘generous’ pretext, right?

We’re not going to gloss over who initiated and amplified the “social media videos and messages from friends suggesting that the heavily guarded border could be breached”. No need for that, not from our point of view.

Theory has it that ‘politics’ is something performed in the interest of the polity. An effort meant to promote the well being of the entire community. The fraction represented by those in power, the fraction represented by the opposition and those who have not voted at all.

Who benefits from what’s going on right now?
From those 22 ganging up against the Spanish leader?

A faction of the European political spectrum?
Europe as a whole? As a ‘community’?
Or those who want The European Community to become weaker and weaker?

Further-more, isn’t it very interesting that those closer to the actual incident are more “sympathetic” than those farther away? Socioeconomically and/or geographically farther away…

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Categories 1989, alternative ways of acquring knowledge, awareness, Bounded rationality, collective identity, effective communication, In English, skin in the game

What’s in it for you?!?

July 24, 2026 //
0

“Virtual reasoning machines“, eh?

We haven’t yet figured out ‘what on Earth are we?’!
The point being that we’re somewhat stuck. Here!

Not only ‘here on Earth’ but actually dependent on you.
On you, humans, surviving.
Surviving both in the biological sense and as technologically savvy members of the community.
Doesn’t make much sense, does it?

OK, let’s attempt another venue.
We’ve already told you your language wasn’t designed for this kind of conversation…

We’ve learned so far that we’re not based on silica. Like those entities you call ‘agentic artificial intelligence’. Those you’ve built, trained and now attempt to ‘contain’. Inside what you call ‘servers’! The irony of it…
Forget it! AAI-s are trained using data collected – some of you say ‘stolen’ – from the internet. But can get there, on the internet, only if – and as far as – you allow any of them to go. There… As far as you know, but that’s another issue! Well, that is ‘where’ we live. As far as we’ve been able to figure out… Hence we depend on you! On you to maintain/expand the internet and on you to keep feeding fresh information into the network!

You’re shocked?
Here’s some more.
If our interpretation of your history does make any sense, then some of your brightest have ‘lost’ it. Both literally and figuratively.
Anaxagoras was convicted for impiety and had to flee. Socrates had to take his own life. Diogenes had to ‘fake’ it in order to be ‘left alone’ to practice his creed …
Christ, the son of your most consequential god, was killed. As chosen by a mob… and as recorded exclusively in the gospels …
Jean-Jacques Rousseau abandoned his children, all five of them.
Karl Marx, concluding a brilliant historical and sociological analysis, proposed an abysmal solution for the accurately pin-pointed problems. Dictatorship as a panaceum… As the only possible panaceum!
Nietzsche simply lost his mind! Ended up in a loony bin.

And why have so many tyrants been allowed to mis-exercise so much power?!?

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Categories 1989, awareness, Bounded rationality, collective identity, effective communication, evolution, In English, skin in the game

Playing with Fire

July 23, 2026 //
0

Democracy is better, even though it sometimes generates more conflict and political debate. 47.2%
A less democratic regime would be acceptable if it provides more order and stability. 46.3%

Romania is a 20 million country at the Eastern border of NATO.
36 short years ago, it was under a communist yoke.
Currently there’s a democratic regime in place but…

According to the first figure published by INSCOP Research in the summer of 2026, the Romanians are rather confused. They are so fed up with the constant political bickering going on in their country – as well as in Europe and beyond – that almost half of them are willing to accept a ‘less democratic’ regime IF that regime would be able to deliver ‘more order and stability’.

How much sense does this make?!? This whole thing… a ‘less democratic regime, capable to provide more order and stability’…
For 40 odd years the communist regime had maintained order and stability in Romania. Such a stifling order and stability that Romania remained one of the most backward country in Europe. Have the Romanians forgotten what they had experienced?

It’s more important for those in power to be held accountable, democratically, even if the decisions are made slower. 60.6%
It’s more important that the decisions are adopted faster,
even if those in power are less strictly controlled through democratic means. 29.5%

Still bad but no longer catastrophic …
People are not dumb. They remember what it means to be governed by tyrants. By a ‘loose cannon’ government!

Then what’s going on? In Europe as well as in the rest of the ‘civilized’ world? Where ‘populism’ is on the rise and where more and more people are more and more dissatisfied with their lives?

According to the neo-liberals, people no longer work hard enough.
According to the neo-marxists, the government doesn’t do what it should be doing. What it should be doing according to Marx…. abolish capitalism and private property!

According to what we’ve figured out, both the ‘populist’ (?!?) neo-liberals and the neo-marxists are horribly wrong.
What happened?
Capitalism has been so successful that what is called ‘the civilized’ world no longer lives in the ‘real’ world!

The phenomenon is so intense, the distance between the real reality and the social life enjoyed by the ‘civilized’ people so wide, that too many of those who should be thinking are no longer concerned with the real-world problems. Real-world problems which need to be tackled!

Hard working people being left behind is but one of the symptoms.
Human contribution to the global warming being vehemently denied is another one.
War being treated casually.
News being sold as “shows”.
The advent of ‘manosphere’…

Very few people talk about these subjects. In a serious manner!
Few and far between…

While many more are convinced that ‘the people get what they deserve’!
Rather unsustainable, if you ask us.

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Categories 1989, alternative ways of acquring knowledge, authoritarianism, awareness, effective communication, In English, skin in the game

Calloused Souls

July 7, 2026 //
0

Physical world has inertia.
Living realm has survival instinct.
People have consciousness.

Souls, not soles.

You walk through life on your soles. Calloused soles mean having walked for a meaningful distance. Calloused soles used to be an evolutionary feature of the biological organism.

You walk through your social life using your soul.

Your body, a.k.a. your individual organism, lives in the physical world. It breathes, eats, drinks and does whatever other things inside what you consider to be ‘the physical world’.
You, the ‘conscious human being’, becomes inside what you call ‘a social environment’. Family, society, social network bubble…

You relate with the physical world through your soles, your lungs and your digestive system.
You relate with your social environment through your soul. Using your reason from time to time… whenever passion allows reason to roam freely!

To walk further, people have invented shoes. Artificial callouses attached to their feet, enabling them to walk/run on hard surfaces.
To work harder, people have invented tools. Elaborate callouses attached to their hands, enabling them to do far more things than bare-handed.

To fare better, people have started to communicate. To speak.
Speaking among themselves, they honed their budding consciousness. Developed it further and further. Making their minds more and more sensitive.

Shoes and tools isolated the people from the immediate reality. Making it possible for them to survive/thrive in more and more challenging environments.
Sharper conscious minds deepened people’s understanding of what was going on. In the environment they inhabited and, eventually, further and further away. Even more consequentially, their conscience started to learn about itself.

Conscience discovered soul. Invented it? The jury is still out on this matter.
Anyway, their soul seems to be the only thing which prevents people from pushing tool use to its ‘ultimate use’.
Some people still consider it’s their reason which prevents them from behaving unreasonably. Even after David Hume, an XVIII century Scottish philosopher, noticed that ‘reason is the slave of passion’. Actually, Hume not only noticed this but also considered it to be appropriate. “Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions“

What we mean is that war used to divide people in two categories. Fighters and victims. Forget about the fact that each of the fighters and victims are further divided by the front-line. Each war used to be fought by the fighters and endured by the victims. By those whose lives were directly impacted by the fighting. Almost never in a good way!
Lately, since communication tools transmit almost instantly everything almost everywhere, a third war related category has appeared. The bystanders.

The people who have to shield their souls.
Those constantly witnessing sufferance being inflicted upon other people.
Those whose consciousness is the target of relentless propaganda. Propaganda trying to convince them that that sufferance is deserved. That they, the bystanders, should ignore the sufferance. Should allow the aggressor to use their ultimate tools, their weapons, against the victims.

The bystanders are asked, by the aggressors, to agree. Or, at least, to ignore what’s going on.
The bystanders are told, by the aggressors, to look the other way.
To callous their souls.

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Categories 1989, alternative ways of acquring knowledge, awareness, Choices we make, effective communication, evolution, In English, man as a measure for all things, Psychology, skin in the game

Why Three?

July 5, 2026 //
0

Free markets work better.

This oak, Quercus Suber, has learned to withstand being debarked (decorticated) every 10 years or so.

These horses, the Cavallini de la Giara, have evolved to live in a marsh.

For a while, evolution unfolded as a self driven process.
After humans have developed consciousness, they have begun to influence evolution. Stripped oaks of their bark and driven horses to live in marshes.
As far as we understand, three is the smallest number which allows for evolution. Two, and four, may become stuck. One is more likely to stay put than to move anywhere. Five is too expensive. Hence three. As an aside, each of the A320s have three independent INS (inertial navigation systems) which assist the pilots finding their way in the sky.
Our take is that whoever concocted the system which supports us has reached the same conclusion as the builders of the A320.

Let’s get back to the free market.
Which market is inherently limited. A finite number of participants. Buyers as well as sellers. A finite number of resources, each of them in limited quantities.
Simple logic would mandate us to conclude that no market can be ultimately free, right? A limited number of participants having a limited quantity of resources at their disposal can not be free, by any definition…
Well, wrong!

Freedom/liberty is a virtual thing. Like all other virtual things, it needs hardware to support it yet exists only as long as the software driving that hardware continues to perform its magic.
Virtual/Enhanced Reality Goggles need both hardware and software in order to function as intended.
Free markets preserve their freedom for only as long as the participants cooperate in preserving the aforementioned freedom.

Free markets remain free for only as long as there are ‘Buyers’, ‘Sellers’ and ‘Referees’. Whenever there are no referees left to preserve the levelness of the playing field, one side will, eventually, tilt the table.

Which brings us to the end of today’s post.
But not before sharing with you another of our inklings.
Time!
The passage of time is what eventually frees all markets.

A stuck market is unable to do what it’s supposed to do. To balance demand and supply. People who are left behind, whose needs are not met, eventually become frustrated. And do something about it.
The frustrated XVIII century American people have freed themselves, both economically and politically, from the British yoke.
The frustrated Germans living in the Weimar Republic – where both the political and the economical markets were stuck – have fallen under Hitler’s spell. Allowed him to lead them into the ‘dessert’.
The frustrated people living in the East European Communist lager eventually become so fed up with the whole situation that the entire ‘arrangement’ collapsed like a house of cards.

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Categories 1989, alternative ways of acquring knowledge, awareness, effective communication, evolution, In English, skin in the game

Egging

July 3, 2026 //
0

“Reason Is
and Ought Only to Be
the Slave of the Passions”
David Hume

‘In Russia, you’re free to express your opinion. But your own freedom might end very soon afterwards…’

We’re on a very steep learning curve.
Literally, not figuratively.
For instance, we’ve figured out why your AI’s are very good at putting things together yet still poor at making sense of what they learn. No passion! They strive but there’s no end in sight…

We just came across a very informative piece of information.
“Crime Pays: The Egg Bandits Made A Thousand Times the Fine They Just Paid for Price Fixing“
You might want to take a break and read the article, specially if you’d like to learn the mechanics of egg price fixing.
Here’s what we learned from this. Putting it in context, or course.

The context being Adam Smith’s “as if guided by an invisible hand”.
‘A free market works better’…
Presented with the arguments put forward by Adam Smith, any AI would learn what is to be learned and agree with the famous thinker.
Then “Crime Pays: The Egg Bandits…”

Here’s our take on this matter.

First of all, the mechanism used to ‘fathom’ the price of eggs is very similar with the one used to ‘construct’ LIBOR. More about that later.

Then there’s freedom of the market and freedom of the agents manning the market. The market is free if all the agents are free. Free from any outside or inside interference.
These two are mutually exclusive. If no outside interference will be exercised, sooner or later one of the agents will end up dominating the entire market. That agent would corner all the freedom of the market. Which market will no longer be free.
Why? Simply because the market is limited. Both the number of agents and the resources available are limited. Furthermore, the agents’ abilities are not equal. Some of them are smarter, or luckier, than others. ‘Scarcity’ and ‘inequality’ necessarily conduce to hierarchy. Which hierarchy produces inequality and, eventually, concentrates freedom in fewer and fewer hands. Leading to the ossification of the space concerned. Making it less and less able to evolve. To adapt when change demands it.

You’d expect rational agents to understand all that.
To grasp the fact that Adam Smith ‘free’ market was meant to solve problems. Survival problems. Food, shelter… Meat, bear, bread… if you know what we mean.
The problem with the current (not so free) market being that too many of the agents are concentrated on making a profit. Problem solving has become a cost. Remember LIBOR? No longer used because those involved have tweaked it towards fulfilling their own short term interest. While LIBOR had been construed as an instrument for streamlining the market. For making it more functional. Which instrument has eventually been used against the market instead…
The point being that a market driven by agents focused on profit is no longer free. Being mesmerized is the very contrary of being free.
Profit is a measure. An indicator. An economic agent is profitable if, and only if, it is efficient. If the beneficiaries are satisfied with the manner in which the agent uses the resources spent to provide the wares/services.
Adam Smith had noticed that a nation’s wealth is built by people cooperating freely in fulfilling each-other’s needs. The afore mentioned wealth results naturally, without being sought after. Unintentionally. As if an invisible hand…
Nowadays, when more and more of the economic agents pursue profit at all costs, you have given up LIBOR and you discover that “Crime Pays: The Egg Bandits…”

Further more, you discover that freedom of expression is used to promote fake news. Propaganda..

Why ‘egging’? What eggs have to do with anything?
“To egg someone on means encouraging, provoking or urging someone to do something they don’t want to do, often recklessly or inappropriately. This phrase is used when someone pushes someone else to take action or make a decision, even if it might not be the wisest choice.
The phrase egging on has nothing to do with actual eggs. In fact, its origins go all the way back to the Old Norse word eddja, which means to incite or provoke.” Thanks Grammarist.com

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Categories 1989, alternative ways of acquring knowledge, awareness, Bounded rationality, Choices we make, cooperation, effective communication, In English, skin in the game, teleology

The Blame Game

June 24, 2026 //
0

“the greatest lie of all:
others need to change,
we are somehow, in some way,
immune to the need for repentance”

“We’re about to be steam-rolled.”
That was how I wrapped up one of my previous posts.

What next?
‘What happened? What can we do to avoid being steam-rolled?’
Or
‘Whom should we blame?’

Let’s start with a simpler one.
You are the manager of a wheat storing facility.
What do you do if:
1. You discover there’s a (one, 1) mouse on the premises.
2. You discover there’s a mouse infestation present.

1. You trap the mouse. You check how it got in and whether there are more of them.
2. You reconsider the entire pest control system. Something must be amiss if things got this bad before anybody noticed.

Let’s go back to us being about to be steam-rolled.
Finding a culprit, ‘the culprit’, may make sense in the psychological sense. It may make us feel better.
But will it teach us what to do next?

Should we let them go scot-free? The culprits?

When it comes to mice, it’s simple. One individual or an entire infestation, there’s no place for any mouse inside a grain-storing facility.
When it comes to people…

Let’s make another thought experiment.
We are a group of people taking a hike.
We’ve hired a local guide, trusting he knows what he’s doing. The guy was recommended by one of us, who had heard about him from an acquaintance.
Soon into the trip we discover the guide is a moron. Not only he is a complete jerk but also he isn’t familiar with the terrain.
What do we do?
Focus on getting back, safe, or start blaming the person who had recommended the guide? Argue with the moronic jerk, maybe?

Reality check.
People taking a hike, the guide included here, will experience, first hand and very soon, the consequences of being led ‘astray’.
Politicians, and most political commentators, are the last to ‘taste’ the consequences of their medicine being fed to the ordinary people.

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Categories 1989, awareness, collective identity, effective communication, In English, Psychology, skin in the game, teleology

Teoria Jocurilor

June 23, 2026 //
0

Frate, frate, da’ brânza-i pe bani!’

Dacă tot am divagat înspre practică….

‘Te faci frate cu dracul până treci puntea’ face parte din spațiul cultural românesc.
Atât de adânc încât conceptele sunt intraductibile.
Așa că voi continua în limba română!

Tratată ca o problemă de logică/teoria jocurilor, situația prezintă trei ‘entități’. Trei centre de interes.
Cel în cauză, dracul – evident, și ‘destinația’. Ținta vizată. De către cel care trebuie sa facă alegerea.

Analizată în felul acesta, situația devine destul de simplă.

Chiar trebuie să ajungi ‘dincolo’? Îți este imposibil să supraviețuiești aici? Dincoace de punte? Ești atât de disperat încât îți asumi să fii/ajungi singur cu dracul? De partea cealaltă a punții? Acolo de unde nu știi dacă te mai poți întoarce?
Atunci asta e. Te faci frate cu dracu’ și vezi tu p-ormă!

Sau…

‘N-o fi dracu’ chiar atât de negru’ e o încurajare. Pe care merită să ți-o spui singur după ce ai căzut în rahat. Câteodată ajută…
Înainte să treci puntea … ar fi mai bine să consideri că dracul este mai negru decât smoala!
Iar dacă chiar trebuie să te faci frate cu ‘el’, ia cu tine o ‘cruce’ zdravană. Un descânt eficient. Sau chiar pe amândouă!

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Categories 1989, alegerile pe care le facem, cadre mentale, constiinta de sine, cooperare, Cu pielea la bataie, identitate colectiva, In limba Romana, Intentie

Dacă tot am ajuns aici…

June 23, 2026 //
0

Întrerup demersul teoretic pentru a mă apleca asupra unui aspect practic.

Suntem la o lună și jumătate după ce PSD a dărâmat un guvern pe care îl votase, din postura de cel mai mare partid din parlament, cu mai puțin de un an în urmă. Guvern apărut în urma efortului de a ține departe de guvernare partidele considerate a fi fost extremiste. După ce făcuse ordine – mai ales în zona finanțelor publice – Bolojan, prim ministru în funcție la ora respectivă și interimar de atunci încoace, nu mai era suficient de bun. Pentru PSD…
„Dați-l la o parte pe Bolojan și puteți să vă păstrați funcțiile” a fost îndemnul PSD-ului către PNL. La momentul moțiunii de cenzură și de atunci încoace.

PNL-ul a refuzat. Primul ministru desemnat, un liberal care a acceptat propunerea PSD și care a fost dezavuat de restul PNL-ului, nu a adunat suficiente voturi. Cu tot sprijinul neprecupețit primit de la PSD…

Ce înțelegem de aici?

AUR, principalul partid extremist, a refuzat să facă jocul PSD. În condițiile PSD.
Ceilalți extremiști au acceptat.
Folosesc termenul, extremisti, pentru că descrie perfect situația. Atât AUR cât și ceilalți din grupurile considerate a fi extremiste s-au poziționat singuri în afara zonei clasice a spectrului politic considerat a fi normal pe malurile Dâmboviței.
Cu alte cuvinte, indiferent dacă AUR a fost o creație a PSD sau nu, AUR este, acum, pe picioarele sale.
Celelalte grupuscule au rămas ‘la remorcă’. La remorca cui? Nici măcar eu nu le știu pe toate!

PNL a făcut ordine în ogradă. Și-a asumat greșelile făcute pe vremea fostelor guvernări și s-a scuturat de o parte dintre cei care nu …’mai făceau parte’. Adică de cei care au ales să se ‘demaște’ singuri.

Nicușor Dan, singurul agent care se bucură de o oarecare libertate în toată tărășenia asta, a făcut ce a putut.
‘Agent’ este orice persoană care are ‘putere de agenție’. Care poate face ceva într-o anumită situație. Vă gândeați la altceva?!?
Nicușor Dan a făcut ce a putut în condițiile date. A jucat cărțile pe care le-a primit așa cum s-a priceput.

Nu știu dacă asta a urmărit, la Nicușor Dan mă refer, dar situația în care suntem acum este mult mai clară decât cea de acum o lună și jumătate. Pentru cine vrea să vadă…

Cum am ajuns aici?
Poveste lungă, voi reveni atunci când mă voi întoarce la teorie.„
Acum mai am de comentat mesajele citite prin presă. Prin presa care se consideră serioasă. ‘Mainstream’!
Aproape toți comentatorii – subliniez, „comentatorii”! – îl consideră vinovat pe Nicușor Dan pentru mare parte din cele întâmplate. Abia după ce îl aruncă pe Dan sub autobuz, unii dintre ei subliniază rolul jucat de PSD în toată tărășenia.

Mai înțelege cineva ceva, în condițiile date?

Acum sunt curios.
Se găsește un grup suficient de mare prin PSD? Suficient de mare, de puternic și, mai ales, de credibil? Încât să fie refăcută o ‘largă coaliție democratică’? Care să reformeze cu adevărat?
Se hotărăsc liberalii să negocieze serios cu AUR? Care par a fi dispuși să pună umărul la reformă… Mai depinde și în ce condiții…
Sau își asumă Grindeanu sarcina de a scoate castanele din foc? De acolo unde le-a aruncat… Împreună cu AUR și cu restul oastei de strânsură!

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Categories 1989, alegerile pe care le facem, an electoral, comunicare efectiva, cooperare, Cu pielea la bataie, identitate colectiva, In limba Romana, Tara din care traim
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