I do NOT have you muted; which means until now I must have valued your comments.

I agree on rules not rulers, but unfortunately most people love power more than they love beauty, so a ruler must establish FIRMLY that the rules don't change. And for that, bitcoin indeed HAS a ruler, who must keep the rules unchanged and make decisions to that effect. Once bitcoin gets some valuable things built on it, then the NEW ruler will be not yanking the foundations from beneath the towers. Rationality SHOULD prevail, but in cases it appears it won't, a constitutional monarchy exists to hopefully preserve the integrity of the rules. We've ALREADY seen problems with this in the past, so by pragmitism and experiement, not theory or dogma, we've come to realize that bitcoin needs leadership for at least SOME period of time before it is secure. This shouldn't be a surprise, as bitcoin was co-opted a couple times by those who wanted to change it (SEGWIT, anonymity, 2nd la...