If you know the root password, then you can switch to the account called root using the su root command.

In Linux there is always a user called root, which is the only account allowed to perform most system management tasks. The sudo command just executes a commend as root. Most of the time you don’t need to actually sign into the root account, just use sudo, but you can actually sign into it in the terminal as it is a real bona fide user account.

The sudoers file is located at /etc/sudoers. Do keep in mind that this file should not be edited directly. You can use the cat command which will print the content of a file to the terminal. So try cat /etc/sudoers.

I’m not sure exactly what causes this, but you can work around it as long as you can actually run commands as root (i.e. using sudo) in the terminal.

The command to add a new user is adduser.

The command to add a user to the administrators group (i.e. give them the ability to use sudo) is usermod -aG wheel.

These commands should be run as root by prepending sudo.

The Taiwan issue has exactly to do with the fact that sending official diplomatic representatives to it means recognising its legitimacy and sovereignty. Even though most Western countries already believe this, sending the representatives would be to express that they believe this which is what upsets the Chinese government. China doesn’t care what people think as long as they keep it to themselves. It’s when they get “embarrassed” on the world stage that Chinese leadership thinks it demands action.

The whole system of formal diplomatic recognition needs to die. Right now, “recognising” a government seems to be tantamount to acknowledging that government is legitimate and representative of the people. This is a very obstructive and unproductive system. It doesn’t matter whether you “recognise” a government and it also doesn’t matter what you decide to call your representatives to it. Refusing to recognise a government doesn’t mean that group of people doesn’t hold power or doesn’t actually control territory. It just prevents you from engaging with them in a constructive manner. It’s just a head-in-the-sand approach to intergovernmental relations.

If there’s a group of people calling themselves a government that holds power over a group of people or a piece of territory that you are interested in, it shouldn’t have to result in this whole game of charades. You should be able to send official representatives to that group without having to worry about offending everyone else. The whole concept of “recognition” is just nonsense.

The presence of far-right politics has really seen an uptick in recent years. It seems to have started in America but has spread to Europe and other countries like a plague. You have the AfD in Germany who claimed second place unseating a centre-left government, the entry of Nigel Farage’s far-right Reform UK party into the British parliament (even overtaking the traditional Conservative Party in recent polls), the fourth consecutive election in Portugal where the nationalist Chega party has gained seats, and Canada narrowly avoiding electing Pierre Poilievre the “Maple MAGA”.

Surprisingly enough, prior to Donald Trump blowing up the US-Canada alliance, Poilievre was predicted to win in a landslide in Canada with a 90%+ chance of his party getting a majority but somehow it really does seem like everyone who associates with Trump outside the US loses their election. The premiership really shipped right through Poilievre’s hands like a lump of dry beach sand. Lol

I wonder what would’ve happened if they sank that mf

…or sent it on a special undersea operation

Yet another irreplaceable natural landmark destroyed by idiot hooliganism. There is nothing the courts can do that will ever bring that tree back.

Edit: Apparently the tree sprouted from its stump.

I don’t think a BRICS currency will be successful in replacing the dollar unless the governments of the participating countries force their businesses to use it. The reason why transactions are denominated and settled in US dollars is because of the perceived stability of its value and the openness of the US financial system to international trade. People use the US dollar because they trust the American government to not excessively devalue it and for it to be reliably useful later on.

And yes, I recognise that all of these are under attack by the current US government.

I have to agree with the sentiment expressed by the social media posts shown in the article. If your country’s electricity infrastructure is so fragile that a monkey could take it offline then it’s probably time to take a hard look at investing in improving its resilience.

I want to add a third thing to this list:

3. Feeling left behind by mainstream political parties.

The parties in power surely pay lip service to the issues that concern the young but very rarely do they actually do anything about it.

Machiavelli wrote about this. People don’t need to love you for your power to be secure, and in fact, it’s far preferable to be respected because people fear you than to be respected because people love you.

I’ve heard it said before that most of China’s geopolitical strategies can be explained with two statements:

1. War is bad for business.
2. China is big on business.