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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Owle, post: 1295350, member: 22004&quot;]Thanks for the points; the posting of this idea thread came about as a result of a conversation with a knowledgable world coin dealer.&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>Relevant to the point you made, it would be good if we could bring back some discarded uses of language like &quot;ruthful&quot;.&nbsp; People use the word &quot;disgruntled&quot;, but when was the last time you heard the word &quot;gruntled&quot;, again a perfectly good word.&nbsp; People are named &quot;Lawless&quot;, Lucy Lawless comes to mind as a pretty charming example, but how many people are name &quot;Lawful&quot;?&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>As to the criteria of the most ruthless, I think the following should apply:</p><p><br /></p><p>1. Entrusted with great power, and completely amoral, using an &quot;end justifies the means&quot; power-oriented political philosophy, ala Machiavelli.</p><p><br /></p><p>2. A great pretender, at least to start with, appearing to be good, altruistic, credentialled, with people around him/her to reinforce perceptions of competance.&nbsp; Later on the pretence may fall away as the people learn to live in great fear of the absolute ruler.</p><p><br /></p><p>3. A leader who finds similarly unscrupulous people to do his/her dirty work leaving no tracks or trails to tip off significant people off to his/her plan.</p><p><br /></p><p>I&#039;m sure others could come up with more criteria.</p><p><br /></p><p><strike>ince love and fear can hardly exist together, if we must choose </strike></p><p><strike>between them, it is far safer to be feared than loved. — Niccolò </strike></p><p><strike>Machiavelli, <i>The Prince</i>, 1513</strike></p><p><strike><br /></strike></p><p><strike><a href="http://mises.org/daily/1819" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="http://mises.org/daily/1819" rel="nofollow">http://mises.org/daily/1819</a></strike>[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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