I wager in some part of your analysis you're not dead on the money but in broad strokes this all rings true. The political acumen necessary to survive as a programmer is intense, it is one advantage black programmers i've met had a better handle on than white programmers who are more often autism-spectrum n therefore terrible at office politics, cept when being oblivious is advantageous which it can be. It was ironic in the scheme of racial stereotypes present in American culture, that both black coders were employed while the white coders were not, this was in a hacker house, but it was simply because they were better coders. No issues there. We got along great, but in terms of office politics, n without being aggressors either, j very good instincts. It isn't talked about in plain terms enough even on HN, well i guess it is discussed a lot, but never like "alright, here's the strat if you're facing X" like you talk about in the face of other commentors's naysaying.