[cronjobber]

> the bureaucratic mindset holds that the rules are always, by definition, correct

It has long been known that you can get better optimization if you disregard correctness ;)

C compiler writers know that the assumption "pointer is not null because it was dereferenced" doesn't hold in general. C compiler writers know that they're performing incorrect optimizations.

The bureaucracy now doesn't tell them that the transformation is correct. It tells them it is fine to be incorrect because UB.

The bureaucracy gives them a "license to kill" for the greater good.

(What is the greater good, you ask? Can't answer that; ask a bureaucrat.)