New decision from CA Court of Appeal on the fee-shifting provisions of AB 1633 has big implications for NIMBYs' incentive to challenge housing approvals under CEQA & beyond.
Context: As part of the 1970s revolution in admin law, states & the federal gov't actively encouraged self-appointed "private attorneys general" to sue, via attorneys' fee bounties.
/2
Asymmetric fee-shifting provisions were written into scores of public laws: If a plaintiff challenging a gov't decision wins, the gov't has to pay for the plaintiff's attorney; if the plaintiff loses, they don't have to pay for the gov's attorney.
As always, China's detailed balance of payments data is worth parsing -- in part because China's surplus is big ($800b annualized in q3) and in part because the financial account confuses most of the world (China isn't adding to its reserves anymore) ...
1/many
Let's start with the current account -- $200b or so in q3. That is still a bit smaller than it should be. But it is has jumped from an implausibly low $50b a quarter in late 23 and early 24 to a number that is much closer to reality.
2/
With China's new current account methodology (introduced in calendar 2022) there isn't a stable relationship between the reported customs surplus and what shows up in the BoP, as this chart of the "gap" shows --
- Federal contract and grant data
- Recipient organizations
- Award amounts by fiscal year
2. HHS Per Diem Rates
- Standard shelter care: $256-$290 per day
- Influx facility care: $700-$775 per day
- These are the rates HHS says it costs to care for one child per day
3. Federal Indirect Cost Guidelines (NICRA)
- De minimis rate: 15%
- Typical negotiated rate: 15-30%
- This is the maximum administrative overhead the federal government allows
4. IRS Form 990 Filings
- Nonprofit tax returns
- Revenue, expenses, executive compensation
- Publicly available through ProPublica
Trump 9/11 Israel Windmill Falcon Decode 1. A series of Trump "errors" is getting attention now.
"Windmills are killing all of our beautiful Bald Eagles"
Except the picture is a dead falcon and instead of "our" birds the picture is from Israel? Dated September 11?
2. Trump has just had a press conference with Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu the day before the post and the images used for Trump in this article are from that conference.
Given the location of the windmills posted is Israel I doubt that's a coincidence....
3. The bird definitely isn't a bald eagle, it's widely reported as a falcon, but it might not be that either as the original Israeli post identified it originally as a different bird.
For them to invoke falcon may be meaningful as the Falcon 9 is a cornerstone project of SpaceX.
🔥🔥🔥Breaking! The Center For Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) vowed to destroy the right globally! Recall Rubio sanctioned its CEO, Imran Ahmed!
Trump, Bolsonaro, Orban, Modi, AFD party, & Netanyahu are all on their hit list! And they even called Fox News a hate actor too!
Today I will show you earlier writings where Imran Ahmed let the cat out of the bag!
♦️2019 CCDH about us page, populism must be destroyed:
“Populist politicians have allied with haters to gain new advocates and troll armies which harass opponents and institutions that provide checks and balances in liberal states, like the media and judiciary. If we do not deal with this threat, it will continue to divide our societies and undermine the strength of our democratic systems.”
♦️Imran Ahmed 2020 Medium post - The multilateral disarmament of populists:
“From Modi’s Hindu nationalism to Netanyahu’s anti-Arab hate to Trump’s clear and brazen bigotry, this new lifeform has emerged in multiple places simultaneously, demonstrating that it is a product of deep changes in our technological base, rather than contingent circumstances.
The CCDH, which I run, was set up to find solutions to the nexus of agile and innovative identity-based hate actors and powerful political actors, supercharged by digital technology.
First, politicians gain digital armies of single-minded advocates, adept in the tools of digital communications, for example, creating compelling shareable memes.
Second, digital advocates can use social media platforms such as Facebook to change voters’ understanding of the world to benefit their particular politics.
Given these advantages, can it be any surprise that we see this new form of political movement emerging worldwide? Modi in India; Netanyahu in Israel; Trump and the Alt-Right; the French Gilet Jaunes movement; the German AfD; the anti-EU movements in the UK and anti-Muslim bigots; the British Labour Party and antisemites.
This is why we believe the time is now right to tell our politicians: for the sake of our democracies, for the sake of yourselves, it is time for multilateral disarmament.”
♦️Imran Ahmed May 2020 interview - elections are in danger because liberalism is in retreat:
“The vicious anti-Muslim and racist elements within the BREXIT movement, and then having seen the rise of TRUMP six months later, we realized we were watching the rise of a new kind of political actor – one that intimately forms a symbiotic relationship with hate actors.
We realized this new paradigm of hate actors was causing huge damage to our democracies and the LIBERAL values that underpin it.”
“It is developing all across the world. It can go so far as Orban, who happily calls himself an illiberal Democrat, but we also see it with Modi, we see it with Duterte, we see it in Bolsonaro.”
“Look at the way in which trolls have literally been brought into the most senior places in our government, whether it's Trump embracing trolls in the Oval Office or Boris Johnson literally hiring a man named Andrew Sabisky”
“The US has institutionalized some hate actors. Fox News is on cable. Is there an equivalent in the UK?”
Fake news sites like Breitbart have huge readerships, quite often as much as any newspaper. They preach a gospel of hatred and misinformation, and often, quite structured misinformation.
If you look around the world, LIBERAL DEMOCRACY IS IN RETREAT, elections are under threat!”
♦️Imran Ahmed - We must stop the reversal of LIBERAL VALUES
“If we are to succeed, we will need to fuse technical expertise with campaigning expertise, and ensure allies understand the nature of the fight we are in and the new rules of engagement in digital spaces
We will need to work together to stop the history of the 21st century being one of liberal values undermined and reversed in the new digital plane of human existence. The moral arc of history does not bend towards justice without a force to push it in that direction. That is our mission at CCDH today.”
You know, @Cryptos4me56 has a good point. This is hate speech directed at the populist right.
This 2019 Center For Countering Digital Hate, “about us”, page was from when they were a fresh NGO. And they tell you what they were all about, fighting populism. It’s sheer bigotry to say every populist is part of a hate group.
♦️This is soo totally wrong and it’s HATE.
“Populist politicians have allied with haters to gain new advocates and troll armies which harass opponents and institutions that provide checks and balances in liberal states, like the media and judiciary. If we do not deal with this threat, it will continue to divide our societies and undermine the strength of our democratic systems.”
♦️And they want to strengthen liberalism, eh?
“CCH works with practitioners in diverse fields, such as political science, behavioural science, the law, countering violent extremism and counterterrorism, child protection and identity-based hate to develop strategies that strengthen tolerance, liberalism and democracy, and counterstrategies to new forms of political hate.”
Well, it didn’t take the Center For Countering Digital Hate to try and hide their HATE FILLED intentions. They deleted the populist part.
But they still mentioned that this was STRICTLY A DISRUPTION OF POLITICAL ALLIANCES.
(This will make even more sense in part four. Is your passport swishing at the gate yet Imran?)
♦️2020 “About us” page:
“develop strategies that STRENTHEN tolerance, LIBERALISM and democracy”
“The Center for Countering Digital Hate's primary goal is to DISRUPT ALLIANCES between hate actors and POLITICAL ACTORS in digital spaces. The Center was established to deal with the increasing use of racial and religious intolerance, sexism, homophobia, and other forms of identity-based hate to polarise societies and undermine democracy.”
A few things to keep an eye on heading into the start of the new year. 🧵
Remember, annual predictions are worthless, nobody knows shit in terms of what is going to happen next year with 100% certainty. 😂 Things that look good today might end up looking like crap and things that look like crap now may turn into the next big winners. Never know. Always keep an open mind and adapt when necessary. Day by day you take care of the process and the results will reflect your efforts over time. Wishing everyone the very best in ‘26. 🥳🎉
📍Moskova Devlet Univ. tarihçilerinin, Matematikçilerle yaptıkları çok özel bir çalısmayla tarihimizin 17. ve 18. Yy.'larda değiştirildiğini ortaya koydular.
📍Dünyaca ünlü Türk, Tataristan ve Azerbaycanlı Türkologlar, Türklerin Anayurdunu da ortaya çıkarttılar. [1]
📍Rus Matematikçiler Eski ve Orta Çağ'ın Skaliger tarihinin kökünden yanlış olduğu ortaya koydular.
📍Ayrıca tarihimizin XVI.yy sonuna kadar XVII.-XVIII. Yy'larda kasıtlı olarak tahrif edilmiş olduğu ortaya çıktı.
Anatoliy T. Fomenko,
Gleb V. Nosovskiy [2]
📍Burada ismi geçen Tabletler, Yazıtlar, Steller ne söylüyor?
Türki krallığı ve Turukkular ne anlatıyor?
It’s been a huge year for our image generation and editing model Nano Banana, starting with its debut in August as the top-rated image editing model in the world. Then in November, we released Nano Banana Pro. Built on Gemini 3 Pro, Nano Banana Pro uses Gemini’s state-of-the-art reasoning and real-world knowledge to visualize information better than ever before.
Amid all this momentum, it’s been incredibly fun to see the creative ways you’re actually using Nano Banana. Here are some of the most fun Nano Banana trends we’ve seen this year — which one’s your favorite? 👀🍌
1/ General photo edits
Prompt: Turn this into a night scene, lit by the moon, with dramatic shadows and moody overall lighting.
2/ Figurines
Prompt: Create a realistic-looking small 3D model of this dog. Place the model on a desk next to birthday packaging that makes it look like someone unwrapped the model as a gift.
🧵on his misrepresentations, falsehoods, and straight up lies told by the special counsel to House Judiciary Committee on Dec 17.
Smith had no evidence that any of the so-called "classified documents" he claimed to have found were in boxes temporarily stored in MAL ballroom or bathroom after the president left the White House.
Lie #2:
Smith was extremely aware of the 2024 election calendar--which is why he took what he himself described as the "extraordinary" step in asking the Supreme Court to bypass the DC appellate court--the next normal step-- in considering Judge Chutkan's Dec. 2023 order denying all forms of presidential immunity from criminal prosecution and take up the immunity question immediately. (SCOTUS denied his request, Chutkan's order was upheld by 3-judge panel in Feb. 2024, which was then considered by SCOTUS in April. On July 1, 2024, SCOTUS issued its decision providing for a broad swath of immunity for acts in office, resulting in a major gutting of Smith's J6 indictment.)
Lie #3: That the unarmed protest at the Capitol on Jan 6 was an "attack" incited by the president and the still unsubstantiated allegation that 140 officers were injured by protesters.
Keep in mind: Smith's J6 indictment was four counts: two related to 1512(c)(2)--a corporate fraud statute unlawfully used in J6 cases according to SCOTUS in the Fischer decision--and two other VERY vague conspiracy counts, conspiracy to defraud and conspiracy against "rights."
Smith was barred from discussing any nonpublic parts of his classified documents probe by Judge Cannon's order prohibiting DOJ from divulging any nonpublic info about it.
DOJ opted against having a lawyer present for Smith's deposition.
AWS' growth has trailed competitors so far, which was the biggest reason for the stock's underperformance for the last two years.
AWS growth is expected to reach 25% next year, and e-commerce and digital advertising are also expected to accelerate as the Fed will keep cutting rates.
The stock is trading near its lowest multiples despite the decades of runway for robust growth.
Marketplace is still growing 38% YoY, but I think the real star is its fintech business.
Fintech now makes up 43% of all revenue, and it's expected to surpass e-commerce in the next 2-3 years.
As a result, margins will significantly expand, and its moat will get even stronger as its fintech-marketplace ecosystem will lock in both merchants and customers.
Given that both of its businesses are growing above 30% YoY with years of runway ahead, 10x 2030 earnings is just criminally undervalued.
3. $PGY
5-year Revenue CAGR: 80%
Forward P/E: 15
ROIC: 8%
AI-powered lending infrastructure connecting banks with institutional investors, now the leading US personal loan ABS issuer.
Its valuation is depressed as investors are worried about markdowns on the loans it carries on its balance sheet; however, we saw in the last two quarters that markdowns are normalizing.
Thus, I believe the company is significantly derisked, though the market is yet to recognize this.
It's trading at 15x next year's earnings on around 20% expected growth. I think the market will bump up the multiple to at least 20x if we see further normalization in markdowns.
Prof dr Mehmet Bayrakdar:
Mısır Piramitlerini ilk kuranlarda,
Tekerleği ilk icad eden de,
İlk yazıyı, dili edebiyatı, efsaneyi icad eden de Türklerin Ataları Sakalardır.
"Türkler yoğurttan başka ne icad etti ki?!" diyen 'maraz kitle' ye duyurulur..
1-Prof Mehmet Bayrakdar hocamın dinleyicisi, öğrencisi olmak büyük şans.
Atatürk'ten sonra Türk Tarihini bu açıdan ele alıp yorumlayan akademisyene pek az rastladım.
2-Prof Mehmet Bayrakdar: Farsça'da 3500 Türkçe kelime vardır. Bizim Farsça sandığımız kelimelerin çoğu Sakacadır/ Türkçedir. Üstelik bunları ortaya koyan filolog da İranlı'dır.
“They executed my comrade Yura. Then showed me a bag with pieces of skin he had cut off.
He wanted to cut off my neck tattoo for his collection and cut off my arm. My last name saved me they thought I was Armenian” — Vasyl Davydian, Ukrainian POW, after 3 years in captivity. 1/
Vasyl: They burned my tattoo with a taser until it faded. Beatings were constant — stun guns, pipes, hammers, hands, feet.
They beat my nose, ears and groin. They shocked my tongue until I couldn’t speak. When I said my tongue was gone, they replied: We’ll cut it off anyway. 2/
Vasyl: They tried to sterilize us. I have cysts and tumors in the groin, but I’ll be able to have children. Two men with heart conditions asked for help.
A doctor was promised for tommorow. By morning, one was dead. I asked twice. The answer: “You’ll be treated in Ukraine.” 3/
1/25 Em plau compartir el missatge d’any nou rebut del savi mestre i vell amic, Walt Patterson, un pioner en repensar l’energia, que porta publicats nombrosos articles i un bon grapat de llibres. Si el voleu conèixer deixo aquí l’enllaç al seu web waltpatterson.org
2/25 En Walt Patterson va participar a la XXV CCFSNiES (abril 2011), que amb el títol Mudant l'energia: Què s'ha fet malament i què s'hauria de fer?, es va reunir a Barcelona, on la seva aportació va ser Changing the way the world Works. energiasostenible.org/ca/gctpfnn/con…
3/25 Comença així el missatge rebut, traduït al català:
“Acabo de rellegir el meu últim llibre, Electricity vs Fire, per primera vegada des que el vaig escriure, i em plau descobrir que en realitat és força bo.” waltpatterson.org/evf.htm
2026 IS THE YEAR OF AMERICA FIRST 🇺🇸
Top RINOs ON THE 2026 PRIMARY BALLOT
Time to clean house. These Republicans betrayed the base and must be replaced!
The GOP doesn’t have a Democrat problem — it has a RINO problem.
In 2026, these establishment Republicans are on the ballot. 2026 midterms are as crucial as electing Trump 2024. We must keep fighting against the uniparty! 🇺🇸
In Dec 1987 Mikhail Gorbachev landed at RAF Brize Norton for meetings & lunch with British PM Margaret Thatcher, enroute to Washington.
While positive, he also directly attacked Thatcher for her sending missiles to Afghanistan.
A short thread on an incredible meeting.
During 1987 the UK/Soviet relationship was tentatively improving, despite Cold War issues. Both leaders had a desire to improve their working relationship, so when the opportunity came, with Gorbachev flying to DC, the UK invited him to call in for a bilateral and lunch.
The visit lasted a few hours, but was enough time to discuss issues of formal substance. No10 and the FCO worked to identify the likely Soviet goals of the bilat, and in turn agree the key talking points for the British delegation.
With Minnesota's Somali fraud epidemic in the news - the same state where a White mom is up on charges for calling Somali thieves a name - here's a thread where we take a look at Minnesota's REAL problem:
The Whiteness Pandemic.
Rainbow-gender-potato Nomi Ostrander was awarded a $650,000 grant from Minnesota's Department of Education to fight the "Whiteness Pandemic" by "addressing issues from historically marginalized communities."
The university receives $628 million in taxpayer funding.
Sharmarke Issa - widely celebrated for being the first Somali to run public housing in Minneapolis - used his position to steal millions of dollars. I'm sure he was using the money for altruistic purposes though - like fighting the “Whiteness Pandemic.”
Alaa Shivani & Rahul alasipoi nidhrapoyaaru, appude vikram tho baaga intimate aina Vaishnavi water thaagadaaniki hall loki ochindhi. Water thaagi thirigi velthuu alaa oka look veella room vaipu vesindhi. Iddharini chusi shock aindhi
Alaa nude gaa padukovadam chusi, em jarigindho Vaishnavi ki ardham aindhi. She is happy for Shivani. But Vaishnavi ki Rahul wet modda chusi noru oorindhi 🤤
Melligaa valla room loki velli. Rahul kalla madhyalo dhoori vaadi modda ni patukoni naakuthuu notlo pettukoni cheekutundhi
Aah touch tho Rahul ki ardham ipoindhi, Vaadi modda cheekitundhi Vaishnavi ani.
Vaadu lechi Vaishnavi ni chusi oka smile ichaadu. Thanaku kooda vaadi modda ni cheekuthuu eye wink 😉 chesindhi.
Rahul alaa padukoni relax avthunte, Vaishnavi aame kaamam teerchukuntundhi.
🚨Monthly Solar Geoengineering Updates (Dec Edition)
From NCAR’s possible shutdown & the Guardian’s sun-dimming debate to an African-led #SRM hub, the EU’s first governance conference & new studies, SRM dominated headlines and labs alike.
Top 10 SRM Highlights (Dec 2025)🧵1/8
1️⃣ Trump administration plans to dismantle NCAR, a leading hub for climate & SRM research
2️⃣ Guardian editorial sparks debate, warning of “sun-dimming” under political control. In response, letters argue research shutdown stifles science & misrepresents African perspectives.
2/
3️⃣ DSG launches SRM Governance Horizons, a project to assess institutional readiness and inclusive governance for solar radiation modification debates.
4️⃣ Sandro Vattioni wins China’s 2025 Pineapple Science Award for research on diamond dust as a potential SRM material.
In 1780, Paul Cuffee, his brother & 5 other Black men petitioned the Massachusetts legislature demanding the right to vote.
He won free black men the right to vote in Massachusetts on the basis of "No Taxation Without Representation."
THREAD
Paul Cuffee was born Paul Slocum on Jan. 17, 1759, Cuttyhunk Island, Massachusetts, to Kofi Slocum, a farmer & freed slave, and Ruth Moses, a native American of the Wampanog nation.
In 1766 he & his brother John inherited a 116 acre farm from their father in Buzzard's Bay, Massachusetts, near Dartmouth. He changed his surname to Kofi, spelled "Cuffee." The name Kofi suggests that his father came from the Ashanti or Ewe people of Ghana.
Did you know that the death rate from measles declined by 98% BEFORE the measles vaccine was introduced?
“This is all on the CDC website… That decline had nothing to do with vaccines.”
So, if vaccines didn’t do it, what caused that decline from 1900 to 1963?
The answer is better nutrition, better sanitation, clean water, etc., according to Attorney Aaron Siri.
Yet “science” wants you to believe that vaccines saved the day.
But that’s not even the biggest vaccine deception. It’s what happens before they approve these shots for human use. 🧵
Faith in vaccines is just that. Faith.
Complete trust. Allegiance to duty. Belief in something for which there is no proof.
Medicine has carefully crafted a myth that it and only it rescued humanity from the dark ages of deadly disease. The kind of disease that was lurking around every corner, ready to wipe us off the map for all of eternity.
And because medicine so valiantly rescued us from erasure, it deserves ultimate supremacy. It should never be questioned. It can do no wrong.
A central part of medical mythology is the belief that vaccines ended infectious disease. And because it is indeed mythology and its adherents are acting on faith alone, it requires no proof and can simply dismiss any and all evidence against that bold claim.
But the evidence is not lacking. Far from it.
Despite medicine’s best efforts to hide and obscure it, those seeking the truth can plainly see it.
In this short presentation, Secretary Kennedy lays it out for all to see. There is no evidence that vaccines were responsible for the decline in infectious disease that has so aggressively been credited to them.
The year is drawing to a close so I thought I would do a recommendation thread for the accounts I have enjoyed interacting with the most this year!
These are all accounts dedicated to history and art free of political flim flam or AI slop!
[Thread]🧵
.@HeraldOfRome covers the history of the Roman Empire with a focus on politics, identity and the nature of power in the Roman state.
.@EchoesofEmpire_ Katie dedicated to posting some of the most exquisite artwork from beyond the periods I usually focus on. There are slso threads on some of the most thrilling episodes from history!
2025 is a pretty surprising year for me, but I'm ready to end this year and close the chapter 🎉
here's my 2025 annual writing self-evaluation 🥳
List of works published this year (from oldest to latest):
I started the year with doramitsu (archiveofourown.org/works/61871032) and ended it with enzan (archiveofourown.org/works/76538116)
I managed to write 96 fics for 4 fandoms, with 193k+ in total. These are the relationships I wrote.
Work you are most proud of (and why)
I'll have my top 3 for this.
1) my entries for octoberabble
I managed to write consecutively for 30 days. 30 fics in 6 different aus and all centered in doramitsu. I think I just surpassed my last year's. archiveofdomi.carrd.co/#fics-on-ao3
Pro-Pals were just at Lewes prison. They chanted “From Lewes to Foston Hall, Palestine will free us all.” Foston Hall is the prison where Charlotte Head is held. She admitted being the driver of a van that rammed the doors of a factory. How does that “free us all”? Mad.
I’m used to them chanting Israel is a “terror State” but today in Lewes they added “Britain is a terror State” to the mix. They don’t just hate Israel. They hate us.
An English pro-Pal taught the crowd a racist chant “Palestine is Arab” in Arabic. He even tells them the translation and they still do it. The ‘left’ ladies and gentlemen. Meanwhile they harass me and say I’m a “Brighton Zionist” as if I am the problem. Laughably awful ppl.
The Ukrainian Forces continue to defend the country, and this is the main outcome of 2025. The Ministry of Defense works every day to strengthen Ukraine's military. Our priorities remain unchanged: people, weapons, and the system.
Results of our team’s work in 2025:
2/ More Ukrainian weapons at the front. 76% of everything the state procures is purchased from Ukrainian arms manufacturers. In 2025, we delivered a record number of FPVs to the military and began mass deliveries of ground robotic systems and interceptor drones.
3/ We secured unprecedented foreign defense assistance. We launched a PURL mechanism that allows us to continue receiving unique American weapons.