Recent well liked threads

Twitter's new privacy policy takes effect on 29 September

It gives X the right to use your posts - including DMs - & all your data - including phone, email, biometrics (e.g. face scans & eye scans) to train their AI & to share with any partner X wants👇
twitter.com/en/privacy

“I do not accept that Twitter has deteriorated in any way since Elon Musk took over”

A week before Twitter’s change in privacy policy, some questions for @elonmusk

1. What biometric information will be collected & what are the intended uses?

How will X ensure that that the data of X’s 530 million users isn’t used for unlawful purposes?
mashable.com/article/x-twit…

@ukhomeoffice - @SuellaBraverman plea to Rewrite #RefugeeConvention to oppose “simply for being #gay and fearing discrimination …” (via @guardian )
A right-wing push to further destroy the UK’s reputation as a place of sanctuary .. this must stop! theguardian.com/politics/2023/…

Paras 19-21 of OO (Sudan) [2009] EWCA Civ 1432 as per Sir David Keene - violations must be sufficiently serious bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/…

One example where discrimination was held to amount to persecution was the case of the Gay Kenyan Rugby player Kenneth Macharia (2021) @AttitudeMag

33bedfordrow.co.uk/insights/news/…

Veo que hay confusión con lo de la CURP.

La credencial de elector contiene tu número de CURP pero no contiene el documento completo.

Al documento completo de la CURP es al que quieren agregarle tus datos biométricos.

La oposición a esto proviene de tres causas (abro 🧵)

1.- Los datos de menores de edad están protegidos por ley y la CURP se puede obtener desde el nacimiento. Esto es contradictorio.ñ porque publicar los datos de ellos sería ilegal.

2.- En otras ocasiones los datos recolectados de los ciudadanos mexicanos han sido vendidos…

por personajes de la política que tienen acceso a ellos, como el caso del 2020. Hay empresas que pagan muy bien por esos datos y los usan sobre todo para hacer publicidad violando tu privacidad.

3.- La insistencia de la SEGOB a través de los años para conseguir esos datos…

@SuellaBraverman interviewed by @AnushkaAsthana for @itvpeston continues to repeat highly inaccurate starlets on gay men, and women, gaining asylum solely on the basis of discrimination.

Reference to the original intentions of the framers of the 1951 REFUGEE CONVENTION (omitting the amendments via the 1967 PROTOCOL to address the international protection needs of Palestinian Refugees) - our UK Supreme Court in HJ (Iran) [2010] UKSC 31 made clear the High Contracting Parties - some did not believe homosexuality existed - “This was manifest nonsense” (Lord Hope), para 2.

The UK DOES NOT GRANT ASYLUM SOLELY ON THE BASIS OF BEING GAY, A WOMAN, OR SOLELY ON DISCRIMINATION.

Our Court of Appeal in 2009 (OO (Sudan) and JM (Uganda) [2009] EWCA Civ. 1432 made clear the threshold is high “sufficiently serious violations”. [21](See earlier tweets)

Home Secretary - Reference to Operationally we are seeing MANY PRETENDING TO BE GAY to get SPECIAL TREATMENT- NO @ukhomeoffice EVIDENCE Cited.

72% of LGB initial decisions in 2022 resulted in a POSITIVE GRANT of REFUGEE STATUS. Approx 50% of negative decisions are overturned on appeal before the Tribunals/Courts.



FACTS ARE IMPORTANT
#CultureOfDisbelief

@33BedfordRow @UoSLawSchool

@StevePeers @AlasdairMack66 @ZoeJardiniere @LouCalvey @stand_for_all @AfricanRainbow1 @rock4_ronnie @AdamWagner1 @Nancy_M_K @ILPAimmigration @JacquiMckenzie6 @SinnKandiah @MigrantVoiceUK @JCWI_UK @AttitudeMag @rainbowmigrants @senthorun @trentchambers4

Note: 72% grant of refugee status or other form of leave to remain in 2022 - an increase from 44% in 2019. The @ukhomeoffice evidence contradicts @SuellaBraverman statement , as FEWER individuals are refused at initial decision stage. Within the 28% of refusal decisions will include positive acceptance of claimed sexual identity, but a negative decision on risk on return.



* inaccurate statements not starlets

28% REFUSAL RATE of LGB claims in 2022 - The Discretion Test?

Applying the 2010 UK Supreme Court binding guidance (HJ (Iran) para 82 -Lord Rodger) refusal decisions could also include those who are found by the @ukhomeoffice to be “voluntarily discreet” ONLY due to social pressure, or personal choice - #discretiontest



The discretion test (“reasonable tolerability of voluntary discretion”) was first introduced by the Courts following submissions made by the Home Office under @UKLabour in 2004 (Z v SSHD) .



This “test” resulted in a 98-99% refusal rate of LGB claims, based purely on the application of a presumption of voluntary discretion of an LGB applicant when faced with well-founded persecution (UKLGIG, 2010 “Failing the Grade”).



Whilst “reasonable tolerability” was struck-down by the @UKSupremeCourt in 2010 (the coalition government was formed on the last day of the May 2010 hearing (no change in @ukhomeoffice instructions), the discretion test has been modified to refusing a refugee claim where (voluntary) discretion is only due to personal choice or social pressure, notwithstanding the applicant has “proved” gay, and comes from a country where if they were identified by a potential persecutor, would lead to a real risk of serious harm/persecution (for example, the death penalty in Iran - currently 66 countries criminalise, including two-thirds of Commonwealth countries).

(2017 challenge to the discretion test before the Court of Appeal failed (LC (Albania)).

Sumption making in print the case for withdrawal from the ECHR.

It is politicaly significant that this has become a "respectable view", and so what does Sumption get right, and what does he get wrong?



/1spectator.co.uk/article/judgme…

First

"Many of the rights which the convention proclaims were part of British law long before the convention was conceived."

Thios is often said, both by opponents and proponents, of the ECHR. Did we have this before long before?

No. It is nonsense.

/2

The ECHR contains obligations on signatory states on how thy treat their citizens. It is a restriction on state sovereignty. Its nature (and that of other international human rights instruments) is well described by Joseph Raz here



/3papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cf…

Varios facultativos han enviado esta mañana un escrito al Departamento de Sanidad y al Colegio de Médicos de Bizkaia solicitando la suspensión inmediata de la campaña de vacunación con quintas dosis contra el Covid 19. Abro hilo 😉

Ángel Bidaurrazaga Vandierdonck Doctor en Medicina, exprofesor de la EHU

1/ “En vista de lo que hemos visto, creemos que esta supuesta vacuna, que erróneamente se denomina 'vacuna', no sólo es inútil sino también muy peligrosa; porque probablemente aumenta el exceso de mortalidad de la población vacunada,

@SpinningHugo @StevePeers I don’t see how a domestic BoR solves anything unless is not a BoR as ordinarily understood. The real complaint in all of this ultimately is that HMG/Parliament has cramped its style by all the various Conventions - ECHR, Refugee, CAT, UNCRC etc - which operate to cramp its style

@SpinningHugo @StevePeers The “arrogant, self assurance” line made me laugh though.

New: in a blow to the Biden administration, a privacy board has recommended Congress adopt substantial overhauls to a key surveillance power, saying it threatens Americans’ privacy and needs more court oversight.

wsj.com/politics/natio…

In a 3-2 split, the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board said the FISA Section 702 program is highly valuable to national security but “poses significant privacy and civil liberties risks.”

All five members of the board urged some reforms.

wsj.com/politics/natio…

The PCLOB report on Section 702 "gives the lie to the government’s objections to judicial approval," says @LizaGoitein. "The board concluded that judicial approval of U.S. person queries is not only workable, it’s critical to safeguarding Americans’ constitutional rights."

Titan-Barrikady is the Russian producer of Iskander launchers. In 2021, its Chief Technologist Ingemansson A.R. defended a doctoral dissertation on "securing consistency of the machining processes"

It were the HAAS milling and turning machines that his research was based upon

"Turning was conducted on the SL-40L CNC lathe, milling - on the horizontal drilling-milling-boring EC-1600 machining center (all production of "Haas Automation", USA)"

"Machining operations have been carried out on the existing production site, under the regular conditions"

It's no coincidence that George Soros owns Taylor Swift Music Catalog.

It's no coincidence that she is registered as a Democrat.

It's no coincidence that she hates D. Trump.

It's no coincidence that she is dating Travis Kelse.

George Soros is leveraging Taylor Swift to get zoomers to vote.

Which is why Gavin Newsome & Michelle Obama happen to be running on the same ticket.

These celebrities are "State Property".

They are used as pawns to push the Democrat/Liberal agenda.

Think-

Who managed Taylor Swift? Scooter Braun.

Who are the people who finances Scooter Braun? George Soros & Alex Soros. And ofcourse The Carlyle Group.

People these are how celebrities are positioned. To benefit the establishment.

These celeb relationships are orchestrated.

The outrage over the refusal of a Gujarati-dominated housing society to allow a #Maharashtrian woman to rent an apartment/ office at Mulund in #Mumbai is not the first such instance of housing apartheid directed at #Marathi speakers in their own capital. The roots of this discrimination run deep in #history.

Some political activists got together and ensured that the father-son duo in the Mulund society apologised to the woman. But soon, it will be back to business for them. At least, until the next outrage…

Even today, there is no clarity over whether that silly "rule" which was cited as the basis for the denial has been rolled back.

Thread

#Marathi #Maharashtra #MarathiIdentity #Marathipan

One must note that while the liberal intelligentsia is quick on its feet to denounce any expression of nativist, pro-Marathi sentiment in Mumbai, they often ignore similar regional and linguistic chauvinism, sub-nationalism and xenophobia in their own states. They also fail to acknowledge that opportunities are often secured through networks linked to caste, linguistic and regional identities with merit per se taking a back seat.

#Mumbai was a part of #Maharashtra in the geographical, historical, and socio-cultural sense. #Marathi speaking groups like the Agaris, Kolis, Bhandaris, Pathare Prabhus, Pachkalashis etc populated the clutch of islands that make today's Mumbai. These indigenous residents had to eventually pay the highest price for Mumbai's 'development.'

Marathi merchant princes and entrepreneurs like Rama Kamat Lotlikar and Jagannath 'Nana' Shankarseth Murkute, and the middle and labour class have built Mumbai brick by brick over the centuries and so have people like Nagu Sayachi and Raosaheb Papanna, who spoke Telugu but were culturally Maharashtrians. Economic migrants from other states came here later because they saw opportunities here and because they felt Mumbai was the mythical El Dorado, the city of gold.

Anyone denying this reality are living under a rock, or perhaps, they are THE rock.

The Samyukta Maharashtra movement had to fight tooth and nail to ensure that Mumbai was retained as part of Maharashtra and was not hived out as a union territory or merged with Gujarat as big money and capitalists wanted it to. The point to be noted is that the leaders and foot-soldiers of Samyukta Maharashtra also included the Telugu-speaking working class and journalists and activists like Va. Ra. Kothari, a Jain, who were Maharashtrians by conviction and belief. Maharashtra secured Mumbai on 1 May 1960 after the martyrdom of 106 people. Those who wanted to usurp Mumbai by hook or crook have certainly not forgotten this "slight!"

Mumbai had a strong working-class movement. This was broken down after mill owners, politicians, bureaucrats, builders, and the underworld colluded to sell off lands on which the textile mills stood. This was a barbaric case of dispossession. The mills were syncretic spaces and supported a strong manufacturing ecosystem. This was broken down. The communal strife in Mumbai during the 1990s owes much to this. The same story repeated itself when it came to the engineering units.

We keep hearing how long bond yields are spiking higher.

Sounds ominous, but why? And more specifically, what does it mean for investors?

Time for a debt 🧵👇

🤨 Reality of ‘risk free’

Before diving in here, a quick primer on bonds and Treasuries, what they are and how they work. For those of you who are comfy with this part, feel free to jump ahead

But if you want a bit of a tune-up, let’s proceed...

First, bond prices are a function of both yield and duration

If interest rates rise, bond prices fall to compensate for that move in yield. And vice-versa.

The longer the duration, the more sensitive a bond price is to interest rates, i.e., the more the price will rise or fall.

THREAD Let's start a long thread about how Russian book market prepared Russians for a full-scale war against Ukraine, NATO, the West, and promoted stalinism and nazism, and how this was ignored by the West. Keep seat belts fasten, you will see a lot of nasty things here. 1/52

One of the first indicators of Russia preparing for a full-scale turn into dictatorship and a global war was the mass production of books praising Stalin and Stalinism and welcoming upcoming war against the West. These books appeared on Russian bookshelves in early 2010s 2/52

The appearance was so massive that it could not be a coincidence on a book market which was under a strict control of secret police FSB. "Be proud, not sorry! Truth about Stalin Age" "Stalinist's Handbook", "Stalin's Repressions: A Great Lie" and "Beria: Best XXCent Manager" 3/52

Less than 31 hours since OpenAI started dropping the ChatGPT vision feature on pro users...

People are scratching their heads in disbelief.

10 wild examples:

1)

https://twitter.com/mckaywrigley/status/1707047423863136687

2)

https://twitter.com/youraimarketer/status/1706461715078975778

1/Another interesting article by @jasonfurman. A better title imho would have been "Profits and Losses don't matter at the Federal Reserve the way they matter for a regular bank, but they do matter for taxpayers." The Fed balance sheet is not a black hole for losses.

https://twitter.com/jasonfurman/status/1707210043022594171

2/The losses matter. If you consolidate the Fed and the Treasury, then QE has shortened the duration of the government's IOUs. The mark-to-market losses measure the cost to taxpayers of shortening duration and not locking in longer rates.

https://twitter.com/HannoLustig/status/1641828804007014400

3/A separate normative question (which is the one Jason is after) is whether the Fed should take these potential losses into account. QE has first-order implications for public debt management and I think it would be odd for the Fed to ignore these implications.

Stellt euch vor es ist Krieg, und eure Klassenfahrt geht nach #Russland. Die #Waldorfschulen Weimar und Erfurt fuhren trotzdem hin.

"Die vieldiskutierten Konflikte liegen in der globalen Politik, aber auf keinen Fall in den einzelnen Menschen."

Thread 🧵
deutsch-russisches-forum.de/portal/wp-cont…

Ein Schüleraustausch mit russischen Waldorfschulen gab es keinen Flug, also per Linienbus nach Kaliningrad. Vormittags Waldorfschule, nachmittags Ausflüge und Arbeit auf einem #Demeter-Hof.

"Es fühlt sich genau richtig an, dass wir gerade jetzt diese Reise unternommen haben!"

Die WaldorfschülerInnen besuchten den Kreml. Er beherbergt auch den Senatspalast des Präsidenten und Kriegsverbrechers Wladimir Putin. Putin hatte genau ein Jahr zuvor die Ukraine überfallen.

Der Diktator wird von Internationalen Strafgerichtshof per Haftbefehl gesucht.

People often ask me how in the world I maintain a close relationship with my dad. I’m a progressive gay man, and as many of you know, he is a Southern Baptist preacher who describes himself as “to the right of Ronald Reagan.” 🧵

These days, you can score a lot of likes on social media by posting about the people you’ve bravely severed from your life—problematic parents, snarky siblings, catty childhood friends. (In severe cases, this may be a necessary step.)

But in this age of “going no contact,” my dad and I have chosen another, harder path. We’ve chosen to stay and stick it out, and learn to love across difference.

10 concepts that explain the modern world

1. Parkinson’s Law: Companies become bigger and worse over time. Clerks manufacture work for each other as overall capacity dips. When British Navy ships went down from 68 to 20, officials increased by 78%.

2. Chesterton Fence: If you don’t know what an old custom does, don’t touch it. It may be holding back problems you’re completely unaware of. You’ve not seen the wolves yet because of the very fence you’re about to demolish.

3. The Medici Effect: Sculptors, painters, and architects converged in Florence as the Medicis were funding the artists. Their proximity led to a fertile dialogue which, in turn, led to the Renaissance. The internet will amplify this cross-pollination of ideas.

4. The Centipede's Dilemma: Ask a centipede which one of its hundred legs moves the fastest and it forgets how to move. Reflecting on what we normally do without thought ironically worsens performance. A culture of endless self-reflection, therapy, and navel gazing is eroding important life skills.

5. Tyranny of small decisions: Individuals make small decisions to maximize convenience but this leads to massive social failure. We nod along to contagious ideas like “gender is fluid” because resisting them is too much work - till kids start getting transgender surgery. The slippery slope is not a fallacy but a fundamental reality.

6. The Zebra Effect explains why people don’t want to stand out. Zebras are hard to individually study as it's nearly impossible to track one of them for long (lost in the striped chaos). So scientists once put a big red dot on one zebra so he could be tracked & studied. Lions zeroed in on him and hunted him with ease. Getting lost among others is a survival mechanism. Hence the human desire to conform.

7. Why the ruler can’t rule: The executive head can’t implement his ideas on ground because the bureaucrats are closer to it, and have an agenda of their own. The Tzar of Russia had to deal with the Deep State too. Nicholas II: “I never ruled Russia. 10,000 clerks ruled Russia.”

8. Gall's law: A complex system that works is invariably found to have evolved from a simple system that worked. Only fools and modern technocrats try to create complex systems from scratch.

9. Minimal Self Hypothesis: Narcissism is a “strategic retreat” into the safety of one’s own self. When the future looks random, inexplicable, and informationally overwhelming, people enter survival mode. The self becomes “minimal” to reduce its surface area to pain. People today are giving up on commitment of all sorts to conserve energy for vague and upcoming disasters.

10. Tetris Syndrome: The world will eventually start looking like Tetris blocks if you play the game too much. What we do most often becomes the metaphor through which we look at the world. Takeaway: Most people today are addicted to their 2D phones - and this will hurt the general aptitude for dealing with the 3D world.

I'm collecting useful heuristics here:

Find inside:

• The Gain-loss theory of attraction
• Mozart effect
• Overjustification effect
• Cheerleader effect
• The Birthday Number Effect

And more👇🏻new.memod.com/jashdholani/co…

Comme promis, je vous propose un (trés long) thread pour comprendre le bitcoin et les blockchains.

On va essayer de voir (1) a quel problème théorie cette technologie répond, (2) est-ce qu'il existe des cas d'usage pertinent en économie pour ces technos ?

C'est parti ! 🧵

Alors en pratique, la fault tolérance à des limites : si 99% de vos serveurs sont en panne, le systéme risque de ne plus fonctionner. Tous les algorthimes de consensus n'ont pas la même tolérance au faults/pannes, en général on tolère plus ou moins 1/3 de serveurs en panne.

C'est bien entendu aussi une propriété essentielle, puisque c'est un peu historiquement la raison d'etre de l'algorithme distribuée : pouvoir avoir un systéme qui tolère qu'un serveur soit détruit par l'ennemie (ou juste en panne dans un contexte civil).

Vibrational energy is the very fabric of this reality we find ourselves in.

Even mainstream science now admits that everything is a vibrational waveform of varying degrees.

DEEP ESOTERIC THREAD

Expressing itself in countless formats right before our eyes, ears, noses and even the physical objects we touch with our hands & feet.

Thinking only about sound or music as a vibration is an oversimplification.

But music is a powerful weapon in the arsenal of the ruling class.

A deadly oversight that the masses fail to recognise, to their detriment and eventual destruction.

/1💰BREAKING💰

We just uncovered new documents obtained from our litigation against HHS, revealing how the Biden admin used $2 billion dollars in taxpayer funded contracts to house illegal aliens and enrich a former Obama/Biden admin staffer.

Must-read thread:

/2 In 2020, Family Endeavors hired Andrew Lorenzen-Strait, a former member of the Biden transition team.

https://twitter.com/project_veritas/status/1689048983858024448

/3 Shortly after Endeavors hired Lorenzen-Strait, HHS awarded it a single-source, no-bid contract worth $530 million dollars. foxnews.com/politics/dhs-i…