Usually, when I need an appointment at the VA, I can get one within 2 weeks. Today, I called for an appointment and the next available is in May, 2026. Firing 35K people will do that. The Trump administration hates veterans.

More financially distressed farmers are expected to lose their property soon as loan repayments and incomes continue to falter | Fortune fortune.com/2025/12/13/f...

Russia is making preparations for the Zelensky ceasefire. A bill on the genocide of the occupied territories has passed the Russian parliament and will be brought in effect once the frontlines are frozen in place.

Reddit keeps serving up r/HealthInsurance and it is grim.

Sounds about right.

I know it and I feel it and still, this stat blows my mind: Childcare is unaffordable for 80% of New Yorkers. www.thecut.com/article/dayc...

it drives me crazy that the preferred solution for these guys to ostensibly avoid war is to return to the world order and social structures that gave us 100% of prior World Wars

Respect!!! @harvard.edu 😍 The link to the FREE GOVERNMENT COURSES is ... pll.harvard.edu/subject/gove...

Grading and googling hallucinated citations, as one does nowadays, and now that LLMs have been around for a while, I've discovered new horrors: hallucinated journals are now appearing in Google Scholar with dozens of citations bc so many people are citing these fake things

The latest CNBC All-America Economic Survey found 41% of Americans plan to spend less for the holidays this year. Among those spending less, 46% blame the high cost of goods. - via @cnbc.com by Steve Liesman www.cnbc.com/2025/12/15/i... (Yes, it's about affordability.)

Big announcement from Gov. Newsom:

Tired: Disinformation. Wired: This information.

Farming is a $1.7T business, 70% of workers are migrants, 40% of them are undocumented. As reported in the enclosed, some of the migrant workers in US legally are not showing up for work because they are fearful of ICE-S. Don't expect prices to fall soon. foodinstitute.com/focus/crops-...

Ahmed al Ahmed, the man who tackled one of the Bondi killers, became an Australian citizen 3 years ago. His deed was "his way of conveying his gratitude for staying in Australia, for being granted citizenship." He took 5 bullets, and fears he'll lose his left arm. www.smh.com.au/national/nsw...

Like you hear these congressional reps, especially republicans, talking about how they're scared to vote against the party line because they might get hurt and Ahmed al Ahmed literally ran at a guy with a gun because he felt his duty to his fellow humans was to try and sanctify life

NEW: After pushing hundreds of thousands of government employees to leave their posts and dismantling many government technology units, the Trump administration is launching an effort to recruit new technology talent. www.nextgov.com/people/2025/...

Christmas tree market against the backdrop of the devastation caused by Russian attacks on Kyiv. We are exhausted,there's no electricity for most of the day in Kyiv.But still,people buy Christmas trees,kids will get presents. Resilience is a skill,we're getting a lot of practice. 📹nststkh

"According to the…annual Harris Poll, for the 1st time, a majority of Americans believe billionaires are a threat to democracy. A remarkable 71% believe there should be a wealth tax. A majority believe there should be a cap on how much wealth a person can accumulate." www.nytimes.com/2025/12/14/o...

5. The 1915 version grew to at least 4 million people in the 1920s. 100 years ago this year, they marched on Washington in massive numbers. And they had organizations in nearly every state, and were heavily involved in politics. It was seen as an America First Christian Organization.

Merry Christmas from the Klan! It's hard to see this photo and not have a visceral reaction right? Every year around Christmas it circulates, but more than often with no context. So every statement aligns with the feeling of the person who posted or shared it. But what about the real story? 🧵

Jasmine Crockett sets the record straight on Israel and Gaza. She says the social media attacks are twisting her record to make it sound blindly pro-Israel and anti-Gaza—not the case. Listen to the facts. 1/2

Thank you, Rob. ❤️🏳️‍🌈

Small drones are playing such a big role in the Russia-Ukraine war not because they've proven superior, but because no one has air superiority, air defense is weak, and attempts at complex combined arms have broken down. US-China wouldn't look like that. Very good, timely piece by Justin Bronk.

For more than two years, Jared Kushner has sought to build a Trump-branded complex of towers in a central Belgrade site once bombed by NATO. But the plans are running into resistance in Serbia.On Monday, a special prosecutor indicted four officials including a cabinet minister over the project.

The Japanese physicists Koba & Takeda submitted similar work two days earlier. When Dyson learned this he amended his paper, acknowledging their work and lamenting the impact of the war: "The isolation of these Japanese workers has undoubtedly constituted a serious loss to theoretical physics" (5/n)

A $400 million Varshavyanka-class Russian submarine used to launch Kalibr cruise missiles at Ukraine has been successfully decommissioned by the SBU using underwater drones. The first time in history a drone takes out a submarine.

This already was their compromise. Do you think any MAGA supporter actually knows that, sincerely? Or have they all been brainwashed by the propaganda of "Obamacare"?

The US State Department officially endorses the German Nazi Party which is also backed by Russia.

“At Texas A&M, internal emails show staff are using AI software to search syllabi and course descriptions for words that could raise concerns under new system policies restricting how faculty teach about race and gender.” www.texastribune.org/2025/12/15/t...

NEW: One of the most significant accomplishments of the Trump Admin: Decimating the US's humanitarian aid. We went to S. Sudan to see the effects. Rubio says no one has died from the cuts. Spoiler: That's not true. @annamaria.bsky.social & Brett Murphy: www.propublica.org/article/usai...

🚨🚨This is worse than we could have imagined: Full version of #Trump's national #securitystrategy reportedly calls for “pulling Poland away from #EU”. 🧵 notesfrompoland.com/2025/12/10/f...

Dave's interviews are always worth a listen, but I found this one particularly interesting. Lot's of good conversation on climate policy, and I appreciated how Dave pushed Aliya on political "both siderism" in the face of massive R opposition, and on the Gatesian opposition to distributed tech

One citizen said that federal agents in Idaho pointed guns at her children, ages 6 and 8, and dragged her 14-year-old daughter out of a truck and zip-tied her. The mother told investigators that an agent threatened to “fucking blow your head off.” By @nicolefoy.bsky.social

Hundreds gathered at the National Academy of Sciences in D.C. for a powerful screening of "Out of Plain Sight," a documentary exploring the origin and impacts of toxic dumping off the coast of California. The event was emceed by Scripps alum and National Academy of Sciences President Marcia McNutt.

And the owner of the shop, herself a Chinese immigrant, went out of her way to provide comfort to her community. She is also a hero.

For the second year in a row, the wealth gains for the 100 richest Americans exceeded what ALL American households spent on groceries combined. ~$995B for billionaires vs ~$775B in total grocery spending. We have an oligarchy and inequality problem masquerading as an affordability crisis.

Reported by CNBC last week: Layoff announcements top 1.1 million this year, the most since 2020 pandemic share.google/MoJPCWKHIRhg...

FBI Confirms 630 Million Stolen Passwords — How To Check Yours Now

Ukrainian Navy reports that russians deliberately attacked the Turkish vessel VIVA in the Black Sea with drones. The vessel was heading to Egypt carrying sunflower oil. Its passage through the sea was conducted via the grain corridor. There were 11 Turkish citizens on board.

‼️🇺🇸 Russian GRU hackers attacked critical US infrastructure, a grand jury indictment in California has been released. They carried out attacks on an airport in Missouri, water systems in Texas, Pennsylvania and Indiana, a meatpacking plant in California, and an oil and gas company in Colorado.

Outside of Covid, New Jersey’s unemployment rate is at a 10-year high:

"The global burden of vaccine-preventable neurological diseases is substantial... barriers to vaccination uptake must be addressed urgently... in countries where public health institutions are being actively dismantled and public health leadership is increasingly paralysed by political ideology."

This is probably BS, but it misses the point anyway. I get statements from DHS all the time about “serious offenders” being deported, and it’s like a middle-aged mom of four whose small town loves her but she messed up once and got a theft conviction when she was 19.

Oh this poll is fascinating

The US has already largely ceded renewable energy manufacturing dominance to China, but now we also risk also falling behind on next generation clean energy: www.nytimes.com/2025...

Add to this that HSI just filed a declaration in our case challenging these policies saying they can’t trust REAL IDs as proof of status. So showing your papers isn’t even enough to end the stop.

👇👇👇👇

Since fish farms were closed on most of the inside pass of Vancouver Island, look at the amazing coho fishery recovery. Amazing to see!