Many of the people who talk up "Heritage Americanism" today are descendants of people -- Jews, Irishmen, Italians -- who were abominated by the "Heritage Americans" of an earlier time. The Know Nothings and their kin decried the new arrivals as unfit for American life. On it goes.

Russia’s public officials/influencers competing for the employee of the month title

The problem with their warning that Europe faces “civilisational erasure” is that right now, it is the US that faces civilisational erasure ✏️ @alastaircampbell2.bsky.social

Google advises some employees on visas, including H-1B visas, not to travel outside the US due to processing delays, following new social media screening rules (Business Insider) Main Link | Techmeme Permalink

Looks like they're right. Data Set 1 / Photo 468, the image from yesterday's Epstein files release that included photos of Trump in a drawer, was removed.

CATO INSTITUTE: Despite DOGE slashing jobs, government spending in every month of 2025 “was greater than in every other year .. An observer who did not know when DOGE started could not identify it” on a chart. 🤡 www.cato.org/blog/doge-pr...

Fatigue, joint pain, rashes, brain fog or tingling in the hands and feet can seem like normal signs of aging—but they may also point to an autoimmune disease. 🔗: on.wsj.com/4aVx5rX

FT defends London, one of the greatest cities in the world www.ft.com/content/dd79...

“We encouraged people to be proud bigoted assholes about 50% of things but they became proud bigoted assholes about 80% of things. This is the fault of the Democrats party.” By Ben Shapiro and Vivek Ramaswamy.

Delaware high court reinstates Musk’s $56bn Tesla pay package ft.trib.al/cYE51Y1

#NYgov @politico.com www.politico.com/news/2025/12...

still thinking about how this guy was critically responsible for this shit and is now like oh nooooo

The US has allowed sanctioned Russian banks to provide financing for the construction by Rosatom of the Hungarian nuclear power plant project Paks-2. www.kommersant.ru/doc/8294524

The Norwegian Defence Research Establishment has just released a report on strengthening the resilience of the power grid, with some recommended actions and priorities. www.ffi.no/aktuelt/nyhe...

Here's a quick reminder of the composition of the economy of countries that are all too often perceived as agricultural: Italy: 65.6% services, 21.7% industry - 2% agriculture France: 70.4% services, 17.5% industry - 1.4% agriculture Austria: 65.3% services, 23.1% industry - 1.2% agriculture

Gift link, probably the funniest thing the Wall Street Journal has done this year.

An inevitable outcome of monetizing social media content and prioritising engagement

New EU law shifting EU funding towards defence adopted www.consilium.europa.eu/en/press/pre...

Crucial piece for those attending today's European Council. Belgium's worries about using Russian assets to support Ukraine don't hold up; even if they did, throwing UA under the bus would be the wrong solution - catastrophic not just for UA but for the rest of Europe.

About the Belgium concerns…

Moscow had 3 years to prepare retaliation for an eventuality where the EU uses the frozen assets to fund Ukraine. Now FT reports Moscow has not revealed yet what steps it might take and officials are looking into X Y Z. Years of prep and that's it - so there are no options?

"Among those granted clemency was Jared Wise, a former FBI agent himself. According to bodycam footage submitted in court, Wise urged rioters to kill police during the Capitol siege. Wise now serves in the Trump administration." www.reuters.com/investigatio...

"I understand Belgium is under a lot of pressure from Russia...but also from the United States" says @KajaKallas "In order to get off that pressure we should have a European proposal. Then 🇧🇪 will just abide by the law, and whoever has any concerns can go to court against 🇪🇺"

The choice EU leaders face today is not the reparations loan vs. "Eurobonds". The choice is agreeing on a workable solution that rapidly gives a lot of money to Ukraine vs. going back to the drawing board with no clear idea where to go next while Ukraine's money is running out. Should be obvious.

Putin said Russia will not back down from its mission to “liberate its historic lands” and predicted the European “swine” backing Kyiv would ultimately lose power, in a speech that showed no readiness to compromise on the goals for his invasion of Ukraine. w/ @maxseddon.bsky.social @henryjfoy.ft.com

When China’s rulers ordered tens of thousands of soldiers to crush pro-democracy demonstrations in Beijing in 1989, Gen. Xu Qinxian was the commander who famously said no. Now, leaked video from his court-martial was posted online. nyti.ms/48Ho706

If you're God's gift to the country, at some point you should have something more than excuses to show for it. Right?

Inside the ‘industrial scale’ Trump pardon machine ft.trib.al/stfL2xH

No. No. No! This is critical research. It's not even centered on climate. It's solar physics! It's geomagnetic storms! It's space weather! It's sunspots! It's a research center needed for satellites and spaceflight!

Popular supplements with billions of “good” microbes really help only a few illnesses, research shows

NEW: Pardoned January 6 rioters have been advising Justice Department officials how to pursue – and perhaps prosecute – the very prosecutors who helped put them behind bars. www.reuters.com/investigatio...

Starmer had a lot of opportunities (Vance Munich speech, Zelensky White House bustup, etc) to make the case for a real increase in UK defence spending, but he just doesn't want to do it.

"I asked Putin to please try to scare us"

Sentences we read these days: "Russian troops launched a motorized infantry assault... ... with 16 quadbikes" The most mechanized army in the world, ladies and gentlemen.

Doing non-causal inference (and being explicit about it), yet using a causal word as second word in the title. If you pay Nature € 10.690, they will publish this in Nature Ageing. I can tell you what I think of that for free. www.nature.com/articles/s43...

Looks like Elon is now following the EU laws

UK launches foreign interference probe after ex-MEP jailed over Russian bribes

Europe's nighttime glow from space 🌍 This first colour mosaic of the continent at night was created from 7000+ pictures taken by astronauts on the International Space Station. www.esa.int/ESA_Multimed...

UK to rejoin EU’s Erasmus student exchange programme

I’m just going to leave this one here.

Hearing this is payback for Colorado not honoring Trump/Peters ‘pardon’

Inside Mark Zuckerberg’s turbulent bet on AI ft.trib.al/B0tAM57

The hypocrisy of US complaints over X fine ft.trib.al/Ra8lM0y | opinion

Great thread. The Swiss are figuring out what we did 80 years ago: - Protection by geography can be made irrelevant by technological change - It is too late to plan for assistance when you are under attack (- Pretending to be non-aligned/neutral is probably the worst of all solutions)

Two legal opinions prepared by international lawyers contradict Belgium's claim it could be on the hook to pay substantial damages if the EU moves ahead with plans to use Russia's frozen assets to help Ukraine.

The funniest thing about the public debt of Finland that has reached quite an alarming level is that Norway could just pay it off and earn it back in a year or so. I think it’s time for us to proceed with the plan to invade Norway, immediately surrender and become a Norwegian province

Hilarious. The WH had all the Cabinet members simultaneously put out statements supporting Susie Wiles after the Vanity Fair article came out.

If we can't even identify our enemies then how can we fight them? Trump's National Security Strategy is the longest suicide note in American history www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2025/1...

But of course