tajhb.bsky.social

The man behind the all-powerful presidency

The New York Times is willing to say we’re “on the brink” of “the all-powerful presidency,” but it’s not willing to say Trump is building a dictatorship. The D word is too much for them.

Only in the 5th and 6th paragraphs do we get the perfectly innocent explanation that a member of the U.S. delegation inadvertently triggered the escalator stoppage. Yet Karoline Leavitt and Fox act like it’s an international incident. 2/2

NY Times: Trump’s $100,000 Visa Fee Spurs Confusion and Chaos The White House sought to clarify the proclamation on Saturday, but many companies remained cautious. “We are still flying in somewhat foggy conditions,” one attorney said.

Fortune: White House scrambles to clear up H-1B visa confusion after panic throws corporate America into chaos overnight

Politico: White House tries to tamp down corporate panic for high-skill visa holders after last-minute overhaul The Trump administration announced Friday that H-1B visas will now come with a $100,000 annual fee, but the White House says it will only apply to new visa applicants.

NDTV World headline: 'Return To US Within 24 Hours, Don't Leave': Meta, Microsoft To H-1B Visa Holders

Well-oiled machine. Only the best people. etc. etc.

Super great business environment.

The termination letter The Washington Post sent to @karenattiah.bsky.social is insane. They’re claiming that white men are a protected marginalized group

One thing about rights is that they only exist if you fight for them. If you just capitulate to authoritarian demands they are worthless.

Friends of the blog Citation Needed is part of a loose collective of independent publications that share a commitment to thoughtful, critical reporting. I encourage you to check them out, and consider supporting their wo...

as you cancel disney subscriptions, please remember to support your favorite independent media. there are amazing people doing critical work with very little support, and things are only getting harder.

here are some of my favorites: www.citationneeded.news/friends/. feel free to post yours below!

FBI to Categorize Trans People As "Nihilistic Violent Extremist" Threat Group, Report Says The choice is being championed by the Heritage Foundation, which is behind Project 2025.

Ok my cis friends, we are going to need a lot of you to step the fuck up and fight hard for us

www.them.us/story/trump-...

I stand with Jimmy Kimmel.

In other words, I am the *opposite* of his cowardly employer.

"Health losses attributed to anthropogenic climate change," a brief communication in the journal Nature Climate Change. There's a map showing regions of the world, and pie charts of relevant studies as they apply to different health impacts like "heat-related deaths" and "maternal and child health"

🚨 NEW: Climate change is already causing 30,000 deaths per year - a global annual economic loss of $100-350B USD - but the true damage is probably 10x higher. Out TODAY in Nature Climate Change: the first systematic look at the science of "health impact attribution" 🔓 www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Scheduling note I had missed: The Fifth Circuit has tentatively set the en banc rehearing arguments in the case over Texas's SB4 criminal immigration law for the week of January 19, 2026.

A 2-1 panel had affirmed the injunction earlier this summer: storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

To clear up some misinfo: Newsom has not approved the $750M loan, he committed to working on it. That means 2 things:

1. Our organizing is working — we got the loan from dead and gone to back in negotiation.

2. Keep fighting! Call Newsom and thank him for prioritizing transit at (916) 445-2841

@renzaro.com

You heard that right! BayPass is here, giving all UC Berkeley students unlimited, FREE access to public transit across all nine Bay Area counties. 🚆 Now you get to explore the whole Bay! Tag the frien... TikTok video by UC Berkeley

Wow! UC Berkeley students get free passes to what sounds like almost all Bay Area transit. Great synchronization of so many priorities www.tiktok.com/t/ZT6owrXGm/

The government is likely to prevail on plaintiffs' challenge to the validity of Executive Order No. 14163's suspension of refugee admissions, and we cannot engage in "a searching inquiry into the persuasiveness of the President's justifications." Hawaii, 585 U.S. at 686. "The sole prerequisite set forth in § 1182(f) is that the President 'find[]' that the entry of the covered aliens 'would be detrimental to the interests of the United States? The President has undoubtedly fulfilled that requirement here." Id. at 685. "[T]he language of § 1182(f) is clear, and the [Executive Order] does not exceed any textual limit on the President's authority," id. at 688, to suspend the "entry of ... any class of aliens into the United States," 8 U.S.C. § 1182(f). The remaining factors, touching upon both domestic and foreign interests of the United States, as determined by the "broad discretion" conferred on the President, Hawaii, 585 U.S. at 683-84, favor the United States as well.

For reasons to be explained in full in an opinion to follow, however, the government is not likely to prevail on at least one of plaintiffs' challenges under the APA. Under 8 U.S.C. § 1522, the government must provide certain reception and placement services to refugees after their admission into the United States. Section 1522(a)(1)(A) requires the Director of the Office of Refugee Resettlement-an 6 25-1313 Case: 25-1313, 09/12/2025, DktEntry: 149.1, Page 7 of 12 office within the Department of Health and Human Services"to the extent of available appropriations"-to: (i) make available sufficient resources for employment training and placement in order to achieve economic self-sufficiency among refugees as quickly as possible, i1) provide refugees with the opportunity to acquire sufficient English language training to enable them to become effectively resettled as quickly as possible, iii) insure that cash assistance is made available to refugees in such a manner as not to discourage their economic self-sufficiency, in accordance with subsection (e)(2), and (iv) insure that women have the same opportunities as men to participate in training and instruction.

In light of the government's uncertainty regarding its ability to provide the reception and placement services statutorily mandated under 8 U.S.C. § 1522, the government is hereby directed to reinstate such cooperative agreements necessary to provide the reception and placement services described in § 1522 to refugees who have been admitted to the United States. Such services shall include the usual and customary services that have been afforded such refugees under the prior cooperative agreements.

On Friday, on a 2-1 vote, a Ninth Circuit panel in a case challenging Trump's EO and policies to end the refugee resettlement program held:
* Trump is likely to win on stopping new refugee admissions
* Challengers likely to win on claim that services must be provided to those already in the U.S.

So where are we now, like 1940, 1941

👀👀👀

I can't help but see a pattern here.

A graph of long-term traffic levels in the UK since 1949. It's gone up. Lots.

A graphic showing that cars have got wider, and this leaves less space for road users including cyclists

"I cycled to school when I was a kid, and we didn't need fancy cycle lanes."

Yeah, but there's three times more traffic than there was in 1973..

Twice as many cars as there was in 1982..

..36% more traffic on urban minor roads than there was in 1994..

..and cars were *way* smaller, and lighter.

y'all I got up before the sun rose to tune into a press conference that told me charlie kirk was killed with a furry sex meme bullet

How Trump spread incitement of violence throughout the GOP Republican leaders have embraced a sinister tactic honed by the ex-president.

Republican leaders have embraced a sinister tactic honed by the president.
From 2022:

Trending Empathy 257k posts

Is it though?

Pardoned insurrectionists are using Charlie Kirk’s death to call for civil war “Charlie Kirk's assassination pulled me out of retirement. More work must be done.”

NEW @motherjones.com: Pardoned J6ers are using Kirk's killing to call for civil war

Stewart Rhodes will rebuild Oath Keepers; Proud Boys call for "retribution"; & ex-insurrectionists are coming "out of retirement."

Experts fear they could incite others to violence. W/ @kieraevebutler.bsky.social:

The saga of RFK Jr. and an Estonian vaccine skeptics conference Kennedy withdrew after the country’s Minister for Social Affairs reportedly called him “cuckoo in the head.”

Kennedy withdrew after the country’s Minister for Social Affairs reportedly called him “cuckoo in the head.”

The Department of WAR just lost four ships in the Gulf of AMERICA; triggered much, libs?

To be clear (and I know you know this, but for the fellow readers) contactless payment is not why the gates are slower. It is because Cubic, which runs Clipper, has continuously pushed faulty updates, failed to fix problems, and delayed the rollout of Clipper 2.0. MTC must seek accountability

ICYMI: You can now pay for BART with credit or debit cards or with mobile payment like Apple and Google Pay.

We talked with riders at SFO on launch day to get their thoughts!

Tonight at my commission a 12 (?) year old boy made his first-ever public comment. His arm in a sling, he talked about being hit by an SUV riding his bike earlier this week.

This kid was so young he asked to speak early because public comment was past his bedtime. We’ve completely failed our youth.

Trump stuns Washington with push to repeal debt ceiling With time running out to avert a government shutdown, the president-elect demanded that lawmakers lift the borrowing limit as well.

President-elect Donald Trump has stunned lawmakers in Washington by calling for the suspension — or outright elimination — of the federal borrowing limit.