Andrew Farrand

Algerian Ambassador to the UN speaking after UNSC vote on MINURSO mandate, 31 October 2025

Algerian Amb. Bendjama quotes Woodrow Wilson in his speech on occasion of Western Sahara vote at UN Sec Council:

"Self-determination is not a mere phrase. It is an imperative principle of action, which statesmen will henceforth ignore at their peril."

How rewetting peatlands could help protect EU borders – DW – 10/30/2025 Finland and Poland are considering rewetting drained peatlands as a defense barrier in case of a Russian attack. It could also help the climate.

Europe looks to adopt a 'quagmire defense'

One of the 2 people pictured here is indeed mostly artificial (and it's not the hero on the right)

bUt kiM's SuCh a gReAt eNtRepRenEuR ...

We had a good run! (for like a few years there in the 20th century)

30 minutes until the UNSC vote on #WesternSahara

American politics, explained

that's because "AI literacy" is an oxymoron. off-loading your brain to a sycophantic prediction machine wrecks your brain. it's like "seated running"

What really happened:

Trump imposed artificial trade barriers to gain leverage in negotiations, so Xi did too. Now they've met and agreed to partly walk them back.

Nobody has won here.

Investors and consumers get a modest rollback in trade barriers, but the underlying (il)logic remains in place.

The global boom in solar — with or without the US Despite the scepticism about renewables in Washington, falling prices for new panels are making a compelling business case around the world

"In 2010, the IEA estimated that there would be 410 GW of solar panels installed around the world by 2035. There is already more than 4 times that capacity, with about half of it in China."

But with so much of this capacity coming as "addition" rather than "transition," climate gains are limited.

Le Monde headline: "Western Sahara: US goes on offensive at UN to defend autonomy under Moroccan sovereignty"

You cannot have autonomy under someone else's sovereignty.

My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings. Look on my works and let me know if you have any questions! 🤗

'original painting on paper' view looking up at the intersecting angles of stone steps, railing, and line of manicured trees in winter

Frédéric Forest

Paris - 1
January
2024

Ukraine Has a Plan for Victory. Its Allies Don’t. Ukraine is about to suffer its most brutal winter since Russia invaded in 2022. That isn’t a risk but a certainty as both sides sense they’re blocked on the ground and focus on the long-range air war....

Putin has a plan for victory, and Kyiv has a plan to survive it. I returned to Ukraine to see what that is and how much it depends on inconstant allies. My column for Bloomberg
@opinion
shorturl.at/N9JPi

Opinion | A Nazi Tattoo Exposes Democrats’ Greatest Weakness

"The conceit at the heart of that belief is that poor white people are too racist, and too uniquely ignorant of their racism, to vote in their best interests. Therefore, Democrats have to accept a little racism to win the working class."

@tressiemcphd.bsky.social pushes back on Platner apologists:

Unprecedented corruption:

Trump's "family raked in more than $800 million from sales of crypto assets in the first half of 2025 alone, a Reuters examination found, on top of potentially billions more in unrealized 'on paper' gains. Much of that cash has come from foreign sources"

It's fun how enshittification is driven by two quite distinct forces, the comprehensible one where websites are run for profit and so they try to maximize engagement and thus ad revenue rather than providing a good service, and the incomprehensible one where they just want to put AI into everything

I've talked before about power struggles within hardening authoritarianism. Usually, regime supporters fight over using rule-of-law in crackdowns (with massive abuses, of course) vs. completely embracing extrajudicial methods. Here, we see the latter dominating. Which is very bad news going forward.

The 37 ballroom donors won’t be remembered for generosity, but for funding a monument to authoritarian vanity during a shutdown, at a venue nicknamed after a sex trafficker, while Americans wonder how they’ll eat. History keeps receipts & their names aren’t coming off those walls

Opinion | What Happened in Gaza Might Be Even Worse Than We Think

"After all, it is a catastrophe funded by our money, made possible by our weapons, condoned by our government and carried out by one of our closest allies. It’s little wonder that some want to downplay the damage."

This is a murder masquerading as a book review 😂 and well deserved, it appears

Ugh, Mercator 🙄

Image of the mechanical ladder outside the Louvre Text below says WENN'S MAL WIEDER SCHNELL GEHEN MUSS (When you need to move fast) Underneath is more German text which translates as "The Böcker Agilo transports your treasures weighing up to 400kg at 42m/min - quiet as a whisper."

The German company that makes the mechanical ladder used in the Louvre heist has used the image to advertise, with the text 'When you need to move fast'

10/10 response, no notes

Accept no substitutes!

If a temporary resident of the White House can totally demolish the East Wing to build a gaudy ballroom, without any authority, approval, or regulation, he can tear down the rest of the White House to build a Walmart. That this destruction is allowed underscores how off the rails our country is now.

When you're too focused on elite cowardice to notice normie courage

Trump Is Wasting No Time in Tearing Down the East Wing

It is shocking that Trump is quickly tearing down a portion of the White House. But isn’t the bigger story that this action is of a piece with his autocratic presumption that he can unilaterally destroy public goods without any public consultation or explanation?
www.nytimes.com/2025/10/22/u...

We Will Tear Down the Trump Palace Ballroom and Casino Thinking like a dissident movement.

“It is important to demonstrate that authoritarian gains are not permanent. That liberal society has the will to undo their grotesqueries.
Demolishing the Trump ballroom and restoring the East Wing will be symbolic. But symbolism matters to authoritarians.”

www.thebulwark.com/p/we-will-te...

FDR Memorial, Washington DC.

-RIP East Wing-

Sequoia COO quit over Shaun Maguire’s comments about Mamdani Sumaiya Balbale left the venture firm after it decided not to discipline outspoken investor for posts about New York mayoral candidate

Kudos to her for reminding Silicon Valley that bigotry has real costs - a lesson they'd rather forget these days.

And good luck to Sequoia ever raising more Gulf cash...