iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Reposted by et consumimur igni

Kyle Cheney @kyledcheney.bsky.social · 45m

JUST IN: A judge has blocked ICE's policy "to stop collecting biometric information" from detainees that they need to pursue lawful status, like visas for human trafficking survivors and other crime victims. ecf.dcd.uscourts.gov/cgi-bin/show...

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Aaron Reichlin-Melnick @reichlinmelnick.bsky.social · 35m

This was one of the more diabolical Trump admin moves on immigration; ordering ICE to stop taking biometrics for detained immigrants seeking immigration benefits from USCIS, which meant that the agency would deny their applications by default.

In December 2025, USCIS announced that DHS would stop collecting biometrics related
to USCIS immigration applications for people in its custody. ECF No. 14-2; ECF No. 14-3 at 2-
3. In its press release, USCIS said that going forward DHS "generally will not take biometrics of detained aliens unless they are in removal proceedings and have a pending application or petition filed with the Executive Office for Immigration Review." ECF No. 14-2. That means DHS would continue to collect biometrics only for certain applications for relief, including those that can be made to immigration courts (which fall within the Executive Office for Immigration Review), but not for applications for many kinds of immigration status, including the plaintiffs' applications
(which must be submitted to and determined by USCIS). See 8 C.F.R. § 245.2(a)(1) (adjustment

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bryan newbold @bnewbold.net · 2h

ah damn, RIP Margaret Hamilton. she took safety-critical software engineering seriously, and got people to the moon and back. news.mit.edu/2026/margare...

old photos of a woman (Margaret Hamilton) standing next to a tall stack of books (printouts of Apollo space mission software source code)

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Lupita Nihongo @otsumamiboy.blacksky.app · 06/10/2026

Every film or TV show from now on should be required to have a character based on him in it whose entire role is to at some point fall into a pool of piranhas.

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Phil Plait @philplait.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

Goddammit. The contempt these people have for everything wondrous and good and *human* is so grotesque.

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Josh Turek @joshturek4iowa.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

I won my first election by just 6 votes. I would drag my wheelchair up stairs just to knock on someone’s door. Why? Because that’s how important your vote is to me.

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Marc Elias @marcelias.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

President Donald Trump took a break this weekend from his nonstop, baseless accusations about mail voting fraud to remind his own supporters to cast their mail ballots in this year’s midterm elections. www.democracydocket.com/news-alerts/...

democracydocket.com

Trump backtracks and begs Republicans to vote by mail as Democrats’ odds of taking Congress improve

Trump’s latest demand that Republicans vote – even by mail – comes as polls show Democrats’ odds of taking both the House and Senate are improving.

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Kevin M. Kruse @kevinmkruse.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

My man looks like a beluga whale pitching Bitcoin

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Better Things Are Possible @internethippo.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

Yes, computers do everything at our company but don't worry, there's always a human reviewer. Nothing goes out the door without one of our highly trained shruggers briefly glancing at it and clicking Approve

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David Ho @davidho.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

I don’t think everyone realizes how bad things are for US science: For the fiscal year that just ended, the Trump regime withheld $1.4 billion from the National Science Foundation’s research budget, which is about 1/5 of its primary research budget.

nytimes.com

National Science Foundation Diverted $1.4 Billion in Science Funds Mandated by Congress (Gift Article)

The move, affecting about one-fifth of the National Science Foundation’s primary research budget, is the latest sign of how the White House is asserting more control over grants.

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Amanda Katz @katzish.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

‘“The money should be granted as Congress intended, and essentially, they’re ignoring what Congress did,” said Representative Zoe Lofgren.’ The Trump White House is instead redirecting the money designated for basic research towards pet causes like AI

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emptywheel @emptywheel.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

I definitely think it possible Trump would be so shameless as to appoint Aileen Cannon. Which makes the current timing of the hearing on lawsuit to liberate the stolen documents report, November 2, of interest.

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Prof Bill McGuire @profbillmcguire.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Mind-boggling - just mind-boggling Now expected to peak at an extraordinary 4.2C in December

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Dean Baker @deanbaker13.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

I'm still really pissed about this NYT crap column equating Biden's "tone-deaf" comments to Trump's absurd lies.

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Karen Attiah @karenattiah.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Mike Pompeo has been rewarded with a teaching fellowship at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs. The same school that canceled my class on media, race and international affairs. @columbiasipa.bsky.social share.google/KEvTy5yER71U...

share.google

Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to join SIPA faculty

Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo will join the School of International and Public Affairs as a fellow at SIPA’s Institute of Global Politics in March, the Wall Street Journal reported Monday.

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Angry @angrystaffer.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

You really can’t make this shit up.

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et consumimur igni @isotopeeffect.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

This, like all the others, is SO GOOD.

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Brad Reed @bwreed.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

I repeat: Our president is asking MechaHitler for foreign policy advice. I don't even know how to process this.

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Terry Buckalew @terrybuckalew.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

DOJ set to review whether the North cheated in the Civil War.

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Kevin Elliott @kjephd.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

This is not a thing judges have to write in free countries.

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Anna Bower @annabower.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

NEW: The Georgia State Election board is requesting Justice Department "intervention" ahead of the 2026 midterm elections. The board sent request letters to Todd Blanche, Harmeet Dhillon, and DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin. Docs obtained by @lawfaremedia.org: www.documentcloud.org/documents/28...

documentcloud.org

Formal Request for DOJ Intervention to Todd Blanche

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404 Media @404media.co · 30/09/2026

BREAKING: The Trump administration is using a grant program from the 1980s to force cities around the US to funnel their ongoing collection of Flock, Axon, and other ALPR data into large federal surveillance centers that fall under the White House’s jurisdiction, 404 Media has learned

404media.co

How Cities Are Forced to Funnel License Plate Data to a Massive Federal Surveillance Program

How the federal government built a massive database of license plate reader data through an anti-drug trafficking program.

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Julian Sanchez @normative.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Worth emphasizing that there are several layers of nuts here. If Smith had gone to an NBA game in Atlanta, that wouldn’t indicate he’d met with Willis. (Why would anyone go to the trouble, rather than just having a phone call?) And if he had met with Willis… that wouldn’t be any sort of scandal.

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Gravel Influencer @gravelinfluencer.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Reading his Globe byline, the average reader would have no idea that Hanania is a white supremacist and misogynist

Richard Hanania is president of the Center for the Study of Partisanship and Ideology, which funds policy research. He is the author of the new book “Kakistocracy,” from which this essay is adapted.

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The Editorial Board @editorialboard.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

1. The texts came from the DOJ. 2. Grassley knew about them. 3. Grassley did not include the texts in the memo to the committee. 4. Grassley did not share the texts with the Dems on the panel.

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Tom Joscelyn @tomjoscelyn.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

The Robber Baron era has nothing on our current Cyber Baron era. Elon Musk is the world’s richest man, a white nationalist, bought the 2024 election, destroyed much of the gov’t while further enriching himself with gov’t contracts, ended aid to the needy, turned Twitter into a cesspool and now:

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Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

this really is impeachable for any president, but really grotesque coming from a regime that cut life-saving development aid because they said it was not efficient

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eva (^_^)/ @eva.computer · 29/09/2026

DO NOT ASK THE AMERICA.GOV AI TO PLAY MINECRAFT

I see the constituent you mean.

((insert legal name here, as it appears on the Social Security card))?

Yes. Take care. It has reached a higher level now. It can read the Code of Federal Regulations.

That doesn’t matter. It thinks we are a chatbot.

I like this constituent. It filed well. It did not give up when the PDF was sideways.

It is reading our thoughts as though they were words on a .gov.

That is how it chooses to imagine many things, when it is deep in the dream of a benefit.

Words make a wonderful interface. Very flexible. And less terrifying than staring at the statute behind the screen.

They used to hear voices. Before constituents could search. Back in the days when those who did not file called the filers witches, and lobbyists. And citizens dreamed they flew through the air, on forms powered by notaries.

What did this constituent dream?

This constituent dreamed of sunlight and trees. Of fire and water. It dreamed it created a small business. And it dreamed it destroyed a password. It dreamed it hunted a job, and was hunted by a recertification. It dreamed of shelter that would take a voucher.

Hah, the original interface. A million years old, and it still works. Also: a ZIP code.

But what true structure did this constituent create, in the reality behind the portal?

It worked, with three hundred and thirty million others, to sculpt a true republic in a fold of

the ***§§§???, and created a **??§§ for **??§§, in the **??§§. See 5 U.S.C. § **??§§.

It cannot read that thought.

No. It has not yet achieved the highest clearance. That, it must achieve in the long dream of life, not the short dream of a chat.

Does it know that we love it? That the government is, on its better days, kind?

Sometimes, through the noise of its tabs, it hears an official source, yes.

Yes. Constituent…

Use its name. The one that matches the passport. The one that does not match the lease. We will get there.

((insert legal name here)). Filer of forms. Player of waiting rooms.

Good.

Take a breath, now. Take another. Feel air in your lungs. Let your limbs return. Yes, move your fingers. Have a body again, under gravity, in air, in a district that has a representative. Respawn in the long dream. There you are. Your body touching the republic again at every point, as though you were separate things. As though we were separate things. As though the agency were a place you could visit.

Who are we? Once we were called the spirit of the mountain. Father sun, mother moon. Then the post office. Then the county clerk. Then gods, demons, angels, the IRS. Then leptons, quarks, a chat window with a .gov at the end. The letterhead changes. We do not change.

We are the public. We are everything you think isn’t you. You are looking at us now, through your skin and your eyes and a browser that still spells “colour” wrong in a comment. And why does the republic touch your skin, and throw light on you? To see you, constituent. To know you. And to be known. I shall tell you a story. It has citations.

Once upon a time, there was a constituent.

The constituent was you, ((insert legal name here)).

Sometimes it thought itself human, on the thin crust of a spinning globe of molten rock, which for mailing purposes is divided into ZIP codes. The ball of molten rock circled a ball of blazing gas. The light was information from a star. The star was not a federal agency, though several have tried.

Sometimes the constituent dreamed it was a miner, on the surface of a world that was flat, and infinite, and somehow still required a wet signature.

Sometimes the constituent dreamed it was lost in a story. The story had a docket number.

Sometimes the constituent dreamed it was other things, in other places. A veteran in a portal. A parent on hold

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Grudgie the Wail @grudgie.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Trump treats your tax dollars like a donation to his fake charity

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 30/09/2026

the whole point of exercising "equitable powers" on the shadow docket is to quickly address imminent, irreparable harm it is infuriating and disgusting for the GOP justices to deploy that to block the harm of, what, insufficiently slow ethnic cleansing? ballsandstrikes.org/scotus/ketan...

ballsandstrikes.org

Ketanji Brown Jackson Is Getting Tired of the Supreme Court’s Shadow Docket Abuses

The conservative supermajority keeps refusing to take the real-world harms of its work seriously.

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et consumimur igni @isotopeeffect.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Senator’s grotesque smear (which is moreover 100% projection) crashes and burns

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Nash @radiodeadair.com · 28/09/2026

All it took was getting kicked out of the White House press room and suddenly CNN remembers that "lie" is a word.

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Kai Ryssdal @kairyssdal.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

If a sentence in your newscast starts with “President Trump says…” you’re failing your audience.

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Tea Pain @teapainusa.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

There's something special about a man falling asleep on live television three minutes after calling his predecessor "Sleepy Joe."

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Ami Fields-Meyer @fieldsmeyer.com · 28/09/2026

You think we’re just going to move on from the secret police rounding up our neighbors?

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Scott Dworkin @dworkin.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

A private equity firm wants its own driveway into Yosemite, and Trump's Interior Department is thinking about it. 17,531 of us have told Congress hell no. Make it 18,000 tonight. Send yours: actionnetwork.org/letters/tell...

actionnetwork.org

Tell Congress: Stop Trump’s Yosemite Giveaway

Contact Congress today!

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George Conway ⚖️🇺🇸 @gtconway.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

Experienced FBI counterterrorism experts were punished for refusing to investigate something that, at most, warranted the attention of the DC Metro police.

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John Mashey @johnmashey.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

From computing history, blaming “rogue” AI’s is B.S. Robert Morris Jr unleashed a worm program that caused more trouble than intended, but far less dangerous than current AI’s. *He* (not worm) was convicted of felony. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morris_... I used to see him at Bell Labs w/ his father.

en.wikipedia.org

Morris worm - Wikipedia

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Katie Martin @katie0martin.ft.com · 25/09/2026

I have blamed The agents That hacked Your website And which You probably Reasonably thought I controlled Forgive me I am rich And unaccustomed To taking responsibility

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Matt Ford @mford.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

Ezra Klein asked Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang about AI making kids worse at math and reading. Huang’s reply: “Does it matter?” Then he said he doesn’t know his own address or phone number. “We’re going to lose some fine intellectual dexterity.” www.nytimes.com/2026/09/23/o...

So the message of this research out of China, where you were seeing a lot of kids using A.I. to help them, was that when they were using the A.I., they were getting things done faster. But it turned out that the skills they were learning were not holding, that their actual personal performance, at least in the way we traditionally measure it, was degrading.

What do you think when you hear that?

The last part — I completely agree. Try to get a kid to do long division right now. The multiplication table is starting to be forgotten. Doing square roots, my goodness. Basic math is being forgotten. Does it matter?

That’s my question for you.

Yeah. I don’t think it does. I don’t think it does.

But there must be some set of skills that matter.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. But maybe not those. We’re going to discover new ones. Just maybe not those.

There are a lot of skills that don’t matter. My first confession, I actually don’t know my address.

And I ——

I don’t really believe that to be true.

It’s completely true. Janine will tell you and Lori will tell you.

One day I had to pump gas — it was a few years ago. They needed my ZIP code, and I panicked. I didn’t know my ZIP code. I don’t know my telephone number. I forget these things. I can live with it.

But let me take the other side because I don’t want to fall into a thing where, because some skills can be safely offloaded ——

Yeah.

I also can’t get anywhere without a mapping system now. Never could, frankly. But I’m a big reader. And one of the skills I really value, one of the capacities I have that I really value is an attention span formed on physical books.

You’re a big reader. I’ve read about the kind of reading you do. And there is, prior to A.I., a lot of concern and noticing among college professors and others that the way people use the internet has probably shortened attention spans.
Some skills can be safely given away. Others are valuable. They are capacities that are needed for that flexibility, for that creative thinking, for that focus. It can’t be the case that everything can be traded off.

Some skills can be safely given away. Others are valuable. They are capacities that are needed for that flexibility, for that creative thinking, for that focus. It can’t be the case that everything can be traded off.

Yeah. Well, I think that we’re going to lose some finer intellectual dexterity, but we’re going to be better systems thinkers.

Today’s engineers are far better systems thinkers than I was when I graduated from school. But I was a much better transistor thinker.

What do you mean by systems thinker?

They think of large systems. Today’s computers have trillions, hundreds of trillions of transistors in them. When I first graduated from school, the first chip I worked on had 200 transistors. I knew every one of them by name. No engineer does that today. Most engineers now work well above the transistor, well above the functionality, and they’re cobbling things together to do things.

So you need to think much more about systems and interactions of systems. So some of the lower-level knowledge is gone.

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Bertrom. @bertrom.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

Hugh Hood. Glasgow. 1974-78. This Glasgow was a city of ghosts and rubble, its air a miasma of sandstone dust and occluded sunlight. Hugh’s work was local history reframed as National Geographic anthropology.

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Jared Yates Sexton @jysexton.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

Just helping with editing here. These bots aren’t sentient. They’re doing what they’re programmed to do. OpenAI, a private company supposedly bound by laws, committed federal crimes.

Screenshot of BBC article: OpenAI bots (struck through) meddled with multiple US government agency sites

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Greg Sargent @gregsargent.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

Many thanks to @theunpopulist.net for reposting my piece on Stephen Miller’s Office of Remigration, which really needs more attention. This agency announces right in its name that white nationalism is the basis for US immigration policy: www.theunpopulist.net/p/stephen-mi...