Finally found the time to digest the Energy White Paper properly. Here is the slowest hot take ever (thread).

TL;DR: The WP (rightly) mainly focuses on progressing some chunky tech decisions. It also reveals several emerging faultlines that still need to to be resolved...

Big clean power tech delivery: delighted to see moves on nuclear, CCUS, offshore wind (inc. floating), building on announcements in the 10-point plan. We are going to need a bucket-load of low carbon power. So moving into negotiations with EDF on Sizewell very welcome step.

Progress on CCUS, particularly industrial clusters (already announced in 10-point plan) is also excellent news. Politics and industry now much better aligned than 5 years ago when second competition canned. Positive also to see BECCS feature, a potentially important technology.

The commitment to greater openness in modelling is also a real shift that will lead to better policymaking. As the White Paper said: "[Ensure HMG models/data are] open to all and trusted by the department and wider stakeholders." Geeks of the energy world rejoice...

This includes once again publishing clear information on prices and bills (I confess I may have played a part in its disappearance). Think tankers should be happy (I ruthlessly mined it for stories/papers when @Policy_Exchange)

Good morning and Happy #Festivus. Today we will air some more grievances in the holiday tradition!

I’ll throw in a new wrinkle this year because SO MANY people are joining in with my grievances that I want to highlight how the word is spreading — your government is out of control, and a LOT of us have grievances.

We will talk about Congress, Petty Tyrants all over, foreign aid, wasteful spending, science denying “experts” and other holiday goodies.This is not the time for holiday cheer! That’s for TOMORROW, AFTER we air our grievances.

Later, for feats of strength, we will see who can lift with one hand the 5593 page monstrosity of a bill Congress just passed. Good luck!

I’ll start where everyone in American should begin with their grievances. Congress. Oh, Congress, where to even begin.

Trying to get my husband a Christmas present: a thread.

My husband is very hard to shop for. He is quite particular and buys everything he wants for himself anyway. But THIS year, he mentioned one thing one time, and it was perfect. All-weather mats for the Jeep. Great!

I'm texting the whole family like I'm pitching a multi-level marketing scheme. I am offering YOU the opportunity to get in on the ground floor and sponsor a floor mat and finally get this man something he actually needs and wants. Let me take this off your Christmas plate.

I have my friend @okmaher order the mats for me so it doesn't show up on the credit card. Oh, we are so clever! Surely, the mats will arrive at my home in a nondescript box just like every other Christmastime order!

Car dealership: Pulls up to the house, knocks on the door, and hands my husband a clear plastic bag full of cargo liner and floor mats. For those who do not know me, I am very invested in surprises, and clearly I need better op-sec. This was a stroke of bad luck.

But I have another Christmas present idea. And this one is EPIC. For those who don't know my story, I was married before, for 4 years to my 1st husband, Jake, who passed away suddenly in 2015. We had a beautiful, sassy 2-year-old daughter and I was pregnant with our second.

Long Thread:
Debunking the myth of Rajputs saving Hinduism(from islamic iconoclasts) in Odisha.
In last few days there are some people who are trying to selectively quote few things and create an impression that Rajputs saved Odisha from iconoclastic muslims 1/n

To discuss this specific issue I will analyse various available information from beginning of islamic rule in India till d period of start of Maratha rule in Odisha(from 1193 to 1751). In dis I will cover the question of Rajputs safeguarding hindu cause in Odisha as well. 2/n

Muslims started ruling in India after the fall of Prithviraj Chauhan. It is to the credit of Rajputs and other Indian kingdoms who stopped the islamic armies for centuries. But, finally they lost and by around 1200 they reached near the border of Odisha. 3/n

after d fall of Sena Dynasty they took Bengal into their control. Their next target ws Odisha, d next door neighbour. So, frm around 1200 till around 1570 for almost 370 years muslims from Bengal either as independent rulers or under sultanate of Delhi did multiple invasion s 4/n

of Odisha from northern side. Along with that another muslim kingdom of Jaunpur (eastern UP) also had multiple invasion of Odisha. In the eastern side obviously due to bay of Bengal, there weren't any land invasion. But, there are theories that invaders from 5/n

NEW SCOOP from @zachsdorfman: China's Ministry of State Security has demanded that private Chinese companies, including Baidu and Alibaba, help them process stolen U.S. data, such as from the OPM hack, U.S. intelligence officials

Zach writes, "In what amounts to intelligence tasking, China’s spy services order private Chinese companies with big-data analytics capabilities to process massive sets of information that have intelligence value, according to current and former officials."

“Just imagine on any given day, if NSA and CIA are collecting information, say, on the [Chinese military], and we could bring back seven, eight, 10, 15 petabytes of data, give it to Google or Amazon or Microsoft, and say, ‘Hey, we want all these analytics," said one official.

It's hard to overestimate the significance of this intelligence assessment.

There has been speculation that Baidu, Alibaba, and Tencent might have ties to China's security state. In fact, they work directly with them and for them—because they have to. According to US intel.

If you have been enjoying this series of scoops from @zachsdorfman, also take some time in your day to appreciate the skill and dedication that FP editor @BeijingPalmer has put into them.

20 life lessons every father must teach his son

=THREAD=

1. Self-Respect is paramount

Without self-respect, nothing else in life is possible. Discipline, integrity, work ethic, values: they're all made possible through self-respect. Guide your actions with the question “What would a self-respecting man do?” Then do that thing.

2. Everything must be earned

You are owed nothing. The world will rightly treat you as such. You must believe you are capable, and you must believe you WILL achieve your goals. But you must never rely on others to do the work for you. If you don't earn it, it isn't really yours.

3. People are ultimately self-interested

People will behave in whatever way is most expedient for them. It isn’t right or wrong, it’s just true. People want their problems solved, and they want to feel good. Give them those things and you’ll never be wanting.

4. Compounding powers the world

Success is the result of your daily actions. The effort you put in today, whatever the endeavor, will build on itself over time. Investment, strength, knowledge, the rules are the same: 1% of 100 is much less than 1% of 1,000,000.

The right have attacked the Green New Deal on the grounds that it will hurt economic growth. In response, the left have defended it by saying it will *increase* growth. And maybe it will. But taking this approach is a bad strategy for a number of reasons:

1. If the GND *does* generate growth, that will drive aggregate resource use and energy demand up, and therefore make it paradoxically more difficult (and probably unfeasible) to decarbonize the economy in the short time we have left.

2. Clean energy infrastructure requires material extraction (for solar panels, wind turbines, batteries, etc). More energy demand means more extractivism, which will have significant social and ecological impacts - on global South communities in particular.

3. Climate change is not our only problem. More growth means more resource use, which means rising ecological impacts across all other planetary boundaries. (See:

4. All sorts of regressive social and ecological policy is justified in the name of growth, including cuts to labour standards and environmental regulations. When we affirm growth as the ultimate objective, we play into the hands of neoliberals.

Doha links to Muslim Brotherhood. The Saudis want Qatar to end all financial support for the Muslim Brotherhood, which the kingdom has labeled a terrorist organization but Qatar is still doing business with MOUs to work with Doha.

The Doha Bank has a Toronto branch and were looking to expand Canadian branches.

Brookfield Asset Management and Doha connected with Brookfield Property Partners (BPY). Through a sovereign wealth fund, Doha holds $1.8bn worth of BPY and Qatar can force Brookfield Asset Management to buy them back for $1.8bn over the next 6 years.

Qatari funds ended up in a billion-dollar rescue by Brookfield Asset Management for a company directly tied to Jared Kushner.

Among the areas of focus identified by US Congressional investigators is Brookfield’s decision to pay nearly a century of rent in advance when it leased 666 Fifth Avenue in 2018, months before the Kushner mortgage fell due.

The army is doing a better job of fighting Boko Haram in the northeast, especially Borno state. The Islamic terrorists continue disrupting commerce in Borno state by attacking road traffic and occasionally even army bases. The army has set up a convoy system and even these

escorted convoys are attacked. Boko Haram continues to raid rural towns and villages for supplies and prisoners. The captured civilians are either convinced (if they are teenage boys) to join the fight or used as slaves. This was especially the case when Boko Haram took large

numbers of teenagers from rural boarding schools. Criminal gangs are now trying mass kidnapping and demanding ransoms.

Despite the heavy losses, the two major Boko Haram factions continue to operate, raise money and attract new recruits.

The larger faction is also called ISWAP and it is the cause of most of the violence near Lake Chad. The two factions have fought each other in the past but in the last two years appear to have established some form of ceasefire and an effort to stay out of each other’s way.

But there seem to be growing competition between various criminal groups. Boko Haram released a video showing some kidnapped boys and offered to negotiate. It turned out that Boko Haram was not involved but was trying to benefit from the incident before it was resolved.

[thread]

I want to write a thread with a simple theme

One from a sad day four years ago

We all have more in common

There are people who want divisive culture wars

And those who don't

Pick a side

Actually scrub that

Imagine there are no

Now I am going to make it clear at the start

I did not vote for Boris Johnson

I did not vote for Brexit

I did vote for Yes in 2014 for Scotland (although I am undecided how I may vote in any future choice)

I did vote to scrap FPTP

So as befits a Scot

I am a loser

I have "sucked up" all my losses

But

I want Boris Johnson and his party to succeed in their manifesto

I want Brexit to succeed

Within the manifesto's and campaigns they promised much

And I want them to simply deliver that

23 December 2020 #MAGAanalysis #PenceCard

If By Any Other Means...

First a nod to my new friend, @HeloProcurement, Don The Pleb. You'll enjoy the show we did last night, and it's meditating on our conversation that led to today's

An "Aquarium" needs cleaning in my opinion, but who am I, a mere monkey, to give advice?
Astonished at what @bellingcat discovered about GRU & FSB operations
Skripal https://t.co/PzH3a7JZvy
Navalny https://t.co/eZi63UhWw1
FSB https://t.co/sViYk9RwmB
GRU https://t.co/MY5d5gw2OG

A great post by Ilya Yahin on

Every time Putin talks about “our special services,” his signature smirk appears on his face, and in his words there is poorly concealed bragging
"Of course, we knew everything in advance"
"Yes, we are looking"
"Mercader has already been sent"
“World-class professionals”

Putin clearly loves all these spy games. He is very proud of the special services and therefore endlessly increases budget funding for them.
This is his top priority.
The elderly dictator cannot understand one thing:

there are no effective special services in a state that is completely corroded by corruption. You won't have honest professionals at your fingertips if your son-in-law buys shares of a state company for $ 100, the real value of which exceeds $ 380 million.