@simansfield.bsky.social
Kinda into transit, politics, nature, maps, technology, architecture, proto-futureism, touching rocks
maybe I'll use this / maybe I wont 🤷
📍west yorks
maybe I'll use this / maybe I wont 🤷
📍west yorks
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It continues to be a bad failure that essentially there's a policy debate that is obvious to you if you read a business newspaper OR the gov dot uk website or the MI5 threat update OR a decent policy Substack is basically invisible on the BBC and in 90 per cent of Commons debates.
Maybe we can, oh I dunno, start to have a conversation with voters about this? The problem is not going to go away.
The way politics is being conducted by both the tories and Labour seems surreal to me. We have a lunatic in the WH who simply cannot be relied on to be an ally, indeed the opposite, we need to spend a ton of cash on defence and no-one seems to think voters might need to be, er, readied for all this
January 18, 2026 at 1:54 PM
It continues to be a bad failure that essentially there's a policy debate that is obvious to you if you read a business newspaper OR the gov dot uk website or the MI5 threat update OR a decent policy Substack is basically invisible on the BBC and in 90 per cent of Commons debates.
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What Europe could do is threaten to boycott the World Cup. It won't. But that might actually work. Trump wants his big show.
January 17, 2026 at 6:51 PM
What Europe could do is threaten to boycott the World Cup. It won't. But that might actually work. Trump wants his big show.
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Jesus Christ, we're still 3 days shy of it being one full year 🫠
January 17, 2026 at 7:48 PM
Jesus Christ, we're still 3 days shy of it being one full year 🫠
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I love that Wikipedia's edit history is public because it only takes two clicks to get to the very first version of the "ant" article in its entirety from 2001. Happy 25th birthday Wikipedia! You've come so far
January 15, 2026 at 9:17 PM
I love that Wikipedia's edit history is public because it only takes two clicks to get to the very first version of the "ant" article in its entirety from 2001. Happy 25th birthday Wikipedia! You've come so far
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The single biggest thing (in cost terms) I’ve changed my mind about is UK tuition fees. Dreadful system, need to scrap it.
This is clearly depressing and radicalising in a way a tax wouldn't have been.
January 15, 2026 at 5:30 PM
The single biggest thing (in cost terms) I’ve changed my mind about is UK tuition fees. Dreadful system, need to scrap it.
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I’ve started using the term “ethnic cleansing campaign” to describe the ICE occupation here in Minnesota. This is deliberate because the reality on the ground is that, at a given moment, any non-white person can be kidnapped by masked federal paramilitaries regardless of their constitutional rights.
January 15, 2026 at 3:22 PM
I’ve started using the term “ethnic cleansing campaign” to describe the ICE occupation here in Minnesota. This is deliberate because the reality on the ground is that, at a given moment, any non-white person can be kidnapped by masked federal paramilitaries regardless of their constitutional rights.
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Jenrick saying he's "put aside personal ambition" too join Reform is the single most shameless statement I've ever heard.
If he "put aside personal ambition" he'd disappear. That's all there is.
If he "put aside personal ambition" he'd disappear. That's all there is.
January 15, 2026 at 5:23 PM
Jenrick saying he's "put aside personal ambition" too join Reform is the single most shameless statement I've ever heard.
If he "put aside personal ambition" he'd disappear. That's all there is.
If he "put aside personal ambition" he'd disappear. That's all there is.
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Sums up how rubbish Badenoch is that she has been forced into a “You’re dumping me? I’m dumping you!” rather than just sacking and disbarring Jenrick over the many, many things that would have kept him out of any Tory Cabinet since 1968.
January 15, 2026 at 11:14 AM
Sums up how rubbish Badenoch is that she has been forced into a “You’re dumping me? I’m dumping you!” rather than just sacking and disbarring Jenrick over the many, many things that would have kept him out of any Tory Cabinet since 1968.
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The 'give ice qr codes' thing reminds me of when Sarah Everard was murdered by a real policeman using his real police id to kidnap her, and the police & gvt made out the solution was to have a helpline to check that the person bundling you away was a real policeman (as the murderer was)
January 14, 2026 at 6:02 PM
The 'give ice qr codes' thing reminds me of when Sarah Everard was murdered by a real policeman using his real police id to kidnap her, and the police & gvt made out the solution was to have a helpline to check that the person bundling you away was a real policeman (as the murderer was)
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Thought I’d do a mega hread on NPR, partly because I’ve seen some London based commentary that doesn’t really get the bigger picture quite right imho
January 15, 2026 at 7:34 AM
Thought I’d do a mega hread on NPR, partly because I’ve seen some London based commentary that doesn’t really get the bigger picture quite right imho
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Disagree. Means that the vote at 16 will be like pre-atomic age steel from a Scapa Flow battleship: the one pure vote you will ever cast. It should count double.
'You can vote at 16 but can't use social media at 15 and 364 days' is not a coherent policy platform.
January 15, 2026 at 9:55 AM
Disagree. Means that the vote at 16 will be like pre-atomic age steel from a Scapa Flow battleship: the one pure vote you will ever cast. It should count double.
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actually it's called Reform because they're trying to re-form the Conservative party but in the tent next door
January 15, 2026 at 11:46 AM
actually it's called Reform because they're trying to re-form the Conservative party but in the tent next door
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The absence of any public pushback from the Republican Party on a situation as insane as Trump is rapidly reaching on Greenland is itself a huge sign of how far gone the US already is.
January 14, 2026 at 11:55 PM
The absence of any public pushback from the Republican Party on a situation as insane as Trump is rapidly reaching on Greenland is itself a huge sign of how far gone the US already is.
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Senate Democrats absolutely have to shut the govt down to stop this ICE insanity in the Twin Cities. This is not sustainable & cannot be normalized. Any Democratic vote to provide money to the thugs who are brutalizing this community is a grave betrayal to the people here. Accountability can't wait.
January 15, 2026 at 3:37 AM
Senate Democrats absolutely have to shut the govt down to stop this ICE insanity in the Twin Cities. This is not sustainable & cannot be normalized. Any Democratic vote to provide money to the thugs who are brutalizing this community is a grave betrayal to the people here. Accountability can't wait.
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They have fucking assault rifles and we have whistles and they’re scared shitless, because they know we’d rather be righteous and dead than ever be them.
January 15, 2026 at 3:56 AM
They have fucking assault rifles and we have whistles and they’re scared shitless, because they know we’d rather be righteous and dead than ever be them.
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On the ground here in Minnesota, it’s hard to reconcile the immense bonds of community that have been built in a week with the fact that we live in a country whose government appropriated billions of dollars to an unaccountable paramilitary force whose sole purpose is ethnic cleansing.
January 15, 2026 at 5:05 AM
On the ground here in Minnesota, it’s hard to reconcile the immense bonds of community that have been built in a week with the fact that we live in a country whose government appropriated billions of dollars to an unaccountable paramilitary force whose sole purpose is ethnic cleansing.
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the people of MN have been murdered, brutalized and kidnapped for weeks now and have remained *amazingly* peaceful in the face of it. lecturing citizens to not “take the bait” etc is pretty disrespectful after a point and avoids the real question: how long are they supposed to take this, undefended?
State investigators have been on the scene in North Minneapolis.
I know you’re angry. I’m angry. What Donald Trump wants is violence in the streets.
But Minnesota will remain an island of decency, of justice, of community, and of peace.
Don’t give him what he wants.
I know you’re angry. I’m angry. What Donald Trump wants is violence in the streets.
But Minnesota will remain an island of decency, of justice, of community, and of peace.
Don’t give him what he wants.
January 15, 2026 at 5:39 AM
the people of MN have been murdered, brutalized and kidnapped for weeks now and have remained *amazingly* peaceful in the face of it. lecturing citizens to not “take the bait” etc is pretty disrespectful after a point and avoids the real question: how long are they supposed to take this, undefended?
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Tbf that is half of our entire army.
BREAKING: The UK is sending a single military officer to Greenland at the request of Denmark to participate in a multi-nation exercise
January 14, 2026 at 9:32 PM
Tbf that is half of our entire army.
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When the interior ministry declares its militia to be above the law in terms that equate dissent with treason there really isn’t any question of whether or not we are looking at an authoritarian regime.
January 14, 2026 at 4:05 PM
When the interior ministry declares its militia to be above the law in terms that equate dissent with treason there really isn’t any question of whether or not we are looking at an authoritarian regime.
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Here’s my favorite line in it. Thanks to everybody yesterday who helped me figure out what those Gowanus Whole Foods wind turbines are good for (not much!)
January 14, 2026 at 7:49 PM
Here’s my favorite line in it. Thanks to everybody yesterday who helped me figure out what those Gowanus Whole Foods wind turbines are good for (not much!)
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This is a pretty severe escalation from CBS, just straight up lying like this.
BREAKING: The ICE agent who fatally shot Renee Good last week in Minneapolis, Jonathan Ross, suffered internal bleeding to the torso following the incident, according to two U.S. officials briefed on his medical condition.
ICE agent who shot Renee Good suffered internal bleeding, officials say
Jonathan Ross, who shot Renee Good in Minneapolis last week, suffered internal bleeding after the incident, two officials said, though it's not clear how extensive the bleeding was.
cbsn.ws
January 14, 2026 at 5:34 PM
This is a pretty severe escalation from CBS, just straight up lying like this.
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oh my god, an actually funny quote from an unnamed Westminster source, stop the press
January 14, 2026 at 1:51 PM
oh my god, an actually funny quote from an unnamed Westminster source, stop the press
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This is daft of the provincial mayor, but the annoying underlying point is that the DfT didn't provide every local official (of all parties) with a personalised media kit for their region to use, and that Labour HQ didn't do the same with partisan messaging. Sheer, non-ideological, incompetence.
January 14, 2026 at 12:55 PM
This is daft of the provincial mayor, but the annoying underlying point is that the DfT didn't provide every local official (of all parties) with a personalised media kit for their region to use, and that Labour HQ didn't do the same with partisan messaging. Sheer, non-ideological, incompetence.
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If the figures we're getting out of Iran are in the right league, this weekend was, I think, one of the bloodiest state crackdowns of all time. People are talking 12,000-20,000 dead; for comparison Hungary in 1956 was about 2,500, Tiananmen - across country, in multiple cities - probably 1000+
January 13, 2026 at 7:41 PM
If the figures we're getting out of Iran are in the right league, this weekend was, I think, one of the bloodiest state crackdowns of all time. People are talking 12,000-20,000 dead; for comparison Hungary in 1956 was about 2,500, Tiananmen - across country, in multiple cities - probably 1000+
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The FT got is architecture critic Edwin Heathcote to write about data centres and it's wonderful. www.ft.com/content/7692...
January 14, 2026 at 7:09 AM
The FT got is architecture critic Edwin Heathcote to write about data centres and it's wonderful. www.ft.com/content/7692...