Ben Adlin
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badlin.bsky.social
Ben Adlin
@badlin.bsky.social
410 followers 210 following 150 posts
sitting on a bench typing notes
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badlin.bsky.social
just the anticipation of moving later this month makes me want to instead live my life on milk crates and sleep in a hammock and drink my morning coffee out of my only cup
November 15, 2025 at 8:23 AM
badlin.bsky.social
this is such a great vignette about why seattle sucks
typewriteralley.bsky.social Ryan Packer @typewriteralley.bsky.social · 2d
This meeting is happening now, as expected, opponents of pedestrianizing Pike Place Market are pretty heavily represented when it comes to providing public comment on potential bollard installation at the Market.
typewriteralley.bsky.social Ryan Packer @typewriteralley.bsky.social · 8d
URGENT BOLLARD ALERT.

SDOT is going to the Pike Place Market Historical Commission next Wednesday to get initial guidance on the "physical protective barriers" planned ahead of the FIFA World Cup.

The board is getting its temperature taken on a "hybrid approach" of bollards and vehicle barricades.
November 13, 2025 at 7:02 PM
Reposted by Ben Adlin
ckubzansky.bsky.social
After @mandophotos.bsky.social photographed federal agents pointing rifles at 26th/Lawndale yesterday, I inquired with DHS about what threat had prompted them to pull weapons on a busy commercial strip (pictured). This is the response I got from a representative of the United States government.
November 7, 2025 at 9:31 PM
Reposted by Ben Adlin
typewriteralley.bsky.social
Over $100,000 in outside money was spent in support of electing John Hines Mayor of Tacoma, but it looks like voters are set to elect (Urbanist endorsed) Anders Ibsen instead.
November 5, 2025 at 7:01 AM
Reposted by Ben Adlin
chrisgeidner.bsky.social
A SNAP election result out of Colorado, you might say?
November 5, 2025 at 3:46 AM
badlin.bsky.social
so many western conifer seed bugs this year
November 4, 2025 at 2:58 AM
Reposted by Ben Adlin
lauranrodriguez.bsky.social
Immigration agents crashed into a U.S. citizen on her way to work—then dragged her out of her car and arrested her.

Her family couldn’t find her for hours.
She was later released without charges.

Read the story: www.chicagotribune.com/2025/11/03/c...
November 3, 2025 at 10:21 PM
badlin.bsky.social
lawyers, why say “cite to” when you can just say “cite”?
November 3, 2025 at 10:33 PM
Reposted by Ben Adlin
chrisgeidner.bsky.social
BREAKING: Federal judge rules that the Trump administration likely illegally suspended SNAP benefits, ruling that at least reduced distribution is required to go forward under law using the $6 billion reserve fund.

Judge gives the Trump admin until Monday to respond as to whether it will act.
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS COMMONWEALTH OF MASSACHUSETTS ET AL., Plaintiffs, V. UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE ET AL., Defendants. * * * * * * * * * * * Civil Action No. 1:25-cv-13165-IT MEMORANDUM AND ORDER October 31, 2025 TALWANI, D.J. Pending before the court is Plaintiffs' Motion for a Temporary Restraining Order [Doc. No. 3] seeking to enjoin, on an emergency basis, Defendants' November 1, 2025 suspension of benefits under the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program ("SNAP"). For the reasons stated below, Plaintiffs have standing to bring this action and are likely to succeed on their claim that Defendants' suspension of SNAP benefits is unlawful. Where that suspension of benefits rested on an erroneous construction of the relevant statutory provisions, the court will allow Defendants to consider whether they will authorize at least reduced SNAP benefits for November, and report back to the court no later than Monday, November 3, 2025. A. Likelihood of Success on the Merits Plaintiffs have demonstrated a strong likelihood of success on the merits of their claim under the Administrative Procedure Act, 5 U.S.C. § 706(2)(A), (C), that Defendants' suspension of SNAP benefits is contrary to law. At core, Defendants' conclusion that USDA is statutorily prohibited from funding SNAP because Congress has not enacted new appropriations for the current fiscal year is erroneous. To the contrary, Defendants are statutorily mandated to use the previously appropriated SNAP contingency reserve when necessary and also have discretion to use other previously appropriated funds as detailed below. As both parties acknowledge, Congress has not yet appropriated any new funds for SNAP benefits for Fiscal Year 2026, which began on October 1, 2025. Pls.' Mem. 6 [Doc. No. 4]; Defs.' Opp'n 7 [Doc. No. 18]. But Congress took steps to protect against the deprivation of SNAP assistance. In the 2024 Consolidated Appropriations Act, Pub. L. No. 118-42, § 6, 138 Stat. 25, 93-94, Congress separately appropriated $6 billion to the SNAP program "to remain available through September 30, 2026" and "be placed in reserve for use only in such amounts and at such times as may become necessary to carry out program operations." See also Pub. L. No. 119-4, § 1101(a), 139 Stat. 9, 10 (2025). As Plaintiffs point out, given the mandatory nature of SNAP benefits under 7 U.S.C. § 2014(a) and the appropriation of these funds to be available 10 Case 1:25-cv-13165-IT Document 26 Filed 10/31/25 Page 11 of 15 through this current fiscal year, the government is obligated to use this contingent reserve account to fund SNAP "as may become necessary to carry out program operations." 138 Stat. at 93-94; Pls.' Mem. 11 [Doc. No. 4]. Defendants argue out that a "suspension" is permitted under USDA's regulations, and that USDA "has consistently interpreted its authority to allow for the suspension or cancellation of benefits when necessary." Defs. Opp'n 6 [Doc. No. 18). The regulation at issue, 7 C.F.R. $ 271.7(a), sets forth procedures to be followed if monthly SNAP allowances "must be reduced, suspended, or cancelled to comply with section 18 of the Food and Nutrition Act of 2008" (emphasis added). But that the regulation allows for a suspension when there are no funds does not mean that Defendants may choose a suspension over a reduction while funds do remain. If the regulation did authorize such discretion, it would be inconsistent with the statutory mandate that benefits "shall" be paid unless funding is no longer available.
October 31, 2025 at 5:59 PM
Reposted by Ben Adlin
henryfung.bsky.social
LA Metro announced on X they are extending last trains tonight so Dodger fans get to go home.
October 28, 2025 at 6:50 AM
badlin.bsky.social
i loved nancy bea, but boy howdy is dieter ruehle a good heir
October 28, 2025 at 7:06 AM
Reposted by Ben Adlin
ologies.bsky.social
i wasn't watching the game but I can tell we won because of the explosions in LA right now
October 28, 2025 at 6:56 AM
Reposted by Ben Adlin
ahym666.bsky.social
Seattle, get you a mayor who doesn’t hate taco stands

Burien, get us a city council who doesn’t hate taco stands too
jseattle.bsky.social jseattle @jseattle.bsky.social · 19d
Waiting for somebody to open a joint called Unpermitted Taco Stand. This crackdown at an already precarious time for immigrant communities continues www.capitolhillseattle.com/2025/05/heal...
October 27, 2025 at 5:20 PM
Reposted by Ben Adlin
amywestervelt.bsky.social
A stat we don't talk about enough: Newspapers have lost 77% of their jobs over the last 20 year, more than any of the 532 other industries tracked by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
October 27, 2025 at 11:54 PM
badlin.bsky.social
love to play dumb when sources ask me inappropriate questions 🙃
October 27, 2025 at 11:57 PM
Reposted by Ben Adlin
sanho.bsky.social
Tobacco will kill 480,000 people in the US this year according to the CDC. That’s SIX times more than all US drug overdose deaths. Does that mean we’re going to drone strike the homes of tobacco executives in the US? Can other countries target them? Here’s the video of my debate on Al Jazeera:
What's Trump's strategy to tackle the US illegal drugs problem?| Inside Story
YouTube video by Al Jazeera English
youtu.be
October 25, 2025 at 8:32 PM
Reposted by Ben Adlin
kleinman.bsky.social
The most important thing here is that the president is unilaterally raising taxes on you because he got mad at his TV
October 26, 2025 at 2:05 AM
Reposted by Ben Adlin
rchirgwin.bsky.social
Kind of a digital toxiplasmosis, getting the host to behave in ways beneficial to the parasite.
October 22, 2025 at 12:20 PM
Reposted by Ben Adlin
gili92107.bsky.social
We know the fate of the Brownshirts when they became inconvenient to Hitler’s ascension to power. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Night_o...
Night of the Long Knives - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
October 21, 2025 at 11:29 PM
Reposted by Ben Adlin
ketanjoshi.co
Chatbots have an impact specifically on the brains of bosses and managers that ought to be subject to an entire new field of social science

www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
Norway Wealth Fund CEO Says AI Ends the Need for Climate Hires In this Article Norges Bank Government Pension Fund Global -- Follow Norges Bank -- Follow Anthropic PBC Private company Contact us: Provide news feedback or report an error Confidential tip? Send a tip to our reporters Site feedback: Take our Survey By Frances Schwartzkopff and Heidi Taksdal Skjeseth October 22, 2025 at 8:00 AM GMT+2 Updated on October 22, 2025 at 1:25 PM GMT+2 Save Listen 4:31 Norway’s sovereign wealth fund, the world’s biggest, is giving artificial intelligence a key role in protecting its $2 trillion portfolio from climate risk. Norges Bank Investment Management will use AI for a range of tasks including to “extract signals from company dialogues,” according to its 2030 Climate Action Plan. The fund also intends to use AI to improve decision making, and “to strengthen investment processes across teams,” ultimately helping it identify corporate winners and losers, it said. Tangen has made no secret of his enthusiasm for AI. In an interview in May, the 59-year-old former hedge fund manager said he’s been running around “like a maniac” trying to get staff to use the technology, even going so far as to say that employees shunning AI “will never be promoted.” At Oslo-based NBIM, AI is already proving useful in determining whether the fund’s climate policy is working, Tangen said. That includes evaluating the effectiveness of its engagement with portfolio companies, crunching data to guide recommendations on proxy votes and generating quantitative climate scores, he said. “Portfolio managers get this information directly in their trading systems,” Tangen said. AI can help identify “transition winners,” which he describes as companies that are “decarbonizing faster and more effectively than the market expects.” During the press briefing, Tangen was asked to comment on ChatGPT’s advice that a long-term investor keen to manage climate risk should reduce its exposure to fossil fuel companies. “We disagree, we won’t do it,” he said. Tangen then asked the head of his climate team, Eivind Filflet, to run the same question by Claude, the language model developed by Anthropic PBC. Claude’s response laid out the case “for continuing engagement,” he said. “But Claude knows me,” Filflet said. Tangen said the example demonstrates why it’s still important to have a “human in the mix.”
October 22, 2025 at 12:10 PM
Reposted by Ben Adlin
chadloder.bsky.social
"US Marshal shot during immigration enforcement in LA"

* article explains he was shot by an ICE officer whose weapon discharged when he used it to smash a car window
US Marshal shot during immigration enforcement operation in LA, reports say
A U.S. Marshal was shot while assisting an immigration enforcement operation, according to several reports.
www.kktv.com
October 21, 2025 at 8:28 PM
Reposted by Ben Adlin
donmoyn.bsky.social
"He swings it one time and I saw her body go completely limp. And then he stood over her and hit her twice more."
www.bbc.com/news/article...
October 22, 2025 at 1:34 AM
badlin.bsky.social
please help shorten my commute by filing interesting lawsuits in tacoma federal court
October 22, 2025 at 3:28 AM
Reposted by Ben Adlin
gordonofseattle.bsky.social
They used to. The Republican St stairs used to connect Cascade and Capitol Hill. Then I-5 came a long and dropped a concrete curtain through the city. Today only the top 1/3 remain
Colorized Republican stair climb
October 20, 2025 at 2:51 AM
Reposted by Ben Adlin
shirleyswirley.bsky.social
I am sooo tired of this. Yesterday at my bus stop that doesn’t have a bench, there was a KC metro work truck that came and I was like oh r u gonna add a bench?? And he was like no, I’m just painting over graffiti and then he fumed up the whole place to cover a tiny ass 10 inch wide scribble. WASTE
typewriteralley.bsky.social Ryan Packer @typewriteralley.bsky.social · Oct 15
With 22 full time employees devoted to graffiti abatement in Bruce Harrell's 2026 budget, that team would officially be twice as large as SDOT's Vision Zero team (11 people).
“One Seattle Graffiti Plan” - Citywide initiative for graffiti removal, including targeted enforcement and assistance for impacted businesses, support for public art and volunteer clean-up efforts. • The 2026 Proposed Budget adds $2.1 million and 6 FTE, bringing the total Citywide expenditures for graffiti abetment to $6.1 million and 22 FTE. • Proposed budget also includes transfer of existing staff and funding from SPU to SPR. Details will be further discussed in the upcoming Seattle Parks and Recreation presentation.
October 15, 2025 at 6:04 PM