the requirements to succeed on new media platforms are almost precisely the opposite of what successful experts… have trained themselves to do: maintain an institutional tone of formal detachment & stay ruthlessly on-message at all times.’ @noupside.bsky.social carnegieendowment.org/research/202...

Minister Heinen zei vanochtend namens het kabinet dat de rellen van gisteren niet politiek moeten worden gemaakt. Ik heb nieuws voor het kabinet: je kan niet iets politiek máken dat allang politiek ís.

🇧🇪 🚴‍♀️ 🎉 2 keer raak voor België: Remco Evenepoel verlengt wereldtitel tijdrijden in Rwanda, Ilan Van Wilder pakt brons vrtnws.be/p.oLVM5o93o

Referendums are a tool of the powerful, not the people. www.journalofdemocracy.org/online-exclu...

In the town hall of Forest/Vorst for #OpenMonumentenDag #HeritageDays and @dzyrl.bsky.social is geeking out on municipal architecture

Once again, the federal government is telling cities “if you want to help people, pay for it yourself”. Chipping away at solidarity between people and between different parts of the country. www.rtbf.be/article/plan...

Interestingly enough, this constellation was only now made possible with the party seat change from NSC to BBB (Agnes Joseph). Hopefully, this does not mean that there will be more of this in the upcoming weeks.

I have a theory that the longstanding American assumption that politicians are inherently corrupt actively increases corruption by chasing off honest, well-intended people and giving cover to the worst of the worst.

By the same token, anyone left of centre should be spending their time writing letters to the Daily Express that they won’t print, while also buying the Daily Express and getting their news from the Daily Express. (Or Valeurs Actuelles, insert your borderline-fascist hatesheet here).

Decent first half of the first half pressure from #rsca #anderlecht against Antwerp - but frustratingly little output and a sense of fragility on the counter that doesn’t bode well.

Again Bouie from the top rope

I disagree only to the extent that I (a) they know this hypocrisy is an advantage and they use it, and (b) some of them probably do believe that anyone to the left of them is a subhuman for whom human rights don’t apply.

What Plasterk is saying, echoing rightist talking points, is: “You must not make political capital out of political violence that occurred at a political protest by people whose political aim is to overthrow democracy”. What the hell are you meant to do with it then?

Far-right thugs rampage in the Hague, attacking police and the HQ of centrist party D66. While parliament condemns the threat of “fascist” antifa. Shame on every politician -including VVD ones - who spent the last year ramping up tensions to win votes. You don’t get to do that and then condemn this.

Is het mogelijk chatbots te beïnvloeden en daardoor verkiezingen te manipuleren? 🗳️ Het is niet onmogelijk en het is vooral onbekend en ontransparant. Ik sprak er met @trouw.nl over ⬇️ www.trouw.nl/duurzaamheid...

War on What-We-Define-As-Terror - repression of internal dissent edition.

Dutch comedian Arjen Lubach has a nice bit about Disney cancelling Kimmel. www.youtube.com/watch?v=7vRX...

Pope Leo XIV said a proposal to create an AI-version of him so people could have a virtual audience with the pope pretty much horrified him.

Looking forward to the remake of It’s A Wonderful Life with Mr Potter as the hard working, risk taking capitalist hero and George Bailey as a woke bleeding heart liberal who deserves to die.

I’m old enough to remember when a lot of people on social media told me that Vance’s remarks in Munich about free speech were to be taken very seriously.

First Colbert, now Kimmel. Last-minute settlements, secret side deals, multi-billion dollar mergers pending Donald Trump's approval. Trump silencing free speech stifles our democracy. It sure looks like giant media companies are enabling his authoritarianism.

Quick day trip to London. Got to St Pancras and saw one of the shops with Hallowe’en stuff up and thought “that’s a bit early, isn’t it?” Then in Camden Sainsbury’s at lunchtime…

I wrote this in January, about the issues we face when responsibility for covering the irony-poisoned and extremely-online trolls of the far right, falls to journalists who can't rotate a PDF. www.irishexaminer.com/lifestyle-co...

(in tiny letters almost too small to be read) Free Speech (in letters that are visible from Mars) Absolutist.

▶️ Panel 2: Bold ideas to innovate European democracies ▪️ Ken Godfrey (@kenlcg.bsky.social), @epd.eu ▪️ David Van Reybrouck, writer, thinker and historian ▪️ Eva Bordos, DemNet Hungary ▪️ Anthony Zacharzewski (@anthonyzach.be), @demsoc.org

[me, a journalist who spends all day every day on a social media app where the discovery algorithm is personally controlled by its owner, captain birdseye] you know, a lot of people are talking about fish fingers, we should probably cover that

Fond memories of the Economist, at about the time this chart begins, telling me that it wasn't possible or even a priority (hi, Bjorn Lomborg!) to switch to renewable energy.

¡Allá! La Restinga (La Laja bus stop) on the island of El Hierro, the end of the longest point-to-point journey you can make in the Schengen Zone by surface public transport. 5650.2km from Vardø Havn. 192hrs 31 mins. Now excuse me while I go and find my room and shower and I’ll be back. #Schengen200

I told myself I wouldn't do a snap reaction to Ezra Klein's noxious editorial. I said, "If you're still mad about it on Monday, then you can write about it." I'm still mad about it!

North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany's most populous state, held local elections today. Support for AfD up but at 15% well below party's national polling. And lower among the young: 5th place on 11% among under-25s, who also delivered a smaller swing towards the party than did older generations.

L’impossible deuil de la majorité absolue pour le monde politique français

Hasi’s #anderlecht are a strange mix of chaos and violence with neither plan nor passion. Degreef red card a good example of it. Guess we’re going to struggle to save a point here. Absolutely shambolic, again. #hasiOut #rsca

Very perceptive. “Rivers of Blood” speech is far more solution-focused and less bloody than Musk’s calls for violent overthrow of democracy.

Absolutely right from @stellacreasy.bsky.social here.

Review of Michel Barnier's Brexit diaries by someone who is a keen observer of British and European politics @nwhyte.bsky.social : fromtheheartofeurope.eu/my-secret-br...

It was obviously wrong at the time but I remember most his sneering smugness about how the Europeans were all prey to the far right and Britain was immune.

I’ve looked into this now. I can’t find an example of a far right march or rally attracting much more than 10,000. A far right march on this scale is completely new for the UK.

Shot, chaser Young men more likely to vote Green than Reform. Young men second most progressive group of any demographic. Combined right-wing vote barely bigger than Green vote alone for young men

Govt should take this message seriously. The far right, backed by the world's richest man, is actively stoking racial & political violence. Staying quiet, flattering them, saying "we hear you" won't work. Stand up for decency, for respect, for the best of modern Britain or watch those things burn

The owner of and absolute unquestionable algorithm controller of a preferred communications channel of the UK Government calling for violence and the overthrow of the Government. www.theguardian.com/politics/liv...

It’s been a busy day so it was only by stumbling across it on Belgian news that I saw how big the fash-led march in London was. Ugh. Almost worse to see it through the eyes of others. www.rtbf.be/article/lond...

1. Some years back I was at a small-ish conference. Someone (a truly terrific academic) presented on far-right views of int'l order. It was good, but not, for me, particularly revelatory. As soon as he was finished it was clear that everything he said was TOTALLY new to most of the audience.

Democracy … can go too far.

De Groypers zijn echte zotte mannen, nog extremer dan het al extreme MAGA, waar Kirk 1 van de meest prominente stemmen was.

As selected on Discord polls. (Am not joking)

There’s a real generational divide between Labour MPs leaking to the Guardian and Labour MPs leaking to the Huffington Post

This is century-defining stuff.

Watching the new Pont Sainctelette-brug span being installed, like a high level version of an Ikea wardrobe

14 hours and 12 minutes after leaving Ljubljana - and apart from train connection stress at Villach it was a beautiful journey.