spookily accurate

The EU's latest proposal on WTO reform is here: docs.wto.org/dol2fe/Pages... The paper refers to report on consultations by the facilitator, Norway’s ambassador Petter Ølberg, which can be found here: tradebetablog.wordpress.com/2025/12/15/w...

The US granted visas to Jews but only allowed 30,000 in from Germany a year. You had to wait for your number to come up. Meet Robert Smallbones. An unassuming British diplomat who 'hacked' this system so effectively (saving 48 THOUSAND Jews) the UK government kept his scheme secret for decades /1 🧵

Trump demands Carney give him his standing ovation from Davos

The TACO cycle: Markets want to price in TACO. But TACO only works if Trump sees stocks tank. So we get a loop: Trump does things → nothing happens (markets already priced in TACO) → that emboldens him to do more → until markets start to think he might not TACO → stocks fall → TACO is restored.

🌮

My vote for the most sexually charged dialogue in all of Heated Rivalry

We, the foreign ministers of the U.K., Finland, France, the Netherlands and Norway, met today with Ukrainian Minister Andrii Sybiha. He described the horrific situation with thousands and thousands of Ukrainian families left without electricity, water and heat because of unjustified Russian strikes.

Great to see Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, leader of the democratic opposition in Belarus. Canada will always stand with those who defend freedom and democratic values, in support of a peaceful and democratic future for Belarus.

the New Diplomacy in action. See also Lutnick causing a walkout in Davos, or Greer saying “Canada’s geopolitical decisions are not the hinge on which history swings.” These guys really know how to make friends

Trump’s tariff policies have introduced termites into the woodwork of global trade: not easily seen, but likely to make any structure crumble over time, Robert Lawrence writes.

I love my profession deeply, but some of them are not covering themselves in glory these days. If a mob boss draws a sharp blade languidly across your palm and says it would be a real shame for you to lose your pinky, your headline isn't "Godfather rules out hacking off finger to settle debt."

The question on NYC's congestion pricing has quickly moved from "is it working?" to "why isn't my city doing this?"

After watching Prime Minister @mark-carney.bsky.social demonstrate real global leadership at the World Economic Forum yesterday, it’s worth remembering the kind of approach Pierre Poilievre would have taken to keep his alt‑right, conspiracy‑driven base satisfied.

"The gathering descended into uproar after combative remarks from Lutnick, the people said, with widespread jeering, some guests walking out and appeals for calm from Fink" Literally the only good Davos ever as.ft.com/r/fc8cb382-4...

When sexism is allowed to infiltrate academic discourse, it becomes harder to combat in the culture as a whole. "Both of us posted multiple times about our essay. Only one of us, however, received a steady barrage of vitriolic criticism over the course of the day."

Today’s newsletter is about a natural experiment that happened on Bluesky yesterday. danieldrezner.substack.com/p/on-trump-a...

Trump on Canada: They should be grateful also, but they’re not. I watched your prime minister yesterday. He wasn’t so grateful. But they should be grateful to us. Canada lives because of the U.S. Remember that, Mark, the next time you make your statements.

Re-reading a speech Chrystia Freeland delivered in Washington in 2018 (while receiving Foreign Policy's diplomat of the year award). Here's the choice she saw at the time. I think Carney just chose/invented a third option. www.canada.ca/en/global-af...

New Special Issue in @the-peio.bsky.social: Public Opinion and International Organizations. In the SI intro, we map the field, place the SI papers & identify ways forward: rdcu.be/eXt2R with @jonastallberg.bsky.social, 🙏 @adreher.bsky.social, reviewers & SI authors #Polisky #InternationalRelations

Canadian PM Carney’s speech at Davos is a must-read. Nice illustration of Balance of Threat theory—he’s saying medium powers must band together to deal with the threat of a rogue US. He’s right: it’s just more evidence of #Trump’s grand-strategic incompetence. globalnews.ca/news/1162087....

Amazing moment on French TV. A French judge explains how Trump sent people from the US Embassy basically trying to intimidate her during Le Pen's trial for embezzlement - something they've done to other judges around the world.

Globe & Mail reporting on Canadian military's modelling of how an extended insurgency against a US invasion would play out: In short, we'd take cues from the mujahideen. "The aim of such tactics would be to impose mass casualties on U.S. occupying forces..."

It’s Penguin Awareness Day which seems like a great excuse to post the greatest ever Wikipedia edit.

Danish pension fund to dump US treasuries "The US is basically not a good credit and long-term the US government finances are not sustainable," says chief investment officer www.investing.com/news/stock-m...

👀 Wow: Carney's opening remarks re how the global rules-based order was always a partial fiction w/ diff rules for strong & weak. I spent 2 years writing speeches for a former Canadian foreign minister lauding the indispensability of global rules-based order & we never acknowledged this reality.

1/Carney laying out in plan language the logical conclusion of US weaponization of interdependence. As US turns to coercion for parochial political goals rather than global public goods, it will spur growing backlash.

Trump says America doesn’t need cars made in Canada or Mexico. If that’s true, why are U.S. automakers advocating to keep North America integrated? https://macleans.ca/economy/the-myth-of-the-all-american-car/

Would be amazing if European leaders would also start throwing out truth bombs like this. bsky.app/profile/atru...

This is one of the sharpest analyses of international affairs that I've heard from a Canadian leader - or any national leader - in a long time. And I suspect he wrote the main bits himself. paulwells.substack.com/p/the-carney...

An insane timeline.

Mark Carney says middle powers must stop pretending the rules-based international order is still functioning and instead build coalitions to survive. He urged nations to condemn economic coercion, even when practiced by an ally - a clear reference to the U.S. www.theglobeandmail.com/gift/b450ad3...

In a speech to the World Economic Forum, Mark Carney says middle powers such as Canada must accept that the rules-based international order is effectively dead, and great power rivalry with is here to stay. Key excerpt:

1. 🌍 Global support to #agriculture now exceeds USD 800 billion per year, around 20% higher than before COVID-19, according to @oecd-ocde.bsky.social estimates. Roughly half of this support is channelled into the most distorting and environmentally harmful policies.

Really can't stand the self-abasement of takes posing as the reasonable middle by conceding it'd be a sensible policy to purchase / annex Greenland so long as it wasn't by force, as if any of the nonsense reasons are compelling. Stop it. There is no reasonable version, that would still be idiotic.

If your peace plan includes Vladimir Putin and excludes actual allies, it’s not peace. It’s submission.

Life comes at you fast.

The first test is even a US constitutional one. The text of the document claims its setting up an international organization - can this be done under an executive only agreement or does Trump need the advice and consent of the Senate?

In the meantime, while everyone is distracted ...

www.state.gov/u-s-support-... The Chagos deal the Telegraph, Times and others continue to portray as the UK's gift to China is welcomed here by US Secretary of State Marco Rubio as a "monumental achievement" It has also been welcomed by UK/US allies around the world

🚨The US 30-yr yield is starting to fly this morning. No-one in America is getting a cheaper mortgage any time soon. Congress may lack the backbone to stop the madman. But markets are not servile, they have no loyalty and will never bend the knee. Global crash anyone?

“As America prepares to commemorate its 250th anniversary, the republic is flirting with its own funeral.” My column. www.ft.com/content/dede...

It seems Trump is organizing a meeting about Greenland in Davos. But note: Denmark did not send anyone to Davos and I don't think Greenland is there. Once more, Trump is negotiating about territory without the involved countries present. www.spiegel.de/ausland/davo...

🇫🇷❗️🇺🇸 Macron will decline Trump’s invitation to join his “Board of Peace, - Bloomberg

I've harped on congressional war powers for a long time and we do need to fix all that, but threatening to invade Greenland while ranting at Norway about the Nobel Peace Prize and imposing trade sanctions on NATO is more the kind of thing you can only fix by not having a literally insane president.

i turned this image into a column and pointed out the obvious: this is bad mkay? as.ft.com/r/6ab36f93-7...

Great stuff by @robinwigglesworth.ft.com and @tobyn.bsky.social on how “Europe can bring the US to heel by dumping Treasuries” is a very long shot indeed.

"Trump has imposed executive orders blocking travel from nationals of more than three dozen countries, including four which have qualified for the World Cup...." One of those 4 is Senegal, which is the current reigning champion of Africa. www.politico.com/news/2026/01...

sums up my feeling