Top 1 reason I will never pay for Spotify but will continue to shell out for Apple Music: no AI slop. Yes it has come to that. This is the world we live in. Even the music you listen to is not real. Congrats. Enjoy the world warped by a product meant to please you.

People often ask if war coverage would have been different if we had social media in, say, the 1990s. Nope. We'd still have some random celebrity call Milošević "iconic", and we'd all be outraged anyway. We still have a lot to learn.

Today was really rough, in what has become a series of rough days. I had to write about the senseless and untimely death of Diogo Jota. Bottom line, you do what's right and you feel for his loved ones, that's all you can do. Forever our 20. You'll never walk alone. www.euronews.com/my-europe/20...

This is my #Eurovision2025 grand final top 10, in no particular order: 🇦🇱 Albania 🇬🇷 Greece 🇮🇹 Italy 🇳🇱 The Netherlands 🇦🇹 Austria 🇲🇹 Malta 🇸🇪 Sweden 🇱🇺 Luxembourg 🇫🇷 France 🇺🇦 Ukraine Honorable mentions: 🇵🇹 Portugal, 🇳🇴 Norway, 🇸🇲 San Marino (aka Italy 2)

I can't believe how many people are using AI models to write anything from full-blown reported pieces and opinion articles to social media commentary and even — get this — homages to friends and colleagues who passed away. Just copy-pasting what AI churns out, as if everyone's an idiot. Shameful.

Everyone in Europe right now:

Apparently, an ICE document states that some 845 people residing in the US need to be deported back to Yugoslavia. I didn't know the Trump administration is in possession of a time machine 😎

That didn't take long.

As Melania Trump returns to the White House, Slovenes in her homeland brace for another 4 years of being turned into a punchline, their history and heritage often the subject of jokes as Americans struggle to adjust to a very European (& Slavic) First Lady. My story: www.politico.eu/article/mela...

Italy's renowned photographer Oliviero Toscani died — mostly known in the West for his Benetton ads in the 1990s that pushed people's buttons. Few might recall that he also spent an enormous amount of time and energy to draw attention to the war in Bosnia (like in this ad here). Un grande maestro.

By doing this, Kyiv has set an example that everyone should follow — namely, when your enemies exploit and weaponize a historical issue for propaganda points (both in their countries and abroad), the best you can do is confront it head-on and show a willingness to discuss it openly and honestly.

🚨 A massive breakthrough: Polish PM Donald Tusk says an agreement has been reached with Kyiv to exhume the bodies of Poles killed by Ukrainian ultranationalists in the Volhynia region during WWII. This was a major wedge issue between the two and often exploited by Russian propaganda.

Quote of the day: "It is certain, in any case, that ignorance, allied with power, is the most ferocious enemy justice can have." - James Baldwin

Never forget.

Disappointed but not surprised that the French political class is making dewy-eyed tributes to convicted holocaust-denier and open fascist Jean-Marie Le Pen rather than saying "The Elysée is aware of the death of convicted holocaust-denier and open fascist Jean-Marie Le Pen".

Nailed it

For weeks now, Sarajevo has been among if not *the* most polluted city in the world, with the air consistently deemed very unhealthy or hazardous. The fact that this has resulted in *absolutely no reaction whatsoever* from city and canton officials is even more terrifying.

Giorgia Meloni pitched her Albania refugee camp as a near-miraculous solution. A few months in, the camps host more Italian staff than they ever did refugees as Meloni struggles to dodge European refugee repatriation laws. By @elenagiordano.bsky.social and moi: www.politico.eu/article/gior...

By "a wall between Italy and Turkey," does she mean "Greece"? 🙄

🤯 Damascus, Syria tonight. 2025 will be the first year free of Assad tyranny since 1971 — more than half a century.

I continue to be deeply moved by this statement to the heavens by President Carter.

🚨 Exit polls from today’s Croatian presidential election show rabble-rousing populist Zoran Milanovic leading with 50.7% — a whopping 30 points ahead of his closest rival. If these numbers hold there definitely won’t be a need for a second round.

Did we all really think the insane times we are experiencing would simply end on January 1? With all these people just going "new year, new me" on everyone? I’m going to play it safe and add “US tanks roll into Mexico” to my 2025 bingo card instead.

A headline so imperialist they managed to use a Russian word to describe Ukrainian grandmothers.

Scratch that, all of the Magdeburg attacker's tweets are now back online, after many X users pointed out his restored account either showed select bits and pieces or only went as far back as November at first. Bizarre.

So Elon first took down the entire account belonging to the Magdeburg attacker but then reinstated it after removing his tweets praising AfD and Geert Wilders? The world we live in, eh.

This sums it up, yes.

Candidates to edit the post hear Murdochian Will Lewis' strategy and say, never mind. Scoop: Top editors stiff the Washington Post www.axios.com/2024/12/17/w...

Western hot-take experts often overlook this thing about Romania: despite its significant democratic flaws, the country boasts a core of capable, efficient politicians ready to outmaneuver nationalist and far-right opposition when the moment demands.

Repurposed Assad tank in Syria.

The story of Romania’s pro-Russian far-right presidential candidate Călin Georgescu gets murkier by the day. His bodyguard Horațiu Potra, who led mercenaries in Congo, was put under judicial supervision after driving to Bucharest with cars full of weapons www.rferl.org/a/potra-geor...

The editor was having a nap when this was published

A photo I posted of graffiti in Syria in 2014. "One day the war will be over and I will return to my poem" I hope they will return to their poem

Uniforms of Syrian soldiers from the dictator Bashar al-Assad’s army, abandoned as they fled Damascus. A historic image marking the end of the dictator and his army.

Little was done, and - worse - what *was* done has entered political lore as a terrible mistake.

One of the worst questions you could ask now that Bashar al-Assad is gone is "now what". We don't get to ask that after years of twiddling our thumbs as he wrecked his own country many times over, driving millions of Syrians to death, starvation and misery both at home and while seeking refuge.

They are taking down statues of Assad? Oh no, how will anyone know about this historical period?

Tucker Carlson is back in Moscow to cry crocodile tears over the deaths of 12 Russian soldiers. Joe Rogan is hosting waves of guests spouting Russian propaganda about Crimea in 2014. The manosphere is the best propaganda tool the Kremlin has. A good thing Trump will fix it, right?

I have to admit I’m really not above saying "I told you so" to all those people who were huge fans of Joe Rogan and his podcast before he outed himself as the #1 useful idiot among roid bros. That guy was always there or thereabouts with the likes of Tate and Dan Bilzerian, only a tad more subtle.

Exactly 11 years after Euromaidan in Kyiv — prompted by an anti-EU, pro-Kremlin government — Georgians are gathering en masse to protest night after night, prompted by an anti-EU, pro-Kremlin government. How many times do we need to go through this before everyone is aware of the root cause?

Bluesky is winning because both twitter and threads have gone out of their way to make their platforms inhospitable to reputable journalists and news. @kattenbarge.bsky.social reports: www.nbcnews.com/tech/social-...

As Romania reels from Sunday’s election results, several outlets claim to have identified the mastermind behind Calin Georgescu's viral social media campaign. Using the handle "BogPR" and calling himself the "King of TikTok," he openly admits to backing the candidate but denies owning "troll farms."

If you're in any Western European capital tonight thinking what's happening in Georgia or Romania does not affect you and your life, you couldn't be more wrong. Not only does it matter for your future — for Europe's future — the same malign forces are already knocking on your door, too.

Breaking: Romanian media are reporting that the Constitutional Court is considering canceling Sunday's presidential elections that saw far-right candidate Calin Georgescu end up first in the polls. A vote can be annulled if the "voting and the establishment of the results took place by fraud."

Whenever he does this shit I think of Crassus, 1/3 of the triumvirate with Caesar and Pompey; briefly the richest man on earth his hubris was so chronic he walked into avoidable slaughter at the hands of the Parthians who, we're told, poured molten gold down his corpse's throat to mock his greed.

As votes continue to be counted, PM Ciolacu remains in the lead. But it appears independent candidate Calin Georgescu is poised to advance to the second round. Georgescu’s far-right sympathies rival, if not surpass, those of AUR's Simion, incl. controversial stances on Romanian history and Ukraine.

It's funny that Elon would claim Gladiator 2 is "woke lies" when Caracalla and Geta — two Roman emperors who were of North African and Syrian background and likely more similar in appearance to Macrinus, played by Denzel Washington — are portrayed by white Western actors.

Lesson 1: Do not obey in advance. Thread of lessons from my book #OnTyranny. Written in 2016.