The top U.S. and Chinese economic officials held "candid" talks ahead of Trump’s visit to Beijing, with both sides raising complaints about the other's trade policies www.reuters.com/world/asia-p...

this is just social media

He's not wrong. www.theguardian.com/football/202...

Log into Polymarket, and go all in on the Normans

“Blue Sky”

This dude has just completed the FA stage of one FAFO cycle. www.reuters.com/world/china/...

"Why are all the journalists laid off now" this is why. Pretty simple.

(WSJ) - The U.S. national debt now exceeds 100% of gross domestic product, crossing a once-unthinkable threshold, on the way toward breaking the record set in the wake of World War II. @wsj.com www.wsj.com/economy/u-s-...

Joking aside, it appears we can finally and fully assume that the Huang Fu-hsing faction is not just a conservative, reactionary, leeching group of inept military men, but also an active United Front operation. Every one of them is a natsec issue.

As we have all this talk of non-red supply chains, here we have a Taiwanese firm literally acting as a supplier in the GREAT FIREWALL and efforts to export it to other countries, and then shrugging it off as that the company it supplied to is not sanctioned, so no action needed

A large-scale inauthentic network with documented links to the CCP has built sustained access to Taiwanese & Japanese audiences on Threads. While the content is mostly apolitical, the scale & infrastructure represent a risk to online discourse if repurposed during elections. dtl.tw/borderless-g...

Curious how to actually use Chinese social media for research? Join us live in under an hour. discord.gg/bellingcat?e...

Sens. Bernie Moreno, R-Ohio, and Elissa Slotkin, D-Mich., introduced the legislation weeks ahead of President Donald Trump's planned meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping.

dpa: German drone companies seek opportunities in Taiwan – ‘in light of experiences from Russia's war against Ukraine, according to Linda Blechert, managing director of the service unit of the German Trade Office Taipei.’

Literally "up is down" discourse.

First time in 70 years, #Japan has scraped it's laws regarding #weapons exports. For now they will export to 17 allied countries. The major exportable weapons platform includes drones, ships, fighter jets, missiles and others. This is in reaction to US/Trump isolationism. apnews.com/article/japa...

How eating gets your immune system fortified: revving up T cell metabolism and function, the adage to "feed a cold" has a basis! nature.com/articles/s41... explainer nature.com/articles/d41...

All of the map fights right now matter more for 2028 than 2026 -- 2026 is more or less a done deal.

Farage admits he pocketed £5 mn "gift" from Thai crypto king, "for security." www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/poli...

It's outrageous how many of these media celebrities give Cheng a free hand when her words and actions are so destructive. Catherine Chang is an exception; for the most part there's a lot of toadying going on.

The argument that Taiwan Cabinet’s proposal of NT$1.25 trillion over eight years would be a “blank check” does not make any sense. The focus on LOAs has one goal: allowing for more stalling at a time when the production capacity bottleneck on the U.S. side has been easing up.

King Charles to President Trump: You recently commented, Mr President, that if it were not for the United States, European countries would be speaking German. Dare I say that if it wasn't for us, you'd be speaking French.

Good long read on Europe’s reactions to German rearmament. giftarticle.ft.com/giftarticle/... Germany re-arms: what does it mean for Europe?

💯

AI alignment can be improved by banning it from using em dashes. Reserve the queen of punctuation marks for humanity.

Over 20 years, Peter Thiel quietly turned his Roth IRA into a gargantuan tax-exempt piggy bank. Using stock deals unavailable to most people, the billionaire took a retirement account worth less than $2,000 in 1999 and spun it into a $5 billion windfall. (Published 2021)

This is so fucked. www.thebulwark.com/p/exclusive-...

At some point you have to wonder whether New York Times is showcasing these voters on purpose to promote the idea that voters are simply too dumb to make the right choices, so politics should be reserved for the "elites" like those at the NYT themselves. www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

It's only a matter of time before the Trump administration starts running propaganda about not using your car. It won't be as good as Errol Morris's Miller High Life Campaign, and it'll be hilarious to see Republicans do it, but...

United Arab Emirates Says It Will Leave OPEC in Blow to Oil Cartel www.nytimes.com/2026/04/28/w...

Born on this day in 1937. Former President of Iraq Saddam Hussein

The remarkable thing about this essay—written by a Palestinian who denies Chinese atrocities in Xinjiang—is how much the author justifies China’s claims over Xinjiang using exactly the same argumentation with which Israel claims Palestine

An important lesson of social media is that some posts do not require us to comment.

INT: New York Times building, day Editor: “OK, people, brand new day! Who’s got an idea for an article that will make Bluesky melt down?”

The South, Midwest, West Coast, etc., get their due, but about a third of the songwriters on this list are from Greater New York City. You could say, well, it's the Times, they're notoriously provincial, but NYC is also a good place to think up music. www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

I wasn't really sure what to call this post, but both issues discussed in it ultimately boil down to Chinese bullying laorencha.substack.com/p/standing-u...

🧵 UAE has announced that it is leaving OPEC. What does it mean? ⬇️

US 2026 NDS: we’re going to focus on Indo-Pacific and on containing China <5 minutes later> US: j/k, we’re going to send everyone to Middle East and Asia can eat shit

Of course Europe can defend itself! It is a challenge, structures are as they are but we need to stop pretending that we are some helpless babies needing to be saved by the US. My - slightly less rant-y - comments from last night.

Kallas speaking after EU-ASEAN ministerial - a struggle convincing Asian partners not to buy Russian oil these days "There is an energy crisis right now and unfortunately, this energy crisis is benefiting Russia... oil revenues are what Russia is using to fund this war."

Hungarian oligarchs begin fleeing the country, transferring assets, in anticipation of corruption investigations giftarticle.ft.com/giftarticle/... via @FT

An interesting result of the latest My Formosa poll in Taiwan: KMT chairwoman Cheng Li-wun's (very modest) popularity bump after her meeting with Xi comes almost exclusively from within the ranks of those who want to maintain the cross-Strait status quo forever. m.my-formosa.com.tw/DOC_225352.htm

Another tedious case of abuse of assistant funding, so common among legislators of all parties. This commonality is why the KMT is trying to abolish the laws against this. www.taipeitimes.com/News/taiwan/...

Yep. deep into the 1940s the CCP supported Taiwan independence, as it had in the 20s and 30s, a feeling widespread among educated Chinese. globaltaiwan.org/2026/04/the-...

Can't decide if the Raven is learning to deliver a more direct force after observing the higher height, or if he's thinking "your dumbass tool ain't working bro" and decides to use his beak instead...

Ko Wen-je’s demolition of the Zhongxiao Bridge immediately after taking office now scrutinized for not being consistent with the bid, the article points out there are other possible corruption cases that Ko may be linked to news.ltn.com.tw/news/politic...

If this isn’t emblematic of the world becoming an oligarchy of the super rich, I dont know what is. www.bbc.com/news/article...

China's ethnic unity law could be aimed at Taiwanese www.msn.com/en-in/news/w...