NATO's Supreme Allied Commander, Dwight D. Eisenhower in his diary on June 11, 1951, “Europe’s security problem is never going to be solved satisfactorily until there exists a United States of Europe."

Så sandt som det er sagt. 💯

Paul Krugman only reads blogs and that is why he, unlike everyone else who has been in punditry for decades, has never lost his mind

This this this. This is what I've been saying all along about the biggest problem with AI

"You're the presumptive Democratic nominee. You've got $200m in a war chest with no end in sight. Now it's two months until the New Hampshire Primary and I don't know what we're for. I don't know what we're against. Except we seem to be for us winning and against someone else winning." - Josh Lyman

The great thing about delaying hard decisions is that you never have to make them and it all turns out fine in the end (Ed - pls check).

In some ways it's quite reassuring that 'Number 10 staff' (who could it be we ask?) are treating the PM with the same contempt they treat their voter base and the electorate more generally.

The BBC and Starmer’s Labour govt share much in common. They’re easily bullied and often afraid, as institutionalised too often are, of exercising their own power. They then appear weak and ineffectual. They’re judged against standards to which their critics would themselves would never adhere...

I have a deep objection to this sort of approach: Everything need not be done according to political-electoral guesswork. Rule of law matters. Constitutional democracy matters. Principles matter. Or at least they should. Dems shouldn’t validate Trump’s lawbreaking because it’s wrong. That’s enough.

We went to a Parisian museum the other day where the staff could only check tickets but not sell tickets so we had to buy them on our phones outside in the rain (and of course you had to create an account etc etc) and I really thought I was going crazy.

Another gentle reminder. The only way for Germany to stop the meltdown in its auto sector is by working with Europe. Germany is too small to go it alone. Anyone with half an econ brain can see that.

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Good 🧵

Breaking the tax pledge is the right call...and politically sulphurous. Reeves must argue, far more forcefully, that taxes are *the* essential downpayment we all pay for a fairer society. Patrick Diamond and I wrote for @renewaljournal.bsky.social. Key points in 🧵 👇 renewal.org.uk/blog/if-labo...

Assume all the yes and no votes from Dem senators are strategic and not sincere votes. The party caucus made a decision. No way to know how many were in favor. Then the caucus decided who would vote yes and no based on what would protect each of them politically the most. That’s how this works.

Cowards die many times before their deaths, The valiant never taste of death but once.

Zelenskyy: "Europe fears the word ‘escalation.’ They believe any response is escalation - but Russia sees non-forceful, intellectual responses as weakness." This is exactly right. We are at war a thug, or a school bully. Give them something and they will demand more!

Regular reminder that Axios stories saying Dems are about to cave are likely sourced from GOP staffers trying to make it happen. Doesn't mean it definitely won't happen. But it's like those NYT stories that Harvard is considering caving (they haven't). The anonymous source was trying to manifest it.

There is no “affordability crisis.” There is the real problem of many Americans not being able to afford good things that some others can afford. Except that’s always been true, and is less true now regarding basic needs and regular wants than before, in particular compared to the 20th century.

They weren't terrorists. They weren't cartel members. They had no fentanyl. And they weren't coming here. They were transporting cocaine. To Trinidad. Most importantly, they were human beings. And they were murdered. By the government of the United States of America.

The economist in me loves this. European 10y gov bonds have a yield of 3.2%. They assume 4%. Fine. Should Euroclear not be able, with some prodding, to generate above 4% nominal returns?

Any UK government whether whether left-liberal, centrist or right wing is going to face scepticism in Brussels after the Brexit mess and with Reform's strength in polls. Banging the table and demanding special treatment didn't work for Johnson and won't work for Starmer.

Political strategists spend a lot of time trying to get their attack lines into the headlines. Serious news outlets should not be playing along - whichever party benefits. The whole "he said - she said" model is just a total repudiation of what journalism should be.

This is the obvious next step. Drop the "reparations loan" and just do Eurobonds. Frankly, it's way better for Ukraine. The rep loan effectively prevents the Russian assets from being used by Ukraine b/c now claimed by EU. Eurobonds+seizing RF assets is way better! www.euractiv.com/news/exclusi...

⚖️🗺️Our friends at World Justice Project just released the 2025 edition of the Rule of Law Index. Unsurprisingly, they found an accelerating decline in the state of the rule of law globally. Let's take a look at Central & Eastern Europe and how this trend plays out there. 1/

I've been beating the Eurobond drum for the last five years (post-Afghan withdrawal it was clear Europe needed more air enablers; ie a European defense public good). It's an idea whose time has long past come. Why? You don't fund a war effort from your regular budget! You finance them. 1/

"Trump got played, it was total amateur hour" "When he has the entire leverage of the US economy behind him he can win a negotiation. But when he has to be on somewhere near equal footing with another world power he is totally outclassed" 🇨🇳 acts like a world power. 🇪🇺 doesn't.

"No one asked me if I was the mayor." That is incredible. As bad as you think the state of journalism is in this moment, it's worse. It's much much worse.

IMV there is a problem in US debate where there no longer seems to be a space to differentiate between Socialists, of which there are few in America, and Social Democrats which could encompass a much wider group of people ideologically distinct from Liberals

Chatbots — LLMs — do not know facts and are not designed to be able to accurately answer factual questions. They are designed to find and mimic patterns of words, probabilistically. When they’re “right” it’s because correct things are often written down, so those patterns are frequent. That’s all.

Signal's president on why they use AWS, and why it's a big problem for our digital infrastructure that we have become so dependent on a very small number of tech giants to provide this kind of global server architecture.

The car crisis tops today’s EU summit but leaders keep staring at the wrong problem The issue isn’t the 2035 engine ban - it’s demand falling off a cliff today With @sandertordoir.bsky.social and @lucasguttenberg.bsky.social, we show why flipping regs won’t help - and what the EU can do instead.

"Instead of each European country trying to maximise the size of its piece of the cake, Europeans would have to start baking the cake together."

Ich finde es schmerzhaft, dass unser westliches Lager (for lack of a better word) von schlichteren Gemütern angeführt wird als das unserer Feinde

Die Fortsetzung unserer transatlantische Außenpolitik als wäre nichts beruht auf der Konstruktion, dass die US-Innenpolitik klar von der Außenpolitik zu unterscheiden sei - und darum ignoriert werden könne. Diese Fiktion wird JEDEN TAG getestet. Ich bin gespannt, wann sie zusammenbricht.

Dear Europe, especially Germany, Stop obsessing over what Trump will or won’t do. Hoping & praying America will step up so we don’t have to is dangerously stupid. Step up yourself, destroy Russia’s war economy, & give Ukraine what they need to win. Europe must defend Europe.

Playing nice with Trump will not save you from humiliation, quite the contrary

*bangs head on the desk until it bleeds** A ONE OFF wealth tax cannot help the problem of a DEFICIT which is a RECURRING thing www.thetimes.com/uk/politics/... *my head not the desk

Die 10 wichtigsten Punkte aus der öffentlichen Anhörung der Nachrichtendienste BND, BfV und MAD: 🧵

The Israeli government prefers a weakened Hamas in a besieged Gaza, to any alternative administration (including a neo-colonial one run by Blair). A besieged, impoverished, ruined and unstable Gaza leaves open the prospect of ethnic cleansing and occupation.

Trump took office with a Israel-Hamas ceasefire in place, then announced a vision for Gaza as a US-owned resort, with most Palestinians living there gone. Israel restarted military ops in March and imposed famine. Thousands of dead Palestinians later, the Trump admin helped broker another ceasefire.

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Ta' den Hummelgaard

glad to be born at a time when i got to see what life was like before the internet and will be dead before AI completely destroys humanity

Europeans voting for extremes must understand this. They’ll start with ones you might not like: muslims, homosexuals etc. But as Amen in the church even light destillations of fascism will continue with journalism, courts and eventually physically threaten any kind of opposition. Even you.

The Russian drones operations reveal two things that Europeans seem unable to admit to themselves. The first is that they are unwilling/incapable of stopping these operations and seem helpless to keep them from multiplying. The second is that the US government doesnt care and will not help Europe.

I find it extremely dumb of our governments to not release selected materials that show the serious nature of some of the drone incidents. A majority is likely hysteria but there are also the real cases (mil drones). The countdown to losing that info-battle started a week ago.

While it's appropriate to criticize Jake Sullivan, the main responsibility for the failed escalation management strategy rests with Joe Biden and Olaf Scholz.

Russia’s refining capacity is collapsing at an unprecedented rate, deepening its soaring government deficit and making the war in Ukraine increasingly unsustainable. This pressure could have been applied years ago if not for one person and his fear of “escalation”.

Scandinavian/Nordic countries frequently top the happiest countries in the world surveys. The cost of a coffee presumably isn't a problem for them. They know their taxes go towards supporting them and their fellow citizens when they need it. We are never going to be Denmark.