Mārtiņš Vaivars

It’s time Europe got to grips with the MAGA challenge, writes Mark Leonard How Donald Trump can be used as a weapon against his ideological allies on the old continent

If liberal European leaders can defend their national sovereignty from Donald Trump’s attacks, he “will not be just a populist firecracker”, writes Mark Leonard of the European Council on Foreign Relations. “He will also be a catalyst for a new centrist European politics”

Elon Musk Has Made X a Threat to Democracy and His War on the EU Proves It Caroline Orr Bueno reports on how the billionaire X owner has turned Twitter into a tool for foreign interference which monetises and weaponises a global network of disinformation

Elon Musk Has Made X a Threat to Democracy and His War on the EU Proves It. bylinetimes.com/2025/12/08/e...

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Europe's "Civilizational Erasure" The US National Security Strategy and the End of the West

Michael Ignatieff -- Europe's "Civilizational Erasure" -- The US National Security Strategy and the End of the West substack.com/inbox/post/1...

Opinion | Populists are replacing meritocracy with something far worse Undermining expertise is a pretext for consolidating power among the ultra-wealthy.

Fareed Zakaria: As the populist right trashes meritocracy, it is replacing it with something older, cruder and more corrosive: a naked plutocracy — rule by the very rich. www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/202...

Whether through malice, incompetence or both the Trump administration is doing what it can to help Putin & harm Europe. And ironically, it brings peace no closer because Putin sees the evidence of Western weakness & disunity as a reason to keep the war going & achieve his goal of destroying Ukraine.

The West’s Last Chance How to build a new global order before it’s too late.

Alexander Stubb -- The West’s Last Chance www.foreignaffairs.com/united-state...

Four unidentified military-style drones breached no-fly zone to target Zelenskyy's arrival in Dublin Gardaí are investigating whether the drones took off from land in Dublin or from an undetected ship.

Christ on a cracker — these seemingly hostile drones only missed Zelensky’s plane because he was unexpectedly early www.thejournal.ie/drones-dubli...

Great culture can save lives. Literally.

Amazing letter in today’s @thetimes.com about Tom Stoppard

Arī lietuvieši uztraucas par aktīviem autoritāriem mēģinājumiem ierobežot mediju brīvību un neatkarību. 😬

Izskatās šis ir gads, kad demokrātijas atplūdi sasnieguši Baltiju.

www.lsm.lv/raksts/zinas...

WSJ Gentry Beach, a college friend of Donald Trump Jr. and campaign donor to his father, has been in talks to acquire a stake in a Russian Arctic gas project if it is released from sanctions. Another Trump donor, Stephen P. Lynch, paid $600,000 this year to a lobbyist close to Trump Jr. who is helping him seek a Treasury Department license to buy the Nord Stream 2 pipeline from a Russian state-owned company.

One sign that he may be serious is that some of his most-trusted friends, sanctioned billionaires from his St. Petersburg hometown-Gennady Timchenko, Yuri Kovalchuk and the Rotenberg brothers, Boris and Arkady-have sent representatives to quietly meet American companies to explore rare-earth mining and energy deals, according to people familiar with the meetings and European security officials. That includes reviving the giant Nord Stream pipeline, sabotaged by Ukrainian tactical divers, and under European Union sanctions. Earlier this year, Exxon Mobil met with Russia's biggest state energy company, Rosneft, to discuss returning to the massive Sakhalin gas project if Moscow and Washington gave the green light.

Extraordinary WSJ reporting today that unveils the extent to which Trump, Witkoff, Kushner and US business executives are salivating over business deals with Russia while Putin’s forces kidnap Ukranian children and bomb civilians in their apartments.

🎁 www.wsj.com/world/russia...

Make Money Not War: Trump’s Real Plan for Peace in Ukraine The Kremlin pitched the White House on peace through business. To Europe’s dismay, the president and his envoy are on board.

"By dangling multibillion-dollar rare-earth and energy deals, Moscow could reshape the economic map of Europe—while driving a wedge between America and its traditional allies"

Read this excellent @wsj.com account of the business deals behind the "peace"negotiations

www.wsj.com/world/russia...

Krievijas oligarhu Latvijā apciemo Ungārijas varas draugs | Re:Baltica

Kāpēc Latvijā dzīvojošo Krievijas oligarhu Pjotru Avenu apciemo Ungārijas varas draugs no pareizticīgās baznīcas? Lasi mūsu un ungāru neatkarīgā medija 24.hu jaunākajā kopdarbā: rebaltica.lv/2025/11/krie...

the price of populism

Estonia ranks third worldwide in scientific impact – how did it happen? .

Ko sēsi, to pļāusi. Prieks par kaimiņiem.
estonianworld.com/knowledge/es...

Russia must get no amnesty in any peace deal for Ukraine Gyunduz Mamedov, a lawyer-turned-soldier, fears the West will acquiesce in the Kremlin’s bid to undermine justice

Evidence of Russian war crimes “means nothing” if no credible criminal judicial process follows, warns Gyunduz Mamedov. “The sad fact is that Ukraine cannot uphold justice alone”

Just a periodic reminder.

X exposing political accounts' location shows why trust and safety teams mattered: to combat coordinated inauthentic behavior, not "censorship" of viewpoints (Mike Masnick/Techdirt)

Main Link | Techmeme Permalink

My guide to populist-proofing your democracy – before it’s too late | Timothy Garton Ash From public service broadcasting to an independent judiciary, these are the things that we must fight to keep, says Guardian columnist Timothy Garton Ash

My latest commentary: how to populist-proof your democracy before it's too late…
www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Although the scale of this is still to be assessed, this is the inevitable outcome of the monetization of the algorithm. Rage-bait becomes a personal revenue model. Nothing about this should be a surprise.

Top MAGA Influencers Accidentally Unmasked as Foreign Actors A new feature on Elon Musk’s X has given deeper insight into the online “America First” movement.

It’s hilarious and revelatory that a bunch of giant MAGA/America First X accounts are actually based in Eastern Europe and Nigeria.

Kāds % ar profiliem Latvijas Facebook un X nav no Latvijas? Kāds % no profiliem nav īsti cilvēki?

Atkal -- šo varētu sekundē apturēt ar vienkāršu prasību. Reģistrēties / reizēm atsvaidzināties ar Smart ID vai citu digitālu identitātes pierādījumu. Eiropa nav gatava aizstāvēt savu demokrātijas telpu

Donald Trump’s peace plan would be bad for Ukraine, Europe and America It is a sad mix of naked opportunism and strategic myopia

Be in no doubt that this is a perilous moment. America’s proposal prescribes a deeply insecure future for Ukraine and richly rewards Vladimir Putin’s aggression

Trump Has a Recipe for War and Corruption, Not Peace Who would benefit from the White House’s 28-point proposal for Ukraine?

This is not a peace plan. It is a proposal that weakens Ukraine and divides America from Europe, preparing the way for a larger war in the future. In the meantime, it benefits unnamed Russian and American investors, at the expense of everyone else.
www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2025/1...

Stream a small monthly donation to help the Armed Forces of Ukraine finish the war sooner Join https://stopify.org.ua and help the Armed Forces of Ukraine finish the war sooner!

Ja uznāk dusmas par to, ka ASV mēģina piespiest Ukrainu padoties, atgādinu, ka mums ir iespēja ne tikai dusmoties, bet arī atbalstīt Ukrainu. Piemēram, caur stopify.org.ua Ja kāds no maniem sekotājiem vēl nav pierakstījies, iesaku to izdarīt.

Btw, I do hope people understand what they have seen today. It was a well-planned and deliberate ambush of Ukraine by Trump, to force the Ukrainians to bend the knee to Putin's dictatorship. It was not slip-shod, rushed, impulsive or an accident. It was prepared malice.

The party that promised "free speech on campus" has made sure there can be no free speech on campuses.

All the rape, torture, and murder will be brushed under the carpet, a great lesson for any future war criminals.

See also Curtis Yarvin's remarks in a recent Oxford lecture:

"Say what you want about MBS, he's quite an effective king I think in a lot of different ways. Um love the Ritz thing, the whole Saudi embassy thing, I don't know, but I mean he was a journalist". [Giggles]
www.youtube.com/watch?v=zXYl...

Governments and voters are both reacting to algorithm-shaped “public opinion,” not grounded priorities. Immigration feels urgent because platforms amplify fear, pulling parties into hollow performances of toughness. The far right reads that drift as confirmation it’s winning.