Eric Prenen

When did they pass a law that every man has to have a beard? Some men look great in them, like Sean Connery. But if a guy's beard is weedy, he looks like one of those acidheads grooving in the mud at Woodstock

When did they pass a law that every man has to have a beard? larryderfner.substack.com/p/when-did-t...

Signs that Putin’s regime is panicking and in its twilight have multiplied in recent days universul.net/signs-that-p...

Belgium is basically a narco-state, top Antwerp judge warns “Extensive mafia-like structures have taken root,” judge writes in anonymous letter laying out how criminality seeps into every part of Belgian society.

Belgium is basically a narco-state, top Antwerp judge warns www.politico.eu/article/antw...

Tariffs, deals and multilateral ideals: can the World Trade Organization survive? The Trump administration’s trade policy accelerates the WTO’s decline and challenges global trade governance

Tariffs, deals and multilateral ideals: can the World Trade Organization survive? www.bruegel.org/working-pape...

Unravelling a new romance: Why emigrants support radical right populists - Sergiu Gherghina, Sergiu Miscoiu, 2025 There is mixed evidence regarding the extent to which emigrants support radical right populists in their home countries, and we also know very little about why ...

Unravelling a new romance: Why emigrants support radical right populists - Sergiu Gherghina, Sergiu Miscoiu, 2025 journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

AI is coming for your job faster than you think and here’s who will be replaced first A new Elevate report predicts AI will replace millions of jobs by 2030 with data entry clerks, telemarketers, and cashiers most at risk and creative roles still holding out.

AI is coming for your job faster than you think and here’s who will be replaced first nerds.xyz/2025/10/ai-c...

Israel’s Mounting Ceasefire Violations in Gaza “The matter is not a ceasefire — we are talking about a managed genocide, a managed forcible displacement.”

Israel’s Mounting Ceasefire Violations in Gaza
theintercept.com/2025/10/15/i...

Quiz: What’s Your AI-dentity? Are you an AI Doomer, an Accelerationist or somewhere in between? Answer these questions to find out.

I took @Opinion.bloomberg.com’s AI-dentity quiz. My AI-dentity is the Accelerationist. What’s yours? www.bloomberg.com/graphics/202...

Already today, Israel has:

-Conducted a drone strike on Khan Younis in Gaza

-Shot & wounded two others near Khan Younis

-Killed 5 Palestinians in Gaza City

-Fired on & wounded a several others near Jabalia

All in violation of the “ceasefire.”

The Creeping Integration of Far-right Parties in Europe
www.swp-berlin.org/publications...

How Crypto Became a Trump Trade It’s primarily a vehicle for crony capitalism now

Crypto derives its value largely from the support of politicians and government officials — in particular, officials who can be bribed. paulkrugman.substack.com/p/how-crypto...

Why Trump lost the Nobel Peace Prize (which he wasn't qualified for in the first place) Donald Trump has earned a reputation for being the guy who does what he wants, even as president of the United States... But this is only the case at

Why Trump lost the Nobel Peace Prize (which he wasn’t qualified for in the first place) universul.net/why-trump-lo...

The WIRED Guide to Protecting Yourself From Government Surveillance Donald Trump has vowed to deport millions and jail his enemies. To carry out that agenda, his administration will exploit America’s digital surveillance machine. Here are some steps you can take to ev...

hi hello unpaywalled

The Nobel Committee is like, "This is why that orange asshole doesn't deserve the Nobel Peace Prize and why we are rewarding the exact opposite of him."

Right-wing extremist violence is more frequent and more deadly than left-wing violence − what the data shows Donald Trump and top administration officials confidently assert that left-wing political violence is a huge problem in the US. They’re wrong, say researchers who study extremism.

Right-wing extremist violence is more frequent and more deadly than left-wing violence − what the data shows theconversation.com/right-wing-e...

Screenshot of the guardian profile on Threads

Screenshot of guardian posts on threads

Millions of followers ≠ engagement. @theguardian.com has 1.4m followers on Threads with almost no engagement. On Bluesky, links can get 3–4x more clicks than likes.

The real question isn’t “how many followers do you have?” but “what kind of engagement do you get?”

Interest Rates and Inflation: Knives Out – Economics from the Top Down There is strong evidence that higher interest rates don’t mitigate inflation. Instead, they might make it worse. I wade through the details here.

“when we look at the World Bank database, there is no evidence that higher interest rates down-regulate inflation.
If anything, the evidence suggests that rate hikes make inflation worse.” economicsfromthetopdown.com/2023/02/19/i... #econsky

‘It’s like when you see the tsunami coming in’: Agricultural economists are sounding the alarm about produce prices doubling Consumers “don’t have a clue what’s going on,”  said Raymond Robertson, a labor economist.

"The first wave of grocery-price increases will likely hit this winter...prices could rise 50% to 100% by early next year..."

Which is what every competent economist has been saying for over a year now. Throttling supply of goods & labor, unsurprisingly, means prices go up.
#EconSky

Don't be a Drive-By Critic The Ethics of Public Disagreement

Don't be a Drive-By Critic nathannobis.substack.com/p/drive-by-c...

A drawing of a horse. The front half of the horse is black. The back half of the horse is white. The tail is black. Text reads: I defragged my zebra

This one is only for Blueskyers of a certain age.

Study: AI wiping out entry-level jobs for young workers Researchers at Stanford University say they have found strong evidence that Large Language Models (LLMs) are hitting entry-level jobs the hardest, especially for younger workers.

Study: AI wiping out entry-level jobs for young workers www.neowin.net/news/study-a...

A careful study of every populist episode since 1900 finds catastrophic consequences, which play out slowly.

On average, incomes fall behind by nearly 15% over 15 years.

For the U.S., this is a cost of about $13k per person per year. Over a lifetime, that's million bucks.

How To Argue With An AI Booster Editor's Note: For those of you reading via email, I recommend opening this in a browser so you can use the Table of Contents. This is my longest newsletter - a 16,000-word-long opus - and if you…

How To Argue With An AI Booster www.wheresyoured.at/how-to-argue...

Philosophy Majors & High Standardized Test Scores: Not Just Correlation (guest post) - Daily Nous You’ve probably heard that philosophy majors do well on standardized tests for admission to graduate and professional programs, such as the GRE, LSAT, MCATs, and GMATS. You’ve probably also heard the…

Philosophy Majors & High Standardized Test Scores: Not Just Correlation dailynous.com/2021/07/14/p...

Studying philosophy does make people better thinkers, according to new research on more than 600,000 college grads Philosophers are fond of saying that their field boosts critical thinking. Two of them decided to put that claim to the test.

Studying philosophy does make people better thinkers, according to new research on more than 600,000 college grads theconversation.com/studying-phi...

Sunny Days Are Warm: Why LinkedIn Rewards Mediocrity I, like many people, find LinkedIn particularly annoying. I like the premise of it, don’t get me wrong, a resume you don’t need to update all that often seems cool. Unfortunately though, its turned…

Sunny Days Are Warm: Why LinkedIn Rewards Mediocrity www.elliotcsmith.com/linkedin-tox...

TrumpBessenomics: The First-Semester Report Card Now that we are six months into the second Trump administration, it is worth revisiting the economic philosophy that I refer to as “TrumpBessenomics.” The term captures the fusion of Donald Trump’s…

TrumpBessenomics: The First-Semester Report Card www.advisorperspectives.com/articles/202...

This is unprecedented:

Core CPI inflation is back above +3% and PPI inflation is at its hottest since March 2022.

Meanwhile, President Trump is calling for a 300 BASIS POINT rate cut and is set to replace Fed Chair Powell.

Are you ready for what's next?

Intel stock surges on report Trump administration mulls taking stake in company Bloomberg reported Thursday that the Trump administration is exploring taking a stake directly in struggling chipmaker Intel.

Wait. Isn't this...communism?
Also, maybe more market manipulation? Pump and dump?
#econsky #finsky

finance.yahoo.com/news/intel-s...