Can't wait for Janan's nuclear take on this
02.03.2026 12:22 β π 6 π 1 π¬ 0 π 0Can't wait for Janan's nuclear take on this
02.03.2026 12:22 β π 6 π 1 π¬ 0 π 0OK we get it, Trump contradicts himself. He is large, he contains multitudes
28.02.2026 17:07 β π 6 π 1 π¬ 1 π 0Don't start this war with me Stan. You won't win.
28.02.2026 07:16 β π 6 π 0 π¬ 0 π 0I knew you'd all come round in the end.
28.02.2026 06:11 β π 11 π 2 π¬ 2 π 0Maybe they learned he was "liberal" and something got lost in transatlantic translation
23.02.2026 20:13 β π 0 π 0 π¬ 0 π 0The American mind cannot comprehend a country where neither the leading party nor its chief rival sit on the left
23.02.2026 19:42 β π 23 π 3 π¬ 5 π 0Bet he thought no one would notice this act of recycling tho
21.02.2026 10:49 β π 11 π 0 π¬ 2 π 0
Good Economist piece on Merz tough China trip.
"For not only has Chinaβs market begun to dry up for Germany, big chunks of German industry now regard China as a direct threat to their interests.."
With a favourite chart of Setser and mine. China's net car exports now dwarf even peak Germany.
1/
"The central front of our China policy is at home in Europe".
Excellent piece by @tomnuttall.bsky.social ahead of German chancellor's first China trip.
Pairs nicely with Christian's piece on the EU's emerging economic security doctrine. www.economist.com/finance-and-...
19.02.2026 15:41 β π 1 π 1 π¬ 0 π 0Next week Friedrich Merz will embark on his first visit to China since taking office. The vibes, as they say, will be off. My piece on a relationship that has become a lot more complicated in recent years. www.economist.com/europe/2026/...
19.02.2026 15:10 β π 11 π 3 π¬ 1 π 4EU's flagship piece of industrial-policy legislation turning into a bit of a clownshow.
17.02.2026 14:28 β π 3 π 0 π¬ 1 π 0In a news item about ICE & deportations ZDF used an AI-generated item. Not labelling it properly seems to me the lesser crime. Why use it in the first place? It also included an unrelated 4-year-old piece of footage of a kid being arrested after a school shooting. What or earth are they playing at?
17.02.2026 14:00 β π 8 π 0 π¬ 0 π 0If a German public broacaster was deliberately seeking to bolster the accusations of bias and unprofessionalism levelled by its far-right critics, it might well do something like this. www.stern.de/politik/deut...
17.02.2026 13:58 β π 7 π 1 π¬ 1 π 0Skipped MSC this year. This is where all the cool kids are, anyway.
15.02.2026 16:40 β π 11 π 0 π¬ 0 π 0This, basically. What is new is the tone from some European leaders. Witness Friedrich Merz - barely a trace of transatlanticism in the speech from the former chair of the Atlantik-BrΓΌcke. And some biting, if belated, responses to Vance's broadside last year, echoed later by Emmanuel Macron.
14.02.2026 08:48 β π 42 π 10 π¬ 2 π 1It would be very funny for a European newspaper to report on a Trump speech and call him an "American official".
13.02.2026 15:46 β π 126 π 28 π¬ 3 π 0I think he cancelled because of the shootings
13.02.2026 09:14 β π 3 π 0 π¬ 1 π 0
This week I ask if Germany can rearm its way to economic growth. Tl;dr - jein.
www.economist.com/europe/2026/...
This is an odd, or perhaps telling, way to describe a set of democratically elected national politicians. www.ft.com/content/4551...
11.02.2026 13:21 β π 3 π 0 π¬ 1 π 0In the "fuck you, Europe!" stakes, Marco Rubio's travel plans after Munich are not quite at Vance-meeting-Weidel levels. But they're not far off. t.co/ddDlUoe2Wu
10.02.2026 08:17 β π 20 π 3 π¬ 1 π 0
If you've been paying attention to far-right circles in Europe you'll have noticed the growing prominence of the term "remigration".
I dug into its background, interrogated its meaning, interviewed its advocates and looked at the dilemma it poses for the AfD. www.economist.com/europe/2026/...
Insufficient attention to Manfred Weber's brain farts.
04.02.2026 12:00 β π 6 π 0 π¬ 2 π 0God I love the British public in one of its periodic fits of morality
03.02.2026 19:42 β π 11 π 0 π¬ 1 π 0Strong "minor cabinet minister asked to defuse scandal on weekend political talk show" look
02.02.2026 15:04 β π 1 π 0 π¬ 1 π 0A photocopy of a letter that reads.. British Embassy EAST BERLIN The Rt Hon Douglas Hurd CBE MP Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs London SWl Sir, GERMAN DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC : ANNUAL REVIEW 1989 1. I ended my last year's Review With the remark that "Accidents apart, I expect no substantive change of course in 1989"...
File under, we never quite know what's coming next.
One of my favourite embassy reports. The UK ambassador in East Berlin reporting in after the fall of the Wall...
RIP Sly Dunbar. Testament to his (and Robbie Shakespeareβs) skills that this highly eccentric Serge Gainsbourg number still somehow works.
youtu.be/egHsU2zBgKI?...
hello Mr Vice President this is your economist speaking I am advising you to keep using this metaphor
22.01.2026 18:06 β π 5775 π 961 π¬ 160 π 25