Philippe Defraigne

Hard to believe this isn't a Monty Python sketch

Leaving Munich after an intense weekend at #MSC25, I was struck by Ukrainian President Zelenskyy being the only European leader without any illusions about Trump's America. The others still have the luxury of hope.

Bruce Springsteen denounces ICE and dedicates song 'Promised Land' to Renee Good, 2026.

Trump is just the trigger. There are deep historical forces: The dismantling of the FCC fairness doctrine by Reagan, the resulting emergence of Fox News, conservative talk radio, and other propaganda outlets, the removal of guardrails for the influence of money in politics (e.g. Citizen United), the continuous reduction of taxes on high incomes, the ever-increasing wealth and income inequalities enabled by the above, the stagnation of working class income despite continued increase in productivity (and corporate profits), the total lack of social protection and benefits compared to other developed countries. People in the middle class and below have been screwed for 40 years and are angry. They should be angry at Republicans. But the Republican party has managed to deflect their anger towards immigrants, non-Christians, non-whites, liberals, LGBT, China, academia, intellectual "elites", scientists, journalists, and non-existent scarecrows like Antifa.

Life finds a way

A LEGO creator in Japan built a fully automated paper-airplane machine from scratch. [📹needmobricks]

John McCain, 2014

We have two types of Dangers in world.

What do you think?

Marco Rubio: “For years to come, there are many people on the right, in the media and voters at large, that are going to be having to explain and justify how they fell into this trap of supporting Donald Trump.” (March 2016)

Is what he was saying still relevant?

No thanks. Buy European 🇪🇺

Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski: “How we came to a place where we're fighting now with Canada, and we're making nice with Russia. It's beyond me…”

Ukraine received its first 'frozen Russian asset' tranche from Canada. x.com/NOELreports/st…

Russian troops tried to infiltrate the Sudzha sector by crawling through the Brotherhood Pipeline, a pipe with only 1,420 mm (56 inches) in diameter. I provided a map where the pipeline is positioned in this area. At the border station is the terminal. You can actually see on sat pics the underground pipes. I guess that Russians entered the pipes near Bol'shoe Soldatskoe. Coordinates of that access point: 51°18'50.88"N, 35°28'50.94"E According to Ukrainian sources around 100 Russian soldiers were involved in this attempt of which 80% were destroyed.

After Elon Musk has been insinuating to turn off Starlink in Ukraine, Poland‘s Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski is reminding Musk that Poland is paying for it and, furthermore, is making clear that if Musk follows through that Poland will abandon Starlink altogether for being an unreliable service.

Ronald Reagan perfectly sums up tariffs. The logic is sound.

🇺🇸 In New York, a rally was held in support of President Zelensky and against the actions of the Trump administration.