Bryan Bilven, PhD

Delighted to share our new paper in @BMJMentalHealth: “Cannabis use, cognitive function and dementia risk in older adults: observational and genetic analyses” (2026) 🔗 mentalhealth.bmj.com/content/29/1/e… @uk_biobank @UniofOxford @StCrossCollege #CannabisResearch #DementiaResearch

Wait for it... 🔥🔥🔥

“We’re ready to negotiate this in a peaceful, in a diplomatic way. We’ve been prepared to do that for days. They are the ones that played games, as they have done for 40 years, as they have done to multiple presidents, they tried to play games with @POTUS, and they see what happens.” — @SecRubio

As my scheduled time as a Special Government Employee comes to an end, I would like to thank President @realDonaldTrump for the opportunity to reduce wasteful spending. The @DOGE mission will only strengthen over time as it becomes a way of life throughout the government.

Trump administration blocks Harvard from enrolling foreign students, threatens broader crackdown reuters.com/world/us/trump…

I finally got round to reviewing @harari_yuval's new book, "Nexus." I was underwhelmed.

🚨BREAKING: AG Pam Bondi says a Tesla Dealership Terrorist in jail looking at 20 years, Sends DARK Warning to Others: "We have someone in jail looking at 20 years. If you're gonna touch a Tesla, do anything - watch out. We're coming."

True

"Ukraine is a place of money laundering and corruption" FBI Director Kash Patel has ordered an investigation into where the hundreds of billions sent to Kyiv have gone. "The entire American people want to know because it's our money," Patel stated.

I agree

Ten bad takeaways from the Zelenskyy blow-up 1. Zelenskyy does not grasp—or deliberately ignores—the bitter truth: those with whom he feels most affinity (Western globalists, the American Left, the Europeans) have little power in 2025 to help him. And those with whom he obviously does not like or seeks to embarrass (cf. his Scranton, Penn. campaign-like visit in September 2024) alone have the power to save him. For his own sake, I hope he is not being “briefed” by the Obama-Clinton-Biden gang to confront Trump, given their interests are not really Ukraine’s as they feign. 2. Zelenskyy acts as if his agendas and ours are identical. So, he keeps insisting that he is fighting for us despite our two-ocean-distance that he mocks. We do have many shared interests with Ukraine, but not all by any means: Trump wants to “reset” with Russia and triangulate it against China. He seeks to avoid a 1962 DEFCON 2-like crisis over a proxy showdown in proximity to a nuclear rival. And he sincerely wants to end the deadlocked Stalingrad slaughterhouse for everyone’s sake. 3. The Europeans (and Canada) are now talking loudly of a new muscular antithesis, independent of the U.S. Promises, promises—given that would require Europeans to prune back their social welfare state, frack, use nuclear, stop the green obsessions, and spend 3-5 percent of their GDP on defense. The U.S. does not just pay 16 percent of NATO’s budget but also puts up with asymmetrical tariffs that result in a European Union trade surplus of $160 billion, plays the world cop patrolling sea-lanes and deterring terrorists and rogues states that otherwise might interrupt Europe’s commercial networks abroad, as well as de facto including Europe under a nuclear umbrella of 6,500 nukes. 4. Zelenskyy must know that all of the once deal-stopping issues to peace have been de facto settled: Ukraine is now better armed than most NATO nations, but will not be in NATO; and no president has or will ever supply Ukraine with the armed wherewithal to take back the Donbass and Crimea. So, the only two issues are a) how far will Putin be willing to withdraw to his 2022 borders and b) how will he be deterred? The first is answered by a commercial sector/tripwire, joint Ukrainian-US-Europe resource development corridor in Eastern Ukraine, coupled with a Korea-like DMZ; the second by the fact that Putin unlike his 2008 and 2014 invasions has now lost a million dead and wounded to a Ukraine that will remain thusly armed. 5. What are Zelenskyy’s alternatives without much U.S. help—wait for a return of the Democrats to the White House in four years? Hope for a rearmed Europe? Pray for a Democratic House and a 3rd Vindman-like engineered Trump impeachment? Or swallow his pride, return to the White House, sign the rare-earth minerals deal, invite in the Euros (are they seriously willing to patrol a DMZ?), and hope Trump can warn Putin, as he did successfully between 2017-21, not to dare try it again? 6. If there is a cease fire, a commercial deal, a Euro ground presence, and influx of Western companies into Ukraine, would there be elections? And if so, would Zelenskyy and his party win? And if not, would there be a successor transparent government that would reveal exactly where all the Western financial aid money went? 7. Zelenskyy might see a model in Netanyahu. The Biden Administration was far harder on him than Trump is on Ukraine: suspending arms shipments, demanding cease-fires, prodding for a wartime, bipartisan cabinet, hammering Israel on collateral damage—none of which Westerners have demanded of Zelenskyy. Yet Netanyahu managed a hostile Biden, kept Israel close to its patron, and when visiting was gracious to his host. Netanyahu certainly would never before the global media have interrupted, and berated a host and patron president in the White House. 8. If Ukraine has alienated the U.S. what then is its strategic victory plan? Wait around for more Euros? Hold off an increasingly invigorated Russian military? Cede more territory? What, then, exactly are Zelenskyy’s cards he seems to think are a winning hand? 9. If one views carefully all the 50-minute tape, most of it was going quite well—until Zelenskyy started correcting Vance firstly, and Trump secondly. By Ukraine-splaining to his hosts, and by his gestures, tone, and interruptions, he made it clear that he assumed that Trump was just more of the same compliant, clueless moneybags Biden waxen effigy. And that was naïve for such a supposedly worldly leader. 10. March 2025 is not March 2022, after the heroic saving of Kyiv—but three years and 1.5 million dead and wounded later. Zelenskyy is no longer the international heartthrob with the glamorous entourage. He has postponed elections, outlawed opposition media and parties, suspended habeas corpus and walked out of negotiations when he had an even hand in Spring 2022 and apparently even now when he does not in Spring 2025. Quo vadis, Volodymyr?

The people have spoken.

Once again, I wish I had not resigned from @APA a few years ago, so that I could resign again this year:

I resigned from the American Psychological Association last year after 43 years of membership. Sally Satel ⁦@slsatel⁩ explains the reason - takeover (and ruination) of scholarly & civil-society institutions by illiberal radicals. thefp.com/p/american-psy…

Good luck, you have my full endorsement!

I very much appreciate this response. Yesterday was a bit like one of those pub brawls after which the combatants shake hands and have a drink. I'll watch with keen interest how the negotiations go. I still disagree with what @realDonaldTrump said about @ZelenskyyUa, but what matters is achieving peace and security for Ukrainians, ensuring that Russia is not rewarded for its aggression, and above all strengthening America's global position. Again, I wish you luck.

In this thread I'll respond to some of what I've seen out there. Let's start with Niall: 1) On the general background, yes, you have been more right than wrong on a lot of the details of the conflict. Which is why I'm surprised to hear you call the administration's posture "appeasement." We are negotiating to end the conflict. It is "appeasement" only if you think the Ukrainians have a credible pathway to victory. They don't, so it's not. 2) As far as I can tell, accusations of "appeasement" hinge on a few arguments (not all of them from Niall, to be clear). The first is a criticism that we're even talking to the Russians. Well, the President believes to conduct diplomacy, you actually have to speak to people. This used to be called statesmanship. Second, the idea--based often on fake media reports--that we've "given the Russians everything they want." Third, that if we just passed another aid package, Ukraine would roll all the way to Moscow, raise Navalny from the dead, and install a democratic and free leader to Russia (I exaggerate, but only a little). All of these arguments are provably, demonstrably false. Many people who have gotten everything wrong about Russia say they know what Russia wants. Many people who know the media reports fake garbage take anonymously sourced reports on a complex negotiation as gospel truth. But the bigger issue, as I think Niall knows, is that most of those loudly shouting "appeasement" are people who aren't dealing with the reality on the ground. 3) On the specifics of the negotiation, I"m not confirming details publicly for obvious reasons, but much of what I've seen leaked ranges from entirely bogus to missing critical info. The president has set goals for the negotiation, and I am biased, but I think he's awfully good at this. But we're not going to telegraph our negotiating posture to make people feel better. The president is trying to achieve a lasting piece, not massage the egos or anxieties of people waving Ukraine flags. The idea that the President of the United States has to start the negotiation by saying "maybe we'll let Ukraine into NATO" defies all common sense. Again, it's not appeasement to acknowledge the realities on the ground--realities President Trump has pointed to for years in some cases. 4) Many of the subjective criticisms amount to pearl clutching that don't ultimately matter. I'm happy to defend POTUS's criticisms of the Ukrainian leadership (not that it matters, because he's the president, but I agree with him). You're welcome to disagree. But these critiques of POTUS don't bear on the war or on his negotiation to end it.

On this week's elections in Germany

Hi. Want to see a murder on live TV? I give you White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller vs. generic CNN Karen. CNN Karen complains that the White House is prosecuting Illegal Aliens who commit tax fraud. Then, Fatality…