A piece of our time: a special edition covering the Vance speech, the Ukraine peace plan, and the EU response.

They say sunlight is the best disinfectant. But what if you’re a germ? As the USA.I.D demolition continues, we’re beginning to see the outlines of what might be a network of real corruption - and it's not just the tinfoil hats saying it. How will the US public deal with having the wool pulled from their eyes? And will the Beltway liberals ever recover? 

Meanwhile, Britain has agreed to the deal of the century. The Mauritians get: £18 billion. We get: to give them a strategically important series of islands. The Chagos saga must already rank as the most tawdry fiasco since Suez. What no one can understand is: why? 

Finally, while it’s retreating from aid, the US imperium is once again reasserting itself over the periphery when it comes to tech. With the Silicon Valley set signed up behind Trumpism, Europe is being asked to bend the knee, not just on market access, but on their much eroded rights to online free speech. What can you say? 

USAID is being dismantled brick by brick, the bricks are being pulped, the pulp is going in the blower, the dust is being scattered to the four winds. 

R.I.P, U.S.A.I.D. 

We’ll be sharing the surprising implications for independent anti-government bloggers in Moldova. 

Meanwhile, DeepSeek has beggared the US stock market and set NVIDIA on fire. Have the Chinese pulled off their Sputnik moment? Or just the ordinary shooting of a fox? 

Finally, the frenzied abandon of Donald Trump’s tariff blitz often feels like a version of Oprah’s You Get A Car. Except: You Don’t Get A Car. But is this more than a phoney war of sound and fury? 

No European who saw it would have avoided a pang of dread, when a meme appeared online this week, in the wake of the DeepSeek AI phenomenon.  

It pictured three dragons. One, ferocious, on its chest the logos of OpenAI, MetaAI, Gemini AI, and the US flag. 

The other, just as ferocious: featured the Chinese flag, and the logo of DeepSeek. 

The third, looking like the kid in primary school who eats the crayons, featured the EU logo, and the emblematic grafted-on plastic water bottle lid that has become totemic of the EU’s failure to do anything but regulate itself out of existence. 

The message was clear. Europe is increasingly at a crossroads. Between the coming eastern powers, and the declining western powers. And if it isn’t at the table, it will be on the menu. 

Which way, European man? 

Glen Diesen is professor at the University of South-Eastern Norway. 

He has a very popular Substack, and is a regular guest on a range of podcasts, including The Duran. We’re very glad to have him here today, to talk about Europe, Trumpism, the end of the Ukraine War, and beyond. 

This week is a paywalled premium episode.

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Joe Biden spent his final week minting pardons like Mugabe minted bank notes. In fact, his last act in office was to pardon his entire family. What does this unprecedented use of the seal of office portend for America’s future – and what has it got to do with the Russian word for roof? 

Meanwhile, it’s been a rollercoaster week for zombie-eyed American Zoomers. TikTok was shut down. Then it was reprieved by Trump. In between, Red Note gave them a glimpse into the parallel universe of zombie eyed Chinese Zoomers. Many of whom seemed to have better standards of living in their communist hellhole. What are the geopolitical implications of this collision of worlds? 

Finally, after looking at the quality of Chinese youth, we’re discussing the quantity. New demographics numbers are in. And they paint an extraordinary picture.  Those Zoomers are humping. Join us as we find out more. 

***

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Britain is under attack by the world’s two worst entities - rape gangs and bond market speculators. As Starmer mounts a last stand, we’re reporting from the tattered remnants of old blighty. Is Musk just messing with Starmer’s tiny mind - or are the Americans serious about sinking HMS Britannia. 

Meanwhile, just as the world is thirsting for AI, the Biden regime has decided it will titrate the market for the specialised NVIDIA graphic chips that are vital to building AI systems. 

It’s like sanctions - but for everyone else in the world. So will this make America more friends?

Finally, we’re revisiting a Multipolarity tin foil hat classic: Trussification – the process of targeted financially dynamiting of a political regime. As Biden squeezes the oil market, is he looking to leave a tightly coiled inflation turd on the desk of his successor? 

***

Be excellent to each other, and -

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Welcome to 2025.

How bright is the future?

Andrew and Philip share their predictions.

😎😎😎

Ian Proud was once Britain's man in Moscow.

A career diplomat of 24 years, he got to look in directly upon the withering relationship between the United Kingdom and Russia, in the crucial period from 2014 until 2019.

In fact, he rebuilt embassy staffing structures following the mass expulsion after the March 2018 Salisbury nerve agent attack.

Since then, Proud has been outspokenly critical on questions of UK-Russia relations.

This week, Philip and Andrew are trying to get into the British diplomat mindset as relations approach a crucial juncture.

***

Be excellent to each other, and -

Get us on Twitter. 

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On Patreon. 

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Or on our Substack. 

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Trumpism 2.0 offers both danger and opportunity. 

Trumpism 1.0 was built around being tough with China. 

And while that is no longer a rhetorical priority for the big man, much of what was started in 2016 has since become the accepted wisdom in DC. 

Today, Trumpism 2.0 is as much about American competitiveness – in an international market that has slipped further away from its hegemon across the last eight years. 

It’s about deregulation, DOGE, and developing strategic dominance in the emerging fields of AI, weapons tech, and genetics.  

We’re in for four years of great power competition with China - against a background of a new focus on US competitiveness. 

Almost no one spans these subjects as elegantly as Steve Hsu. 

A professor of theoretical physics, startup founder and one of the most prominent members of the new counter-elite that has recently emerged from the high tech world of America's west coast to challenge the status quo in Washington DC 

Steve's research has included black holes and quantum information, dark energy, quantum gravity, and quark matter. He has also contributed to the field of genetics, especially on the construction of genomic predictors of complex human traits.

Steve has founded several startups, including Othram, a company that uses DNA sequencing to help solve hot and cold criminal and missing persons cases, Genomic Prediction, which pioneered polygenic screening for embryos in IVF, and most recently Superfocus, an enterprise GPT that uses Large Language Models for language capability. 

Somehow, he finds time to host Manifold, one of the world's most interesting podcasts and a must-listen for all those who wish to keep abreast of the ideas and knowledge of the Silicon Valley and VC world.

***

Don’t call it a comeback! Four years after the last embers appeared to have been snuffed out, this week, the Syrian Civil War shocked fans by announcing it’s getting the band back together. Is the world’s most confusing conflict about to get explicable? Not entirely. We’ll be explaining why the situation in Aleppo is not something you’ll brush up on soon.

Meanwhile… The fireworks guns have been a great special effects innovation. Madam President is certainly giving a hammy turn of character acting. But the script is stale. The dialogue is dreary. Frankly, the franchise is dying. Is this the last of the colour revolutions? 

Finally, The French can’t pass a budget. The Prime Minister is about to resign. The President himself is running around the middle east gladhanding potential bond buyers. Two and a half months on from his bold gambit, things are looking positively pre-revolutionary in the Elysee Palace. Macron has kicked the can down the road – now the can is kicking back. 

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