Have you seen Vladimir on Netflix? A dynamic and sensual show, I love the first episodes. An aging American lady develops a crushing dependence on a random guy called Vladimir. Thanks for reading— now you have a better sense of the politics of the decade
Will there be anything more stupid than Donald Trump wanting credit for stopping wars he started?
Few reflections, including mine
www.newstatesman.com/world/europe...
has written the House of Government, an idiosyncratic but revealing book about Stalinism and its ideologists. What a bitter irony www.stimson.org/2026/fyodor-...
Fedor Lukyanov is a mastermind of Russia’s self-justifications. In a recent interview, he said that Russia’s “position” has not changed. “We” want a transformation of Ukrainian statehood. Trump is a model but he should do more for “us”. The host is Peter Slezkine, whose father
A global criminal enterprise that carried out crimes against humanity. Inquiries should also be launched into how it was possible for such crimes to be committed for so long
www.reuters.com/world/allega...
Argentina’s economy is crashing after Trump gave Melei $20 billion. People are taking out loans for food. So he must mean He wants Orban to do well, not Hungary. This is some sort of payoff. America 2nd 🥈
Rubio to Orban in Budapest:
"We want this country to do well. It's in our national interest -- especially as long as you're the prime minister and the leader of this country."
Indecent and self-damaging policy that defeats any rational explanation, confirming the wildest of conspiracy theories
The Guardian: In 2024, Trump urged 20 fossil fuel tycoons to stump up $1bn for his presidential campaign – while vowing to remove controls on the industry.
Marc Bloch, historien et résistant juif, entrera au Panthéon le 23 juin
I’m not a conspiracy theorist. But when it comes to Jeffrey Epstein, there are a lot of things that remain objectively strange. A DOJ draft press release dated the day before his death, with the final version adding the phrase “of an apparent suicide.” 1/3
“Twentieth-century fascism found a welcome base in the security forces. Millions participate in widespread protests, but few believe that they lead to change. Evennwithout political parties, hyperpolitics will retain its power. True disorder may be just beginning.” www.nytimes.com/2026/02/07/o...
So many senseless choices are making sense in the light of the Epstein drama. But there is a limit to explaining politics this way. Epstein was a charmer but, for one, I am not enchanted. What’s primary, gerontocracy or pedophilia? Capital or desire? Or, to formulate it personally, Trump or Epstein?
Yes
Oh yes, I do
Here is a real image, from an old Soviet film, with the very young Churkin (the future ambassador to the US and Epstein’s friend), with an actor playing Lenin
Again, best way to understand Epstein is to see him as a master of psychological manipulation. This art relies on construction of differences — the interlocutor feels on the top but not quite, and climbing. It easily comes to narcissism, racism, machismo and then, a MAGA sort of delusion
The origins of his wealth remain unclear. Some allege that, through Maxwell, he inherited access to a secret fund of the Soviet Communist Party — the semi-mythical zoloto partii, the cradle of Russian coups and conspiracies.
He was was a pimp. He was also a billionaire. He was a philanthropist and a political activist on the far-right. He was an old-style influencer — not a persona who performs in public, but a secretive figure who imposes his will through psychological manipulation and intrigue.
So what do we know about Epstein? This is a thread — first, the documented facts; then, a few hypotheses.
a thread that I wrote about Epstein some time ago on X — I’d update with a comparison with Rasputin: similarly, psychological manipulations, instrumentalized sex, working for foreign powers, both get killed by former friends. A difference: R was a medic disguised as monk, E a political animal
Fascination of Epstein’s clients with the Russian girls was overdetermined by several factors: 1. Girls were white; 2. They were cheap and available, probably subsidized; 2. Epstein and his clients were racists
Are you not surprised that the only official who has resigned because of the Epstein files is the Slovak?
Putin appears in the Epstein files 1,000 times. Masha Drokova (here) and Jagland, former prime minister of Norway, coordinated their financial plans. These alliances—between oil and sex, pedofiles and crypto-utopians, corrupt and ‘clean’ governments—paved the way to the current ordeal
