Alex Van Steenbergen
@alexvsbe.bsky.social
Economist by trade. At home in Belgium. Occasional writing. Continuous coffee drinking. Piti piti, zwazo fè nich li.
Thanks for highlighting such an example of brazen doublespeak.
What a paradox this is: the US administration's "realist" policies giving the floor to reality-bending narratives.
What a paradox this is: the US administration's "realist" policies giving the floor to reality-bending narratives.
Putin's declaration of "brotherly love" for #Ukraine and what it looks like in reality.
Putin is a maniac and a sadist.
We know who we're dealing with.
Peace through force and ironclad security guarantees for Ukraine are needed. Putin's promises are worthless.
Putin is a maniac and a sadist.
We know who we're dealing with.
Peace through force and ironclad security guarantees for Ukraine are needed. Putin's promises are worthless.
August 20, 2025 at 8:16 PM
Thanks for highlighting such an example of brazen doublespeak.
What a paradox this is: the US administration's "realist" policies giving the floor to reality-bending narratives.
What a paradox this is: the US administration's "realist" policies giving the floor to reality-bending narratives.
Reposted by Alex Van Steenbergen
It's also a bit stupid because the research will still take place, just not in the U.S. www.pbs.org/newshour/sho...
Federal mRNA funding cut is 'most dangerous public health decision' ever, expert says
Many public health experts and scientists say they are stunned by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr’s decision to cancel nearly half a billion dollars in federal funding for future vaccine develop...
www.pbs.org
August 19, 2025 at 12:31 AM
It's also a bit stupid because the research will still take place, just not in the U.S. www.pbs.org/newshour/sho...
Reposted by Alex Van Steenbergen
Do you know how you counter a powerful bully? You bring all your friends!
August 17, 2025 at 2:39 PM
Do you know how you counter a powerful bully? You bring all your friends!
Or living in the "realist" echo chamber: bleak messages allow the messenger to pose as stern, serious and not as detached from reality as the people they mark as "idealist".
The analysts who said that this Russian operation might lead to a Ukrainian collapse and were a sign of Russian success were either fools or desperate to praise Russia.
August 16, 2025 at 1:31 PM
Or living in the "realist" echo chamber: bleak messages allow the messenger to pose as stern, serious and not as detached from reality as the people they mark as "idealist".
And only one Poland will be a leader. PiS will lead Europe nowhere.
"A rich and increasingly powerful Poland, with the best and largest land army in Europe outside Ukraine, will need to assume a leadership role for which its history has not prepared it," writes @EliotACohen
August 7, 2025 at 8:08 PM
And only one Poland will be a leader. PiS will lead Europe nowhere.
Krugman demolishes the headlines on the us-eu trade deal.
Before talking about trade, talk to the expert first.
Paul Krugman Brutally Wrecks Trump’s Europe Deal: “Scam on His Voters” newrepublic.com/article/1985... via @newrepublic.com
Before talking about trade, talk to the expert first.
Paul Krugman Brutally Wrecks Trump’s Europe Deal: “Scam on His Voters” newrepublic.com/article/1985... via @newrepublic.com
Paul Krugman Brutally Wrecks Trump’s Europe Deal: “Scam on His Voters”
As the emerging details of Trump’s trade agreement with Europe puncture his hype, economist Paul Krugman explains at length why it’s actually a big loss for our country—and especially for Trump’s MAGA...
newrepublic.com
July 30, 2025 at 1:59 PM
Krugman demolishes the headlines on the us-eu trade deal.
Before talking about trade, talk to the expert first.
Paul Krugman Brutally Wrecks Trump’s Europe Deal: “Scam on His Voters” newrepublic.com/article/1985... via @newrepublic.com
Before talking about trade, talk to the expert first.
Paul Krugman Brutally Wrecks Trump’s Europe Deal: “Scam on His Voters” newrepublic.com/article/1985... via @newrepublic.com
This article from Haiti's Nouvelliste leaves me with mixed feelings. I'm glad the word is spreading on the country's nefarious oligarchy, but i'm puzzled about an article using exactly the same studies as one of my own's (see below).
Oh well... Ayiti p'ap peri!
lenouvelliste.com/article/2583...
Oh well... Ayiti p'ap peri!
lenouvelliste.com/article/2583...
Quand quelques familles contrôlent l'économie haïtienne : dissection d'un oligopole systémique
En Haïti, faire ses courses coûte cher. Très cher. Une étude de la Banque mondiale révèle que les prix alimentaires y sont 35 à 77% plus élevés qu'ailleurs dans la région caribéenne. Derrière ces chif...
lenouvelliste.com
July 24, 2025 at 5:51 PM
This article from Haiti's Nouvelliste leaves me with mixed feelings. I'm glad the word is spreading on the country's nefarious oligarchy, but i'm puzzled about an article using exactly the same studies as one of my own's (see below).
Oh well... Ayiti p'ap peri!
lenouvelliste.com/article/2583...
Oh well... Ayiti p'ap peri!
lenouvelliste.com/article/2583...
Reposted by Alex Van Steenbergen
America's superrich emerged in two phases: predatory finance followed by quasi-monoplies based on network effects paulkrugman.substack.com/p/inequality...
Inequality, Part IV: Oligarchs
The rise of mega-fortunes
paulkrugman.substack.com
June 22, 2025 at 9:13 PM
America's superrich emerged in two phases: predatory finance followed by quasi-monoplies based on network effects paulkrugman.substack.com/p/inequality...
Reposted by Alex Van Steenbergen
Import Chinese battery: 145% tariff
Import Chinese battery inside Chinese laptop: 20% tariff
Import Chinese battery inside Vietnamese laptop: 0% tariff
Fuckin brilliant. A+ work here team. I am so glad there are such smart people working on our trade policy.
Import Chinese battery inside Chinese laptop: 20% tariff
Import Chinese battery inside Vietnamese laptop: 0% tariff
Fuckin brilliant. A+ work here team. I am so glad there are such smart people working on our trade policy.
April 12, 2025 at 3:11 PM
Import Chinese battery: 145% tariff
Import Chinese battery inside Chinese laptop: 20% tariff
Import Chinese battery inside Vietnamese laptop: 0% tariff
Fuckin brilliant. A+ work here team. I am so glad there are such smart people working on our trade policy.
Import Chinese battery inside Chinese laptop: 20% tariff
Import Chinese battery inside Vietnamese laptop: 0% tariff
Fuckin brilliant. A+ work here team. I am so glad there are such smart people working on our trade policy.
Reposted by Alex Van Steenbergen
Perhaps naïveté on my part, but still rather startled Guardian journalists simply scan this humble Twitter feed & my newsletter for sources, articles, quotes etc & then recycle them as if they're their own. Makes me wonder how often that happens there. Disappointing.
March 25, 2025 at 1:20 PM
Perhaps naïveté on my part, but still rather startled Guardian journalists simply scan this humble Twitter feed & my newsletter for sources, articles, quotes etc & then recycle them as if they're their own. Makes me wonder how often that happens there. Disappointing.
I'd say "some/many Americans", but basically she's right. It's the indifference that enables the autocrats.
People responding to this by saying "the press has normalized this": this interview was aired on MSNBC. I am reading many reports about conflicts of interest, in a wide range of media. If you aren't reading them, then that's your fault. It's not the press who don't care - it's Americans.
December 13, 2024 at 10:14 AM
I'd say "some/many Americans", but basically she's right. It's the indifference that enables the autocrats.
Reposted by Alex Van Steenbergen
People responding to this by saying "the press has normalized this": this interview was aired on MSNBC. I am reading many reports about conflicts of interest, in a wide range of media. If you aren't reading them, then that's your fault. It's not the press who don't care - it's Americans.
December 13, 2024 at 7:27 AM
People responding to this by saying "the press has normalized this": this interview was aired on MSNBC. I am reading many reports about conflicts of interest, in a wide range of media. If you aren't reading them, then that's your fault. It's not the press who don't care - it's Americans.
Who are three people looking for a buddy to play Risk in the basement of Lubyanka?
“I’ll take ‘Moscow’ for $1000.”
“Answer: Edward Snowden, Viktor Yanukovich, and Bashar Al-Assad.”
“Who are people living there because it’s the only place where they can escape prosecution for their crimes?”
[Me: Alex, is this correct?
Alex: Sure, it’s a good layman’s post.]
“Answer: Edward Snowden, Viktor Yanukovich, and Bashar Al-Assad.”
“Who are people living there because it’s the only place where they can escape prosecution for their crimes?”
[Me: Alex, is this correct?
Alex: Sure, it’s a good layman’s post.]
December 9, 2024 at 11:12 AM
Who are three people looking for a buddy to play Risk in the basement of Lubyanka?
Grift. That's the only way you can turn a thing without intrinsic value in to a cash cow.
Why the crypto industry backed Trump: because the crypto oligarchs want billions of dollars from the US government
@chrislhayes.bsky.social has the best explanation of this story I have seen
youtu.be/qWANiC28M8o?...
@chrislhayes.bsky.social has the best explanation of this story I have seen
youtu.be/qWANiC28M8o?...
‘Enormous heist’: Hayes on the ‘audacious scheme’ to reward big donors
YouTube video by MSNBC
youtu.be
December 7, 2024 at 10:35 AM
Grift. That's the only way you can turn a thing without intrinsic value in to a cash cow.
Accurate, indeed.
But Biden still should have not done it, i think.
But Biden still should have not done it, i think.
December 4, 2024 at 4:08 PM
Accurate, indeed.
But Biden still should have not done it, i think.
But Biden still should have not done it, i think.
Love this thread.
And here's me adding: "But while Hitler's army plods along in the wastes of Western Poland, in the US Franklin D. Roosevelt is ousted by Charles Lindbergh. The window to defeat the Nazi's closes fast."
And here's me adding: "But while Hitler's army plods along in the wastes of Western Poland, in the US Franklin D. Roosevelt is ousted by Charles Lindbergh. The window to defeat the Nazi's closes fast."
If we extrapolate the current war against Ukraine to World War II (as we often do), at this point, Hitler has invaded Poland but suffered defeats near Warsaw and Krakow, lost Poznan and has been locked in grueling battles for almost three years over completely devastated border districts.
November 29, 2024 at 11:53 AM
Love this thread.
And here's me adding: "But while Hitler's army plods along in the wastes of Western Poland, in the US Franklin D. Roosevelt is ousted by Charles Lindbergh. The window to defeat the Nazi's closes fast."
And here's me adding: "But while Hitler's army plods along in the wastes of Western Poland, in the US Franklin D. Roosevelt is ousted by Charles Lindbergh. The window to defeat the Nazi's closes fast."
Been thinking about that "con" remark of Macron's when referring to Haiti's politics.
It's way out of order, but also for a reason that may not be obvious.
Is "con" - moronic in french - a term to frame Haiti's obvious internal dysfuntions?
Or is there a system in the apparent madness? 1/
It's way out of order, but also for a reason that may not be obvious.
Is "con" - moronic in french - a term to frame Haiti's obvious internal dysfuntions?
Or is there a system in the apparent madness? 1/
November 27, 2024 at 1:10 PM
Been thinking about that "con" remark of Macron's when referring to Haiti's politics.
It's way out of order, but also for a reason that may not be obvious.
Is "con" - moronic in french - a term to frame Haiti's obvious internal dysfuntions?
Or is there a system in the apparent madness? 1/
It's way out of order, but also for a reason that may not be obvious.
Is "con" - moronic in french - a term to frame Haiti's obvious internal dysfuntions?
Or is there a system in the apparent madness? 1/
For a non-technical story about the role of tariffs and imports in Haiti's dysfunctional political system, see (in french) my www.alternatives-economiques.fr/a-haiti-faim...
For those who don't mind a mathematical equation or two... 1/
For those who don't mind a mathematical equation or two... 1/
November 23, 2024 at 5:53 PM
For a non-technical story about the role of tariffs and imports in Haiti's dysfunctional political system, see (in french) my www.alternatives-economiques.fr/a-haiti-faim...
For those who don't mind a mathematical equation or two... 1/
For those who don't mind a mathematical equation or two... 1/
Trivia: tariff excemptions are one of the tools with which Haiti's elite enriches itself (narcotics trafficking is another).
Seems that it's not the cat-eating refugees in Ohio that turn the U.S. into a version of Haiti.
Seems that it's not the cat-eating refugees in Ohio that turn the U.S. into a version of Haiti.
Good to see the Times picking up on a theme some of us have been hammering for a while: Trump's tariffs, and especially an opaque exemption process, will be an engine of massive crony capitalism 1/ www.nytimes.com/2024/11/23/u...
Trump’s Trade Agenda Could Benefit Friends and Punish Rivals
Donald Trump has a record of pardoning favored companies from tariffs. Companies are once again lining up to try to influence him.
www.nytimes.com
November 23, 2024 at 2:06 PM
Trivia: tariff excemptions are one of the tools with which Haiti's elite enriches itself (narcotics trafficking is another).
Seems that it's not the cat-eating refugees in Ohio that turn the U.S. into a version of Haiti.
Seems that it's not the cat-eating refugees in Ohio that turn the U.S. into a version of Haiti.
Reposted by Alex Van Steenbergen
Meet changing times with unchanging values.
November 21, 2024 at 7:09 PM
Meet changing times with unchanging values.