Stanley Pignal
@spignal
Charlemagne columnist & Brussels bureau chief, The Economist. Past stints in Paris, Mumbai, London. Français. Personal feed. Bio 👇. Charlemagne@economist.com
The most enduring journalist cliché is the framing of interviews in formulaic headlines. Which by convention have to be: "Celebrity X on one thing, another thing—and a quirky third thing".
I went a bit our on Haidt after he identified the "epidemic in myopia" in children to smartphones. Which, given in Asia it surged when kids started reading/attending school, a few decades before they got phones, seemed like a very poor use of data to make a pre-baked point
Amazing how England odds of winning haven't improved since immediately after their goal, despite the time available to Argentina melting away kalshi.com/markets/kxwc...
A good example of Europe's spectacular over-regulation is when a minister in Paris decrees how long retailers can have annual sales on, based on the weather. In this case, deciding shops can keep cut-price deals on for another week - beyond which full prices must apply again OR ELSE.
It had been several months since we last got a "JPMorgan elevates two bankers as potential successors to Jamie Dimon". A regular feature for at least five years.
Brussels redeveloped a large public space and will end up with a vast, plantless concrete expanse. In the 21st century how does this even happen? I know there have been planning and budget problems, but this is still a shameful failure—right on the EU's doorstep.
Smazak do tell me, do you think it's worth me engaging here? Genuine question.
A lot of people left X for Bluesky because of the tone of the discourse there (I wasn't one of them, as it happens). But do be aware that angry lefties aren't above personal insults. If your answer is "oh but you said something I disagree with online", it might be worth rethinking a few things.
"He's a great man posing as a great man. That's what's so fantastic about him. It's like Charlie Chaplin impersonating Charlie Chaplin." --W. Somerset Maugham
I'd always assumed "cougar", used to describe an older woman seeking a younger man, was a recent thing. But here Barjavel is using the term "panther"... in 1957.
1919 image of the Moscow west by-election. The furry was later sentenced to 832 years in a Siberian gulag. The bin man is rumoured to be Trotsky
There is evidence this is an age-old custom that British politicians adopted from other cultures
I don't think there's a single political party in Europe that wouldn't expel someone for saying what Elon Musk is saying—and I'm including the RN, AfD, Wilders etc. The idea that migration is "ethnic cleansing" is too extreme even for them. (Via @polphilpod.bsky.social)
Somewhere in the bowels of Whitehall archives is a vellum copy of "Gordon Brown's Five Economic Tests", ready to be dusted down.
64% of Uber passengers in Europe feel safe riding at night. Not sure I'd put up a billboard that, you know, invites questions about why over 1/3 of riders *don't* feel safe?
When a New York team wins a big championship it's an exuberant celebration across the city, highlighting its multiculturalism. When PSG won the Champions League you had an (alas predictable) night of rioting in Paris.
Hot tip: the length of a man's penis (oh and his tongue) are determined by the length of the umbilical cord left uncut. I actually didn't know that! (From Super-Infinite by Katherine Rundell)
I genuinely love that when Tracey Emin describes David Hockney as "a proud chain-smoking homosexual" it is the chain-smoking that is considered to be the subversive bit these days.
Yes, to be fair it looks more like a paint job (albeit with a few balconies thrown in) than what you sometimes see: an attempt to recreate a past that didn't exist in the way it is depicted.
Things that you can buy for about $8000, wheels edition. - Electric Brompton folding bike - BYD Seagull electric car, 300km range. I'm sure tariffs will help us.
The additional interest the French state has to offer investors to justify the risk of lending to France vs Germany (the 10y "spread") has risen over time. That roughly equates to the cost Germany would bear in "lending" its balance-sheet to France through joint borrowing.
Part of the scariness of that chart is how consistently the gap has grown (chart here). It doesn't matter if the French president is from the left or right or whatever—the number always goes up. To Germans that looks like chronic fiscal indiscipline. Would you issue bonds with *that* country?