Changpeng Zhao, founder of Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, has been pardoned by President Donald Trump. Zhao—known as “CZ”—was sentenced to four months in prison in 2024 after pleading guilty to breaching US money laundering laws. Binance itself was fined $4.3bn after investigators found it had helped users bypass sanctions. That would be a … Read more
I was working in Leeds when I first started seeing adverts for WKD. Billboards, TV spots—loud, garish, and oddly confrontational. They didn’t look like advertising as we understood it. Traditionally, advertising sold aspiration. Buy this and you’ll be better, cooler, more successful—more attractive, even. WKD did the opposite. Its campaign—“Have you got a WKD side?”—didn’t … Read more
Immigration has fallen sharply in both Britain and the United States over the past year. In Britain the change has been dramatic. Net migration fell from 649,000 to 204,000 in the year to June 2025 — a drop of roughly two-thirds. In the United States border encounters have collapsed from around 1.5 million to roughly … Read more
Donald Trump’s second term is going no better than his first. He has failed to end the war in Ukraine, failed to produce a credible healthcare plan, and failed to rein in government spending. Inflation remains elevated, unemployment is rising, and growth is slowing. Strip out AI investment and deficit spending, and the underlying economy … Read more
Trump is bonkers Donald Trump’s speech to the World Economic Forum at Davos was a rambling, incoherent mess. His letter to the Prime Minister of Norway was equally unhinged, blaming Norway’s failure to award him the Nobel Peace Prize for the crisis over Greenland. He appears not to understand the difference between Norway and Denmark … Read more
On the morning of January 3, U.S. forces struck Caracas, seized Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, and flew them out of the country. Once again, the United States has undertaken a military operation that was efficiently executed in pursuit of an uncertain political objective. A dramatic first step has been taken, while the … Read more
America in 2025: When the Cosplay Became Real For years, America’s slide toward authoritarian politics could be dismissed as performance: ironic fascism, meme politics, men in red hats playing at being strongmen. Loud, ugly, but unserious. In 2025, that alibi no longer works. The Republican Party is no longer flirting with extremism — it is … Read more
Dan Bongino is threatening to resign from the CIA. His boss, Kash Patel, is said to be having doubts too. For those who don’t know, Bongino is the current Deputy Director of the CIA—a man whose career path runs from NYPD cop to Secret Service agent to full-blown MAGA media personality. I’ve followed him on … Read more
Donald Trump has signed into law his “big beautiful bill.” The headline? A vast extension of the tax cuts he introduced during his first term—overwhelmingly benefiting the top 1%. Technically, it’s a budget reconciliation bill, meaning it could be passed with a simple majority, shielding it from Democratic filibusters. But there’s nothing technical about the … Read more
Musk and Trump: DOGE, Debt, and DefaultThe Department of Government Efficiency goes inefficiently bust. The last 48 hours have been historic—and not in a good way. Elon Musk has left the Trump administration with a black eye and a fresh dose of chaos. The official line is that he “tripped on something,” but given the … Read more