America vs. The Rest with Alastair Campbell

[0:00] Do you think that democracy still has the credibility as an operating system, or has [0:07] it so been tainted by the mistakes that were made in Iraq, or the mistakes that were made [0:13] in immigration policy, or the inability to solve some of the bureaucratic issues that [0:19] occur within the EU Brexit? [0:22] Well, the one that you didn't put in there, which I think is the biggest of the lot, is [0:26] the fact that we've had a generation growing up with no guarantee whatsoever that they're [0:32] going to be better off than their parents' generation. [0:34] I think if you go back- [0:35] This shit has gotten dark, Alistair. [0:37] We're going to have to somehow find a way to pull out of this, but we're getting dark [0:41] here. [0:42] Oh, sorry. [0:43] Well, let me just give- [0:43] Let's do this. [0:45] Come on, Mr. Sunshine. [0:46] Oh, God, yeah. [0:47] Well, should I get my bagpipes out and play your tune? [0:49] Hey, everybody. [0:55] Welcome to the Weekly Show Podcast. [0:57] My name is Jon Stewart. [0:57] It is Tuesday, March 24th. [0:59] We are- [1:01] In between. [1:01] In between deadlines, I think, with Iran, and I wanted to get a sense right now, we [1:08] talk a lot about, geez, how did we get here, and Trump, he's just impulsive and he didn't [1:13] do it the right way, but I seem to remember there were other wars that we've gotten into [1:17] that we did get into the right way, but were equally as foolhardy and useless, speaking [1:24] of course of Iraq and perhaps Libya and a variety of other things, and I thought, well, [1:28] let me get- I'd like to get the perspective of someone that I met. [1:32] Years ago, who was active in the Tony Blair administration over in the United Kingdom, [1:40] and I thought he was behind the scenes there. [1:42] He has a great perspective on the inner workings of how we ended up going to war in Iraq and [1:51] lots of the other, and I'm sure, opinions about NATO and Donald Trump and all kinds [1:56] of other things, so I'm just going to get to it. [1:58] I'm excited to talk to him again. [1:59] It's been a long time. [2:01] But please welcome an old friend, Alastair Campbell. [2:04] So let us now- we are joined, thank goodness, from someone who can give us the view from [2:14] across the Atlantic, our special relationship, it's Alastair Campbell, cohost of the Rest [2:20] Is Politics podcast, but obviously Alastair Campbell writer, podcaster, campaigner, strategist, [2:25] worked with Tony Blair, worked with every labor politician known to man, and a cohost [2:32] of that good friend, Rory Stuart. [2:33] Alastair Campbell, thank you. [2:33] Thank you. [2:33] Bye. [2:34] Bye. [2:34] alistair john thank you so much for such a lovely welcome it was a lovely welcome wasn't it's a [2:41] delight to see you again it's been too many years and i have to say uh what an exciting time uh to [2:49] reconnect as the world we're doing it again alistair welcome to another episode of the [2:55] exciting series let's go to war in the middle east yeah well i remember you once absolutely [3:03] skewered me at the end of one of your i would never you did it was well done though because [3:08] i thought i've got this is on the daily show i just published my first volume of diaries i thought [3:13] and i was really on a roll and i was getting through it and i said this book is just trying [3:18] to show that in the end politicians are just human beings and you just said like iraqis and [3:24] moved away on to the next item so you did well yeah you did well you did well yeah well it was [3:31] look well look famously [3:33] uh you were with uh tony blair you wrote his speeches you uh were his press secretary during [3:40] that time in the run-up to the iraq war so from your vantage point how does this iran war differ [3:48] how does the relationship between the united states and great britain differ in the run-up [3:54] to this and what are your your general thoughts on on what we're seeing well i think the first [4:00] thing to say is that the [4:04] you know i know that a lot of people will now say because of the way the intelligence planned out [4:09] that we got it wrong but there was a genuine belief that there was a growing threat from saddam [4:15] hussein which i don't believe there is anybody beyond donald trump saying there was a growing [4:19] threat from iran right now to the united states the second thing i would say the big difference [4:25] is that congress was involved um and even though there were people in the american [4:31] administration at the time notably dick cheney and donald rumsfeld who didn't [4:35] particularly want to go down the united nations route george w bush at least tried to get some [4:41] kind of agreement through the united nations i think then the other thing i would say in relation [4:46] to the the so-called special relationship and i don't even know this john it's 80 years to the week [4:51] that that phrase was first coined what yep um in a speech by uh churchill um did you write that [5:00] speech alice no i well i'm only six i'm only 68. i would have written it [5:05] i would obviously have thought of that and you know what i think it's really interesting when [5:08] you go back and read that speech yeah is he wasn't saying this is a special relationship from the [5:15] the point of view of an equal if you read it carefully you get the feelings he's saying that [5:20] we really want this to be a special relationship now it has been on many many levels [5:25] but it's become a bit of a cliche the special relationship so howard wilson famously did not [5:31] support america with troops in the vietnam war and it kind of survived [5:34] but i think [5:35] at the time of the iraq war tony blair was pretty he was he was absolutely sure that if unless there [5:42] was a fundamental breach on the approach then we had to be with the americans what i think you've [5:48] seen here is kia starmer the british prime minister who is on record as saying we have [5:54] to learn some lessons from the iraq war and one of them is you have to be pretty sure that you're [6:01] going into something where you know what you're going into you have to be pretty sure about the [6:07] war and of course it's pretty clear that it was just a calm and lucent scenario and for a long time [6:13] i've been very upset about it um i mean trump has thrown his toys out the pram several times [6:18] at starman because starman would not engage in the in the initial attacks and and he's basically said [6:24] you can use our bases only for defensive purposes etc but that has clearly upset trump i don't think [6:32] fundamentally it's upset the the kind of meet of the special relationship my sense is the intelligence [6:37] I don't think we're in a different era because of any change on our side in our attitudes to [6:41] the United States of America. But I think we're in a different era because of the personality and [6:46] the character of Trump and this administration. Do you wonder, you know, that's an interesting [6:49] point because I wonder if we're in a different era because people view authority and expertise [6:57] and government differently, that our adventures in Iraq so eroded the credibility. I mean, [7:05] I think you can draw kind of a straight line between United States interventionism and maybe [7:10] even the immigration crisis in Europe and Brexit. And that, you know, it's so interesting because [7:19] you talk about Blair. I thought Blair and Bush seemed like peers, that there was a relationship [7:28] of, I don't want to say equals, because I think the arrogance of the United States wouldn't allow [7:34] for equals. Starmer, [7:37] bless his heart, who came in on such a rush and whose popularity is now somewhere between [7:44] Liz Truss and Liz Truss's lettuce. You know, he doesn't seem to be on that same level. [7:50] And so is the relationship changed? And maybe that's because nobody can be with Trump because [7:56] he won't allow it. He considers himself a pharaoh. So it's impossible to have that kind of relationship. [8:03] Well, I mean, what's so interesting about this is over the course of the first part of Trump's [8:08] second term, [8:09] Keir Starmer seemed to be developing that relationship in that. Now, I always thought [8:14] it was likely to collapse because as you say, I don't think Trump recognizes or appreciates or [8:19] respects anybody apart from himself. But Keir Starmer, who's not a showy guy, but you know, [8:26] the whole thing of dipping into his pocket and pulling out the letter and the invitation from [8:29] the king. It was so bad. It was so, it felt so obsequious when he said this has never happened [8:35] before, you know, and when he pulled it out, I thought, oh my God, it's a target gift card. [8:39] What is that? [8:40] He's got in his pocket. [8:42] It's a letter from the king. [8:43] A letter from the king. [8:44] And of course in Trump's head, Trump basically thinks he's the king of your country. So Keir [8:51] Starmer is like bringing this missive from the actual head of your country, the king. So that [8:57] was, even though, as you say, you could cringe at it and you cringed at it and maybe I cringed a [9:02] little bit, but at the same time it did the job. And then the state visit came along and for a [9:08] while. So for example, take the tariffs. [9:10] Trump did seem for a while that he wanted to be a little bit nicer to the UK than he was being to [9:16] others. Okay. Now what seems to really royally pissed him off is the fact that when he picked [9:23] up the phone and said, oh, by the way, BB's been on the phone care and we're bombing Iran tomorrow. [9:27] Mm-hmm . [9:28] And it'd be great if you guys came along and that seems to me was the level of preparation, [9:33] he was expecting a yes answer to. [9:35] That's right. [9:36] Keir Starmer said, no. Now where you're also right. Keir Starmer is not, [9:41] a kind of bill Clinton, Tony Blair, Barack Obama kind of politician. And I think part of the reason [9:48] maybe why he got a landslide victory here is because this country was sick of people like [9:55] Boris Johnson being prime minister and people like Donald Trump being dominating the debate [10:00] the whole time. And therefore why don't we get somebody a bit more serious, a bit, a bit of a [10:05] lawyer. And that has not in terms of, certainly if you look at the polls that has not worked out. [10:10] Well, do you think [10:11] because you know, in, in some respects he gets in on this huge movement towards labor and then [10:17] he decides my best strategy is what if we guard governed like a, a sort of Thatcherism like, [10:25] like we, we go with austerity and we go and everybody was like, wait, I mean, it, it really [10:31] has fueled the more extremes. I think in, in England, the way that he's gone about it has [10:37] Britain, Britain, Britain, sorry, UK, UK, what did I say? [10:41] You said England. [10:42] I meant UK. [10:42] UK. I meant Britain. I meant great Britain. [10:44] You meant great Britain. [10:45] That's what I meant. [10:46] Yeah. Yeah. Well, you're right. It has, it has, it has, and, and you have to, [10:52] but you have to ask yourself whether that would have happened anywhere in Europe right now. Now, [10:57] it's so interesting. This week has actually been very, very interesting. You had some big elections [11:02] in France at the weekend for all the mayors and the far right did not do as well as they expected [11:07] to. No, you had, you had Maloney yesterday, uh, losing a referendum on judicial reform. [11:13] Here, finally, I think we are through peak Farage and he's starting to dip in the polls. [11:20] You can never have peak Farage. You know that now what, why is that even Farage is backing away from [11:26] Trump at, at this moment? Is it that Trump is, although he did visit him at Mar-a-Lago, I think [11:31] last week, he didn't see him. He didn't see him. Oh, well, if, if you can't get an audience with [11:35] the, he was stood up, he was stood up by the kids. You know why he should have told him I have in my [11:39] pocket and then he would have been ushered in and been given. [11:43] Uh, uh, a greeting there. Are we look, I, I wanna go back to this because you were with, [11:50] you said something earlier that I thought was really interesting. There was a sincere belief [11:55] that Saddam Hussein was, uh, a growing danger. And that, that is why I, I don't think there's [12:03] any question that the Ayatollah in Iran was a danger, but is that the bar that we now look at [12:12] as, as intervention? And. [12:15] Is it possible that the lesson of Iraq and Afghanistan and now Iran and all the way back [12:24] to Sykes Pico and whatever else we wanna take it to mm-hmm is that the West can influence, [12:31] but they can't control mm-hmm and that if we don't learn the difference between those two, [12:37] we are destined for these utterly foreseeable consequences of our kind of Cavalier and arrogant [12:48] interventions. Well, I certainly see this one more clearly in that light than I did Afghanistan [12:56] and Iraq at the time. But if you, if you look at the, why, why though Alistair? [13:02] Well, partly cuz partly cuz I was there and we were trying to, because we did believe what we [13:07] were saying, because we were trying to build a coalition and there was a coalition of sorts that [13:12] was being built. But to be absolutely honest, I think because of the motivation of Trump, [13:18] um, you know, Trump is such a huge. [13:20] Consequential figure. And if you have a view as settled as mine, that he is amoral, [13:28] that he is all about himself, that he is corrupt, that he is enriching himself and his family and [13:33] his friends as he sort of, you know, marauds around the place. Yes. I have to dig really, [13:40] really deep to find a positive motivation. Now, that being said, that being said, [13:46] Iran is a horrible regime, but I think what you're saying in your question, [13:51] is actually to the point that maybe given the cost of Afghanistan and the fact the Taliban are back [13:58] in charge. Now I would argue Iraq is a better country than it was, but I accept there was a [14:02] massive cost in life in, in money and all the rest. But I, I wonder what you're saying is, [14:08] isn't it better and less arrogant for the west to do what it can to pursue a policy [14:14] of containment about some of these threats, uh, that we see in different parts of the world. And, [14:20] and, uh, and that was what the. [14:21] JCPOA was all about. [14:23] I think that's exactly what I'm saying. And if you look at, so we have a view that violence [14:31] can solve any of these issues. We did it in, you know, it wasn't just Iraq and Afghanistan. It was [14:37] uh, Libya. It was Syria. We were arming rebel groups as we went through there and we can [14:45] talk about is Iraq in a better place than it was under Saddam Hussein. I think the question is, [14:50] is that our decision to make? [14:53] know america seems to forget that enshrined in our constitution is this idea that uh people would like [15:01] to be in charge of their own governments the taxation without representation i won't get into [15:05] the whole thing you may have read about it years ago about indeed i have indeed i have uh but this [15:12] idea that we can say to iranians your government is terrible and you're suffering and they clearly [15:19] are and they clearly hate them and they clear and so we're gonna make the decision as we did in iraq [15:28] and now that you'll be better off and that's the arrogance that i'm talking about china china does [15:35] it a different way they say i'm going to influence you through infrastructure or i'm going to flood [15:40] your markets with cheap goods yeah but it's certainly different than how the west does it [15:45] i i totally agree with that and and and i think that is a lesson that kia starmer was pointing to [15:51] when he said we have to learn some of the lessons of these past interventions and look i think [15:56] you're in a we're in a place in the world right now exacerbated by the character and the personality [16:02] of of the current incumbent occupant of the white house you mentioned brexit earlier i would argue [16:08] that brexit was this was a was an indication of a country our country for whatever reason [16:15] deciding to go along with its own decline okay i think your choice of trump for a second term [16:22] is an is an indication of america deciding to go along with its own decline and the arrogance that [16:28] you talk about when you hear that that vile hexeth sort of spraying us with stuff from the bible and [16:35] telling us about what to believe and all this stuff whilst clearly glorifying in the sense [16:41] of domination and violence of other people it's almost sexual for him it almost feels [16:47] as though it's it's erotic wow this i mean i'm i'm i'm that is a horrible thought that [16:54] i've never had before oh you gotta you gotta watch him you you gotta watch him more there's [16:59] there's a reveling in it there is a reveling no doubt about it stunning he he came out the other [17:04] day no quarter no mercy no like just blatantly saying like you know those things that we came [17:11] up after uh world war ii to try and prevent uh the horrors yeah we're getting rid of all that yeah [17:16] we're just going in mike makes right stupid rules of engagement stupid rules of engagement when did [17:22] you ever think of stupid rules of engagement when did you ever think of stupid rules of engagement [17:24] somebody that is has uh some authority over the worst weapons in the entire universe never [17:36] today's episode that you are currently listening to has a sponsor sponsored by the name of surf [17:44] shark vpn what pray tell is surf shark vpn well here's the thing i don't know what you do on your [17:54] computer but chances are you don't want me to know what you do on your computer but you know [18:02] you're probably thinking to yourself well [18:03] i can't do anything about that anyway i'm just gonna have to i'm just gonna have to deal with it [18:08] whether it's the government or foreign entities or alien surveillance whatever it is [18:15] looking at what i'm searching for not that i'm in any way suggesting that your searches are untoured [18:21] if that's even a word but see our sponsor today surfshark vpn they will secure your connection and [18:28] protect your privacy while you're browsing online and surf shark it gives you a way to secure your [18:34] digital life the vpn is the way you can check your privacy on your computer when you're browsing online [18:36] VPN ensures your location doesn't even dictate [18:40] what you can see or do online. [18:43] Single subscription allows you to install and run Surfshark [18:45] on an unlimited number of devices simultaneously. [18:50] Go to surfshark.com slash Jon Stewart [18:53] and use code Jon Stewart at checkout [18:55] to get four extra months of Surfshark VPN. [19:00] That's surfshark.com slash Jon Stewart [19:04] and use code Jon Stewart to get four extra months. [19:10] We talked, Rory, Stewart and I, [19:13] do you love sharing the name with the UK's top podcaster? [19:16] I made mine up completely. [19:18] So yeah, I do love it. [19:20] It's admitted, I could have gone with anything. [19:21] I could have gone with Gervais. [19:23] I could have done anything. [19:25] But you went with Stewart, well done. [19:28] But you know, I quoted yesterday [19:31] when we were recording this week's podcast [19:32] that a piece in the New York Times last week [19:34] by a guy called Phil Clay, he said he's a novelist now, [19:38] but he served in the military in Iraq [19:40] and he was saying similar things about the Iraq war [19:42] that you've just been saying. [19:43] But he did say, at least I knew what I was doing. [19:47] The American military involved in this, [19:48] they do not know what they're doing [19:49] because every day they get given a different message. [19:52] One minute it's killing Khamenei, [19:53] the next minute it's nukes, the next minute it's ballistics, [19:55] the next minute it's bringing peace to the Middle East. [19:58] And the one that completely did my head in, [20:00] Scott Besson being challenged about the rising oil price [20:05] says it's worth 50 days of temporary [20:08] price rises for 50 years of peace in the Middle East. [20:11] The idea that this is bringing peace to the Middle East [20:14] is nuts. [20:16] And the other thing that I would also say is, [20:19] you know, we start debating sort of the methodology [20:25] behind how they did it. [20:27] Like, well, if they had only gone [20:29] and made a better case or things, [20:31] without really getting to the question of [20:35] should we be doing these things at all? [20:39] Not. [20:39] Whether or not we should do it more forthrightly [20:43] or we should settle on just one reason. [20:46] Because that's, listen, we all remember Iraq [20:50] was very well coordinated as far as building a coalition, [20:58] going to the United Nations. [21:00] Now, it all turned out to be bullshit, [21:03] but at least they respected us enough [21:06] to go through the process of lying to us, [21:11] you know, reasonably. [21:13] Well, now we're starting to say, [21:16] well, why didn't they do it that way? [21:18] As opposed to I'm talking about a more fundamental question [21:22] within the West, which is don't we have to rethink [21:27] what danger, as you said, is acceptable [21:34] in a world of these growing weapons [21:37] that containment seems to be the only thing [21:41] you can reasonably do? [21:43] It's almost as though we're saying, no, [21:45] the recipe for war is you start to seed it early that there's a growing danger then you start to [21:54] build allies towards what your end goal is as long as you give americans a clear uh distinction of [22:02] what your three aims are like once you get to three aims and you've presented evidence now [22:08] you've fulfilled your licensing requirements for war and you may do it aren't we making a mistake [22:15] by criticizing that part of it rather than the actual bombing part of it well i do think on this [22:26] that it's possible to to criticize every aspect of this yes no i'm not i'm yeah you know what i'm [22:34] saying yeah i just i don't know what you're saying but but i find that one of the things i find so [22:39] stunning about trump is the extent to which your media in particular but our media does exactly [22:45] the same treating him like this is a normal [22:49] all president donald trump has said this donald trump has posted this donald trump's [22:54] and it's we then analyze it and we try to find what we think the thinking behind it might be [23:01] and i suspect we're nearly always wrong how would you treat him as a non-nor i'm curious [23:06] as to what that would what that would look like i'll give you an example i'll give you an example [23:10] this week robert muller dies okay so robert muller we know that trump hates him [23:15] trump puts out a tweet saying i'm glad he's dead okay with all respect to robert muller [23:23] i think that is the story about robert muller's death and but what happens is because we think [23:30] well trump's just kind of firing one of his mad rants off we just we say robert muller has died [23:36] the man who investigated trump over there has died the the the the normalization of utterly [23:42] abnormal behavior for a president any president listen john there are people that i really don't [23:47] like in the world and when they die i won't say anything right what i won't do is say [23:55] i'm really glad they're dead okay it is utterly abnormal well it it shows growth though allister [24:01] because if you if you saw what he said after rob reiner was was murdered this is real growth [24:08] he's gone from being kind of a man baby to now he's in his angsty teenage years like [24:13] i don't care if you're dead i wish you were dead now he's he's like a petulant teenager now [24:18] where he used to be just a giant baby what was he vis-a-vis charlie kirk [24:25] People like me who were saying nothing were being attacked on social media by the magnet [24:31] crowd for saying, for saying nothing for not saying that he was a saint. [24:36] He was a hypocrite and a contradictory figure. [24:39] The point is we do talk about this. [24:41] I have to tell you like 24 hour news cycles, but here's how we talk about it. [24:46] News anchors will bring on a Republican politician and they'll say to that Republican [24:50] politician, and you've, you've had this game played out having been in the press and they'll [24:54] say to that politician, was that appropriate for the president to say that? [24:59] And then they'll say some version of, I think Scott Besson even said on, uh, the, the weekend [25:05] shows, well, you have to have some grace for president Trump knowing what we've put his [25:11] family through. [25:13] Uh, they're basically calling for empathy, uh, in an emotional state that is utterly [25:18] missing from that entirety of, of, of that movement. [25:23] My point is though, he's the. [25:26] The president, how do you, you have to deal with the reality that we're all facing. [25:36] And I guess the policy should be, as we're talking about containment. [25:41] Yeah, absolutely. [25:43] Even with him. [25:44] Totally with him. [25:45] Yeah. [25:45] Here's a, here's another example though. [25:48] Um, I look, I know he lies so much and he misrepresented so wild, right. [25:54] But it seems to me that most of the media has given up even pointing that [25:59] out. [26:00] So now I know he chooses his own friends and he'll do Fox and friends, and he'll [26:03] phone up his podcast friends and therefore they don't check him. [26:06] But even, even the media that is not normally completely in his pocket, to my [26:12] mind, they've just, they just don't do enough of saying, excuse me, that is wrong. [26:16] I'll give you another example. [26:17] Yeah. [26:18] Caitlin Collins from CNN. [26:20] Yeah. [26:21] Or any of those reporters when he suddenly turns on a reporter in one of those press [26:25] conferences, that's right. [26:26] Have none of them got the balls just to stand up and say, excuse me, you do not [26:30] talk to our colleagues like that. [26:32] And if you don't know what I'm saying, kick us all out. [26:34] In fact, she's on an island in a lot of respects because she's relentless and [26:38] she does stay with it, the thing that you're doing, she does she, that you're [26:42] talking about, she will hold them to account, but they don't look, you know, [26:47] this is as well as anybody having worked in the press, um, politicians learn how [26:55] to use whatever form of communication there is against them when television [26:59] first came out and politicians didn't quite. [27:02] Understand the medium. [27:03] It didn't know how to use it. [27:05] There was, I don't know if you remember the Kennedy Nixon debate was a huge, it [27:09] was the first time it was televised and politicians didn't understand the medium. [27:13] And so Kennedy went on television looking like Kennedy tanned and rested [27:20] and buff and dressed and Nixon was like makeup. [27:24] What do I need makeup for? [27:25] The sweat came right. [27:27] So he sweated. [27:28] And if you watched it on television, you said, oh my God, Kennedy wiped the floor [27:33] with them. [27:33] And if you heard it on the radio, you. [27:34] Yeah. [27:34] You said Nixon won politicians learn how to manipulate the form. [27:40] Okay. [27:41] But my point is, yeah, I sense not guys like you, the satire is a different world. [27:47] The satirists can have a field day, but we're impotent. [27:51] I mean, to, to a large extent, the frustration on satire is it's an impotent [27:55] form, well, up to a point, but my point it's, it's less impotent if the guys who [28:00] are in the room and on the plane, and I know how it works, you know, they're [28:04] worried that if they call him out, they don't get more access and why. [28:07] Right. [28:08] But look at the credibility of the Pentagon. [28:11] Now you can talk about Hexeth and all these sort of sexual desires for bombing [28:15] raids and all that stuff, but the fact is what those reporters who refused to go [28:20] by these new rules and walked out, they have helped further to undermine his [28:25] credibility, no question down the track. [28:27] That becomes a problem for Hexer. [28:29] Okay. [28:29] Now my point is with Trump and, and by the way, I think the other politicians, I'll give you an. [28:35] Example of this. [28:36] And I'm saying, so let's say when Trump was over here, he was in Scotland, he was [28:40] doing something with one of his golf courses, Keir Starmer flies up from London, [28:43] but Scotland, as I reminded you earlier, is part of the United Kingdom. [28:48] He is prime minister of the United Kingdom. [28:51] Donald Trump was behaving like he was the host. [28:54] So I was, I was pissed off with that for the start. [28:56] But then the next thing that happened was while they said they bring in the press [29:00] and he's doing one of his mad rambles and he starts going off on one at Sadiq Khan, [29:05] the mayor of London, who he doesn't like because he happens to have very brown skin. [29:10] Okay. [29:11] So he hates Sadiq Khan and he never misses an opportunity. [29:14] So he's sitting in Scotland as a guest of our prime ministry, even though he's [29:18] treating him like he's the host and he starts now, if I'd have been Keir Starmer [29:22] sitting there, I would've just lent over, put my hand on the, on his arm and said, [29:27] Mr. [29:27] President, when I go to the United States, I don't attack American politicians. [29:31] And I don't expect you to do it here. [29:33] We've got to call this guy out. [29:34] Oh, would that have been a moment? [29:36] Well, it would. [29:37] And by the way, I think it would have enhanced Starmer's, uh, reputation, uh, and actually [29:43] done him a world of good politically. [29:45] Not, not only would it have been morally right, but it would have actually been politically [29:49] advantageous for him. [29:51] And it might've stopped him doing it again. [29:53] It might not, but it doesn't matter. [29:55] It doesn't matter. [29:56] What I think has to happen, Mark Carney's Davos speech, the principles in that speech [30:02] are what should be applied now. [30:04] Because there's barely a leader in the world, apart from Donald Trump, who thinks anything [30:09] other than what he's done in the last month is a catastrophe. [30:12] No question. [30:13] Economically, geostrategically, politically, the law. [30:16] Well, I think Vladimir Putin would disagree with that. [30:18] We can come on to him. [30:19] I think he's quite excited about what Donald Trump has done. [30:21] We can come on to him. [30:21] I should have inserted the words democratically elected. [30:24] There we go. [30:25] Now we're talking. [30:26] I get that. [30:27] Right. [30:27] But they're all having to deal with the fallout. [30:29] Yes. [30:29] From what is essentially a catastrophic misjudgment by a terrible president. [30:34] Now. [30:34] I'm not suggesting that Keir Starmer stands up and says this is a catastrophic misjudgment [30:39] by a terrible president, but I think all of them should get together and say, we have [30:44] been put in this position because the American administration has decided to completely upend [30:50] the world order. [30:51] We, therefore, have to start to design and devise the world order that follows this. [30:57] I mean, there have been rumblings of that. [30:59] I mean, you- [30:59] Rumblings. [31:00] Rumblings are fine. [31:01] Right. [31:01] But what Trump, Trump doesn't rumble. [31:03] He does the big, bold brush. [31:04] He does the big, bold brush strokes, and we need a few, Carney's Davos speech was a big, [31:07] bold brush stroke. [31:09] We need more of them. [31:10] It's really difficult to accomplish that when you're not dictatory, when you're not [31:15] authoritarian because they are, look, you know, as well as I do, you know, Europe couldn't [31:19] even get a certain package to the Ukrainians because one country, Hungary, that's more [31:25] aligned with Vladimir Putin had the final say in it. [31:29] So you're dealing with structural difficulties within democratic systems that make that kind [31:34] of action. [31:35] Right. [31:36] Much more difficult. [31:37] The second thing that you're dealing with is the vindictive whims of an impulsive man [31:42] baby who has the full power and backing of the United States military and economic force- [31:48] I agree. [31:49] And he wields it punitively. [31:52] And so you've also, I think he has put you all in a great dilemma through his actions. [31:58] The thing that I want to sort of get back to is the idea that you can look at Iraq and [32:07] Afghanistan and Libya as examples of we weren't being run by an authoritarian man baby. [32:16] We did go to our allies and make the case. [32:21] We were working through the United Nations and collaborating with allies and not dismissing [32:30] them and diminishing them. [32:31] And we got the same fucking results. [32:35] A fair point. [32:36] A fair point. [32:37] That that's the thing that I'm trying to get. [32:41] If we talk to Tony, I don't know if you talk to Tony Blair anymore, but- [32:43] I do. [32:44] Okay. [32:45] Tony Blair, my guess is, and you can tell me if this is wrong, would be for intervention [32:51] in Iran, or at least would lean towards making the case of the United Kingdom, Great Britain, [33:01] joining early on in a coalition of our great friend and neighbor, the United States, and [33:07] taking this military position. [33:08] Would that be fair? [33:09] Well, I have discussed it with him because- [33:14] All right. [33:15] Well, you know that. [33:16] Well, because I'll tell you why. [33:18] Because our newspapers a couple of weeks ago were full of a story that he was at a private [33:23] meeting where he said something along those lines. [33:26] So I said- [33:27] He said something along the lines of? [33:29] Well, the papers said that he said something along the lines of, we should be involved [33:32] in this. [33:33] Okay. [33:34] Oh, okay. [33:35] Since when? [33:36] Okay. [33:37] Since when? [33:38] And he was like, what the fuck? [33:40] And what he says he said is that, because this was a kind of Chatham House thing. [33:45] Off the record. [33:46] Off the record. [33:47] Which as you know, and I know, does not exist- [33:49] No, it doesn't. [33:50] Particularly at that level. [33:51] Yes. [33:52] So he was basically saying in an ideal world, Britain should be alongside the United States. [33:57] And he was saying that Iran is a terrible regime. [33:58] So he wasn't quite saying what you were saying, but he was saying enough for those headlines [34:02] to be written. [34:03] And those headlines were not good for Keir Starmer. [34:05] So I did something I don't normally do on my podcast. [34:08] I mildly rebuke him. [34:09] I rebuked my former boss. [34:11] Just a mild rebuke, John. [34:12] Whoa. [34:13] Now, what does he do in that scenario? [34:14] Does he, do you end up, does the red phone go off and you get- [34:18] The red phone got taken away years ago, John. [34:21] I've just- [34:22] Now, if he says, I want to do, you know, I think Iran is a terrible thing and maybe [34:27] we should be joining it. [34:29] Does he lose his seat on the board of peace? [34:32] Is that what happens? [34:33] Oh, that's a question you'd have to put to your president. [34:37] I don't know. [34:38] When does the board of peace meet today? [34:39] When does the board of peace meet to discuss what's going on in Iran? [34:41] Well, it has met, hasn't it? [34:42] I believe it has. [34:43] But not to discuss Iran. [34:44] Yeah. [34:45] I believe the board of peace, it was like Uzbekistan and Tony and a couple of [34:49] other people. [34:51] But yeah, I do wonder what does, you know, do you have confidence that NATO can exert [35:02] the kind of pressure on the United States to contain some of our worst impulses through, [35:11] now that this president is in power? [35:12] Oh, look, where are you? [35:14] No, that's not, that was not optimistic. [35:15] Okay. [35:16] That was all of the air leaving your body. [35:17] Well, where your current president, like his several of his predecessors, has a point is [35:29] that Europe did kind of take American security and the peace dividend for granted. [35:35] Okay. [35:36] We slightly inhaled the end of history and we're all going to be nice liberal democracies. [35:39] Right. [35:40] Right. [35:41] Right. [35:42] The Americans have got the big stuff. [35:43] The Americans always going to be the big player in NATO and we're all part of NATO. [35:47] Trump go back to term one. [35:49] This is why I was so worried about Trump getting term two and being more organized. [35:53] He was always ambivalent about NATO. [35:55] I've reached a, you know, NATO exists as a defensive alliance and through the cold war, [36:01] who was, what was NATO's core basic enemy? [36:05] It was the old Soviet union. [36:07] Sure. [36:08] What, what has Vladimir Putin done or is he trying to do? [36:10] He's trying to recreate that sense of the old Soviet union with a Russian hegemony. [36:15] Now I, I have reached a point of feeling, um, and as we know, because Carolyn Leavitt [36:23] tells us, you know, feelings are very important because he felt that it's in his bones. [36:28] He felt something and that would tell him what to do. [36:33] But you know, I, I've reached the feeling that Trump is on Putin's side when it comes [36:39] to Ukraine. [36:40] Well, if you're on Putin's side, you're not on NATO side and the other thing, which makes [36:45] me really worried. [36:47] Right. [36:48] Is that he continues to talk this nonsense about both Canada and more significantly about [36:53] Greenland. [36:54] Right. [36:55] You know, and insults Danish troops and insults British troops. [36:58] They kept away from the front line in Afghanistan when, you know, substantial numbers of them [37:01] died. [37:03] And so it's hard to, and then you throw in, we, we had a guest on the podcast last week, [37:08] Pedro Sanchez, the Spanish prime minister, you know, who, who has seen his profile raised [37:14] dramatically for doing to Trump. [37:17] Exactly what you believe. [37:18] Yeah. [37:19] And I think that's what Keir Starmer should have done with a hand on the leg. [37:20] He did it in a sort of a bolder, more pronouncement of no, we're not getting involved in this. [37:25] He did it in relation to this. [37:27] I think Keir Starmer has got to the right position on this and he's expressed it in [37:31] the right way. [37:32] He's done it in a way that has not offended Trump and it shouldn't have done. [37:36] Threading the needle. [37:37] Okay. [37:38] Yeah, exactly. [37:39] Whereas Sanchez is absolutely out there. [37:40] And if you listen to the interview, he goes even further in saying that all sorts of stuff [37:43] about Trump that Trump would not like to hear. [37:46] But was it accurate? [37:47] Were the things he was saying accurate? [37:48] Yeah, I would say so. [37:49] A hundred percent. [37:50] A hundred percent. [37:51] All right. [37:52] There you go. [37:53] But here's the other thing about Trump, because I think, look, you know this, you've [37:56] studied politicians and you've studied, you know, big characters for a long time in your [38:00] life. [38:01] Never underestimate the power of hubris. [38:04] I think that if you think about some of the things that Trump did in the past and you [38:09] think about his psychology comes in first term and the whole narrative around it is [38:13] he's having to be surrounded by grownups and he gets rid of them and he sacks them left, [38:18] right, center. [38:19] He's saying take this shot out of the solution, move away to places of chaos. [38:20] Second time around project 2025's even Miller there. [38:23] Much better organized. [38:24] They know what they're gonna do. [38:26] They're gonna just, you know, must be these nonsense with DOGE and all that. [38:28] They're gonna come in. [38:29] It's gonna be different and it is different this time. [38:32] And what I think he said he's thinking, right, they told me all these experts, they told [38:39] me if I move the Israeli embassy to Jerusalem, there's gonna be, there's gonna be fucking [38:43] mayhem in the middle East. [38:45] It didn't happen. [38:46] If I go into Venezuela and chop. [38:48] Maduro's legs and take them out. [38:49] And let you guys just dive in and get this fucking shit up. [38:49] And remember, here it's slow. [38:49] Take this out of the silo when you travel. [38:49] that and it was to be fair you know if you're looking at purely militarily as an operation it [38:54] was impressive okay you get the guy you take him out and then you do a little deal with delce [38:58] rodriguez and things calm down so everybody said to me if i take out maduro there's going to be [39:02] absolute chaos in latin america that shouldn't happen he then thinks if i and he's got epstein [39:07] coming at him epstein epstein epstein he wants it out of the news i don't know if that's the [39:11] motivation but it's a part of it i guess he thinks he's going to do the same iran so when he says [39:17] my message to the iranian people is is we do this you rise up and you take control of your country [39:22] he think he thinks that's going to happen then when he sees it doesn't he has to have a new [39:26] narrative so the narrative changes and of course he's got the the the difference between any [39:33] previous president is he has got a public opinion a large chunk of it that is going to stay with him [39:40] whatever he does when he said he could shoot somebody on fifth avenue and his base would would [39:45] forgive him i'm afraid it's true i'm afraid it's true i'm afraid it's true i'm afraid it's true [39:48] but i also think that look the laws of icarus will always prevail and to be fair he has lived a life [40:00] of very little accountability for what could ostensibly be considered truly awful actions or [40:08] irresponsible actions whether it be through bankruptcies or through personal uh let's [40:14] call them foibles yeah uh but there's never been he's never really been held [40:20] to account look you run out eventually at a certain point you run out hey man running a [40:29] business not easy that's all i'm gonna say not easy a lot of times hard to find good people and [40:35] all those kinds of things and if you've got a business you're feeling i don't know like uh i [40:39] could use some more people some more people that maybe are are good at this and and not necessarily [40:45] bad at this well how do i how do i figure that out well we got yourselves a solution you got [40:51] yourselves uh upwork it's a one-stop platform you find how do you find a solution you find how do you [40:54] find a solution you find how do you find a solution you find how do you find a solution you find how do you [40:55] find a solution you find how do you find a solution you find how do you hire and pay expert freelancers [40:58] hire and pay expert freelancers [41:20] can do that with upwork thousands of growing businesses trust upwork to hire these flexible [41:26] high quality freelance talent from one-off project ongoing support and it's free to sign up visit [41:33] upwork.com right now and post your job for free that is upwork.com to connect with top talent [41:40] ready to help your business grow that is up w-o-r-k dot com so alice do you have an idea [41:52] if trump is for putin and i i don't disagree with that but i also think it's not necessarily that [41:59] it's nato and putin it's that the united states and trump right now favor right-wing populist [42:07] government if the old world order was communism versus democracy or capitalism versus communism [42:13] ism the new world order in their minds is woke versus unwoke it's that sense of a conservative [42:24] you know let's face it christian uh governing body where those things are melded together and so [42:32] they are more ideologically aligned with putin than macron they are more ideologically aligned [42:41] with orban than they are with starmer that [42:45] the idea that we can lead liberal democracies in any kind of capacity kind of goes out the window [42:54] when the operating system that they would like to run is more authoritarian and more uh nativist [43:04] and so we're no longer natural allies within that regard yeah well just this week netanyahu [43:14] went to hungary to back orban in this upcoming [43:18] election on april the 12th really yeah jd vance is reported to be heading there donald trump has [43:25] done a video backing a warband i mean one of the all the rules of diplomacy have gone well jd vance [43:31] went to germany and suggested and backed the afd and backed the afd and said how dare you censor [43:38] meanwhile they don't say a word about putin they don't say a word about uh you know whatever [43:45] censorious or authoritative or any of those kinds of things um putin is a very conservative and he's [43:49] things occur in those countries not at all not at all and look i think you're right that and this [43:54] is why i talked about with the way that the media treat trump as though he's a normal president [44:00] but also trump's allies treat him like he's a normal president and i think we've got to stop [44:04] doing that but you're calling for courage i certainly am you're calling for something that [44:09] is in it may be in shorter supply right now than than oil maybe there may be a a choke point let [44:16] me tell you this let me tell you this yeah i was i was at davos and i was in the room for for i only [44:23] went in the room for two speeches one was trump right where i'm i regret to say that my mild [44:28] heckling didn't catch on with all the people around me there was no there was no courage in [44:32] that room right and and i was in for khani's now the thing is i have i have it on very good [44:39] authority that since khani's davos speech trump has phoned khani more than khani has phoned trump [44:48] and i think that that is a response to a bit of courage it is true that sanchez who has really [44:56] gone for trump will probably pay a price trump will find a way of making him pay a price but [45:01] i think in doing what he's done i'll tell you one thing he's done he's made himself a site more [45:05] popular in spain than he was which is not important when you're the prime minister of spain so he's an [45:10] interesting cat because now he goes out and he sort of nationalizes i guess 500 000 [45:18] refugees or or immigrants or something which you would think goes counter to what the general [45:26] movement in europe is and certainly on the the populist right but let's face facts the populist [45:32] right is it's not a fringe movement by any means no when it when it comes to europe but yet he [45:39] stands up to trump and do those things offset or are they part of the same kind of no we're not [45:50] going to follow does it put him in threat to right-wing populism in spain um it may do uh [46:00] certainly that right-wing populism in spain the vox party campaigned pretty heavily on immigration [46:04] right but he's also showing courage in going out and making the case for immigration um and he does [46:11] it he did it in our interview he basically said there is a moral case and there is an economic [46:15] case and i'm making them both and i think we need to hear more of that we certainly need to hear [46:19] more of the economic case and you know there are a lot of things that we need to hear more about [46:22] and i think we need to hear more of the economic case and you know there are a lot of things that [46:22] study i think was by the cato institute here in the united states which is by no means a liberal [46:26] organization libertarian you know libertarian right and they made the case that economically [46:33] uh this type of of immigration is actually uh much more of a net positive than it has been given [46:40] credit for that doesn't mean that it'll be politically successful but part of the problem [46:44] we have in the united states is very few people take the time because of the attention deficit of [46:51] the populace you know you said [46:52] earlier uh that they normalize trump and they don't say that he lies they do say that he lies [47:01] but they use a shorthand what they don't do is show their work so you very rarely will see you [47:10] know this happened a lot in the election there was the phrase was the big lie and the big lie got [47:17] coined to describe donald trump's complaint about the 2020 election that he lost but said that he [47:24] won because rip [47:25] so they would talk about this is the big lie what they didn't do very often is walk through [47:34] why what he was saying was incorrect because our news has taken on the circadian rhythms [47:44] of social media it all goes there's very little room to breathe but there's also the the the [47:55] you know the characters who are taking it over [47:59] largely politically motivated i mean that is ideologues no question no question so i don't i [48:06] don't think you can really say it doesn't would you really say america has a free fair media today [48:15] uh you're you're free to do what you do but as a whole does does your media do the job that it was [48:20] doing in the i can't imagine a watergate i mean he does worse than watergate ten times a day [48:27] i think i think certainly the the algorithm and [48:31] the bifurcation of the media has made it more polarized and certainly look the whole point of [48:37] fox news was roger ailes worked for nixon and roger ailes is the one who founded fox news along with [48:45] rupert murdoch who by the way thank you for him he's done such good work here in america we really [48:50] appreciate he's he's he's australian but he he made his bones he's actually an american now he's [48:56] an american citizen oh is he really yes he is otherwise he wouldn't have been able to own fox [49:00] news good good for him [49:01] so he's on you i agree with you he's been net negative he said net net net net negative negative [49:08] negative he gavin newsom was on our podcast a few years ago and tell me if you agree with this he [49:13] said without murdoch there is no trump uh i think that's probably correct i would say without murdoch [49:23] there's probably no george bush without but but that being said i think what [49:30] what they did is intentional they intentionally created those things to buffer their [49:35] politicians from that sense of accountability because they viewed that accountability as merely [49:41] uh left-wing posturing and and left-wing virtue signaling and uh left-wing hits and so now you see [49:49] that fox news is not right enough for trump that's the thing about trump is he's insatiable but let me [49:56] ask you you had newsom on so here newsom is obviously you know he's one of the few politicians [50:03] that can compete in an attention economy [50:06] in the way that trump does he's created this sort of trolling persona that he goes with on what was [50:14] your sense of him as a viable the the the way that i process him is like man that dude is thirsty and [50:22] it's hard for me to move past that in some respects what what was your thought process what does that [50:28] mean thirsty yeah he wants it he wants it in a way that is more ambition than uh conviction conviction [50:39] okay that it's less principle and more uh politics i didn't get that impression oh great [50:45] there you go two reasons two reasons one now this may have been sort of but then again you [50:50] worked for blair so i'm going to take it all with a grain of salt well hold on tony blair and conviction [50:56] fair enough and i will defend him to my grave for northern ireland peace process alone all right um [51:03] no i liked gavin newsom a lot uh i because i'd kind of only seen the kind of you know [51:08] the hair and the teeth and the suits and and what have you yeah yeah and he looks like a kind of [51:14] pretty identikit american politician right yes um but i found him to be very charming very clever [51:25] uh and he's got courage about courage he's got courage he calls things out he's really going [51:29] for this the one thing that he said that i he said at the end i said are you definitely going to go [51:35] for it and he said the only people who go to vote my wife and my children and some of them like it [51:41] some some of them are keen some of them are not and i thought um he's going i mean i thought i [51:46] thought he's definitely going for it yes um i got the sense that his view of the california thing [51:52] is that it's a big bonus while he's getting the nomination and then it becomes a bit of [51:55] a handicap he's got to work out ways of dealing with that i think that's right uh but i i found [52:00] him pretty compelling and pretty tough i thought it was tough i liked him okay [52:05] yeah well well well fair enough then but thank you for for being candid uh about those various [52:10] things i want to revisit uh just remote we sort of talked about nato's role in all this and how [52:15] trump really is ideologically aligned more with these strongmen and certainly seems to prefer them [52:20] yeah to anything else that he does but i want to also ask during your time in office what [52:26] your experience was with the middle east powers because netanyahu has so i think [52:37] for for my money i believe he is not interested in diplomatic solutions to almost anything [52:45] and that he has found his lane in violence and he can all he wants about well we were attacking [52:53] and and understood and i'm not diminishing that but you can't there's a difference between [53:02] capability and ambition and what he's trying to do is bomb the ambition out of people [53:09] he's trying to bomb their will [53:11] away and i don't think that's something you can do no that that the more people are resilient [53:19] and and they will they will fight that you may be able to diminish their capability [53:23] but in doing so their ambition becomes even more resolute i mean again going back to the sanchez [53:32] interview because you know spain and ireland are the two countries in europe that are very [53:35] very pro-palestinian and the break were the first to recognize palestine states etc and he said i [53:43] said to him do you think netanyahu is a war criminal and he said well that is not i'm not [53:47] a judge but he said israel is more isolated than it has ever been now i don't think as long netanyahu [53:56] is thinking i think as long as he's got trump for now he thinks he's fine what i found terrifying [54:05] about recent events is that what is happening in the moment in lebanon is barely on the agenda [54:11] the settler violence in the west bank at the moment is off the scale but it's better exactly [54:16] what is the set what are the settlers even doing how can you justify if if your goal is [54:23] just the security of your state and and only why would you ever be annexing other territory [54:31] which obviously is going to take a lot more money and resources to be able to defend and all it does [54:38] is bisect land that is clearly not yours but that is their strategy to make it theirs but right so [54:48] point totally is how can you say i'm looking for an equitable and just [54:54] solution because when your actual goal is to just eliminate the problem yeah well if you for [55:02] yourselves there was a there was a brief thing i read quite a lot of the israeli press and there [55:06] was a briefing in right one of the papers the other day where they they literally said that [55:11] the military strategy that they were going to be pursuing in targeting hezbollah in lebanon was the [55:18] one that the military is being trying to find that is going to be a U.S. line of attorney and [55:24] then he's got an American military in lebanon with a security group in lebanon and there are [55:26] two other groups that are going to be there and we're not going to be able to cheat them as well [55:30] and there's a well-known example of security group in lebanon that's going to be the ones [55:33] that are going to try to get back to the country and they're under pressure from the military [55:41] because they're going to go back and they're going to record the leg israeli operation and [55:45] so they're going to go back and they're going to undergo aacağım to attack the country and they're [55:47] going to do whatever they want for the purpose of that and they're going to say like you know we're the [55:48] that live with moral purpose and yet and yet here we are and by the way where is saudi arabia in in [55:59] all of this where is you know we've sent them more weaponry than almost anybody else what is is is [56:09] what is their role in this what is their role in defending the palestinians what what is anybody's [56:14] role in this i i i'm so confused you're not alone i mean we're all confused and and i think that you [56:22] see i what trump's support and i don't want to put it all on trump but a lot of it is on trump [56:28] but what what his supporters continue to say ah the trouble with you guys is you don't understand [56:33] he's all about strategic chaos and strategic ambiguity but you just get the feeling he's [56:38] literally making it up as he goes along day by day and that's why that's why i do worry i was [56:44] i was at an event [56:46] meeting recently with some of the kind of different european intelligence people and [56:50] one of the one and one of them said you know do you think this might be leading us into the third [56:56] world war and another one said well what if we're already in it and what the the thing that really [57:03] worries me is that this the the the level of hubris the ego alongside see i think you're right [57:11] about netanyahu netanyahu he wants to survive politically do you know by the way he was he was [57:16] the first israeli [57:17] prime minister we met back in 1997. he was there then as prime minister um so this is a guy who [57:24] knows how to survive he wants to survive right now based on the approach he's taking in iran because [57:31] you've got to understand it's much more popular in israel than it is here you know in the uk on [57:36] the us he thinks this might be the way to winning the next general election he's got trump completely [57:43] and then all the gulf powers there saudi is obviously a very very interesting question [57:48] what's happening with their relationship with the other gulf powers well it just came out today they [57:51] said uh muhammad bin salman has been calling president trump and urging him to finish the [57:57] job that this is a unique opportunity to reshape the the dynamic of the middle east i mean obviously [58:05] there's the sunni shia rift and as iran and this is in no way excusing the mullahs and and the [58:12] actions that they've taken on their own people and through hezbollah and hamas and all those other [58:18] bad actors but if muhammad bin salman is calling up donald trump and saying finish the job well [58:25] you've just bought 15 billion dollars of the highest tech weaponry any country can possibly [58:31] possess what are you doing and as far as the palestinians you know i think they've spent [58:39] more money on sport you know they gave more money to phil mickelson than they did to the [58:43] palestinians like i don't i don't understand any of the dynamics over there or what we're hoping [58:50] to achieve well that and that is the that is the problem that we're all wrestling with right now [58:56] and and the thing that i find terrifying is that trump is so powerful but he did not develop that [59:04] power comes from the stability and he's destroying the very foundation that gives him his power [59:13] right but he he's these countries that have invested hundreds of millions in projecting [59:20] themselves as safe as stable [59:22] and that safety and stability has been based on the fact that they've developed this relationship [59:26] with the united states and the united states now destroyed it and meanwhile they're all looking at [59:31] each other and thinking you know he will try he'll trump will now be trying to divide and rule the [59:36] israelis will be trying to divide and rule oh we're not going to hit that one as hard as we're [59:39] hitting that one you know they're not as bad and so look i i it is absolutely terrifying and the [59:45] answer to the question i i i was tended to agree with the guy who said well maybe we are already [59:50] in third world war and that is why this is all about this is where values have to be reimposed [59:56] and i think what's happened since trump's second term began is the eradication of any sense of [1:00:04] there being values at the heart of this he doesn't talk about you know he talked about the people [1:00:08] rising up but he never talks about democracy he's not interested at least george bush used to talk [1:00:13] about let's try and create a stable democracy in iraq is democracy no longer an operating system [1:00:22] that [1:00:22] had you know we used to say like well we're going to bring democracy and that [1:00:25] sort of was coupled with a kind of prosperity and stability and uh a rule of law [1:00:32] and and all those other things that created the power of the united states that you know [1:00:37] we so randomly squander at so many different times do you think that democracy still has [1:00:45] the credibility as an operating system or has it has it so been tainted by the mistakes that were [1:00:54] made in iraq or the mistakes that were made in immigration policy or the inability to solve some [1:01:02] of the bureaucratic issues that occur within you know the eu brexit is an example of a rebuke of [1:01:10] that system yeah you know do do we need to also shore up the results that democracy can deliver [1:01:20] for their populations well the one that you didn't put in there which i think is the biggest [1:01:24] lot is the fact that we've we've had a generation growing up with no guarantee whatsoever that [1:01:30] they're going to be better off than their parents generation right i think that is what's driving a [1:01:34] lot of what's in europe i think that look that there are various things there's there's i think [1:01:39] if you go back this has gotten dark alistair we're gonna have to somehow find a way to pull [1:01:44] out of this but we're getting dark here oh sorry well let me just give let's do this let's do this [1:01:50] come on mr sunshine oh god yeah well should i get my bagpipes out and play your tune [1:01:57] do you do you like nature do you is that is that an improper question [1:02:02] do you like nature or are you more of a concrete guy or gal are you one of those people that you [1:02:09] see trees and flowers and you're like oh no get me a wall i'm most comfortable staring at a wall [1:02:21] well that is not that is not where it's at people this is about greenery [1:02:26] this is about green space this is about uh being as one with nature that's what i'm talking about [1:02:33] and that's why fast growing trees fast growing trees that's the name of the company that's not [1:02:39] just a description of something in your backyard that's the name of a company they're america's [1:02:46] largest and most trusted online nursery thousands of trees and plants two million happy customers [1:02:55] that's not easy to do people are grumpy get that many happy customers you're delivering some nice [1:03:03] and every plant's backed by their alive and thrive guarantee it promises you that the plants arrive [1:03:08] happy and healthy and ready to thrive right now they got great deals on planting essentials [1:03:13] up to half off select plants and listeners to our show get 20 off their first purchase [1:03:17] when using the code tws at checkout it's an additional 20 off better plants and better [1:03:23] growing at fastgrowingtrees.com using the code tws at checkout fastgrowingtrees.com [1:03:33] now's the perfect time to plant let's grow together use tws to save today [1:03:41] offer is valid for limited time terms and conditions may apply so if you go back my [1:03:49] friend mr scaramucci has written a new book which is coming out later this year and he talks about [1:03:54] these re the three big mistakes that he think have driven driven us to where we are okay the [1:03:59] first is seattle where globalization there was china china was brought in and lots of trade [1:04:08] years and lots of working class people said no no this is a mistake and the globalizers and i would [1:04:13] include myself in that were basically no no you've got to bring china in and this is the way to do it [1:04:17] right now you're talking about when they invited china into the wto into the wto yeah right yeah [1:04:21] okay and it's the the economic cons and social consequences of that the second one he he cites [1:04:27] is the uh iraq war without putting up taxes in other words saying we can have this massive war [1:04:35] but don't worry you won't have to pay for it and then the third one is bailing out the banks so [1:04:40] that he's putting the 2000 the 2008 financial crash yeah right and so these so i i'm gonna add [1:04:46] i'm gonna add covid to that i'm gonna add uh what what people consider to be the government's [1:04:51] arrogance during the covet crisis okay okay well all of these things and you're right by the way [1:04:56] but the the and you go back to the question you asked is is democracy up to dealing with this [1:05:03] the problem is that [1:05:06] china less so russia because russia's you know a separate case in there but china is definitely [1:05:13] looking at our democratic systems and saying they're your problem they're your problem you [1:05:19] can't you can't do stuff like we do stuff i i saw a chinese diplomat not long ago and i was going on [1:05:25] about yeah well in the end we're all going to you know do this than the other and people will still [1:05:29] believe in democratic values and why have you and we were talking about infrastructure and he said [1:05:37] he said because i think you'd heard me say this somewhere on the media uh he said when was the [1:05:42] first discussion that you had about building a third runway at heathrow airport and the answer [1:05:48] was 1998. wow and we're still talking about it and he was saying wow he was saying i've lost [1:05:56] account of how many airports we've built since then so they're much more open about saying [1:06:03] your problem is your system democracy is not working putin what how why does putin have a [1:06:10] a certain following amongst the kind of hard right afd farage and these guys what they like to [1:06:16] say is well say what you like about him but he gets things done right what he gets done is like you [1:06:21] know leading to hundreds of thousands of deaths see it's so interesting that because i actually [1:06:26] think you've got a much better case to make with xi and china in that regard and they certainly [1:06:34] have their state-run capitalism and however they they want to do it then you do with putin because [1:06:38] putin actually does it [1:06:40] get things done and makes incredible and is unbelievably kleptocratic and corrupt [1:06:47] and what a terrible example and i would say they would never align themselves with the [1:06:52] authoritarian nature of china but they would with putin and the reason is they view him [1:06:58] as a defender of what they call western civilization not the western civilization [1:07:04] that you and i define as the enlightenment values that create the foundation of democratic societies [1:07:10] Western civilization along the lines of racial and religious lines and, and ethno, you know, [1:07:17] that's actually why they align there. They certainly can't point to results. [1:07:24] And also views on gays and views on abortion, views on women, the whole manosphere thing is [1:07:30] wrapped up in this MAGA stuff. So no, listen, Putin and Trump are, I mean, look, I know there's [1:07:36] the whole theory about what has Putin got on Trump. I don't think he's got anything to be [1:07:40] I think what he has on him is jealousy. I think that Trump wants to be rich. He wants to be as [1:07:46] powerful and he wants to be authoritarian within his own country. You know, what's incredible 15 [1:07:52] minutes before Donald Trump announced that, uh, he wasn't going to be bombing Iran's energy [1:08:02] infrastructure. After all the stock market insider traders made millions. And that's where we are. [1:08:11] Yeah. [1:08:12] That's where we are. [1:08:12] Because what, so in some respects we are turning into just this explicit kleptocracy. [1:08:19] Yeah. But why is that not on the news every night? Why is the media so quiet and so scared? [1:08:24] I think it's, it's on there. I think it's a harder, you know, look, we have enough trouble, [1:08:30] as you said, from the 2008 financial crisis, insider trading, polymarket calcium. I think [1:08:35] they're overwhelmed. And unfortunately, rather than sort of a more strategic news day, [1:08:43] what you find in our news day is a redundancy. Uh, it's every hour after hour is the same rhythm [1:08:53] of stories. So it's, we're going to go down to the airports and see the TSA line. And then we're [1:09:00] going to go. So they don't have an opportunity to delve into the types of analysis. They leave [1:09:05] that for podcasts like your, uh, podcasts and Rory Stewart's. [1:09:09] But what about the documentary makers, filmmakers? [1:09:11] Oh, and I just got a note from here. [1:09:13] And news organizations now partner with these prediction markets. So they're also corporate [1:09:18] media and they're also invested in profit and they're also consolidating. So that pretty soon [1:09:25] we're all going to be working for the same one, uh, individual. But the point is they don't, [1:09:31] it's not that they don't have the resources. It's that they don't apportion them in a way that [1:09:38] strategically fights the corruption that you're talking about. [1:09:44] Yeah. [1:09:44] Well, [1:09:44] it is a fight that has to be had because, and I mean, it's happening before our eyes, [1:09:48] he doesn't even hide it. [1:09:49] Oh, he doesn't hide at all. The scary point to me is, you know, you could say, uh, you know, [1:09:56] great Britain has a much more responsible media and yet ultimately your country ends up making [1:10:04] the same stupid decisions we do. So you begin to wonder, well, what is the, you know, what is the [1:10:10] solution? Let, let me end on this because hopefully it's, it's a more hopeful, you know, Alistair in, [1:10:16] in your experience and looking around, where do you see green shoots of a new, more robust defender [1:10:27] of liberal democracy and the power that it should hold and the rule of law that can again, create [1:10:35] this kind of stability and prosperity. Where are the green shoots in your mind? Don't pause like [1:10:42] that. Don't pause. No, no, no. I was going to, I was going to say the first, the first obvious [1:10:48] name that comes to mind is Mark. [1:10:49] I think Mark Carney in Canada is doing a pretty good job. I think you, our attorney general guy [1:10:56] called Richard Herman, who's very close to Keir Starmer. He's made a speech this week, making [1:11:00] speech this week, which is very much, this is the time now to fight for human rights, fight for [1:11:05] international law because they're under threat as never before. Just had a great guy in Australia, [1:11:10] just won a landslide in the South Australia election guy called Peter Malinowskis. He's [1:11:14] a labor candidate. He's, he's, he's a, he's just the, he's, he's absolutely wiped out the [1:11:20] opposition pretty much. I think that those, those results I mentioned in France, in Italy, [1:11:27] I think I could be wrong, but if, if the election is free and fair in, in Hungary, [1:11:32] Orban will lose. Right. There is a fight back. And I'll tell you where I get hope. I wrote the [1:11:38] last two books I wrote were kids' books about politics and are now going to loads of schools. [1:11:42] And it's true that you'd get some teenagers who are totally locked up in the, the [1:11:46] manosphere and all that stuff. But my sense of the younger generation is that they get how bad this [1:11:52] is and they know that it's going to be on them to, to get us out of it. So I'm still broadly [1:11:57] positive. I think the other thing I would say is don't, it's very hard not to allow, [1:12:04] if you're on the progressive side of politics, not to allow Trump to do your head in every day. [1:12:08] Okay. Understood. [1:12:09] Right. It's really hard not to do it, but it's important to try [1:12:14] and to go out and find the people and find the arguments. I see in London every day, [1:12:19] the MAGA crowd, they've got this obsession with London because of Sadiq Khan. [1:12:22] Yes. [1:12:23] There's a whole industry developed saying that- [1:12:25] Although now, you know, Zoran Mamdani has taken a little bit of the heat off of Sadiq Khan. [1:12:29] A little bit. A little bit. Okay. But, but, but there's a whole kind of industry [1:12:34] across social media and across parts of the right-wing media in the States basically saying, [1:12:39] I literally have friends phone up saying, is it safe to come to London? Right? Because they see [1:12:44] all this shit. Right. When you do come to London, you see probably still the greatest city in the [1:12:50] world. [1:12:50] Hey, hey, hey. [1:12:52] What? [1:12:52] Come on. [1:12:53] When are you moving here, by the way? It's obviously going to move. You can't move here. [1:12:58] Don't do New York City. Don't do New York City dirty. Come on. Let's, let's just- [1:13:03] I know. Listen, it's a beautiful city. I happen to love London very much. [1:13:06] Yeah. But the point is, what is it within the MAGA crowd, other than the skin color of our Met, [1:13:12] that has led them to this relentless, this goes back to your point about them no longer being [1:13:16] our allies. [1:13:17] Well, it's incentivized monetarily as well. You have to understand that. [1:13:20] For sure. For sure. [1:13:21] You know- [1:13:21] But, you know, when you have an, an American, you know, you know, when you have an American, you know, [1:13:22] when you have an American national security strategy that talks about European civilizational [1:13:28] erasure, right? [1:13:30] Yes. Well, that's- [1:13:30] I would argue, I live in, I go to, I travel around the European countries a lot. Let me let you in [1:13:36] on a secret, John. It's nicer than the United States of America. [1:13:40] Hey, hey, hey. [1:13:41] Oh yeah. Better culture, better scenery, better everything. [1:13:45] Yeah. [1:13:45] We're just, we're just better off here. And Britain would be better off if we were still part of it. [1:13:50] Well, then what, what you're saying is, is, [1:13:53] Europe shall lead us out of the wilderness, that they have learned their lesson through [1:13:57] internecine fighting, and that is all over, and they will lead the democratic, liberal [1:14:02] establishment out of the wilderness, a reaffirmation of the Magna Carta and the [1:14:07] Enlightenment values, and, and, and we shall do it there. Last question, is the antidote to [1:14:12] authoritarianism morality or competence? [1:14:16] Uh, you gotta have both, but I would say it's the, the values bit is the big, [1:14:20] is the big part of it. [1:14:21] The foundation. [1:14:22] A hundred percent is, you know, [1:14:23] what sort of people are we, what sort of countries do we want to be? And I think that is what has [1:14:28] been, that's what Trump is driving out. You talked about Netanyahu trying to bomb the will out of [1:14:32] people. What Trump does every day with his kind of genius level of crazy communication, he's trying [1:14:40] to drive the, he's trying to drive the good out of us. He's trying to drive the morals out of us. [1:14:46] He's trying to basically say, you know, let's all be as bad as each other. [1:14:50] Right. Let's, let's all be realistic about just how terrible. [1:14:54] We all are. [1:14:55] Yeah, exactly. [1:14:56] Exactly. It's not, it's not a very Christian message, is it? [1:14:59] Uh, it doesn't appear to be, although that's not my jurisdiction, so I wouldn't quite know. [1:15:02] Nor mine. [1:15:04] Uh, but thank you so much for, for being with us. [1:15:06] It's a pleasure as always. [1:15:07] Fascinating as always. Alastair Campbell, co-host of The Rest Is, uh, politics podcast, [1:15:12] and obviously, uh, a vast career as an author and, uh, communicator and all those other incredible [1:15:19] things. Alastair, please give my best to Rory and I hope to see you guys soon, uh, over there and, [1:15:24] in that beautiful city of yours. [1:15:25] See you soon. [1:15:26] All right. [1:15:26] Okay. [1:15:27] Bye, sir. [1:15:32] Man, that got dark. [1:15:35] They all do. [1:15:36] I will say this though. I think if anyone was going to narrate the end of the world, [1:15:42] it should be a British person. [1:15:44] A hundred percent. [1:15:45] Ease you into it a bit more. [1:15:47] I think my favorite moment was you defining the word thirsty for him. [1:15:50] Yes. [1:15:51] Definitely mine as well. [1:15:52] I was gonna bring this up. [1:15:55] Did he not know thirsty? Yeah, he did. He said like, what do you mean by that? [1:15:58] Probably not in the [1:15:59] colloquial sense. I imagine he knows like the feeling of having thirst. [1:16:04] That's right. He probably thinking to himself like I am a bit parched. It is, [1:16:07] it is nearing tea time. [1:16:09] I did like you trying to get more information for us about the board of peace. [1:16:13] Nothing. He gave, he gave, I almost seemed as he was unaware of Tony Blair's role. [1:16:18] Yeah. We moved past that pretty quickly. [1:16:20] Yeah. Yeah. No, we moved past that. And I love the whole, you know, it was something that we [1:16:24] never quite reconciled on this, which was, you know, he kept saying, Trump is doing this the [1:16:29] wrong way. And I, I kept trying to get him back to right, but we supposedly did a rock the right way. [1:16:39] But when are we gonna start thinking that maybe we shouldn't be doing any of this shit at all? [1:16:45] Yeah. We're kind of still hung up on the lies portion. I think of it, [1:16:50] the news media, us, the reasons for why it's happening, all these things were still stuck [1:16:56] just on that beginning part. But I guess because the lies are so abundant and quick that there's not, [1:17:02] Right. [1:17:02] too much room to move on. [1:17:04] And I also think, you know, look, hindsight is obviously, you know, and to, to say, and, [1:17:08] and, you know, he seemed to be pretty clear about like, look, we believed what we were saying there. [1:17:13] Maybe that's true for what was going on there. I don't believe that's necessarily true [1:17:18] for America. I don't, I do think there were some real believers in that neocon movement, [1:17:27] but I think a lot of them knew they were manipulating things cynically just to get what [1:17:33] they wanted out of that. [1:17:35] Yeah. [1:17:36] Yeah. Thank you, Jillian. [1:17:37] Yeah. I think we've all come to terms with that. [1:17:40] Yeah. We've all accepted it. And what they wanted were, were the goals for them. [1:17:45] That's right. We've, we've, we've all accepted those sorts of things. Did you, are, are you [1:17:49] familiar with this, uh, uh, Spanish Sanchez? We should, we should reach out. [1:17:53] We could do it. We will. Yeah. [1:17:54] Guy's got some balls. He literally was like, you're not using our shit. I'm not getting, [1:17:59] no, this thing's, this is stupid. [1:18:02] It's impressive because yeah, not too many leaders are willing to be so open about [1:18:08] their dislike of what's happening as he was describing Starmer, you know, threading a needle [1:18:14] with what he says and does. It's nice to see some, uh, authenticity. [1:18:20] Right. [1:18:20] And it was interesting what he said about Carney too, which is that like, I mean, whether [1:18:23] or not it's true that like Trump has been calling him more than he's been calling Trump since he [1:18:27] showed a little bit of courage. And it's like, I don't know, it's kind of similar to what you [1:18:31] said about Caitlin Collins. Right. [1:18:32] Which is that he kind of has respect for people that push back a bit. [1:18:36] Mom Donnie. [1:18:37] Exactly. [1:18:38] Yeah, that's exactly right. Those, those are, are three very good examples. And I do think [1:18:42] that, that there is some of that and I can believe it because, uh, Donald Trump is if nothing else, [1:18:49] uh, a 12 year old with a phone, like he's just, he's on, he's, he's on with everybody. [1:18:56] Uh, but Brittany, what, what, uh, what are the kids want to know this week as we move on? [1:19:00] Yes. Alrighty. Uh, John, [1:19:02] with one of the most consequential midterm elections in us history coming up. [1:19:07] Maybe what? Okay. [1:19:09] Does anyone really want Schumer or Jeffries as their starting quarterback? [1:19:15] First of all, the idea that you would even consider them quarterbacks is like, I, I put them [1:19:22] maybe on the O line. Um, yeah, maybe a, maybe a punter special teams, uh, going through there. [1:19:29] I mean, look, I, I, I don't understand the idea of Schumer. [1:19:34] To begin with his passivity in the face of these really kind of existential crisis that occur is, [1:19:44] is, is beyond me and the, and even the subtle adjustments that he makes, [1:19:51] given the frustration of the democratic constituency, writ large is I'll curse. [1:20:00] Like even that is all show and not, and it's, it's frustrating. [1:20:05] Caret google. [1:20:05] Okay. [1:20:06] They're so, yeah, removed from, I think, the day-to-day that just cursing seems like it will hit our hearts. [1:20:14] We're fucking, oh, we're not, we're fucking fighting back. [1:20:20] We're going to fucking, these motherfuckers have to be. [1:20:28] That's pretty good. [1:20:30] Thank you. [1:20:31] Why doesn't he step down? [1:20:33] Oh, my Lord. [1:20:34] Why doesn't he cede power? [1:20:36] Remember, they don't, these guys don't ever cede power. [1:20:40] They run, look, it was remarkable when Dick Durbin at 82 was like, I don't think I'm going to run again. [1:20:47] And you're like, yeah, of course not. [1:20:49] Selflessness. [1:20:50] You're fucking 82 years old. [1:20:53] Stop. [1:20:54] But isn't there a way for us to like, I just get frustrated because like, isn't there a way for us to hold them accountable and make that happen some way, somehow? [1:21:02] Like voting? [1:21:02] I mean, it's such an internal, you know, the internal politics of Washington. [1:21:07] And insiders is something that is slightly impervious, unfortunately, to the voters. [1:21:12] But the one thing I will say that the Democratic Party could do is their system rewards only seniority. [1:21:18] And so if you want to get anywhere and you want to get any kinds of plum assignments and all that, you just, they only reward longevity. [1:21:26] At least the Republicans don't even do that. [1:21:28] They give them, I don't know if it's two terms or three terms on certain committees, but they don't allow them to just ensconce themselves in these offices until fucking. [1:21:37] Moss starts to grow up their legs, or should I say fucking moss? [1:21:46] But I think the performance of these leaders has been so apparently missing in action that I'd be surprised that whatever new group, but maybe they're, you know, they're other senators and representatives feel beholden to them. [1:22:08] I really don't. [1:22:09] Yeah, there was reporting, I think, over the weekend. [1:22:12] There's like a signal chat, but like Chris Murphy, Elizabeth Warren, and maybe a few others are in where they're talking shit. [1:22:20] They're plotting against Schumer. [1:22:22] So they're like, you know, it's great. [1:22:24] Let's get a signal chat. [1:22:25] That always goes well. [1:22:27] I'd write. [1:22:27] Who would ever find out about that? [1:22:29] It just, it blows my mind that that's the like, because that is something that you would see in like a high school dramedy. [1:22:37] That's like, there's a chat and some of the teachers and students are on. [1:22:42] It like, you just imagine it's, it feels as, as what kind of Alistair was talking early. [1:22:48] Like it feels so lacking in courage. [1:22:51] Yes. [1:22:51] Like I'm going to, I'm going to set up a little social media chat for us and we're going to talk about all the things we would do if we had the balls to do it publicly. [1:23:02] Yes. [1:23:03] It's fucked up. [1:23:04] Brittany, what else we got? [1:23:05] I'm going to talk about it. [1:23:06] All right. [1:23:07] Where, where else are we going? [1:23:08] If you were a ghost, what would wait? [1:23:12] What have they heard? [1:23:13] What would be your go-to casual haunt? [1:23:17] Well, first of all, I am slowly becoming, as I become more translucent through hair color and lack of pallor, uh, I would haunt old music clubs that still allow smoke. [1:23:39] The, my fondest sensory memories are from bartending in old, like. [1:23:47] Punk clubs where the heady aroma of cigarette smoke, stale beer and violent tendencies, uh, feel like that. [1:24:04] I love that aura. [1:24:07] And I think I would probably, that's where I would end up. [1:24:11] What? [1:24:11] Well, I don't know. [1:24:12] Where would you guys end at? [1:24:13] Jillian? [1:24:13] Who would you haunt? [1:24:15] Uh, would you haunt? [1:24:16] Yeah, I'd be like courtside Madison square garden. [1:24:19] Oh, so you, so you wouldn't actually be haunting. [1:24:23] I'm using it for the seats. [1:24:24] So you guys are haunting for good. [1:24:26] I know this is very like positive. [1:24:29] I have like a list of situationships that like, I'm gonna go and torture just to be. [1:24:34] Oh, Brittany, you're going full vindictive. [1:24:36] So you're going kind of you're, you're more poltergeist. [1:24:39] Yes. [1:24:40] All right. [1:24:40] I'm gonna haunt the shit out of people. [1:24:42] Okay. [1:24:43] Yeah. [1:24:43] I do. [1:24:44] I was just thinking more in terms of like, what kind of atmosphere would I like to exist in as opposed to like, who could I fuck with? [1:24:52] Yeah. [1:24:52] I'm getting. [1:24:52] Payback bitches. [1:24:54] But Lauren seems also in the payback mode. [1:24:56] I'm just, we are in a crazy moment and we get this question and all I'm thinking is like, how do I mess with everyone? [1:25:04] Who's messing with, you know, our sanity right now. [1:25:08] But that's still for good. [1:25:10] You would. [1:25:10] So this is interesting. [1:25:12] I went, I went bar. [1:25:14] Brittany went personal vendetta. [1:25:17] Jillian just wants to see good basketball. [1:25:20] And Lauren went halls. [1:25:22] And they were like, oh, my God, I don't think you have power. [1:25:26] So you're, you're haunting could have some real efficacy and an improvement or just make me smile. [1:25:34] And it's not always good basketball. [1:25:36] Sometimes it's just basketball. [1:25:37] Yeah. [1:25:37] That's a good point depending on what year it is. [1:25:40] That's a good point. [1:25:41] How do they keep in touch with us? [1:25:42] Twitter. [1:25:43] We are weekly show pod, Instagram threads, tick tock, blue sky. [1:25:46] We are weekly show podcasts, and you can like subscribe and comment on our YouTube channel, the weekly show with Jon Stewart. [1:25:51] And you should. [1:25:52] Haunt us, for God's sakes. [1:25:55] As always, thank you guys very much. [1:25:57] Really enjoyed that conversation. [1:25:58] Lead producer, Lauren Walker. [1:25:59] Producer, Brittany Mamedovic. [1:26:00] Producer, Jillian Speer. [1:26:01] Video editor and engineer, Rob Vitola. [1:26:04] Audio editor and engineer, Nicole Boyce, who are doing Yeoman's work today. [1:26:07] We were working intercontinentally across the seas, and they were making it work as [1:26:14] Alistair's camera kept trying to fly out the window. [1:26:17] They had to make adjustments as the whole thing was going on. [1:26:20] And our executive producers, as always, Chris McShane, Katie Gray. [1:26:23] Thanks so much, guys, and we'll see you guys next time. [1:26:27] The Weekly Show with Jon Stewart is a Comedy Central podcast. [1:26:31] It's produced by Paramount Audio and Busboy Productions.