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A
You're listening to the Monocle Daily, first broadcast on 25th March, 2026 on Monaco Radio.
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Can Iraq keep itself out of the crossfire? Another reason the EU is counting the days to Hungary's election and a long range diplomatic spat between Denmark and Taiwan. I'm Andrew Muller. The Monocle Daily starts. Hello and welcome to the Monocle Daily. Coming to you from our studios here at Midori House in London. I'm Andrew Muller. My guest Nina Dos Santos and Sir William Patey will discuss the day's big stories. And our on this day historical series will recall the Martin Luther King speech. Everyone would remember if he hadn't given the speech. Everyone does remember. Stay tuned. All that and more coming up right here on the Monocle Daily. This is the Monocle Daily. I'm Andrew Muller and I am joined today by Nina dos Santos, international broadcast correspondent and former CNN Europe editor and Sir William Patey, former British ambassador to Afghanistan, Sudan, Iraq and Saudi Arabia, now political consultant. Hello to you both.
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A
Hello.
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B
Hi there, Nina. First of all, we may have to update our description of you there. You have a new job. Congratulations.
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A
Oh, thank you very much. Yes, I suppose you could say former journalist, although is anybody ever really a former journalist when you spent 20 odd years in. Quite difficult to rewire one's brain, particularly at a time of such important news. But I'm delighted to say I've joined Freud's Group, which is a big communications company based largely in London but also with a footprint in New York. It's been going for about 40 years. I've joined as a director and it's a really interesting multifaceted company that does all sorts of things, not just pr, but also it has an award winning independent production studio in house as well.
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B
Well, we wish you luck with that, as I'm sure do all our listeners. William, you have been pontificating on a ship.
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C
I have. I've been lecturing on a cruise ship. The one lecture they didn't ask me to deliver was the Middle Eastern turmoil. I think they all decided that they were on holiday and that would be far too depressing. And I did manage to return from my, from my cruise via Hong Kong, via Doha, 24 hours before the, the attack started. So I was, I was 24 short of being stuck in Doha for two weeks.
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B
The people who convene these cruises, William, they don't ever have vacancies for somebody who is willing and able to lecture on the history of Australian Rules football or the golden era of Nashville country music.
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C
I think they Would. Yeah, no, there's a cruise all the way from Auckland to Singapore where these would be absolutely spot on topics.
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B
Okay, well I'll get some numbers from you afterwards. We do start in Iraq, the Foreign Ministry of which is executing an audacious and rarely seen diplomatic manoeuvre. The double summoning. Both the Ambassador of Iran and the Shah d' affaires of the United States have been instructed to report for meetings without baklava that Iraq may express its annoyance at being clobbered from both directions during the present hostilities in the Persian Gulf. An apparent US and or Israeli airstrike in Iraq's Anbar Province today killed at least seven fighters attached to the Iran aligned paramilitaries of the Popular Mobilization Forces. Iraq also accuses Iran of ballistic missile attacks on Kurdish forces in the country's north. William, first, first of all, in your experience, how unusual is a double summoning?
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C
Well, usually completely unusual. I've never heard of it before. So you're soldering both ambassadors and complaining about both of them.
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B
I do hope they've brought them in both at once. That would be brilliant.
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C
Well, they probably didn't have them in at once. If they may have had one in the waiting room watching the other one come out. That might be. That might have been interesting. But I think it reflects the fact that Iraq's in the similar sort of dilemma as other countries in in the Gulf, as Saudi Arabia and and u in Qatar. They're trying to stay out of this, but through history and through Iranian influence in the in the country and the history of the United States, the US military presence, they're sucked in whether they like it or not. There are US targets in Iraq, there are Iranian proxies in Iraq and indeed there are some Iranian proxies in the government of Iraq. So they're on the horns of a dilemma.
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B
Nina, is Iraq likely to be more nervous than most countries in the vicinities about what this might portend? They are geographically literally right in the middle, as William says. Both the United States and Iran could well see that they have targets of opportunity in Iraq. And of course, Iraq is making some progress after 20 odd excruciating years of attempting to reassemble itself following a previous American invention in the Middle East.
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A
Yes, they're in a really difficult position, caught between two sides, obviously, Iran and those proxies, as William was just saying before, that have been active inside Iraq, Shia militias and so on, some of which have very strong relationships with the military apparatus and government there and also the United States as well. And the prime minister, remember Sudani himself, is actually just at the helm of a caretaker government because there are elections not that long ago and he's trying desperately to cobble together a government. But this is also economically a disaster for Iraq too, because this is more, less a country that relies exclusively on exporting oil. How are they going to be able to fund the budget if the oil exports can't go out of the country? What they're going to have to do, and we've seen it over the last couple of days, is they've engaged with the semi autonomous Kurdistan region to try and pump some of it up through the pipelines in the north. But that would only take out about 7% of Iraqi oil, which again will give some money. But it's nowhere near the amount of exports that they were exporting up until just the other day. And then of course there's the prospect of that infrastructure inside the Kurdistan region getting targeted specifically by any of these groups. So it's a really, really tense situation for Iraq economically and also in terms of just it getting dragged back into a really difficult domestic situation that it had to deal with 10 years or so ago.
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B
William, also while we have you here, we will draw upon your expertise in translating diplomatic official language statement from the Kurdish Ministry of Peshmerga affair, quote, when we reaffirm our inherent right to respond to any aggression against our people and our land. Is there a threat in there?
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C
Well, there's a thread, but I think it's a meaningless one. I don't think the Kurds have much ability to attack Iran as such. And indeed there are elements of the Kurds around Suleimaniya who rely on Iran. A lot of the trade, a lot of the illegal trade. Iran evading sanctions goes through Kurdistan. So there's a sort of self interest. I think that's the sort of thing you have to say. I'm not sure they've really got much in the way of the FAR party doing anything about it. What they could do is respond by attacking Iranian backed militias in Iraq. It's not clear whether the attacks on Kurdistan have come from Iranian backed militias or direct from Iran. There's some talk of drones and other attacks, but it does, it doesn't help if you end up with an injection reinvigoration of a civil war where the Peshmerga are taking on other Iraqis. So it's unhelpful. But I think the biggest point is regardless of all this, 90% of government revenues come from oil and that oil has stopped The Kurds are in a much stronger position because now the only way to get oil out of Iraq is through the pipelines that go through Kurdistan up into Turkey. But that's small beer compared with shipping it out of out through the Gulf.
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B
Nina, if we look at this more broadly, and it is admittedly an incredible thing to countenance of any endeavour steered by Donald Trump and Pete Hegseth, that they may possibly not have thought things all the way through. We're a few weeks into this now. Does it seem like the possibility of this spreading was somewhat unconsidered?
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A
Well, who knows what happens inside the White House and the Department of War these days? It seems to be as though many of the commentariat are guessing, left guessing here at this point. But what essentially has happened is. Let's think about this vis a vis Iran. Back at the end of last year, where we had protests on the streets largely because the economy was in a really terrible situation. Again, I go back to the economy, and now what Iran has been able to do is to play its hand over the world economy with regards to its stranglehold over the Strait of Hormuz. Now, on the one hand, the United States is now a big exporter of oil and a big important exporter of liquefied natural gas, by the way, to Europe. And so the United States, to a certain extent, actually has more leverage over some of its allies that Donald Trump has been falling out with, like Europe at the moment. But at the same time, it appears as though he hasn't potentially thought about what a chokehold on the Strait of Hormuz would have done to the oil price, and also how that could have affected his popularity with his own electorate back home. As we head towards the midterms, it's really difficult to see that they didn't foresee this, but one wouldn't want to hope that they would want to use this as leverage again with regards to those difficult negotiations with European partners, because the Financial Times just this week raised the possibility of that actually happening.
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C
I mean, the idea that they didn't foresee it is amazing. Of course they foresee it. The American system foresaw this. All Trump would have had to do. I know he doesn't read anything. All he would have had to read was any national intelligence assessment about the impact of an attack on Iran. I mean, we were predicting this, you know, 20, 30 years ago, that if Iran was cornered, its first recourse would be to close the Straits of Hormuz and that the Gulf states would be vulnerable so this is a known. It's not a. Was it Frank Rumsfeld? Known Unknown. This was a known. Known. Just Trump just seems to have put it to the back of his mind, if it was ever in his mind.
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A
But I suppose the question I'm asking here is back in those, America wasn't allowed to export oil, but now it's actually a big oil exporter and it can make quite a lot of money out of a high oil price. And it can also extract leverage if it plays such an important role in the liquefied natural gas provision to places like Europe when they can't get it from other parts.
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C
It's clearly less dependent on Middle east oil, the United States itself. But as we've seen, it doesn't actually matter where you get your oil from. The global integrated economy, the cost of energy, the cost of fuel, gas and everything affects everybody and it's going to affect the United States. Even though the United States is one of the biggest producers of oil and gas and hydrocarbons, it's going to suffer from increased inflation, it's going to suffer from increased costs, the disruption to world trade, the depression that we're about to go into, and I think the head of blackrock was making that pretty clear today that that's where we're heading right now, even if things don't get worse. And that's going to affect the United States. And I think that's what Trump's worried about now. That's why he's become a bit desperate to get a solution to this, because he's suddenly alert to the consequences that are going to affect him and his reelection prospect or his party's reelection prospects. And that's why I think the Iranians can sniff the desperation now, and that's going to affect any negotiations that might or might not take place.
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Well, to Europe now, where listeners with memory stretching to the early years of this decade will be able to recall Poland and hung Hungary, or at least the governments thereof, seeming broadly on the same side, awkward and assertive nationalist populists who enjoyed sodding things up for the rest of the European Union. Since the change of Poland's government occasioned by the parliamentary election of 2025, however, the two have fallen out somewhat and relations have plumbed exciting new depths following media reports that Hungary's foreign minister, Peter Siato, has been keeping his Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov, apprised of discussions at EU summits, the Hungarians, everything, etc. Nina, how surprised would we be if this was in fact the case?
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A
Well, it's the Washington Post that first reported this on Saturday, and it's been decried as fake news, that usual trope that some politicians conveniently troll out every now and then. And I think the issue here is that obviously Hungary is just two weeks away from pivotal election, which polls show Viktor Orban may lose. That would spell the end of his 16 years in power. And, you know, I suppose the point is I've covered a lot of these EU summits, and if you're. And William may have stronger views on this and more informed views on this than me, but I suppose if you're an EU head of state or an EU foreign minister, do you not have, I suppose I'm asking you this, William, do you not have license to actually intently have whoever you want as an interlocutor? We know that Hungary has been pro Putin, taken a closer position towards Russia at successive EU summits. It's been quite difficult to actually get Hungary to sign on the line to all sorts of sanctions after the war on Ukraine. And indeed, support for Ukraine's become a crucial, pivotal issue that Viktor Orban's been able to weaponize inside Hungary in this election. So, I mean, I suppose. Am I surprised? Not that much. Would you be?
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C
I'm not. I'd be gobsmacked if it wasn't happening. I mean, you're quite right. You know, people are free to talk. I mean, you know, I imagine the. The French and German foreign ministers talked to their American counterparts about what went on at the eu. There's not much that goes on at EU summits that is all that secret. So we're not talking about top secrets here. I mean, it'd be interesting for the Russians to see who says what. That'll be the interesting stuff. Who was most in favor of the package for Ukraine, who was weak on the subject. That'd be an interesting intelligence for them. And the others must know that Hungary is so pro Moscow, so pro Putin, that anything they say in front of a Hungarian is in danger of going back to Putin. So I think that's the kind of, the cut and thrust, I think Hungary has to ask itself, does it want to be part of Western Europe or does it want to be in the part of the Putin Russia sphere of influence? That's the big question, I mean, a
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B
question which I guess is being put to the Hungarian people essentially in this election. And on the subject of elections, in program correction, I did refer to Poland's change of government in 2025. It was, of course, 2023, but as you pointed out, Nina, Orban is polling discouragingly. If you're Viktor Orban ahead of this election, would to hazard a guess at how much champagne will be quaffed in other European capitals if he does in fact lose?
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Well, they'll breathe a sigh of relief
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and drain the champagne.
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Forget the gravy train that Nigel Farage used to talk about. It'll be the champagne train all the way to Strasbourg. In which case, I do think that there would be. Yeah, a big significant sigh of relief. Of course. Remember that Slovakia is still quite awkward with regards to its proximity to Russia. And there's been a lot of back and forth over a pipeline that feeds these two countries that are very heavily dependent on Russian oil. That pipeline going through Ukraine, it's been bombed, it's been damaged. There's a lot of bad blood saying that that pipeline hasn't been mended in time. That's become a pivotal electoral issue in Hungary, but it's still a big issue for Slovakia. So some of his rhetoric will continue. But Slovakia is a minnow in comparison to Hungary. Suppose. But we don't know whether or not he'll lose. And my observation is, having covered the start of Orban's rise to power, when he came to power amid a big financial crisis in that country, people had big hopes for him. People had big hopes for Hungary as a new member of the eu. People changed.
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B
He was the future of a liberal Eastern Europe at one point with his Soros funded degree from Oxford. People change. Just finally on this one will, amid the same reporting of this general Hungarian goulash was the, the snippet that the svr, the Soviet foreign Intelligence service, had pitched the idea of faking an assassination attempt of Viktor Orban to garner sympathy ahead of the election. Does that sound a bit, a bit maybe Ian Fleming, or would you.
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Well, they saw the big uptick that Donald Trump got from his Robert Fitzo of Slovakia. Yeah.
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Not that that was fake.
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Yeah, but, yeah, but you know, I'm not saying the Trump one was fake either, but he got a, you know, he got a big boost. It wouldn't surprise me that that's been considered in the svr. I imagine their, their bots are working overtime in favor of Viktor Orban. I imagine there's loads of stuff on social media which has been directed by bot farms in Russia, so I wouldn't put it beyond their thinking.
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B
Well, to Denmark now, which in between assembling a new government following the recent parliamentary election, is also having to conduct a diplomatic spat with Taiwan. Taiwan is miffed that Taiwanese citizens resident in Denmark have their logged on the pertinent official documentation as China. Denmark is apparently the only EU country which does this. Though Denmark, like every EU country, does recognize China rather than Taiwan, Taiwan nevertheless sees this as a gratuitous, if not downright deliberate denial of its identity. Nina, what do we think has gone on here? Is this Denmark deliberately seeking to affront Taiwan for some scarcely imaginable reason, or does this seem more like your common or garden bureaucratic stuff?
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Up.
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Well, first of all, my observation is that whenever you're talking about Taiwan and China, it's quite difficult to figure out what the real information is because lots of the rhetoric in the press is heavily polarized.
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True.
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And, you know, including in some of the US publications and the uk, there's some vibrant China hawkery going on. And likewise, there's a lot of effort that's put into supporting Taiwan's wish for independence. What's unclear about this to me in the scant news articles I can see on it online from independent publications, let's call them, is that it appears as though the Danish government actually made this change on ID cards for people who were originally born in Taiwan, resident in denmark back in 2024. And essentially what they did was they said, as a country, you can no longer choose Taiwan, you have to choose born in Taiwan, and the country of your birth is China. And that's what's obviously got Taiwanese officials hot under the collar, whether or not this is an EU state breaking away amid Chinese pressure to start acknowledging China's claim over wishing to one day reunify Taiwan with China. I'm not entirely clear at this point.
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B
Yeah, I mean, it strikes me, William, it reminds me at least of conversations I have had with people from places like, well, Taiwan being among them, but also Palestine, Kosovo, people who mention that peculiar frustration of when you're trying to buy something or log into something online and you get the dropdown menu of your nationality and it's not an option, it just isn't there. I can see how that would be upsetting.
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C
Well, I can see why it'd be upsetting. But it wasn't until Nina told me that it was 2024, this decision was taken. I was all ready to work up some great geopolitical theory behind this. That this was shows Denmark making a gesture towards China as a warning to the United States about Greenland. You know, Greenland is. Denmark is one nation and Greenland is
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a part of a salutary reminder that it's possible to overthink things.
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C
Yeah, exactly. And I think actually the more likely explanation is some bureaucrat has decided to tidy stuff up.
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B
But just returning again to your expertise, William, in deciphering official language, is this a threat? This is from Taiwan. The issue could damage Denmark's image and commercial relationship in Taiwan, harming the two countries relationship and prospects for cooperation. Now, I assume that doesn't mean that a Taiwanese fleet will be forming up off Copenhagen anytime soon, but what does that actually mean?
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C
That language is just a warning. You know, you've upset us and there could be consequences, but we're not going to specify any of them. I doubt that the. I doubt that Taiwan is going to stop semiconductors from heading off towards Denmark. I think, I think Taiwan has a delicate balance. It can't afford to piss people off because actually China has much more clout and leverage in this when it comes down to it. So they're expressing their displeasure, but I don't think there'll be any consequences. I suppose what they're signaling to other people is we won't just ignore this, so don't go down this route.
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B
Well, on that thought, Nina, if you are Taiwan and they are on the receiving end of Chinese official pettiness more or less relentlessly about any number of things that you would think no sane person could possibly care less about, still less one of the world's great superpowers. But if you're Taiwan, is a battle like this worth fighting in public? Is every little bit of ground you can claim worth fighting for?
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A
Well, I think on either side, whether it's the sort of subtle messages or these big statements like this, there's a lot of effort that's invested into it. That's largely because there are so many countries around the world, in particular about 40 Western countries that on the one hand might recognize the sort of One China policy, but have deliberate ambiguities about it. So there's a gray area that either side can exploit to claim the title of the territory. Whether it's China claiming that they believe Taiwan should be part of China and will one day be part of China, or from Taiwan's perspective, it wants to remain a sort of vibrant democracy that it is. So there's that gray area and I think that's what this speaks to because obviously Denmark is one of those crucial official countries.
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C
Well, you should be thankful that they only have to look down at one, one country in the drop down menu. I mean, if you're British, you'd have no idea where to find yourself in the drop.
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B
Well, that is true.
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C
Britain. I sometimes I spend hours trying to find my, my country in the drop down menu.
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B
I mean, have you ever had the really appalling one though where there's just England and not Scotland?
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C
I do have that, yes.
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B
Yeah, that would be upsetting.
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C
That would be very upsetting.
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B
Well, well now to the imminent annual liberation of Europe from months of damp, darkened cold and the likelihood that many Europeans will to go on holiday somewhere. It says here however, that they may be less likely than in previous summers to go to the beach. According to debatably scientific research by an attention seeking corporate entity which in keeping with petulant program policy we are not going to name people, are now keener on active holidays blending outdoor sporting activities and cultural immersion, whatever that is. If that doesn't all sound ghastly enough, it is being marketed with the insufferable neologist darecations, the coinage of which in a civilised world would be punished by being buried up to the neck in an anthill and then smacked upside the head with a big shovel. Nina, would you take a deercation? And if you did, would you refer to it as a derecation? And if the answer to that question is yes, please leave now.
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No, for the main reason that I used to have a job that would send me to all sorts of weird and wonderful places that some people might raise their eyebrows, sat and find maybe not as dangerous as some of the ones you used to spend time in, William, but still exciting enough let's say. But I am actually a fan of a holiday where you actually learn something. To be quite honest with you, I'm never happier than, you know, the Greek islands where the island next door has a whole archaeological site you can see and a beach as well. But having said that, I am off to Turkey, eminently to the beaches because I've got two young kids and I couldn't face dragging them around something that they'd have to learn more about.
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B
This is, according to the research, William, some sort of post pandemic thing that after still a few years after having been compelled to sit around doing nothing for a protracted period, people feel less like sitting around doing nothing than they may once have done. Do you buy that it might be true?
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C
I suspect it's all about. It's all about global warming. I think the beaches have moved north. I think Germans, Germans, Swedes and Brits no longer needing to go to the beach. It's because it's got a lot hotter in their own countries. But I've never been a beach Fan. I've always looked for, you know, the nice bars, the nice museums, the nice cathedrals, the other things, the ancient ruins. That's always been my favorite holiday. As for derecations, Nina's quite right. I've had enough people shooting at me for long enough. A nice, safe museum, a nice, safe ancient ruins. Although I've had both at the same time in Libya. Leptis Magna and Sabratha, where you can combine archaeology with dates, proper dedication.
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B
In Libya, Yeah, I've been to Sabathra in Libya myself. I mean, Libya, of course, you get the ancient ruins and rather more recent ones. Nina, would you be a fan, though, of the active holiday? Can you see yourself spending your time off, I don't know, potholing or paragliding or whatever the hell nonsense it is these people are pitching?
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A
No, I'm notoriously lazy. I keep the week for exercise running from one place to the next. No, when I do.
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B
You can say that now you've been given on the job.
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A
Oh, yeah, of course. No, I. And by the way, full disclosure, I'm only here commentating on my journalistic capacity, but I would say that, yeah, I think I'm glad to see people are more active on their holidays, that they want more from their holidays, that they want to learn more. Because the reality is we are in a sort of dangerous world. We are in a world where nationalism is on the rise in some countries, particularly in Europe. So if people. People are going out to learn more from other countries, other parts of the world, that can only be a good thing if they're sort of pushing their boundaries and doing it in a positive way. But, no, I'm a bit too lazy to do any. Any full exercise, to be quite honest with you.
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B
On holiday finally then, William, and to bring this back to where we came in, you see how we do this. What is the appeal, do you think, to the people on those cruise ships on which you speak of spending their holiday being harangued about current affairs by former embassy ambassadors?
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C
Well, haranguing is probably not the correct word. I mean, I think they are. They are genuinely interested in. In your experience, and some of them are quite experienced in their own right in different fields. So it's. I think they like the idea of not having to pack up every two days. You know, you get on the ship and you unpack and you don't have to pack again for another two weeks. And I think that's an appeal. But it doesn't mean to say they've. They've gone into A coma.
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B
Sir William Patey and Nina Dos Sant, thank you both for joining us. Finally on today's show, our on this Day historical series reflects on a master orator at the peak of his considerable powers. They'd started out from Selma four days previously, and this time they'd made it to Montgomery. It was the third attempt in as many weeks by civil rights activists to walk the 87 kilometers of Highway 80 that lie between the two Alabama cities. The first march on March 7, 1965, had been prompted by the murder of one of their number, Jimmie Lee Jackson, by a state trooper, James Bernard Fowler.
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C
Some 600 people set out to protest his killing with a march from Selma to Montgomery. They only made it six blocks.
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B
The mostly black protesters were charged by entirely white police officers and vigilantes on the bridge, named as it still is today, after Edmund Pettus, a U.S. senator, senator, Confederate brigadier, and Grand Dragon of the Ku Klux Klan. Dozens were injured. In the United States, it became known as Bloody Sunday. They resolved to set out from Selma again 48 hours later. This time, a judge halted them with a restraining order. A bigger crowd, perhaps two and a half thousand strong, complied with its terms by returning to the Edmund Pettus Bridge, praying and walking back to Selma. That night, a group of Klansmen attacked three white Unitarian ministers who'd come to town to support the protests. One of them, James Reeb, died of his injuries two days later. On March 15, US President Lyndon Johnson corralled a joint session of Congress, pitched a new voting rights bill, and told them they were going to pass it in terms which left little doubt which side he was on.
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D
Their cause must be our cause, too, because it's not just Negroes, but really it's all of us who must overcome the crippling legacy of bigotry and injustice. And we shall overcome.
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B
By March 21, the restraining order had been lifted and President President Johnson had federalized the Alabama National Guard to ensure safe passage for the marchers. Over the objections of Governor George Wallace, Johnson's fellow Democrat, but an unreconstructed segregationist, perhaps 8,000 people began walking on the evening of March 24th just outside Montgomery. They enjoyed performances by artists including Harry Belafonte, Frankie lane, Sammy Davis Jr. Joan Byers, the Chad Mitchell Trio, and Nina Simone.
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D
Second class houses and second class schools. Do you think that all colored folks are just second class fools?
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C
Mr.
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D
Backlash?
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B
On the afternoon of March 25th, on the steps of Alabama's state capitol in Montgomery, the headliners stepped up.
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D
I want to tell the city of Selma tell today I want to say to the state of Alabama, yes sir. Today I want to say to the people of America and the nations of the world that we are not about to turn around.
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B
Martin Luther King Jr. Was 36. A little over a decade previously, he'd become the pastor of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery. He could see it from his lectern today, just downhill and to the left, maybe a few five minute walk. King had helped turn the church into a headquarters of the budding civil rights movement. The Montgomery bus boycott, initially a protest against the racial segregation of the city's public transport, had been run out of the church's basement.
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D
Montgomery was the first city in the south in which the entire negro community united and squarely faced its age old oppressor.
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B
The location mattered for at least two other reasons. On the spot where King stood a little over two years, Governor Wallace had founded his long domination of Alabama politics on a platform of angry, unapologetic, racist defiance.
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D
I draw the line in the dust and toss the gauntlet before the feet of tyranny and I say segregation now, segregation tomorrow, and segregation forever.
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B
A little over a century before that, on roughly the same patch of balcony, Jefferson Davis, a US Senator from Mississippi, had been sworn in as the first and would turn out last and only president of the Confederate states. As King gathered steam on this day 61 years ago, Wallace seethed in his office in the building behind him, and Davis doubtless revolved in his Virginia grave.
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D
So I stand before you this afternoon. There is a conviction that segregation is on its deathbed in Alabama and the only thing uncertain about it is how costly the segregation is and why.
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B
King's speech was a reflection on the road his followers had already taken, literal and metaphorical and an unsparing yet inspiring assessment of the path that lay before them.
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D
I must admit to you there are still jail cells waiting for us. Dark and difficult. More. We were born with the faith that non violence and its power can transform dark yesterdays into bright tomorrows. We will be able to change all of these conditions.
- [34:43]
B
King was obviously a fabulous public speaker. But unlike many activists before and since, blessed with oratorical gifts, he was not cursed with the tendency to believe that looking good and doing good are the same. King was at heart a practical politician. Though certainly keen on what was right, he was much more interested in what would work. He counselled both urgency and patience.
- [35:08]
D
I know you asked him today, how long will it take? Somebody's asking, how long will prejudice blind the visions of men?
- [35:17]
B
King crested on a question rhetorical, to which he nevertheless supplied an answer.
- [35:25]
D
Because no lie can live forever. How long? Not long. Because you shall reap what you sow. How long? Not long. How long?
- [35:38]
B
And he did what the most effective calls to action do, presented the outcome as fait accompli.
- [35:49]
D
Is long, but it bends toward justice. How long?
- [35:56]
B
And that is all for this edition of the Monocle Daily. Thanks to our panelists today, Nina dos Santos and Sir William Patey. Today's show was produced by Tom Webb and researched by Anneliese Maynard. Our sound engineer was Elliot Greenfield. I'm Andrew Muller here in London. The Daily is back at the same time tomorrow. Thanks for listening.
- [36:15]
C
SA.