← The Rest Is Politics
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- [00:01]
Alistair Campbell
Thanks for listening to the Rest is Politics Sign up to the Rest is Politics. Plus to enjoy Ad Free listening, receive a weekly newsletter, join our members chat room and gain early access to live show tickets. Just go to therestispolitics.com that's therestispolitics.com.
- [00:17]
Katty Kay
The.
- [00:18]
Anthony Scaramucci
Rest is Politics it's officially powered by our friends at Fuse Energy.
- [00:22]
Alistair Campbell
And something else we all know is that energy deals. They're about as stable, long term and reliable as a, I don't know, Donald Trump promise to a country, but not this one.
- [00:32]
Anthony Scaramucci
Fuse Energy is offering cheap fixed tariffs for up to 18 months. No price hikes, no drama, just a rock solid rate you can count on. And with the July 1 price cap, now's the perfect time to lock in a better deal.
- [00:45]
Alistair Campbell
And the average home is going to save about £100 compared to the price cap. And that's not spin. That is real money back in your pocket. And here's the clincher. When you sign up, you get duh duh Trip plus for free. And you know by now that means ad free listening. It means bonus content like our recent mini series on JD Vance, early access to Question Time and pre sell tickets for our sellout live shows Powering youg Home and you'd Brain.
- [01:14]
Anthony Scaramucci
At the same time, head to fuseenergy.com politics Download the app and use the code POLITICS to get a free trip plus subscription, fixed tariffs, big savings bonus content what's not to love?
- [01:30]
Rory Stewart
This episode is brought to you by LifeLock. Between two factor authentication, strong passwords, and a VPN, you try to be in control of how your info is protected. But many other places also have it, and they might not be as careful. That's why LifeLock monitors hundreds of millions of data points a second for threats. If your identity is stolen, they'll fix it, guaranteed, or your money back. Save up to 40% your first year. Visit lifelock.com podcast for 40% off terms applying.
- [02:07]
Alistair Campbell
Welcome to the Rest Is Politics with me, Alistair Campbell, and me, Katty.
- [02:12]
Katty Kay
K. Not Rory Stewart, clearly.
- [02:14]
Alistair Campbell
No. Rory Stewart, as I said last week, is in Columbia and so uncontactable is he that even though there has been this massive event in Colombia this week, the conviction of the former President Uribe, who's been convicted of bribery trying to stop a former paramilitary testifying against him, I cannot get even a reply from Rory. So Katya, I'm very, very grateful that you've joined us from the Rest Is Politics Family. Rest Is Politics us no less. Now those are our listeners who don't know. Just tell us a little bit about who you are, what the rest of Politics Us is and how it relates to us.
- [02:54]
Katty Kay
Well, first of all, congratulations to Rory for being on holiday and being uncontactable in this day and age. That's an impressive feat in and of itself.
- [03:02]
Alistair Campbell
Yeah.
- [03:03]
Katty Kay
I'm gonna take a leaf out of his book. So I host along with Anthony Scaramucci, the Rest is Politics Us, which we launched just over a year ago to cover all things American politics and these days, all things Donald Trump in particular. I guess we think of ourselves as your little sibling with a kid on the block. I mean, you know, you're the, you're the big guys and we're the little kids and we follow in your wake. I think that's how we think of ourselves.
- [03:27]
Alistair Campbell
Well, I suspect you may, but I suspect Anthony Scaramucci does not. But there we are. You're no doubt used to dealing with very large egos.
- [03:34]
Katty Kay
You're, you're high table and we're low table. Let's put it like that.
- [03:37]
Alistair Campbell
Okay, Very good. Well, listen, thank you anyway. It's lovely to see you. And we're going to talk about Gaza a lot. I think it's getting worse and worse and worse and worse. We're going to talk about Trump in the greatest country on earth for a few days. He was. Is in Scotland. He still is in Scotland.
- [03:54]
Katty Kay
I thought that was Switzerland, the greatest country on earth.
- [03:56]
Alistair Campbell
Oh, please, do me a favor.
- [03:58]
Katty Kay
Okay. All right. I have to, I have to revise my geography. All right.
- [04:01]
Alistair Campbell
Scotland is the greatest country on earth and Donald Trump has been.
- [04:04]
Katty Kay
That's a fact.
- [04:06]
Alistair Campbell
It's a very strongly held opinion by many people. But he has been there giving Scotland a lot of publicity on his various golf courses. We'll talk about all the stuff he got up to, trade deals, windmills, all sorts of stuff that went on there. And I, I think if we've got time, we should also talk about President Zelensk, who's been an amazing leader for the last few years, but had a little bit of a faux pas, as we say in France, where I am right now. We'll talk about that as well. But let's start with Gaza. Katy, and you said on trip us yesterday that you felt it was breaking through in America in a way that it maybe hasn't been of late. And I mean, just develop that a little bit for me. Why do you think that's happening? And also I guess why, why has America been so I suspense behind the rest of the world in terms of the public anger and revulsion at what's actually happening in Gaza right now.
- [05:01]
Katty Kay
It's been interesting being over in Europe this summer quite a bit, and early on in the summer, it was clear that there was just much more focus on the situation in Gaza, in the UK and in Europe than there has been in America. It comes up occasionally in moments when we see the images, but really not much else, but what these photographs of the children, specifically, specifically that we've seen in the last couple of weeks have run on the front pages of American newspapers. And whilst the American press is pretty monolithic and pretty inward focus, particularly the political press, which has been able to think about nothing but Jeffrey Epstein for the last two weeks, those pictures are so powerful, Alistair, that even Americans who are thinking about their summer holidays and thinking about the price of gas and thinking about Jeffrey Epstein, they can't have failed to notice them. And what's made me think that it's broken through is that I've had members of Congress reach out to me to tell me that their constituents are calling them about this. I spoke last night with Senator Angus King from Maine, the independent senator from Maine, and he wanted to call me, he wanted to talk to me. Now, often, you know, as journalists, as you know from being a practitioner of politics, we're the ones calling you, right? It has to be something important for you want to reach out to us, that you want to get your message out if you're a politician. And Senator King was very keen that I should see a very powerful statement that he had put out.
- [06:26]
Alistair Campbell
Yeah, I read it.
- [06:26]
Katty Kay
On the situation in Gaza. What he was saying is that America should suspend all aid to Israel of any kind, as long as there are children starving in Gaza. And he's very firmly putting this, the responsibility of the Israelis. I spoke to him on the phone after he sent me that statement. He is saying that this is a disproportionate response by the Israelis and he points to Donald Trump, who even says, look, Donald Trump has changed his position. Three weeks ago, there was Donald Trump saying Bibi Netanyahu could do whatever he wanted with Gaza. And now we have him. We'll talk about that. That up in Scotland of what he said yesterday about the fact that there is starvation. So if politicians are starting to get their constituents, make phone calls to them during their summer recess, they're all back now at home, right? All these members of Congress, all these senators are back at home now, and their members, their constituents and voters are calling them, saying that they're outraged by this. Now maybe this is an independent senator and it was a Democratic congresswoman that I spoke to. I think there's probably less response from Republicans at the moment, but it's breaking through. I mean, how can Americans ignore those photographs? You know, many Christian voters, how do they ignore those photographs?
- [07:35]
Alistair Campbell
The only thing I'd say about that is that it does feel like it's becoming more and more difficult to ignore and yet it has been ignored substantially. I was talking the other day to. My only real experience of famine was back in the 80s when I was on the Daily Mirror and I was in Ethiopia and I can remember talking to a guy there who worked for the Red Cross. And he made the point because you get there and of course there's a little bit of the sort of, you know, the white savior arrives and now we're here and we know what to do and what have you. And he was making the point that actually it was already too late. And I worry that that's where we are now. There's a, there's a thread which I think we should put in the, in our newsletter, a guy called Jeremy. I don't know how to pronounce his name. I'm going to go with Jeremy Connie Indick. And he's the president of Refugees International and he used to be the USAID lead for disaster relief. So he knows what he's talking about in this sort of situation. And I have to say, when I saw Donald Trump sitting alongside Ursula von der Leyen in Turnberry Golf Club complaining that nobody had said thank you for the £60 million worth of dollars of food that they'd sent, none of the.
- [08:45]
Jeremy Konyndyk
European countries, by the way, gave.
- [08:47]
Alistair Campbell
I mean, nobody gave but us. And nobody said, gee, thank you very much and it would be nice to have at least a thank you. This is the guy who was slashed, demolished with the help of Musk usaid, which prior to that in these circumstances now would be one of the lead organizations in this. And Jeremy was making the point that we've now probably passed the tipping point and that we are now almost certainly going to see mass scale starvation mortality even if people do now get more food in. And he was saying that, for example, he was saying that we're now in a kind of Sudan, Somalia type situation or Ethiopia, as I was in the, where I was in the 80s. And he said that when he was in charge of these operations, you have to tie these things together, food aid, obviously you have to have that treatment for malnutrition, which doesn't just involve feeding children, health care because he says that disease will now kill more of these people than starvation. Clean water and sanitation. And the Israelis made a big thing in the last couple of days of their switching back on one of the water supplies. I mean, who switched it off and why? I worry that this reaction, whilst welcome, I still worry it's too late. And even yesterday, watching Trump, Cassie with Keir Starmer and we'll talk a bit about these incredible sort of rambling, rote, sort of crazy press events that he.
- [10:13]
Katty Kay
Does well and the awful position he puts those other leaders in.
- [10:16]
Alistair Campbell
Absolutely.
- [10:17]
Katty Kay
But, yes, we'll get, we'll get to that.
- [10:18]
Alistair Campbell
But the point I was going to make is, is that he was there saying, yeah, they, they look really hungry on tv. Based on television, I would say not particularly because those children look very hungry, but we're giving a lot of money and a lot of food. And it's like, how has he missed that? Does he, does he only, could he only cope with things on television, not the warnings that have been given for weeks and weeks and weeks and weeks?
- [10:42]
Katty Kay
I mean, obviously there's a gap, right, a delta between something breaking through and the action that's taken and whether that action is effective and, and we haven't really got to the action part of that yet. But I think it is worth noting perhaps for, particularly for people who are listening around the world who, who aren't kind of steeped in American television in the way, you know, cable television as a public service, I do this for you. For Gaza to be, be on American television networks is in and of itself different. It's not there very often. I do this morning show Morning Joe that I'm on two or three times a week. We've had the situation in Gaza and the starvation on, on every program, leading the program in the last couple of days. That is a sea change, Alistair. And yes, has Donald Trump understood fully what this implies and what needs to be done and how much pressure it's going to take on Prime Minister Netanyahu to do what is needed? Probably not, but he's in a very different position. Donald Trump could say something today and then change his mind tomorrow. We all know that. But what he is saying, the point that these members were making to me is that he is saying something different. So, yeah, he arrived saying, why haven't we be thanked? You know, we gave 60 million and we haven't been thanked and I wish somebody would thank us. But there he was with Keir Starmer the next day or a couple of days later saying, yes, there is starvation. So you can see even in the course of a couple of days that there has been a change in his language. Now, if a change in language leads to a change in American policy, he got there late. And it's ridiculous to say that starving people should be thankful. Clearly, they're starving. They have nothing to be thankful for. And they shouldn't be, you know, have to grovel to the United States or some benevolent benefactor to say thank you. But the important thing is whether there are results and whether there's a change in American policy. Right. And that comes from people calling their members of Congress, from Donald Trump saying there is starvation, from it being on the nightly news and the morning news as people are waking up in the morning. And that has changed in the last week or two.
- [12:48]
Alistair Campbell
You see, what I find very depressing about that is that. And I mentioned the fact that Trump said, you know, you can see on the television as if that's the only reality. If you do have organizations like usaid, if you do have a State Department that is functional, if you do have. You listen to the people who actually know what they're doing in relation to delivery of food and medication in, in disaster zones, then it wouldn't. You'd be ahead of the. The media. Whereas what you're describing to me is a political and media culture where it only kind of matters if the media are talking about it. And then once they're talking about it, how do we get them to stop talking about it so as we can get them back focus on something we want to focus about? And that, to me, is a utterly dysfunctional political leadership which ultimately is going to fail.
- [13:39]
Katty Kay
Yeah, I mean, you get to the point. I know we had a conversation last week, you know, when we were talking about this show, Alistair, about the institutions, and you're right, there's been such a degradation of American humanitarian and international institutions. I mean, globally, but also within the United States. And the level of sophistication, of understanding of what's needed is not reflected in what Donald Trump is saying. I mean, this idea that you could just airdrop enough food in, clearly that's never going to happen. That's pretty performative. It's not even, as you said, it's not just food at this stage, but there is some understanding. A member of Congress sent me a video of an amendment and a speech she made on the floor of the House in which she is laying out all the steps. The nutritionist that would be needed, the nutritional paste that would be needed. So There are people in Congress on the foreign affairs committees who understand what is needed. They've got backgrounds in this. They've seen the experience of what's needed. But you have to. I mean, in the end, what you have to have is a political will to push the Israeli government. Right. And that's where, okay, so he sees it on television. And, yes, he also said, yeah, it's coming down the wires. I mean, I don't know. Nothing's come down the wire since I was a rookie reporter in Japan in the 1990s. I mean, just like it doesn't happen like that. Donald Trump is out of date. We know this. But if he's moving towards a position where he's more willing to put political pressure on the Israeli government, then that is probably the best chance we have. Precisely because, as you said to me, the international institutions and organizations, both American and foreign, that should be doing this have been degraded. Because it's not just that USAID has been degraded. All of the Save the Children Fund, unicef, Mercy, all of the aid agencies that were reliant on USAID funding have also been degraded because of the actions of the Trump administration.
- [15:36]
Alistair Campbell
Right. And that's that. My point is that's been a deliberate strategy. So we talk about the international community. The international community is a combination of governments of the United nations, of international organizations, of the aid agencies. In this context, they have been deliberately undermined. And one of the things that I find so troubling, and I don't, you know, I understand why they do it, but when you watch von der Leyen operate the way she did, Keir Starmer operate the way that he did yesterday, where frankly, you. You would have thought if you were looking in from outer space, you'd have thought, well, this is Trump's country here. He's the host of this. You know, he's the guy sort of. He's even got an American flag on top of his Scottish hotel.
- [16:17]
Katty Kay
He'd probably agree with you, it's the greatest country in the world because it's Trump country.
- [16:20]
Alistair Campbell
Now when he's there, he thinks this is one of the great countries in the world. That's where his mother came from, of course. But my. The thing is that they've. Between them for different reasons, Trump and Netanyahu have got us to a place where they think, frankly, theirs are the only voices that count. And that's why we have to sort of try and nudge Trump and cajole Trump. And what you said there about what his discussion with Keir Starmer where, yes, he appeared. So, for example, I've just been looking at the American papers. They're all saying Trump recognizes starvation at a time that Netanyahu denies that it exists. Fair enough. That's a shift. Is that a shift? Because it's what he's with Keir Starmer, and he's kind of just moved a little bit towards what Keir Starmer's been talking to about. And tomorrow, if he's on the phone to Netanyahu, he can go back to a different place. It's so unpredictable. And the. And the only voice, if you get to a point where the only voices that matter are Israel who are conducting the war, and frankly, with a communication strategy that, you know, you have to be very, very wary of. And Trump, who is so kind of, you know, volatile and unreliable, and meanwhile, un, Nowhere, the big international aid agencies, frankly, feeling completely frozen out. And this Gaza humanitarian thing, this foundation, I mean, I hope people wish again we should put in the newsletter an interview Jeremy Bowen did for the BBC with a guy, former American Special Forces, who was there as part of it, and says he has never seen anything so shambolic, so amateur and so dangerous as what's going on at these food centers. And Trump didn't really seem to know what was going on there at all.
- [18:04]
Katty Kay
Yeah, I mean, even. Even when he describes it, right, he says, oh, well, there are the fences. He repeats. He's very visual. We know this about Trump, right? It's not like he's read a brief on Gaza and the humanitarian situation and why there isn't enough food and why the food is not getting to the people. He hasn't got the data on that, but he's seen pictures of fences, and somehow in his mind, he's thinking it's the fences are the problem and that if there weren't these fences, all this food would get out from these compounds. Now, I've been to food distribution places a bit like you in East Africa in famine situations, and you do actually have to protect the food in some way. There has to be some sort of systematic thing, otherwise you're going to end up with more people dying, in stampedes. The people who know this, I don't know this, but the people who know this are the people who run these aid agencies and who run humanitarian aid programs. The people who used to work for usaid, they knew how to do this. The bigger problem here is that we're reliant and kind of in this sort of weird world of what Minouche Shafiq in the Financial Times over the weekend called G minus one world kind of. It's not G7, it's not G20, it's G minus one. It's the world without America. We're reliant on policy being made by somebody who is volatile, who can change his mind, who responds to sort of on a slightly whimsical nature to what he's seen. I actually think Donald Trump. There have been several times that Donald Trump has responded to pictures of children. He doesn't like pictures of suffering children. It does. It has an impact on him. It did during his first administration when the children were being separated from their parents in the family separation policy at the border. He said very positive things about the kids who were brought into the country illegally by their parents, but brought in when they were very young. What in America are called the dreamers. There is something in him. There's a kind of. There's a sentimentalism around children. But so it doesn't surprise me in a way that he would see the photographs and respond and, you know, want this to be. He wants those photographs to go away. He doesn't want to see those photos anymore.
- [20:01]
Alistair Campbell
Again, Katie, it's interesting. Cause you're saying that he's very sensitive to pictures of the suffering. It's not the suffering that matters.
- [20:10]
Katty Kay
It's the images upset him. Yeah, yeah, but that's. He is upset. Yeah. No, I get what you're saying. Yeah, that's the wrong way around.
- [20:16]
Alistair Campbell
It's kind of like, you know, what about trying to. To think about how do we address the suffering as opposed to how do we stop having to look at a picture of the suffering? It's a very different thing.
- [20:26]
Katty Kay
And look at the difference in language that, you know, there was Keir Starmer saying, we are revolted. Many Brits are revolted by what they see. Donald Trump didn't use that language. Not. Not close.
- [20:37]
Alistair Campbell
He said they looked very hungry.
- [20:38]
Katty Kay
They looked very hungry. And you can't fake it. I mean, so conscious of media. Right. And images. Again, it's that idea that these photos could possibly have been manipulated. But. But I think if there is a change, I mean, contrast this to what Lindsey Graham, Senator Lindsey Graham said over the weekend on American television on Meet the Press, where he said, you know, the Israelis should bring Gaza down and do to Gaza what the Allies did to Dresden and Japan in the Second World War. That's the opposite extreme. And that's where some people on the American right are at the moment. The very strong pro Israeli lobby on the American right. Is there. So Donald Trump is not where Lindsey Graham is at the moment. He's on a different page.
- [21:20]
Alistair Campbell
You mentioned there the Israeli, the pro Israeli lobby. Can I just ask you about it? But you obviously know these people better than I do. So the American Israeli Public affairs committee, these PACs, okay, that sort of fund politicians without them contravening any sort of law. The third largest political action committee is the American Israel Public Affairs Committee committee. And only 33 members of Congress did not receive funding from pro Israel donors in the 2022 election cycle. And interestingly, a lot of that money is going on centrist Democrats defeating progressives in primaries that accounted for 42% of all the spending that was there. Not long ago, right at the start of post October 7th, I remember having this really difficult row with one of my children, Bukalum, my son, and he kept saying, you know what you people won't accept is that the pro Israel lobby is a massive thing and it's incredibly powerful and it stops people telling the truth about Israel. When you see those figures, you start. Yeah, so how would you define the relationship between an organized lobby pro Israel? How much of it is driven by Israel? How much of it is driven just by Americans who support Israel? How well connected are they and how influential are they?
- [22:39]
Katty Kay
I mean, all of the above. Really? Yes, very. APAC is very influential. It is a single issue lobby group and there are not many. I think it's the one of the biggest single issue lobby groups and it is also, I think, the biggest single issue lobby group that supports members across both sides. So you've got very powerful gun lobby groups, for example, but they tend to support, give more money to Republicans than they do to Democrats. AIPAC is different. It's munificence is equally distributed between the two parties and they are very strategic. So the reason they're starting to support these centrist Democrats is that AIPAC is reading the American polling very clearly. And the American polling, as Anthony and I were talking about on the episode we put out yesterday of Trip US shows us that younger Americans are much less pro Israel than older Americans. And that's actually true of younger Republicans as well as younger Democrats. There was a poll before October 7th, in the spring of. Before October 7th, so four or five months before October 7th that showed that actually for the first time, Americans between the ages of 18 and 29 were more sympathetic towards the cause of Palestinians than they were to the cause of Israel. That's a huge shift in American public opinion. And that predates October 7th. It predates the images that you and I have just been talking about in Gaza and the destruction of Gaza and the devastation there. So if you're sitting in Israel, you realize what's coming. Because as Senator King actually said to me last night, when those younger political act voters become political leaders and become members of Congress, American policy towards Israel will change. And AIPAC realizes that. And people in Israel who support AIPAC financially also realize that. So I think there must be a certain amount of fear in Israel. There's a certain amount of fear in aipac, there's a certain amount of fear in the pro Israel lobby in the United States. And that's why they go, particularly, for example, centrist Democrats, many of whom I know and have received funds from aipac, because they need to try and stop the progressive wing of the Democratic Party from taking power as much as they can. But even that's not going to be enough if these numbers hold across both parties. So AIPAC is powerful, but not more powerful than a shifting demographic in the United States.
- [25:05]
Alistair Campbell
I just wonder, what do you think does work in terms of bringing pressure on Trump and also in terms of bringing pressure on Netanyahu? Netanyahu right now seems deliberately, fairly oblivious to anything that is not America. So, for example, even with Putin, you occasionally after a while get, you know, well, Macron puts pressure on Putin with phone calls saying so. And so the E3 come together and say something about Russia. You read in and see and hear very little of people directly saying, we're putting pressure on Israel, they're putting pressure on Trump to put pressure on Israel. So what do you think, from the American perspective? What is the best way to put pressure on Trump to put pressure on. On Israel?
- [25:53]
Katty Kay
I think is what we've seen in the last week, the ceasefire they've been working on. They have tried, right? I mean, he has sent Wyckoff out there multiple times. And the last time they gave up when they came out of Doha a couple of weeks ago and said, this is just not getting anywhere. We can't work with Hamas. So they have actually, Donald Trump would love to have a ceasefire, and he'd love to have a ceasefire that holds because he thinks that's another of the things that he could put in his list, as he said this weekend, of the things that he's achieved on the world stage in terms of peace. But in the short term, let's just focus on the kind of crisis of the moment, which is the starvation and particularly the starvation of children. I think it's what we have seen it's more. I mean, this is just awful. It's more of these photographs on the front pages because he won't like that. He won't like those images. And there will be enough people in the kind of evangelical voting block that also won't like that. People will start hearing about this in church on Sundays. Members, Republican members, will start to get phone calls from their constituents. And you build a groundswell. You know, God, I'm old enough to remember how Bill Clinton changed his mind eventually on Bosnia. And it was because night and after night, it was on the television screens in American households, the snipers in Sarajevo. And that's what changes. You know, this. I mean, this is your field, this is how communications campaigns work. And as one. One member of Congress said to me yesterday, the trouble is, we're only seeing what we see. The Israelis aren't letting international journalists in there. And there's a heartbreaking statement from the AFP about how their journalists are starving. So guess how many more photographs potentially there might be and how many more people are in this position? Children are in this position. I think that's what it's going to be. It has to break through for Trump. It has to break through visually and it has to feel personal. It can't be somebody going to him and saying, this is a policy around nutrition paste and nutritionists. And here's the data.
- [27:56]
Alistair Campbell
Yeah, I must give a shout out. I've already mentioned Jeremy Bowen, the interview that he did with the guy, the ex Special Forces guy, Jeremy Bone, did a really interesting piece last night because. And I think he's a, you know, he's really remarkable journalist, Jeremy, and he was, you know, these air drops. So the Jordanians and the Emiratis are doing some of these air drops and Britain is involved in that as well. So Jeremy was on the plane that was doing the airdrop and it would have been so easy and so tempting for him to have done, you know, a piece to camera hanging out into the air and sort of watching this go by, and here we go, help is on its way, etc. Instead of which he did a very, very measured rapport. He used the word that you used earlier, saying, there's something performative about this, you seem to be doing something, and that's good, but actually it's not really going to address the problem. That's this whole plane only has as much as you could put into one lorry, and there are these dozens of trucks that are waiting to get in, say they can't get in because of Bureaucratic and security obstruction. But he then made the point. He stood by the windows in planes and he stood by them. They were covered. Why were they covered? Because the Israelis had said they did not want any filming from the air of Gaza. And Jeremy Bowen described what he saw looking out of the window. It was really interesting because television, Trump, as you say, it's all about pictures. And he was describing what he couldn't show you, and he said, they don't want us to see what's happening on the ground, and they don't want us to see it from above either. And he was saying, these are places that I know, places that I've been to, and it is utterly raised to the ground. And it's a horrific thing. And I thought that was a really powerful way, because when you talk there about Trump and pictures, pictures. Am I being too Machiavellian in thinking that that is one of the reasons why Israel does not allow foreign media into Gaza? You know, there's part of me thinks, well, they don't allow them because they don't want us to see what they get up to. And of course, in war, all sorts of stuff happens you don't necessarily want to see. But I wonder whether actually they're thinking, you know, down the track, it's all going to be about the pictures. And if Trump's sitting there and he doesn't like what he sees, then we're under greater pressure.
- [30:14]
Katty Kay
Yeah, I mean, it's a, when you phrase it like that, I don't think it's just Donald Trump. I do think Netanyahu doesn't want anyone to see the level of starvation that there is in Gaza at the moment. And we know that they've been playing footsie, opening the border up, shutting the border down, opening the border up, a couple of trucks in, not allowing trucks in. So the, the, the government's own policy to fixing this is, has been completely inadequate. And I think they realize that if anybody sees the pictures, there is some, anybody in the outside world sees those pictures, the risk to them on having to open up those border and allow those trucks in, and then for Netanyahu to have to respond, as Ben Gvir said this week, you know, this is just a hoax by Hamas. We're just, if, if we allow more aid in, we're just capitulating and giving in to Hamas. And he doesn't want that. Right. He doesn't want anyone to see it. But I'm sure, I mean, look, Netanyahu has read Trump very well. He brought him along with the Iranian strikes by having a success of his own that Trump then wanted to be part of. And in this position, it could well be that when he doesn't want people to see those photographs, the person he doesn't want to see those photographs is Donald Trump.
- [31:31]
Alistair Campbell
Final point interview I saw with guy called Dr. Ahmed Al Farah, head of pediatrics and maternity services at NASA Medical Complex in Khan Yunis. He said there is not a single viable can of infant formula left in Gaza. And he said some of the cases we're seeing resemble what humanity saw in ancient times. And he said that there are the consequences here for an entire generation, including those who survived the immediate crisis. So I guess we all have to hope it does stay on the American front pages.
- [32:05]
Katty Kay
Can I just ask you though something, Alistair, because you raised to me last week this idea that international institutions have been degraded and that was a strategy and that has left the response inadequate. And I think that's right. But isn't there more that Europe could be doing that the UK could be doing without Donald Trump in this situation? Or are you right that we really are dependent on this one guy whose positions can be a little mercurial when it comes to policy? I mean, are there things that Europe could push Israel on further?
- [32:40]
Alistair Campbell
Definitely. Definitely. And I think actually we've all got media and politics. We've all got far too sucked into playing Trump's game. Very interesting example. We're going to talk about this after the break, but I'll just say this now about his meeting with Ursula von der Leyen, when Trump sat there and said we've given $60 million and nobody's thanked us and nobody else has given anything. She could actually and to my mind should have said, hold on a minute, let me give you the facts about how much Europe has been putting in to support this. But where you're absolutely right, I think is that Netanyahu may feel is in a position where what Britain says doesn't matter, what France says doesn't matter, what Japan says doesn't matter, what Germany says doesn't matter. But I think they were impact by that foreign minister's statement didn't change their view. But they didn't like it when 28 foreign ministers came together. Australia, Japan, South Korea, most of Europe came together. Germany accepted and said this is an outrage. This has to stop these things. I think you have to keep doing them again and again and again. And I think we far too much, all of us bought into the idea that Trump is the only guy that can move this because if you are reliant upon Trump, you're basically accepting the international order has failed. The international institutions don't work. The international institutions I feel really sorry for in this context are the aid agencies who are desperate to try to help and they just can't operate in the way that they should. And maybe final word from my, the guy who's. And I must speak to him, so as I can say to him, Jeremy, how do I pronounce your name? So, Jeremy Kay, he makes the point. He actually did another thread. He said that Gaza is not in crisis because it's somehow uniquely, more complicated than other conflict zones. He said he's been involved in the delivery of aid to places like Yemen, to the drc, to Tigray, to Iraq, to Sudan is always difficult. But we have not really seen that much in the way of famine for, you know, for some time. Sudan, Somalia. Then you go back to others. We're now seeing a famine, he argues, because of unprecedented obstruction of aid by the Israeli government. Now, I know the Israeli government won't like to hear that, but this is somebody who I, whose expertise and whose opinion I trust on these issues. And I honestly think the Israelis to come out and say there is no famine, it's all down to Hamas, the food is there. I mean, you know, get real. You do not help your cause by industrial scale lying about what's actually happening. So should we take a break?
- [35:24]
Katty Kay
Let's take a break and then we'll.
- [35:26]
Alistair Campbell
Come back and find out why you think Switzerland is a better country than Scotland.
- [35:29]
Katty Kay
Well, that will take a while, but it's very clear.
- [35:33]
Alistair Campbell
Speak soon. This episode is brought to you by NordVPN.
- [35:41]
Anthony Scaramucci
In today's this world, it's more and more difficult to remain private online. A very, very difficult to protect yourself from a whole series of people trying to intrude, gather your data and commit fraud.
- [35:53]
Alistair Campbell
And also, this is of course, peak season for public WI fi. Spend a lot of time in trains, airports, hotels, traveling around. Plenty of people still go online with very limited protection. No password, no encryption, no idea who's watching.
- [36:06]
Anthony Scaramucci
And that's why I use NordVPN, because it encrypts your connection, it hides your IP and it blocks trackers, all while running quietly in the background.
- [36:13]
Alistair Campbell
And especially useful abroad. One click and you're back in the UK with all the usual news apps and streaming site services. It's as if you never left.
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Anthony Scaramucci
And it also helps avoid dynamic pricing. Flights, hotels, subscriptions, all less likely to spike when your location's masked, simple and.
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Alistair Campbell
Secure, keeping the noise out and your data in.
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Anthony Scaramucci
To get the best discount off your NORDVPN plan, go to nordvpn.com restispolitics the link gives you four extra months on the two year plan. There's a 30 day money back guarantee. Links in the description.
- [36:47]
David Olusoga
I'm David Ulushoga.
- [36:48]
Sarah Churchwell
And I'm Sarah Churchwell. Together we're the hosts of Journey Through Time, where we explore the darkest depths of history through the eyes of the people who live through it.
- [36:56]
David Olusoga
Today we're going to tell you about our new series on the Great Fire of London. One of the great pivotal events of the 17 17th century, one of the most important events in all of English and British history.
- [37:06]
Sarah Churchwell
It began at a bakery on Pudding Lane and quickly turned into a catastrophe. It consumed 13,000 houses, decimated London, and caused £10 billion worth of damage. In today's money, it even burned down the iconic St. Paul's Cathedral.
- [37:22]
David Olusoga
The city was already devastated by the great plague, but rumors of foreign invasion led more to attack innocent foreigners on the streets. In this episode we'll explore the chilling consequences of rumors of fake news, of xenophobia, problems that clearly are not unique to today.
- [37:40]
Sarah Churchwell
From desperate attempts to save their homes and belongings to the struggle to assign blame which turned deadly. This is the story of the fire as it was lived through by the people on the ground and the lasting impacts it left on the city.
- [37:53]
David Olusoga
We got a short clip at the end of this episode.
- [38:04]
Katty Kay
Welcome back to the Rest Is Politics uk. Sorry, that still sounds weird. No, no, no, Katty, the Rest is Politics us. No, the Rest is Politics.
- [38:17]
Alistair Campbell
Correct.
- [38:18]
Katty Kay
So I try. You called me out on this because when I'm on television in America, they started introducing me as the Rest is Politics Us. And it ended up as the Rest is Politics us. The Rest is Politicus, which actually was the best. I thought that was quite good. So then I realized these poor morning show hosts, I was just asking them one thing too many and in the end they stopped using the name of the podcast at all. And so I thought, well, we'll just make it easy for them. It's six in the morning, poor guys. It'll be the Rest is Politics. And I do realize I have. I should. You should have patented the name or something. Or you could could sue me for, you know, taking over your title or something like that. But anyway, I apologize.
- [38:56]
Alistair Campbell
It's fine.
- [38:57]
Katty Kay
But I thought the Rest is Politicus was quite good. It sort of had a nice erudite feel, kind of Felt very Latin.
- [39:03]
Alistair Campbell
Somebody else could go for that. No, but I think this is the rest is politics. We don't need to say what country we're from.
- [39:09]
Katty Kay
And also because you actually do the whole world a lot more. So there is. This is the rest is politics of the world. Anyway, welcome back, guys. We're going to talk about, about Donald Trump, who has been up in Scotland this week meeting the Europeans and meeting the British Prime Minister, Skier Starmer, in these, what I think were these rather. Can we just talk, first of all, before we get into the content of the visuals and what it tells you, Alistair, of these leaders? And they weren't, as we said in the first half, I mean, it looked like this should have been the Oval Office because there he was greeting them as if he owned the place and it was his country. But they come in, both of them, Ursula von der Leyen and then Keir Starmer sitting there kind of, and you can see their minds working at 100 miles an hour to think, how do I make sure I don't get derailed here? How do I make sure this doesn't end up really badly for me, for my constituents, for my position with my constituents, whether it's European countries or British voters? And Trump, meanwhile, is sitting there totally relaxed. He doesn't really care what they think of him. He's kind of freewheeling. I mean, he may have decided in advance that he wanted to use the word starvation in Gaza, but otherwise he's going to say what he wants to say. If he wants to lay in to the mayor of London, he's going to lay into the mayor of London. Doesn't bother him. But they are sitting there like, I mean, supplicants is not really the right word because they're, it's sort of more, it's like these overworking brains trying to think, how do I do damage limitation here? How do I avoid the car crash that could come my way from actually crashing? And it's, I found it excruciating. I find it really hard to watch.
- [40:51]
Alistair Campbell
I find it very hard to watch as well. And what was interesting. So let's just work a little bit through the planet.
- [40:56]
Katty Kay
Okay?
- [40:56]
Alistair Campbell
So I, I mean, I've been involved in a lot of American presidential visits, not with Trump, but, you know, there is a sort of, there is a scale to the presidential visit that other leaders just don't have to deal with. I think one of the reasons why Keir Starmer and today John Swinney, Scotland's first minister, and von der Leyen On Sunday. Well, as it were, have gone there rather than. So, for example, Fiona said to me, you know, why didn't Keir say, let's meet in Holyrood, you know, or let's meet in one of the Scottish palaces, or let's meet at Balm, anywhere. And the thing is that you've got to visit. So Trump comes over, uniquely mixing business and pleasure. Bit of golf, bit of this. Bit about talking about his mum opening a new golf course and what have you, and meanwhile doing lots of phone work. Thailand, Cambodia, Von der Leyen, big trade deal, but the security costs and implications are massive. So for him to have landed in Turnbury and then said. Kirs said to say, right, let's meet at the. Let's meet in Glasgow, let's be at Edinburgh, more cost. So they probably say, no, let's just. Let's go and see him there also, Wouldn't he.
- [42:07]
Katty Kay
He would want that. That he would want them to come to him 100% and they want to do what he wants. Right.
- [42:15]
Alistair Campbell
I think that is the dynamic that people find a bit troubling. And then the other thing that happened yesterday was that K's wife, Vic, who's a wonderful person, and she goes there. But of course, because Melania is not there, that picture looks a bit strange because there's Trump goes in the middle. Well, if you're the person in the middle, you're the dominant one. 1. So there's Trump in the middle, Starmer there. And then you had this weird thing. And I'd love to get to the bottom of this because, as you know, Katie, I'm a. I'm a player of the bagpipes, the greatest instrument of the greatest country in the world, the guy who was playing. So normally, if I was involved in the planning of a. Of a BG opportunity between the President and the Prime Minister and the. And the Prime Minister's wife happening to be there, as it were. I would kind of make sure that there were. There wasn't bagpipe music playing in the background, much as I love the bagpipes. Added to which the guy, I don't want to be too critical, but his high A was off.
- [43:13]
Katty Kay
Now, that was that. That is what Alistair Campbell took away from that meeting.
- [43:20]
Alistair Campbell
The high A was off quite on it and. But what he meant was it was sort of surreal that Trump and Keir Starmer were talking about Gaza whilst this bagpipe music was playing in the background. And then fast forward to after the meeting. Sorry, that this. I think it was 75 minutes it went on Keir Starmer sitting there. Now, the other thing I know is about seating, right? If you look at the Oval Office, when. When Trump does a. Like with Zelenskyy or like with Macron, and we've seen lots of them, Modi, etc. Where does Trump sit? He sits on the left looking out. Okay. If you see similar situations when Keir Starmer's doing these in Downing street, he also sits on the left. Okay. That means that when you're planning those things, well, that is the President's seat, that is the Prime Minister's seat now. So that immediately says, I'm in charge here. Okay. And then, of course, with von der Leyen, what was really interesting was that if you'd had a fact checker in von der Leyen's earpiece, they would have been kept quite busy. But she just decided, I don't necessarily like the deal we've done. I know I'm going to get criticized by German business, by the French prime minister, who's come out really strongly against it. The Italians are going to be a bit iffy. The Spaniards are going to be worrying about pharmaceuticals. So are the Irish. I know that. But I have had to make a judgment that rather than get hit by 30% tariffs, 15% is better. I'm going to swallow it and just sit here. And I thought the one. The bit of wrestling that was really kind of almost bullying was when Trump at the end said, I could say this is the greatest, biggest deal in history, but I'll let you do that. And he sort of lent out to shake her hand as if to say, this meeting is now over. That is the main point. I'm lady. But I basically say it's you that's going to say that.
- [45:19]
Katty Kay
Yeah. And she's. I mean, she really. Even more so. So I felt sorry for her because clearly, as you say, the European deal, you know that. I know from conversations with EU officials in Washington over the last few weeks that they did put together this plan of retaliation, and there were member states that wanted to be much tougher, and she has to bring together all of these member states. So, you know, God bless her, she's in a. In a nightmarish position, but she had chosen to go in there. I mean, she's a tough woman for me. Former German defense minister had chosen to go in there and completely marshal all her emotions in that instance in order, and decided to swallow it. She was going to swallow whatever Trump threw at her. And in a way, I mean, when you said earlier why didn't she push back on Gaza? Trump? Because of the whole trade war and the threat of these tariffs has everybody. Maybe not Mark Carney and maybe not the Chinese. Let's see what happens with that meeting in Sweden and subsequent meetings. But he has everybody in a position where they're. Where they're. They're walking on eggshells because they're terrified of 30% as opposed to 15%. And they don't like 15. And we don't actually even know how much. The details. My understanding from talking to business people in Ireland and very vague is that. Very vague. And how much of it actually holds up, how much of this investment really happens. But she doesn't want to be. Can't say, by the way, we've spent X on Gaza. She can't do anything that might in that moment piss Trump off and potentially change the deal going forward, because she can't do that for her European businesses.
- [47:02]
Alistair Campbell
Yeah. The only thing I'd say about that, I think there's more. Look, it's a tricky. It's a really difficult position to be in, don't get me wrong. Really difficult. And she's flown in there, all the hard work has been done. They've crunched the numbers as much as they can. She knows that he's not going to go over the detail, he's just interested in the headlines. Headlines are 15, 700 billion on this, 650 billion on this. You're going to buy loads of Boeing's planes, you're going to buy loads of our. Of our gas. And of course, you know, let's be.
- [47:32]
Katty Kay
Frank, they were going to buy the gas anyway and, you know, the planes, let's see.
- [47:36]
Alistair Campbell
Correct. And they were going to buy a lot of the military stuff as well.
- [47:38]
Katty Kay
Yeah.
- [47:38]
Alistair Campbell
If I think one of the. One of the things that wasn't maybe brought out in a way that it might have been, one good thing out of this is it does actually facilitate the flow of a lot of military stuff from the US to Ukraine with the help of European Union rearmament. That's. I'd say that's quite a good thing in the. In the Ukrainian context.
- [47:55]
Katty Kay
And maybe that's something. Actually, she could. I did think at the time that is something she could have said. She could have said. And we're very excited that Europe is going to be working closely with the American defense sector, you know, to help our friends in Ukraine.
- [48:08]
Alistair Campbell
Brain. Yeah. And of course, with the Keir Starmer thing, because my good friend Jonathan Powell, who I spent years working with with Tony Blair. And Jonathan was sitting there next to Keir Starmer because he's now his national Security advisor. And I know Jonathan so well, and I could just imagine what was going through Jonathan's mind as he went from windmills to Sadiq Khan to nuclear reactors to golf to this to that. And it's like, you know, Jonathan's very much a sort of, of get to the point. Let's get to the point. But I'll tell you the other thing that I thought she could have done. You see, he kept, he's, he's obsessed with this idea that if you put a tariff on a country, that country is somehow paying a bill to America. Whereas, as you know and I know, the tariffs imposed on European Union imports, they are going to hit American consumers in the pocket eventually. Eventually.
- [49:02]
Katty Kay
So far they haven't been doing so, but eventually.
- [49:04]
Alistair Campbell
But the other thing that does happen is that countries that are hit by the tariffs, they can diversify their markets. And there's a bit of that going on as well. So I think, listen, I'm not denying it is, in Trump's own terms, this was a win. As with everything, he overstates it. And also from the European perspective, 15% is better than 13%. But as Chancellor Mertz said, it's still damaging to both. And by the way, I was reading the German media yesterday. I mean, Mertz was the more positive of the German voices, the German business organizations, they were almost like the French in terms of saying this is really, really bad for European business. And the other thing to remember, of course, is that Trump can do what he does. Rory and I talked recently, and I've heard you talk about this as well, is whether he even has the right to do all this tariff stuff, because it's not a national emergence and it's not a security issue. Where is the role of Congress? But of course, she has an even more complicated equivalent of Congress, which is these 27 countries, some of whom, like Orban, are desperate to destroy her.
- [50:14]
Katty Kay
Yeah. But even just from the American point of view, in the long run, you wonder whether these tariffs aren't self defeating to kind of what the project that J.D. vance has laid out and Donald Trump has signed up to. And it was interesting that Stephen Miller was the other person that was sitting there right in that row of people opposite Jonathan Powell. Who was it? It was Stephen Miller, who the most powerful person pretty much in the White House at the moment and is fiercely anti European and very opposed to helping Europe anymore and very opposed to helping Ukraine anymore. But you've got Mertz, who's trying to organize for the rearmament of Europe, the financing of the rearmament of Europe, reform the German economy, deal with his own population and their qualms about doing that, and his own taxpayers and their qualms about doing that, and the German car industry. And then Trump goes and puts the weight of a trade war on Germany as well. I mean, he's making what was already a very difficult thing for Europe to pull off and that he says he wants Europe to pull off even harder because the tariffs that he's just put on them.
- [51:18]
Alistair Campbell
But the two things he has done, two things he has done. He's got NATO countries to spend more, European NATO members to spend more on defence. And now he has. Has set in train the rebalancing of the trade relationships. You mentioned J.D. vance there, Katie, and partly because Rory and I did this sort of. We've now done six parts and the latest one that's out is me talking to David Frum about Vance.
- [51:45]
Katty Kay
Very interesting interview, by the way, Alistair. I thought that was great, that interview.
- [51:48]
Alistair Campbell
Well, listen, let me just tell you what J.D. vance said about. You see, you could have imagined if JD Vance was this big, powerful figure. I know it's a sort of golfing weekend or what have you, but maybe he should have been there with von der Leyen. But this is his one contribution to this debate so far. At a time shortly after Donald Trump had posted a meme of Trump in a police car and a very fat JD Vance in another one chasing Barack Obama, who, as we know is a traitor to America. Brackets Tulsi Gabbard. This is Vance's one contribution so far. Far a post on social media, the entire European press, this Europe that he hates. I don't know how he manages to read all our press is singing the President's praises right now, amazed at the deal he negotiated on behalf of Americans. Tomorrow the American media will undoubtedly run headlines like Donald Trump only got 99.9% of what he asked for. What is with this victim mode that they want to do the whole time? Why can't they? It reminds me of the Brexiteers in Britain, you know, you won, get over it. Why do they have to play the victim?
- [52:54]
Katty Kay
Because that's the whole point of populism, right? It's us against them and you have to be in permanent fight mode, which means you have to be permanently under attack. I mean, we see this in populists all around the world. I thought what David Frum said by the Way about JD Vance isn't this is not just an American phenomenon. To think of J.D. as an American phenomenon is. Think about it. This wrong is actually, you've got to think of this as a global phenomenon. And the whole point of populism, the whole. Actually almost the whole point of populism is that we and you together are under attack. We and our voters are under attack. And so you have to be permanently under attack by the media, which also has the added benefit of undermining the media and telling MAGA supporters, well, you can't believe anything you say in the media, because we've told you you can't believe anything you say. And we tell it to you repeatedly.
- [53:43]
Alistair Campbell
There's one guy talking of victim. Arnaud Bertrand is a French entrepreneur of some standing and he's in a very, very, very long, detailed thread which ends, this is Europe's century of humiliation. He says this deal is an insane transfer of citizens wealth from Europe to the United States. Now, I don't know if his figures are right or wrong, but there is a. Particularly in France, this has had a really, really negative reaction. And Von der Leyen, how she now plays it, because it does have to. You know, the 27 countries will all have their say. I think that this is the other thing we have to watch is that these things can unravel in the detail, I think.
- [54:26]
Katty Kay
Yeah, I mean, look, we're seeing that with the Japan deal deal, right? That was announced a couple of weeks ago. There's clearly lots of holes in that and lots of that is unraveling already. We don't even know all of the details of the UK deal deal yet. And that was the first one to be announced. But my understanding is that von der Leyen was. Was going back to. She would have had the agreement. She wouldn't have turned up in Scotland and announced this 15% deal without having had the agreement of all the 27 countries. They might not like it, but they knew what she was going to Scotland to announce, didn't they? I mean, she. Talking to EU negotiators, that it was a constant. She would talk to the Americans, talk to the constituents, Talk to the Americans, talk to the constituents. Doesn't mean they love it.
- [55:04]
Alistair Campbell
No, no, I'm not sure about that. I think sometimes you have to. She will have been in that position. She'll have had a broad sense of what they would take. But then what you're seeing at the moment, I think, is that she's perhaps in some of the respects, gone further than some of Them thought she would. She also, she was also in Beijing last week for this, for a trade summit with Xi Jinping, which didn't go very well. Xi Jinping refused to go to British Brussels, which is where it was meant to be. They cut it down from two days to one day. They're very angry that Chinese banks and companies have been included in the EU's latest wave of sanctions on Russia. And again, it was very. And I don't know if you saw the thing, I don't know how this happened, but when they arrived, she and Costa and the team arrived at the People's hall and the big red carpet was laid out. They arrived in what looked like a minibus. These things shouldn't matter, but I don't want my leaders sort of traipsing out of minibuses looking like they're just, you know, about to get on an EasyJet flight from.
- [56:09]
Katty Kay
Yeah, you wouldn't get Donald Trump stepping out of a minibus. I mean, that is not going to happen, is it? I don't know if Donald Trump's ever been in a minibus. You get, you get the beast.
- [56:19]
Alistair Campbell
I mean, he's been on golf buggies.
- [56:22]
Katty Kay
Yes, that's true.
- [56:23]
Alistair Campbell
22 golf buggies. And by the way, Ken, was that a fake video of the guy walking in front of him as Trump has hit yet another crap shot, hooked it into the rough and he's driving his buggy. And then somebody from the hotel films a guy dropping a ball just ahead of him?
- [56:43]
Katty Kay
Well, that is, that's the. Mr. Scaramucci's point of view on this is that Donald Trump always cheats at golf and is known for cheating at golf. And this wouldn't be at all surprising if that actually happened. And that's how he keeps winning. And another of the wins that he notches up. So he, he thinks the video is quite plausible. I'm not a golf player. Are you a golf player? I'm not a golf player.
- [57:02]
Alistair Campbell
I used to play a lot of golf. In fact, I've played. I've played. I have played that course, Turnbury and pre Trump era. Well, look, Cassie, we said at the start we were going to talk about Zelensky. Let's, let's do that in, in Question Time, because you're kindly also staying to do Question time tomorrow. And I mentioned J.D. vance there, and I can't let you go without asking you what you thought of the final episode of our miniseries. I know you've done a couple of these miniseries on trip us. You did1 on January 6th, which was fascinating. You did another one on Elon Musk where you're both right. Eventually Musk has been sort of got rid of, you know, up to a point. And we spoke to David Frum and one of the most interesting things he said was he said you guys wouldn't do a four part series on Donald Trump. In other words, he was saying he thinks Vance is more interesting than Trump in some ways. What do you think of that?
- [57:54]
Katty Kay
Yeah, I thought that was interesting. I thought his description of Trump as a crocodile who eats things and basically fairly simple was pretty good. I'm not sure I think I would do it. I beg to differ. I think we would do a four part series on Donald Trump. He is sort of fascinating too. But I do think this idea that he has no core is interesting and that he could have been more. He could have gone back to Ohio, become, you know, been senator, become governor, built up his own base and therefore had a core of constituents to whom he felt loyal as opposed to being this shape shifter which he's become and kind of happy to say or do anything so long as it pleases the boss. I thought that was really interesting when he said that the VP has no power. Of course, the VP's job is to walk the dog and make sure that they're alive, body and stay alive. And basically that's the VP's job. But he does have power in the sense that it puts him in the. And David acknowledged this in that it puts him in the position of frontrunner. Right. So he has. JD does have power in the Republican Party at the moment because they're all looking to see whether he's going to be next. But I thought it was super interesting and it echoed what other friends of J.D. vance's from the past have said about J.D. vance, that they knew one person and now they see see him as a different person.
- [59:14]
Alistair Campbell
Yeah, I also was fascinated by that thing, the story he told about how George Herbert Walker Bush sat down with Reagan days after Reagan won the second term and said, right, I want to go, I'm going for it next time and I want your blessing. And even though Reagan was a bit sort of troubled by it, said, yeah, go ahead. And of course Vance is stymied on that. Vance cannot do anything that looks like he's campaigning to take over for Trump. Anyway, folks, to hear all six episodes in full, just head to the Rest is Politics and there you can join the Rest is Politics. Plus, it takes two minutes to get set up. You'll get the trip Feed synced straight into your preferred podcast platform. Here is a clip from the last episode of the series with David Frum. Do you think you have to be a bit of a chameleon to operate and survive in Trump's world when you're so close to the top? I was thinking, for example, when we watched and rewatched that scene with Zelensky in the Oval Office, I was trying to work on out Is that really him or is that him doing what he thinks Trump wants him to do? When he and Usher went to Greenland and he made that ridiculous speech with the troops there, looking really embarrassed to be there as kind of extras in the show, I thought, is that really him or is that him doing what he thinks Trump wants? What's your take on the relationship, watching it through these really strange events? And I guess the other one I'd throw in is the Munich speech. I think the Munich speech was a really defining moment in his kind of rise.
- [60:37]
Jeremy Konyndyk
Well, I would give you three different answers to those. Three different examples.
- [60:40]
Alistair Campbell
Okay.
- [60:41]
Jeremy Konyndyk
So I think the Greenland event was very much about pleasing Trump. The annexation of Greenland is both so far fetched and if you could do it so destructive. What you're talking about is an American act of aggression against a NATO ally. That's the end of NATO, the end of the American alliance system. J.D. vance would understand this. You want to have a bigger base in Greenland. Nobody would be more delighted by that than the Danes themselves. They've been pressing for that for a generation. It's a budget issue. The United States doesn't spend enough to have enough of a presence in Greenland. The United States has been a presence in Greenland since before it entered the Second World War. That's been a welcome. The Greenlanders are happy about it. The Danes are happy about it. It's not controversial. But whereas seizing their territory by force, which is what Trump is in mind, is obviously so I don't think that's a J.D. vance project. The Zelenskyy thing, I think was very much a J.D. vance project. So Trump has no capacity for face to face confrontation. Vance, who for? And we can talk about why this is so. And there's a bit of a mystery here, but is fiercely anti Ukraine, fiercely anti Ukraine, more fiercely anti Ukraine than Trump himself even he was staging a confrontation to cut off Trump's retreat. Whereas Trump would have avoided confrontation. He precipitated a confrontation to create a Trump or Zelenskyy stark alternative and to trap Republican senators who like Zelenskyy and to say no, there is no middle way here. You're either on Trump's team or Zelensky's team. Either or so I think that was very much an advance move. I think it surprised Trump in many ways. It put Trump into an uncomfortable position, a starker position than he would have gravitated to on his own.
- [62:10]
Alistair Campbell
Is that because Vance cares about the issue more than Trump does? He doesn't want America involved.
- [62:16]
Jeremy Konyndyk
Can I say the word bullshit on your show? Let us have no bullshit about anti war, anti influence involvement. They're on the other side.
- [62:23]
Alistair Campbell
So if you enjoyed that, you want the full series, just join us at the rest is politics plus@therealstispolitics.com you get the full trip plus experience miniseries and we're already thinking about our next one. By the way, monthly bonus episodes, completely ad free, listening much more. Just go to the restispolitics.com so, Katie, thanks again. Lovely to talk to you. And I'll see you tomorrow for Question Time. We're going to talk about Zelensky, as I say, we're going to talk about Epstein scene. We're going to talk about violence against women. We're going to talk about all sorts of things. See you then.
- [62:56]
Katty Kay
See you then.
- [63:04]
David Olusoga
It's David Ulusogga from Journey Through Time. Here's that clip that we mentioned earlier.
- [63:11]
Alistair Campbell
If you look at all of the.
- [63:12]
David Olusoga
Accounts of the fire at this point point as we get to the end of Sunday the 2nd, the 1st day, this fire is not behaving in any way the way fires traditionally did in London. And there are some people who've argued that it was becoming a firestorm, that the heat and the wind and the movement of air caused by the fire was feeding it was becoming self sustaining, as it were. John Eveling, who's a great writer and a diarist of this moment, he talks about the sound of the fire. He said it was like thousands of chariots driving over cobblestones. There are descriptions in Pepys and elsewhere of this great arc of fire in the sky. I mean, imagine that everything around you is colored by the flames, yellows and oranges. And above you is this thick black smoke. This is a city, you know, these are streets you walk. This is a place that's deeply familiar to you and it looks completely otherworldly. It looks like another, like a sort of landscape you've never seen before. People describe the fire almost as if it's supernatural.
- [64:19]
Sarah Churchwell
If you want to hear the full episode, listen to Journey Through Time. Wherever you get your podcasts.