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The Rest Is Politics
519. Trump's NATO Threat & a Critical Election in Hungary (Question Time)
00:50:37
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- [00:00]
Alistair Campbell
Thanks for listening to the Rest Is Politics. To support the podcast, listen without the adverts and get early access to episodes and live show tickets, go to therestispolitics.com
- [00:09]
Dominic Sambrook
that's therestispolitics.com Is NATO finished? I don't think it's necessarily finished, but I think it has never been more embattled. Trump is the first president to really call it into question, and the longer that this second term has gone on, the more dicey its future has looked.
- [00:26]
Alistair Campbell
He was asked if he was reconsidering membership of NATO. He said, oh, yes, it's beyond reconsideration. I was an. I was never swayed by NATO. I always knew they were paper tiger. And get this, Putin knows that too, by the way.
- [00:38]
Dominic Sambrook
I know. So unsettling. How do you answer the anxieties of people? Because they're not just economic anxieties, are they? They're cultural anxieties about people who are frightened by change.
- [00:49]
Alistair Campbell
Too often we're liable to say, oh, because you're being exploited by populace somehow your grievance isn't real, whereas what we should be doing is your grievance is real and we have to do something about it. Welcome to the Rest Is Politics. Question time with me, Alistair Campbell.
- [01:04]
Dominic Sambrook
And with me, Dominic Sambrook. Hello.
- [01:06]
Alistair Campbell
Hello, Dominic. So, stepping in for the absent Rory Stewart for the second time. Thank you very, very much indeed. Lots of questions, and one of them relates to something we discussed on the podcast. We had a lot of questions on these lines. This is from Harper from Sandwell in the West Midlands. Is NATO finished?
- [01:24]
Dominic Sambrook
Wow. I mean, I didn't think you had any listeners in the West Midlands, but I stand corrected.
- [01:27]
Alistair Campbell
We've got listeners everywhere, absolutely everywhere. I mean, we like the history of history with your little sort of cultural cliques around university cities around the world. We, we spread far and wide.
- [01:37]
Dominic Sambrook
Yeah. Every time I go and do a show at the Sydney Opera House, I really lament the fact that our audience is so limited. And the rest is history, as you can well imagine.
- [01:45]
Alistair Campbell
Universal cities around the world. Yeah, carry on. Is NATO finished?
- [01:51]
Dominic Sambrook
NATO finished? Is NATO finished? I don't think it's necessarily finished, but I think it has never been more embattled. From the 1940s when NATO began as an alliance, as an anti communist alliance to keep the Americans in Europe and to hold the line against Stalin's Soviet Union, NATO ever since then has actually been pretty solid, I would say, as military alliances go. Trump is the first president to really call it into question. I think he clearly has no emotional investment in NATO. And the longer that this second term has gone on, the more dicey its future has looked. Obviously, the stuff with Canada and Greenland could have been toxic, absolutely toxic for NATO. And his rage, his anger and resentment at what he sees as the lack of European support for his, to my mind, very misguided war in Iran. I mean, I think that poses a real problem for NATO, because it's pretty clear now that he wants revenge, that he wants revenge in some way on the European countries that he thinks have abandoned him. What do you think?
- [02:56]
Alistair Campbell
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- [02:58]
Dominic Sambrook
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Alistair Campbell
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Dominic Sambrook
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- [03:46]
Alistair Campbell
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- [03:54]
Dominic Sambrook
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- [04:00]
Alistair Campbell
Let's just imagine that something happened to Estonia tomorrow. Now when 911 happened, that's the only time ever that Article 5 an attack on one is an attack on all was activated. It was activated in the United States. Even though he's since then insulted all the British, Australia and Denmark and other troops who were involved by saying they stayed away from the the front line. And he said something very interesting in all places this week of the Daily Telegraph, he was asked if he was reconsidering membership of NATO. He said, oh yes, it's beyond reconsideration. I was never swayed by NATO. I always knew they were paper tiger. And get this, Putin knows that too, by the way. I know.
- [04:41]
Dominic Sambrook
So unsettling.
- [04:42]
Alistair Campbell
Even there. He's kind of, he's speaking for the Putin worldview and who has had as a strategic objective almost top of his list. Putin has been break up the European Union and get America out of NATO. And he's now doing that. It does sort of beg the question that Rory and I and the Mooch especially speculate a lot about is what has Putin got on Trump? Because the worst thing, in a way, because Trump has always been very skeptical about NATO is Marco Rubio, the State Secretary of State who's always been very pro NATO. He even got a thing passed in Congress that no president could unilaterally pull the US out of NATO. He now, as another mini me, is kind of saying the same thing and I think it's important that we understand. I had a spat this week with Ari Fleischer, who was my opposite number with George Bush when I was with Tony Blair during the Iraq war. I don't know whether he's desperate to get in with the MAGA crowd, but he did a really offensive, to my mind tweet, basically saying that England, as he called it, I pointed out that we are the uk, Scotland, Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish troops were also involved in the wars that we helped them with in Iraq and Afghanistan. Us, Spain, Italy, above all France. He said, we're going to pay a big, big price. We've always been weak, we've always relied on America. It was a really kind of offensive sort of thing. And I just reminded him of that, that, you know, when push came to shove in 9, 11, at considerable political cost, which some would argue we still pay. Tony Blair and his reputation and how he's treated around the world, I get the same thing, get abuse about it every single day on social media. We stood by the United States. That was NATO the only time, Article 5. And they're now saying that because these countries, US, France, Italy, Germany, Spain, Albania, all of them said, no, this is not what NATO's about, this is not a sensible thing to do. Suddenly NATO itself is at threat and America gets a huge amount out of NATO. Yes, they put in the most money, yes, they put in something like 4 billion into European defence. But the fact is the economic stability that we all want, a lot of that has been built on post war safety and security in Europe, which is one of America's most important markets.
- [07:01]
Dominic Sambrook
I agree completely, Alistair, but I think something that people don't appreciate as much as they should outside America. There's been a strain of American opinion that has always been extremely critical of any form of foreign entanglement. And that goes right back to, you know, the people who didn't want to join the First World War, people who didn't want to join the League of Nations in the, after the Treaty of Versailles in the early 1920s, people who didn't want to get involved with the Second World War in the 1930s and then the early. And then right up to Pearl harbor in 1941, and then actually all through. I mean, it's. People don't notice it outside America because we tend to visit the coasts. You know, you go to California or you go to New York or something. You don't go to the heartland. You don't read the kind of radio, Reader's Digest, National Review, kind of publications that appeal to conservative Americans. But there has always been a strain of American thinking, particularly on the right. But not just on the right. There's also a kind of isolationist left which has been, why do we get involved in these things? America should be sovereign. We shouldn't be part of the United Nations. It's part of a drive to set up a world government and overthrow our freedoms and all of that kind of thing. And I think we were lucky in the west in that between, let's say, the 1940s and the 2000s, we had a succession of American presidents who were committed to the kind of Atlantic alliance and to America's role in the world and to sort of responsibly upholding that and seeing America effectively as hand in glove with Europe and that relationship as being central to American identity. And what's actually happened from Trump onwards is that we have a different and perhaps in some ways older American way of looking at the world, which is the rest of the world contaminates us. We want to be the shining city on a hill. Why should we get involved? You know, basically, his point about Estonia, I think, is dead right. If I was Vladimir Putin, I have to say that's what I would do. Not because I'd want to seize Estonia, particularly, although there are a lot of Russian speakers in. In the east of Estonia. But I would do it to break the alliance. I would just, you know, you just go over the border, take the first town or something, and you would say, what are you going to do about it? And then you just watch as NATO tore itself apart. And as Donald Trump said, you can just see him and Hegseth and all these guys, Vance going on TV and saying, why should people in Wisconsin care about Estonia? The Europeans should sort it out themselves. They've never been there for us and all of this kind of thing, that's what would happen.
- [09:36]
Alistair Campbell
That's my last week. And I don't know whether you've had this on your book club yet, Dominic, but my book of the year last year was Carlo. If Russia wins where it's a scenario, as he calls it, and that's what it's the story is Putin takes a village in Estonia just to see if NATO and the Americans react and they don't. I think the other thing I've spoken to two or three European leaders this week and it's really been interesting talking to them. I think that the iron which started to enter the soul over Greenland has now solidified into iron in the soul. They now know. I think Mark Carney was the first really to understand this is not normal presidency, this is not a normal president. We are in a completely new age. We all have to deal with it as best we can. It's why I keep arguing with Rory that Keir Starmer can't say he's a blethering idiot, he's a liar, he's a crook, we can say that, but prime ministers and presidents can't. But it's why Sanchez feels so emboldened. It's why Macron this week, when Trump made that disgusting comment about Macron and his wife, and his wife gave him and beats him up and all that stuff, and Macron just went back and says, this isn't unworthy of leadership. This is not a reality, this is not a show. So I think Europe is getting somebody in the pool said to me this morning, starting to put up two fingers. But the truth is we are still so reliant economically. In our case, the nukes, the intelligence, the air defenses. And in Ukraine's case, my big, big worry is that the combination of Iran and Trump pissed off with Europe, he just in the end says fuck it out of Ukraine, including our intelligence and our and the rest of the stuff
- [11:24]
Dominic Sambrook
we give, I could totally agree with that. And if you remember when we did the election night broadcast in New York with Anthony Scaramucci and Marina Hyde and Rory, we were talking a lot in that broadcast about what this meant for Ukraine, about what Trump's victory would mean about the threat to. Because I'm still very much of the view that if Ukraine is allowed to fall or is dismembered in some way, that that would be a catastrophic moment for European security. Because if you were Vladimir Putin or Viktor Orban, you would think, well, you know, these people are complete paper tigers. You know, they. You cannot rely on them at all. And Europe still, I think, partly because of our economic weakness as a continent, I mean, it's sad to say, but our lack of productivity and all of this kind of thing which is not generating enough money, and for that reason, we are not investing as much in our own defenses as we should be. And Trump in this Case, I hate to say it, but he's not wrong.
- [12:17]
Alistair Campbell
No, he's got a point.
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Dominic Sambrook
He's got a point that Europe has been too content to. I don't like using the word. The words that he used like freeload and all of that kind of thing, but to coast, to coast thinking that the American shield would always be there. And that was great folly. I think so. Talking of Viktor Orban, I know you're a huge fan of his work. Alistair, we have a question from Lexi in Portsmouth. You'll be delighted by this question. After nearly two decades in power, could Viktor Orban finally be unseated? And a really good point. Even if he was, would he actually leave? So what do you think?
- [12:53]
Alistair Campbell
Well, one of the reasons I'm not a fan of Victor Orban is that I think he follows the far right populist playbook pretty closely. It's why Maga love him, it's why Putin backs him. And I think he follows Putin playbook as well. The day before we recorded this, there was what I imagine was a false flag exercise. They found an explosive device on a gas pipeline between Hungary and Serbia. Orban summoned his emergency defense counsel, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. He controls most of the media, so this was big news. Alongside. If you go to Budapest at the moment, Dominic, you will see more posters of Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Ursula von der Leyen than you will of Orban, because their messages vote Magyar, the opposition guy. And your kids are going to fight for Ukraine, not for Hungary. So it's a very. It's a nationalist message, it's a populist message. I think he can lose and I think if the election is free and fair. There was an amazing documentary that did the rounds last week. It's called the Price of a Vote and it was exposing a lot of the buying of votes. Mayors in villages who decide so much about who gets firewood, who gets a parking place, who gets medical appoint, basically. And the other thing, we had all that nonsense with Matt Badlos, the Gorton and Denton loser, Nigel Farage's mate.
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Dominic Sambrook
Is that what you call him? Is that his official name now?
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Alistair Campbell
His official name. But that proves. You don't listen to the podcast. I've done it for the last four weeks.
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Dominic Sambrook
Yeah. So there's the whole thing, though, wasn't there? People call him Matt GPT because there was the claim that he used AI to write his book.
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Alistair Campbell
Yeah. Which he is denied in such a convincing way that the new world managed to cover it in three pages this week. But you remember all that stuff about so called family voting where people were, you know, taken into the booth and shown how to vote. In Hungary there are quite liberal, I don't mean liberal liberal. I mean quite sort of relaxed rules if you are illiterate or if you have a health problem. So you just have to turn up and say, I can't read and write. And your mate from Videsh can take you in to show you how to, how to vote. But I see why. I think it's really, really interesting here. This is the dynamic that I hope is playing out and that I hope will follow around Europe. If you think of the way that populist leaders come to power, they present themselves as men of the people against a corrupt ruling elite. Okay? Of course the corrupt ruling elite in Hungary is Orban and the Fidesz party and especially the young. I think they now see them as that. So populism has always depended on the ability of the leader to project the sense that they, the people are the victims of the elite. And I am one of you. It's amazing that Trump pulled it off, but he did. It's amazing that Johnson pulled it off, but he did. And Orban's pulled it off for 16 years. I think this is his fifth election. If he wins it, it'll be his fifth election win. And of course, when you have Trump and Putin backing you, when your best friend, a guy called Lawrence Mesharos, is a gas fitter who has become the richest man in Hungary, word gets around that maybe there's something a bit dodgy going on in the way that you rule this country. So look, I think if it's free and fair, he's lost. The question then does become how big does that win have to be for him not to play the game that Trump played with Joe Biden when he lost in 2020, that this has been stolen.
- [16:25]
Dominic Sambrook
So I was thinking about precedents for this and I think there's a good one in a neighbour of Hungary, just Serbia. So Serbia and Hungary are not so different in this regard that in both cases. So you had Slobon Milosevic in Serbia in the 1990s. And in both cases you have a country with a profound sense of kind of historic victimhood, a country that thinks it is surrounded by enemies. And Hungary, they will circulate maps showing how Hungary was reduced and dismembered in the course of the 20th century. And they were felt very hard done by. They once owned Transylvania and Croatia and whatnot. And they'd lost it so much. And Hungary is smaller than it's ever been, and all of this kind of thing. Of course, they speak Magyar. They're surrounded by, you know, people who speak Slavic languages, so they feel isolated. There's a kind of isolationism to the Hungarian mentality, which explains why Orban has been able to appeal to it, much as Slobodan Milosevic appealed to Serbs in the 1990s. Slobodan Milosevic was a populist leader, nationalist leader, who became the embodiment of a corrupt establishment and then was beaten narrowly in an election by Voroslav Kostunica, who was another nationalist, but an independent one and an outsider in 2000. And the Milosevic people who were controlling the election apparatus basically lied about the result. They tried to claim that he hadn't been beaten, and then it would have to go to a second round where they were clearly going to rig it. And at that point, young people in Serbia said, enough. They went out on the streets and Milosevic fell. And I just wonder whether that could be the answer to Lex's question. That's what Orban would presumably try to do. If it was a very close race, he would say, well, actually, we've narrowly won. Magyar hasn't won. I've won. And at that point, what do all the students and whatnot in Budapest do?
- [18:17]
Alistair Campbell
You.
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Dominic Sambrook
Do they go on the streets as their counterparts did in Belgrade in 2000? And that, I mean, that would be a really, really interesting scenario, because then, of course, we know what Orban would do. Orban would say, george Soros has paid them to go on the streets. The usual thing is you blame the CIA and whatnot. He would probably blame Brussels, wouldn't he? He would say, they're all working for the eu and these people all want your children to become transgender soldiers fighting for Ukraine and whatnot. But would that work? I don't know. I think there's a point where people see through you, don't you, that? Where people get sick of it.
- [18:48]
Alistair Campbell
I think the other thing that's fascinating about this. So we're recording at a time where JD Vance is on his way to Budapest to campaign for Orban now, one that shows the extent to which Orban is completely plugged into this international far right populism. I have a hunch, even with the war going on, that if they thought Orban was nailed on to win, Trump would go so that he could claim that he swung it in the last few days. But Vance is going to go Rubio's already been the idea that now the European Union leaders, all of whom frankly want Orban to lose pretty much apart from the Slovakian, probably maybe one or two others, but they basically want him to lose. But none of them are getting involved in the election. The Americans are openly interfering in this election. The other point that I, I'd like to make is about polarization. We talk a lot about polarization, the way that populists use it. And I was just looking at a, a poll. You have Fidesh supporters on one side and Tisha Magyas party supporters on the other on the question, do Hungarians have a lot of freedom? Fidesz 88% Magyar's people 17 do. Do Hungarians believe that our elections are honest? 84v12 Are you optimistic about economic conditions? 52 vs 18 do you approve of Brussels? 74 against 13. So you know, I think the, that's the other way around. So Fidesh supporters, obviously. Do you think that Fidesh supporters, do they see the government as corruption? 94% of Magyar's people, 38% of now anybody who lives there knows it's corrupt. You have to take part in the corruption to get through your daily life. Good point here. Before we go to the next question, maybe to plug our miniseries. This is a series I've done with Liam Byrne, the Labor mp, and we've had a really extraordinary feedback on this because I think that we talk a lot about populism, but I think what Liam done is he's really gone into in depth and I don't know if you've listened to it, Dominic, but it's one of the most intelligent analysis of populism that I've ever heard. And we've had lots and lots of people on right and the left who are saying that, so.
- [21:06]
Dominic Sambrook
Oh, sounds good.
- [21:09]
Alistair Campbell
Okay. So just to go into this film, the Price of a Vote, I mean lots and lots of kind of different examples, people are saying how it works, how the, you know that different people get given money. When we were in Moldova interviewing President Sandu, we were told that Putin would literally order one oligarch. We were given the name, but given I know how litigious he is, I think I might, might just leave the name in the intro for now. But a very well known oligarch, let's put it that way, and they basically have to hand over the money and then the mayor's essentially worked out how it goes. And so, and you're talking, you know, you're talking between 110, 130 pound, 150 per vote. And this is in places where child benefits about 26, 43 quid per child per month. And the other thing that happens is that the film claimed that they were using drugs. They were giving people this cheap, very addictive synthetic drug, which is widespread. This in a country with some of the toughest anti drug laws in the world. But they're using drugs to sort of say, here you go, you vote the right way. And we're looking after you in this way as well. Foreign interference off the scale. The Washington Post ran a story recently that we're going to do a false flag assassination attempt. Putin's money all over the place. That's why you see these massive post campaigns, massive online campaigns. So I don't know whether this film has been subtitled or whether it's just in Hungarian, but. And of course, because he controls the media, you only know about this stuff if you're following Magyar's campaign online.
- [22:50]
Dominic Sambrook
But just a question for you, Alastair. So these are often people in kind of rural areas who feel alienated from change. They're very anxious about Brussels, for example. I mean, Orban is tapping these feelings and he's amplifying them, but he hasn't created them.
- [23:06]
Alistair Campbell
Right.
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Dominic Sambrook
They are there for a reason. And I wonder whether what you, and maybe what Liam Byrne would think about, how do you answer the anxieties of people? Because they're not just economic anxieties, are they? They're cultural anxieties about people who are frightened by change. And I was talking to, you know the pollster, Sir John Curtis.
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Alistair Campbell
Yeah.
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Dominic Sambrook
And he, a couple of weeks ago, and he said he still thinks the biggest issue in Britain, in British politics, the dividing line, is cultural and educational. So it's whether you went to university or not. And it's how you feel about culture war issues like the flag and all that kind stat. And he said they're still the best determinants of how people vote. And populist politicians or politicians of any kind, they exploit those issues but they don't necessarily create them. Those issues would exist anyway.
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Alistair Campbell
I think Liam Bomer here, he would say he would agree with the premise and he would say that the first step is actually to understand that, that too often we're liable to say, oh, because you're being exploited by populists, which you are somehow your grievance isn't real. Whereas what we should be doing is your grievance is real and we have to do something about it. And that's why, of course, at a time when the global economy is in trouble, when Europe has been stagnating economically, when kids are feeling that their opportunities are being taken away from them, denied, can't get to university, can't afford a house, can't afford university, whatever it might be, can't get a job, then wide open to a Trump or a Farage to come in and say, come to me, I'm a strong man, I can sort all this out for you. But I think then what Liam goes on to say is that we have to understand the grievances are real. We have to understand where they're coming from, but we also have to understand that within that, what we call the populist population, there are gradations. There are people who are angry for different reasons. There are people who are culturally offended, economically weakened. And some of them, he says, are, are just. They're, as it were, gone. They're gone.
- [25:09]
Dominic Sambrook
Yeah.
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Alistair Campbell
The center right, the center left are never going to get them back. But he actually thinks a good 40%, for example, of people who are currently saying they're going to vote for reform, he thinks they are, they can be brought back, but only if we understand why they got there in the first place.
- [25:24]
Dominic Sambrook
That makes total sense to me. I think you have to. My view has always been on these things that, that people, these are not contrived grievances necessarily. So when people say, you know, I don't like people slagging off our history, I don't like people slagging Britain, I don't like people, you know, I don't like Jeremy Corbyn saying, we were always in the wrong in every conceivable historical issue or whatever. These are not contrived or confected grievances from these people. They are genuine what they feel, but you can't. But you don't necessarily need to reduce people to that so that people might have think. People think lots of different contradictory things at once. I think you have to. You listen to people, you respect them, you don't pander to them. You don't have to agree with everything they're saying to you, but you treat their. You make them feel heard. And often that's the mistake that politicians make, is they don't make people feel heard.
- [26:12]
Alistair Campbell
That's a very interesting way to set up a question that we're gonna take in the second half about who uses history better, the right or the left. And I say that you mentioned the statues in a week where Donald Trump has chosen to resurrect the big Christopher Columbus statue. That was taken down. And we know why he's resurrected it, because it was taken down. Okay, let's take a quick break. Welcome back to the rest of Politics. Question Time with me, Alistair Campbell.
- [26:49]
Dominic Sambrook
And with me, Dominic Sambrook.
- [26:51]
Alistair Campbell
Right. God, I nearly called you Rory there.
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Dominic Sambrook
Oh, no, don't do that.
- [26:55]
Alistair Campbell
I won't promise you.
- [26:56]
Dominic Sambrook
Who would be more offended there, me or Rory? Hard to tell.
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Alistair Campbell
I'm not going to go there. Sonny in Lincolnshire. This relates to what we were just talking about just before the break. Why does the political right often seem more effective at utilizing history when constructing political narratives? I feel take the uk I think that the way that, I mean, Churchill is an obvious case in a way, but I think even Thatcher, the way that the right has turned the legend of Thatcher, I think into something far more powerful and effective than on so many levels she was. And yet we. I would argue that Tony Blair has a record every bit as defensible as Margaret Thatcher. But the left has contributed largely, in my view, not just the right who entitled to do that because there is political opponents, but the left has played a big role in a sense, sort of downplaying his kind of historical strengths and historical achievements.
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Dominic Sambrook
Such an interesting question, actually. And I think there are a couple of possible reasons. I think if you're on the right, you probably tend to be a little bit more invested in history. There may be. You are. So, for example, if you're a Conservative, if you're a member of the Conservative Party or reform in Britain, the chances are that when you're asked about Britain's history, you say you're very proud of it. You're quite invested in it emotionally. You think more about preserving the glories of the past than you do about building a better world in the future. I mean, that's just a sort of very basic point then, on the way that people react to individual political heroes. The Tory Party, for example, has always been very good at putting people on a pedestal and creating a slightly simplified Hollywood version of them and turning them into political heroes. So Benjamin Disraeli, Churchill, obviously, Thatcher and so on. Why don't the left do that? I would argue, and maybe, I mean, you will know much more about this than me, Alistair, but I would say there is a tendency among them, the more fervent left wing activists tend to believe that their leaders have let them down.
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Alistair Campbell
Oh, yeah.
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Dominic Sambrook
That they have betrayed them in some way because they have.
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Alistair Campbell
It's the betrayal thesis. Yeah.
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Dominic Sambrook
Yeah. I was just going to say that. How many people in the Labour Party. Random Labour activists who shouldn't really care about 1930s politics will suddenly start muttering to you about how Ramsey MacDonald sold out the Labour Party in 1931. And that's what they all do. Attlee didn't go far enough. Harold Wilson was a waste of space. Tony Blair, well, of course, he was just America's puppet and he was really a Tory. You know, they'll rush to do that in a way that people on the right don't really. I mean, there are some people on the right, some Tory prime ministers, so you would. Ted Heath, for example, people would say, oh, Ted Heath was really a socialist. Or they would say of maybe, you know, Cameron. Oh, Cameron wasn't really, you know, because he was Remain and all this kind of thing. However, I think people on the right tend to be much keener to celebrate their election winners. Whereas, by and large, the surest way to get yourself a place in the Labour Party's hall of infamy is to win lots of elections and make decisions in government. Because then your supporters will say, well, you were just a Tory and you've let us down.
- [30:14]
Alistair Campbell
The betrayal is the key. And I also think you're onto something about the, you know, it's like the slogans of the right, take back control, make America great again. Whereas, as Bill Clinton always used to say, you know, elections have always got to be about tomorrow, but if today feels pretty shit, then projecting that tomorrow can be quite difficult. Listen, related to this, Dominique, when Donald Trump won, you argued that many politicians throughout history fail to understand that most voters don't follow politics closely, tend to vote based on how their lives feel day to day. Do you two think Keir Starmer has learned the lessons from the Democrats loss? And looking ahead to the May local elections, what are your predictions for Labour's performance?
- [30:55]
Dominic Sambrook
Oh, this is a big question. And now I would say, I think you and I will disagree about this because I think Keir Starmer is useless. I think he's a useless politician and I think he hasn't learned the lessons. And I think, I mean, I wrote a column about him in the Times this weekend and I said the politician he reminded me most of in British history was actually Ted Heath. So Ted Heath, rather like Keir Starmer, technocratic, took us into Europe. Yeah. Which Keir Starmer talks about doing but hasn't delivered on. Anyway, so dogged, dutiful, does all the, you know, does all the paperwork, prepares for the meetings. You know, you just know that the school swat kind of person is gonna stay up at night doing all the red boxes and whatnot. But in both cases, really, really poor communicators. And I know it drives Keir Starmer and his partisans bonkers when people say this, but a politician just has to tell a story a politician needs to have. You know, Tony Blair, your old boss, was brilliant at doing this. David Cameron was pretty good at doing this. Your absolute bogeyman, Boris Johnson was quite good at doing this, at saying, this is what I'm going to do, this is what I stand for. Leaving the conversation so that the voter with whom they were talking kind of had a smile on their face and they were like, oh, that was a nice guy. I know what he's about. Do people know what Keir Starmer is about? Not at all. I would say even I read a lot about politics. I don't really know what makes him tick. I don't know what his end game is. I don't know what his vision of Britain is. And I think the failure, his belief, actually, that that is trivial and tawdry and he doesn't want to get in dirtiest hands with it. I think it's colossal folly not to construct a story.
- [32:41]
Alistair Campbell
I mean, I don't disagree with every word of what you've said. I disagree with quite a lot of it. And back to the point you made on the main episode, my tribalism does make me say, and I think this is true, by the way, of all the current potential prime ministers across the parties. I'd rather have him there right now than Badenot, Farage, Polanski, Davy or anybody else. But I think the point. Listen, I make this point all the time about the lack of a compelling narrative that people feel the country's going in a certain direction. I think the point about the lessons from the Democrats, though, because Democrats have pretty much, you know, you could argue about Michael Dukakis, but they've always had pretty charismatic leaders. Kamala Harris, for all her weaknesses and her faults, she could tell a story. She had an energy, she had a charisma about her. But what I think Keir Starmer's hoping, and it may be a forlorn hope, is that actually your point? Most people are not following politics closely. His hope is that come the next election, they've been able to turn the economy around, made a lot more difficult by recent events, obviously. Turn the economy right, get the country moving in a different direction. So they think, yeah, well, say what you like about him, but I trust him to carry on.
- [33:54]
Dominic Sambrook
Yeah.
- [33:54]
Alistair Campbell
See, I think there are lessons that we can learn from the Republicans that we're not learning. And one of them afraid is about communication. Trump at the moment is seen as a pretty much as a global monstrosity, but the reason he there and he got back is because he's a genius modern age communicator. Now, Keir Starmer, as you have pointed out very, very eloquently, is not a modern age genius communicator. But around him, you then have to turn what he says and does into the genius modern age communication.
- [34:26]
Dominic Sambrook
Agreed, I agree completely.
- [34:28]
Alistair Campbell
Now, on the May local elections, what are your predictions? I think they're going to be bad. I was in Scotland last week. Rory and I interviewed Anas Sawa, Scotland's Labour leader. That'll be coming out fairly soon and he was obviously fighting hard, campaigning hard, but you know, you talk to people on the streets and they're basically saying it's pretty tricky for Labour. Wales, I think, could be really bad for Labour. The elections are going to be really bad. So I don't know on numbers, I think predicting the numbers is pointless, but I don't think any Labour supporters are viewing these elections with massive confidence.
- [35:02]
Dominic Sambrook
So I think we're in uncertain waters precisely because of the fragmentation of the political system. So unlike maybe local elections when you were in your pomp in Downing street, it's going to be very hard to impose a single narrative on these because it'll be such a fragmented picture across the United Kingdom.
- [35:20]
Alistair Campbell
Yeah, totally.
- [35:21]
Dominic Sambrook
But just on Labour, things look really tough for Labour and the reason is that for the first time, really, they're being squeezed from different angles. So reform on one side, let's say in Wales you've got reform and you've got applied cumbri in London, let's say you've got reform, but you've also got the Greens. By the way, I'm not a fan of Zach Polanski at all, but it's the first time the Greens have had a spokesman that most people have actually heard of.
- [35:50]
Alistair Campbell
Yeah.
- [35:50]
Dominic Sambrook
You know, and that seems to have cut through, particularly with voters in their 20s.
- [35:55]
Alistair Campbell
Yeah.
- [35:55]
Dominic Sambrook
I mean, for reasons that frankly, I find utterly baffling.
- [35:57]
Alistair Campbell
But you're, with respect, Dominic, you're not in your 20s.
- [36:00]
Dominic Sambrook
I'm not? No, not. Certainly not anymore.
- [36:02]
Alistair Campbell
Haven't been for some time.
- [36:04]
Dominic Sambrook
That's us. I don't come on this podcast to get abuse.
- [36:08]
Alistair Campbell
I am somebody with very young at heart, very young in mind, and I get the vibe of the 20 year old.
- [36:13]
Dominic Sambrook
Of course. Of course you do.
- [36:15]
Alistair Campbell
Now listen, here's what I really want to ask you, and I know you're going to be appalled at my contribution to this discussion. This is from Samantha in Michigan. Dominic, as a well known lover of the Lord of the Rings, what is your perspective on the contemporary tech rights fascination with Tolkien? And here is where I have an admission to make, Dominic, which will truly appall you. I have never read Lord of the Rings and I think that the fact that it has played such a big part in the mindset of Teal and Musk and Zuckerberg and all these awful people who are ruling the world, I don't intend ever to read it either.
- [36:51]
Dominic Sambrook
Well, the first thing to say, Alistair, is that what you clearly need to do more of is you need to listen to our new book club podcast. I've already plugged that you can educate yourself about the world beyond Westminster, which I know you'd really enjoy doing. As for the Lord of the Rings, it's absolutely right that the people on the right have taken this up. So Meloni, Giorgio Meloni, is a massive Lord of the Rings fan and she makes references to it. There is a Lord of the Rings festival in Italy that people on the right go to. You know, extraordinary. JRR Tolkien himself was a very reactionary person. You know, he was a small C conservator. When I say reactionary, I don't mean in a sort of bigoted way, because he definitely wasn't, but he was somebody who genuinely, you know, loved the world of the Middle Ages and whatnot and wished that he could turn back the clock.
- [37:40]
Alistair Campbell
He was Daily Telegraph before it became today's Daily Telegraph, I suppose, a little
- [37:45]
Dominic Sambrook
bit, although he wasn't really interested in politics, but he had a sort of fantasy in his mind of a sort of Middle England, unspoiled by industry. He'd grown up in Birmingham. He'd grown up in a village that was actually swallowed up by Birmingham when he was a boy in the Edwardian period. And he sort of had a horror of the city and chains and technology and all of this kind of thing. He had a horror of the. I mean, he fought in the Battle of the Somme. His son had been involved in the Second World War. He hated, you know, Nazism, totalitarianism, fascism and whatnot. And he worried that the Allies were using totalitarian methods. And so he has a sort of hatred of power and modernity and technology and all of this kind of thing. And technology. I mean, this is the weird thing, right? He hates technology. And actually the tech bros have taken this up. I think there's perhaps a slight element of. I mean, Tolkien himself was absolutely not a racist. And I think when people say Lord of the Rings is racist or whatever, they are wrong. But I think there is something about it that clearly appeals to the sort of white supremacist wing of the tech bro movement. It's an English book, it's about white people, it's about fighting dark skinned people, all of this kind of thing. They like all this. But I think they're completely wrong to see it as a book that endorses their worldview. I mean, the whole. I know this is bonkers that I'm having to explain the plot of the Lord of the Rings to you, Alistair. Something I never ever imagined I would be doing. But they have this incredible, this super weapon, this technological superweapon. And the whole point of the story is they have to destroy it because it will corrupt them if they use it. You know, and obviously you can see how that would be inspired by the nuclear bomb that was in the news when he was writing it. Do Peter Thiel and all of these people think like that? They do not at all. They have a super weapon in AI which they are proposing to roll out and they don't care if it, you know, what the implications for the world are. So I think they are misunderstanding the message of the Lord of Rings. Undoubtedly.
- [39:50]
Alistair Campbell
Well, I will happily listen to this episode as long as you promise me also to do Balzac, Zola, Thomas Hardy and possibly a little bit of Dickens as well. Would that be okay?
- [40:00]
Dominic Sambrook
Well, you name me a lot of very good authors. Now the thing is, you're hiding your light under a bushel here because you read in German, don't you? You read fiction in German, which is very impressive. So have you read Thomas Mann?
- [40:10]
Alistair Campbell
I have read Thomas Mann. I've read Thomas Mann. I read the Buddenbrucks a few months ago in Aufdeutsch. Yeah.
- [40:16]
Dominic Sambrook
God, that is so impressive. That is genuinely gonna dominate.
- [40:20]
Alistair Campbell
What you're exposing here is the British arrogance about languages. Why is it impressive that I read a book in German? Every German reads English books pretty much every week.
- [40:30]
Dominic Sambrook
I agree with you. I did French at university and I used to read. I read Zola, Balzac, Stendhal, Flober in French. Could I do that now? I'm not sure. Because my French is atrophied. Yeah, it's become. I've let it go.
- [40:43]
Alistair Campbell
The reason I've become obsessed about reading in German is because my German atrophid. And during COVID because Fiona knows I'M not very good if I'm trapped in the house all the time. She got me, she bought me these courses at the Goethe Institute to relearn German and I loved it. So you should do the same with your French. Happy to help. Je surai trait quintant de tedais.
- [41:06]
Dominic Sambrook
Yeah. Alistair Campbell, life coach. Brilliant.
- [41:10]
Alistair Campbell
Exactly. Now, Dominic, final question. I think we have to one of the. Look, there are many, many, many joys of doing the podcast with Rory Stewart, but one of the non joys, if I can put it like that, is he doesn't really get football right, so we can't really talk about football. But I think football is so important, including in politics. So a couple of questions to close. Felix in Glasgow. What are your thoughts on the extortionate ticket prices at the World cup next summer? And here's one from Graham. Southampton Football Club. Rest is politics and rest is history. Fan from Weymouth. As a Saints fan, he says it's really disappointing we won't be able to welcome your two teams, Wolves and Burnley, to St. Mary's next season as we pass each other and go up into the Premier League while you both go into the Championship. Would you like recommendations on the best halftime food? I think it's worth pointing out the seventh, they might not get in the playoffs. They're in the FA Cup. They did very well against Arsenal. But I think there's a bit of hubris there. Graham, I think if you don't get promoted, you're going to get the blame. How do you feel about going down, first of all, Wolves?
- [42:20]
Dominic Sambrook
Well, we were down in August, which is very unusual. Which is very unusual. So I've had a long time to get used to it. I think it's very depressing. I think there is actually, for a politics podcast, there's a lot to talk about here. Because we are a Chinese owned club, Wolves, we're historic. We're one of the founder members of the Football League. We have become a symbol of the globalization of football because we are Chinese owned and we came into the Premier League and did really well. Finished seventh two years in a row.
- [42:49]
Alistair Campbell
But that was when you had Jorge Mendez, the famous Portuguese super agent, bringing you all these amazing players from Portugal. He basically ran the club.
- [42:57]
Dominic Sambrook
Exactly. But post Covid, the Chinese government basically said to Chinese companies, stop blowing money on Western projects. Dissuaded them from doing so. So Foson, the conglomerate that owns Wolves, have become very semi detached. So I think our relegation was probably always coming, I think, frankly, because they want to make Their money back. They will invest to try to get us back up, because otherwise they're going to lose a lot of money. But isn't it. I mean, here's the thing. You know, when you're following a club like Wolves or Burnley, the tragedy of football now is that, you know, you can never do what Nottingham Forest did in the 1970s.
- [43:38]
Alistair Campbell
Les did it a few years ago.
- [43:40]
Dominic Sambrook
But it was such a freak, though, Alistair, it's never going to happen again. I mean, the tragedy is, you know, I know that in the last few years, we had as good a Wolves team as we've had in my lifetime. Easily arguably the best Wolves team we've had in my lifetime in 50 years. But there was a ceiling beyond which we could not break. And it was obvious that once we'd finished seventh twice in a row, we would end up selling all of these brilliant players, Ruben Neves or Pedro Neto or Jota who went to Liverpool or Raul Jimenez or whoever, that they wouldn't stay forever. Because the nature of the finances now and financial fair play and all of these kinds of things have enshrined a cartel at the top of football. And if you're not part of the cartel now, you will never break in. And I think that's a tragedy for clubs like ours.
- [44:24]
Alistair Campbell
Well, I can't wait to talk to Rory about this because I think his views will be very, very, very similar. But this underlines why he's missing something. Not just in why football's a wonderful game to watch and get involved in, but also it is so political. And briefly, on Felix's point, by the way, Domin, just to remind you, only two clubs in history have won all four divisional titles. Did you know that?
- [44:46]
Dominic Sambrook
They're our two clubs, aren't they?
- [44:48]
Alistair Campbell
Burnley and Wolves. Yeah, well, because we go up and we go down, we go down a bit more and then we come back.
- [44:53]
Dominic Sambrook
Yeah, that tells you something about the trajectory, that the nature, the size and the nature of our clubs, they will always bounce back because they're really resilient, but they're not quite big enough to establish themselves on a permanent basis in the top flight.
- [45:07]
Alistair Campbell
So Felix wants to know what our thoughts are on the ticket prize of the World Cup. Well, I'm not going to the World cup because I'm boycotting America for four years because of the decision they made to get Trump. And I'm very sad about it because Scotland have qualified. But I never mind the ticket prices. I was looking the other day at the parking prices.
- [45:25]
Dominic Sambrook
Oh, my God.
- [45:26]
Alistair Campbell
Some of the parking prices are into the. Well, into the hundreds. I think it's Scotland, Morocco, you need it. You can't get there by public transport. And I think the parking places were something like 800 quid. $800. The price of a ticket for the final, which they said at the start wasn't going to be about $1,400. It's already up to 10.
- [45:44]
Dominic Sambrook
Wow.
- [45:45]
Alistair Campbell
And then you look at Infantino, the head of FIFA, sort of going around the world on one of the biggest Instagram tours since Liz Truss. Every day, he's kind of, you know, spreading goodwill, spreading this, that, the other.
- [45:58]
Dominic Sambrook
And he made up that prize, the peace prize, and gave it to Trump, didn't he?
- [46:02]
Alistair Campbell
And we've seen how deserved. We've seen how deserved it was over the last five weeks.
- [46:06]
Dominic Sambrook
The other issue with the World cup, the World cup has completely and utterly sold out politically and commercially. It's expanded beyond, you know, the realms of. Beyond the realms of avarice. So now has 48 teams. It will last longer than ever. The entire first stage of it is really superfluous. You know, how many people really want to watch, you know, Jordan versus Uzbekistan or whatever it might be.
- [46:29]
Alistair Campbell
Yeah, I can't imagine there's going to be that many people want to see Cape Verde against Saudi Arabia. The parking for that one's only 85.
- [46:36]
Dominic Sambrook
God. I mean, who. I mean, has there anybody ever who said, I'd like to see a match between those two teams? I'd like to see it. I'd like to see it in America in punishing heat or whatever? Yeah, no, I think it's a real shame because I used to love. So when I was a student, I can remember, my friends and I were like, let's watch every game. And we watched every game, you know, the most obscure games. But now, you know, you physically can't do it. For one thing, there are too many. But also, there are too many dead rubbers. They've really destroyed the romance of the tournaments. I think it's a massive, massive shame.
- [47:11]
Alistair Campbell
Yeah, I think four war is going through a very, very bad phase. I've probably been to fewer games this season than most seasons in my life. Now, partly it's been travel and work, illness and stuff like that. But no, I'm looking forward to Scotland being there, but I'm not really looking forward to the World cup as an event and Trump and I'm convinced, by the way. Let's go back to the first part of our discuss discussion on the main episode. I have a horrible feeling. Trump's going to use it like Hitler used the Olympics in 1936.
- [47:38]
Dominic Sambrook
Well, it depends how well the United States team does. And thankfully they've got a rubbish team.
- [47:42]
Alistair Campbell
That's true. Anyway, listen, Rory, if he's listening, will be falling asleep by now, Dominic. So I think we better call it a day.
- [47:47]
Dominic Sambrook
Yeah.
- [47:48]
Alistair Campbell
He's not.
- [47:48]
Dominic Sambrook
He hasn't listened to all this, surely.
- [47:51]
Alistair Campbell
Well, thank you very much again for stepping in. It's been a pleasure to talk to you again.
- [47:54]
Dominic Sambrook
Oh, thank you for having me.
- [47:55]
Alistair Campbell
We'll do it again one day.
- [47:56]
Dominic Sambrook
I hope so. All right, bye. Bye, everybody.
- [47:58]
Alistair Campbell
See you soon. It. Bye.