Leighton Smith Podcast #321 - March 25th 2026 - Ramesh Thakur - The Leighton Smith Podcast

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Speaker 1 (00:09):
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Speaker 2 (00:28):
Welcome to podcasts three hundred and twenty one from March
twenty five, twenty twenty six. The events and the effects
of the COVID nineteen era have done huge damage to much,
if not most, of the world. The COVID cloud still
hangs over us, both physically and economically. Decisions made or
imposed on society, either by intent or mistake, should never

(00:51):
be visited upon us again. The whow has undermined public
trust and destroyed many lives. Enter the International Reform Project,
which will be officially announced in mid April by its
co chairs David Bell and Rummish the Curve, but Ramesh
the Kurb provides an introduction in three twenty one that

(01:12):
should be heard by anyone in the medical profession and
anyone who knows that health reform is urgently needed. But
first in the introduction, I may mention of the COVID
cloud and its effect on us physically and economically one
of the well, we were all suffering from it one

(01:34):
way or the other. But I concentrated a fair amount
on what was going on in Victoria, Melbourne in particular
because of the well everybody knows by now surely the corruption.
I was going to say because of the ignorance. No,
it was because of the corruption that took place politically

(01:55):
politically in Melbourne during that period, which brings me to
the following published on the twenty third, two days ago,
Victoria a Fool's Paradise or Becoming a Worker's Paradise. History
teaches us that workers paradises eventually succumb to a brutal
market based adjustment. We learn this week that the Victorian

(02:17):
government will legislate a working from home entitlement for employees
in all businesses, all big, medium and small. Also, the
ACTU will campaign for workers to have five weeks annual leave.
A year shift workers will receive six weeks annual leave.
Victoria is on a path that almost yearly expands worker

(02:39):
entitlements and reduces employer rights. Casual employees in nominated industries
have a right to long service leave in advance of
their federal entitlements. Employers in the nominated industries pay a
levy for every employee. In the lead up to the
twenty twenty two state election, the state government introduced to

(03:00):
scheme to give casual employees access to sick leave. This
conveniently ignored the fact that casual employees receive a payloading
to compensate for lack of access to sick leave. The
scheme was discontinued after the election was won. The ignorant
benevolence of the Victorian government is highlighted by the leave

(03:21):
conditions in the Victorian Public Service twenty twenty four Enterprise Agreement.
The agreement sets out an astonishing twenty two types of leave.
Most of the entitlements offer paid leave. The standard annual,
personal career and long service leave apply. Reproductive health and

(03:42):
well being, gender affirmation, surrogacy, grandparent care of grandchildren, foster
and kinship, rehabilitation from alcohol and drug abuse, sporting event participation,
infectious disease, and cultural and ceremonial leave are just some
on the lead menu. The entitlement mentality is open ended,

(04:04):
with VPS employers allowed to grant other leave quote for
any purpose. VPS employees are entitled to work from home,
and many are rarely seen at the workplace. Pay increases
are granted without any attention to productivity improvement. The source
of job's growth in any decent workers paradise comes predominantly

(04:28):
from the public sector. This is the case in Victoria.
Government employment grew by forty two percent over the ten
years twenty fifteen to twenty five. In contrast, the Victorian
labor force, that is public and private employment, grew by
a modest twenty four percent. Analysis by the Australian Industry

(04:48):
Group found that nine out of ten jobs created during
twenty three twenty four were in the public service. So
the worker's paradise is alive and well in Victoria. It
survives alongside punishing tax increases and mountains of government debt. Unsurprisingly,
the attraction to invest in vis Victoria is declining. Who

(05:10):
would have guessed a culture change backed by political courage
is required, No job is guaranteed. The cost of employing
people in the Victorian public sector is unsustainable. Now. That
was written by John Lloyd, a senior fellow at the
HR Nichols Society. No don't, I can't explain, but that's

(05:32):
where he's from. And as we witness over this last
weekend with the situation in South Australia with their election.
Of course the next election is is it November? I
think it is in Victoria and it's disturbing. And why
is it disturbing? Well, you may be aware that we
have an election in this country in October and things

(05:55):
aren't looking terribly flash for well anybody really. But the
danger is if we followed the trend in South Australia
where the Labor Party swept back in Victoria that's been
run by Labor for some considerable time, it stands to
reason that well there may be an influence in this
part of the world. And I don't think too many

(06:17):
of us want to go back to the years that
we suffered under those that are now out of the
country and hopefully stay there now after a short break rummesh,
the cur Buccolan is a natural oral vaccine in a

(06:39):
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protection against bacterial infections in your chest and throat. A
three day course of seven Bucklan tablets will help your
body build up to three months of immunity against bugs
which cause bacterial cold symptoms. So who can take buccolan
well the whole family From two years of age and upwards.

(07:00):
A course of Bucklan tablets offers cost effective and safe
protection from colds and chills. Protection becomes effective a few
days after you take buccolan and lasts for up to
three months following the three day course. Buccolan can be
taken throughout the cold season, over winter, or all the
year round. And remember Buckelan is not intended as an
alternative to influenza vaccination, but may be used along with

(07:23):
the flu vaccination for added protection. And keep in mind
that millions of doses have been taken by Kiwi's for
over fifty years. Only available from your pharmacist. Always read
the label and users directed, and see your doctor if
systems persist. Farmer Broker Auckland Layton Smith Ramesh the Khur

(07:52):
is well known to this audience. But for the odd
person who has not listened before or has missed Ramesh
at some stage, let me just tell you the man
is very clever, very good writer and also a good speaker.
He was a professor of various things in various parts

(08:14):
of the world, including a Tiger University and then the
Australian National University.

Speaker 3 (08:18):
He is.

Speaker 2 (08:18):
Now, I suppose you'd say, semi retired on the north
New South Wales coast, retired.

Speaker 3 (08:25):
Nothing semi about it.

Speaker 2 (08:27):
Well, you're talking to me. I consider that to be.

Speaker 3 (08:33):
Talking to you is both a pleasure and it's something
I'm happy to do. I have no obligation to do
anything anymore, and I'm ruthless about that.

Speaker 2 (08:42):
Well, I guess that's the that's the difference, isn't it.
It's a good way to put it. If you have
no obligation, you are free. I'm on the other hand,
I'm in chains.

Speaker 3 (08:52):
As your end. Yeah, some some are happy being in chains,
but no, it's a good position to be in. It
also means I don't have to worry about suffering any consequences.
And since I'm not on social media, I don't get
into that gutter sphere either.

Speaker 2 (09:08):
So no, did you say gutter sphere?

Speaker 3 (09:12):
I did.

Speaker 2 (09:13):
I think it's beautiful, all right. So the purpose of
this conversation is to discuss something that's new on the scene.
The International Health Reform Project, if I may just a
little from the forward of this experience, has demonstrated that
international health cooperation can, when poorly governed undermine trust, distort priorities,

(09:39):
and produce significant unintended harm. Recent trends of centralized decision making,
emergency exceptionalism, and donor driven agendas, exemplified during the COVID
nineteen response, displaced proportionality, local context, and established public health ethics.
They didn't establish public health ethics. They were You've got

(10:04):
to reverse that. These pages. Yeah, these failures revealed structural
weaknesses rather than temporary lapses. At the same time, cooperation
in public health also required an understanding of the sovereignty
and equality of individuals and the states that represent them,
an understanding that underpins the United Nations itself. Thus, any

(10:28):
institution tasked with managing health cooperation must be based on
this understanding and be fully subject to the states it
is intended to serve. It should come as no surprise
to anyone that, after nearly eighty years of existence in
a greatly changed world, the World Health Organization that WHO

(10:49):
is perceived by many to have drifted from its original model.
Fundamental shifts in its funding base are now The exit
of its largest state funder that's being America, present both
an opportunity and an urgency to reassess the optimal way
in which states should work together to serve the health
needs of their populations, applying the fundamental principles on which

(11:12):
public health should be based to a greatly changed and
evolving world. Now that's just part of the introduction to
this project. When is this going public?

Speaker 3 (11:28):
Well, we're publishing two reports. The title for both is
the Right to Health Sovereignty. Subtitle is Policy Report and
Technical Report. The Policy Report, the launch on Amazon dot
Com of the actual publication is the thirteenth of April,
and hopefully the technical report will be also out by

(11:48):
the end of April, so next month report.

Speaker 2 (11:50):
So we're getting a pretty good brief on this podcast,
I hope. So yes, how did this romesh? How did
this come about? I mean, I know that you and
David Bell have worked together, specifically with the introduction of Brownstone.
You've known each other for some considerable time.

Speaker 3 (12:11):
We have, and he is Australian. Start with that, he
grew up in Victoria. His degree was from the University
of Melbourne Medical School. But he's actually worked with the
WHO for some time in the field in the SORRY,
in the regional office in Manila, and then quite often
in the field in Africa. On various things. And he's

(12:34):
now in Texas. He lives in Texas, so his medical
doctor with considerable experience of the who from the inside.
I come from completely outside to a world of health
with no experience or knowledge or skills in that. But
my experience is in international public policy at a more
senior level, and we have both been interested in issues

(12:58):
of health governance, he more full time in my case
under my interest in global governance. So we came together. First,
we got to know you through the writings for Brownstone,
and we met at a Brownstone Annual conference that was
held in Dallas in what was it October and November twenty.

Speaker 2 (13:19):
Three were you were the big guest speaker ours it.

Speaker 3 (13:22):
That's where I did the main after dinner speech. And
I think where we come together is acknowledgement of two
things and that's been difficult. And before I go through that,
a more general point what we have seen in recent
times across the world is difficulty in communicating across different

(13:44):
points of view. You know, the democratic precept and theory
is we have differences, but we discuss them, debate them,
come to a resolution, or agree to disagree, but do
not damage relations with one another okay that has applied
also to health policy issues now suddenly with COVID nineteen

(14:05):
in particular, if you disagreed you were ego, you're immoral,
you're a granny killer, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera, And the other
side you say, well, hang on, you've become a covidian.
Why can't we just discuss this, Where is the science
behind it? Show me the data. And so the debate

(14:26):
on this became highly polarized, and from that the polarization
and the extreme polarization came through with regard to the
WHOW as well. And so some people are happy to
just accept everything and sign off on all new commitments,
whether legally binding or not, in the form of the

(14:46):
amendments to the International Health Regulations and then a new
Pandemic treaty, and other people are so disillusioned and angry
with the WHOW performance that they want to pull right
out now. With David and me, we felt that there
was a reason why we set up the dou WHOW.

(15:07):
That ration channel hasn't disappeared. At the same time, like
any bureaucracy, really, the WHO has been subverted from within
to serve its own existence and growth. And proliferation in numbers,
in budget, in authority at the expense of its core
mission statement, and that this is producing a backlash and

(15:28):
if we don't go back to original assumptions and principles
and foundational missions, then the risks throwing the baby out
with the bathwater. Now that's of course a very difficult
position to take on any deeply polarized debate in these days.
You know the old margaret thatchemon. If you start, if

(15:48):
you want to stand in the middle, you risk getting
hit by traffic going in both directions. I think that
does apply. But we got together an international panel of
ten of us all together, from Africa, from Asia, from
here obviously, from Europe, and from the US, with a
range of disciplines represented in this as well, because one

(16:11):
of our was certainly one of mine. If you remember,
major criticisms of the COVID policies was not only was
it not contestable advice that was given to governments, they
were not taking a range of opinions forgetting you know,
the basic truth that policy is not about solving puzzles
as much as it is about it's engaging in policy

(16:33):
trade offs within health and between health and other issues.
So we have this range of people and we've been
working for about a year and a half now on
this input from everyone. Essentially, for the Policy Report, I
took the lead in writing it, so it's my lid
opinion and the final product will have me as the

(16:56):
lead writer. There's other lead writers for the technical report,
where I've done oversight and reading and commenting on various
things as well. And the reason for that again for
the Policy report world background and experience in writing these
sorts of things for the UN, and hence I mean
the idea was, if you have one editorial pen, at

(17:18):
least you have some hope of getting consistency and a
narrative flow rather than a report produced by a committee.
I hope that will come through. You might get a
sense of that even from the forward and the executive
summary essentially in advance. But the idea is to have
that and explain why On the one hand, international cooperation

(17:43):
is merited is important, what we will miss the who
was to collapse completely and why that will be harmful
to everyone, but particularly to people in poorer countries and
poorer parts of the world. On the other hand, document
why there has been overreach and how this has produced
a backlash and what we need to get back to

(18:06):
a better basis for cooperation. So the moment we thought
was right because it fits into a broader angst against
so called globalism and globalization. And I think we've discussed
that earlier. And then the US pulling out is as
the biggest state funder, And we have a meeting of
a small subgroup of our project in Washington last month,

(18:30):
and during that time, the Washington Post published that story
about how they're looking to alternative structures and therefore actually
turn out to be much costlier, which is not an
exceptional conclusion in regard to efforts to bypass the un
more generally, if you try to bypass it completely as

(18:51):
opposed to not tinkering the reform, but deep structured reform.
So you a start. That was a starting point, and
that's what the project is about. Sorry, go on.

Speaker 2 (19:01):
So your organization, the International Health Reform Project, is ye
sickly walking a tight wire between between the two options.

Speaker 3 (19:14):
Correct?

Speaker 2 (19:15):
Does it feel? Does it does it feel that? Look?
I didn't, I didn't. I didn't At the beginning, I
failed to mention that you you were an acting United
Nations General Secretary on the assistance assistance on number of occasions.
Your experience is vast. You know, you know the you

(19:37):
know the inside of all of all of this and
what what gets criticized usually without too much justification. You
you are well well aware of it and able to
provide it when necessary. So how difficult might it be
rather than easy to keep this this position between the

(19:57):
two players if you like uh and and make it
work successfully.

Speaker 3 (20:04):
Well, you know, when you have a major polarized bit.
My starting assumption is it's unlikely either that one side
is evil and the other is composed of angels compared
to angels, and secondly, that one side is completely right
and everything it says and the other side is totally
wrong in all their claims. And if you take these

(20:26):
too starting assumptions, which is not a bad one to
begin with, then the trick becomes to identify areas where
you agree with one and the areas where you agree
with the other and see if you can reconcile them.
And that's what we try to be. Going back to
my experience, that's what we try to do on the
International Commission on Intervention and Sovereignty. When we came up

(20:48):
to the formulation of the responsibility to protect and did
reconcile the two and that's why it got adopted by
the UN with exceptionally fast speed in terms of independent
commission making recommendations, and it's being taken up. So that's
what we are trying to do, and begin by saying,

(21:09):
instead of globalism, why not again invert that, just as
we did with the sovereignty issues and said sovereignty is
essentially responsibility and be inverked up by saying, let's go
back to fundational things. You start with individual agency, and
I feel like individual sovereignty and that takes a form
of conversations between the patient and the GP in the

(21:33):
healthcare clinic, and that's where most decisions should be made.
But for that decision to be legitimate, the patient has
to be given as much accurate and relevant information as
possible by the doctor, and neither the medical regulators nor
the national government should come between the patient and the

(21:55):
doctor in the clinic. If you have gaps, you change
your training methods for your doctors, but don't insert yourself
between the doctor and the patient, because the consequence of
loss of faith in the system are much worse than
any mistake or error that dot doctor might make, and

(22:16):
it's the doctor who knows the patient ideally in great detail,
has a family history, has built up trust over many consultations.
And then it's the doctor who gives the different options
with an honest evaluation of prospects for success on each
of the different options and the risks entailed in each

(22:38):
of the different options. And then you move from there
to national level government regulators, bureaucracy experts, whatever, and they
set policy for the country as a whole. And then
you move from there to regional organizations where you can
collate data and evidence and set up surveillance networks so

(23:00):
you can get advanced warnings of disease outbreaks and provide
advice and technical assistance. And then from there you move
on to the global level. So most of the actions
should be in the clinic, then the state, then the
regional and the least at the global level. In terms
of normative guidance, the UN is irreplaceable in standard setting

(23:23):
role in establishing norms and stuff, It is hopeless in compliance,
and it is in between in terms of being able
to monitor. So those that's the relationship partially that it
should be. So then how do you populate the different
levels in more detailed and why and how do you
provide the justifications philosophically, empirical, ifil, et cetera, to justify

(23:48):
these sorts of conclusions and what it would mean and
where we end up. By the way is saying, there
comes a point when the normalies and the accumulated vested
interests have established a very stable equilibrium, so that it
is easier politically, or it may be easier politically to

(24:12):
actually go for a replacement organization with a new name
rather than deep structural reform. And that I illustrate by
going back to the transition from the League of Nations
to the United Nations, because if you think about it,
the United Nations is essentially a continuation of the League,
a General Assembly and Executive Council, a World Court, the

(24:35):
International Labor Organization, the procedures in terms of collective security,
specific settlement of disputes, add education, arbitration, etc. It's essentially
the same learning from experience, improving some that needed improvement,
shedding others that were do hard to improve, adding things
that have become obvious in practice as part of the constitution,

(24:56):
et cetera. So that is there but politically have been
impossible in nineteen forty five to say this is a
reform League of Nations for a number of reasons that
we can go into. So I take example and say,
if you can do destructured from not tinkering on the margins,
by all means it's logically more sensible, but don't waste

(25:19):
so much time on it. If it proves difficult or impossible,
move to doing a replacement international health organization. Now in
the report we say this is not for US or
any independent international commission to prescribe to the country's what
they should do. We are setting out the argument it's
up to you to decide which is a better path.

(25:41):
You can try reform if you like. If it works, fine,
everyone is happy. If it doesn't, you may be better
off going to replacement the route rather than investing more
time and energy. Because what happened to the UN was
the last big reform effort was two thousand and five,
and people less that exhausted and jaded, and we haven't

(26:03):
had a thing since then. And the core of that is,
of course the Security Council reform is struck as well
as procedural. So again, learning from that experience, The idea is,
these are the principles we think are important, and it
is important to restate the principles of informed consent. First,
you know, harm, make sure you're doing good, etc.

Speaker 2 (26:25):
Etc.

Speaker 3 (26:27):
And then go up first from that. So what would
it look like if you started off afresh today? I
don't think you look very much like what it actually is.
And at the heart of that also is the funding formula,
as well as the governor's arrangements. So we go into
all that and much more detail and substantively in the

(26:47):
technical report, which also then gives the footnotes and the
references to the literature, whereas in the policy report I
prefer to go straight into a narrative account rather than
in those technical sites.

Speaker 2 (27:00):
Now you've said so much that I don't think I
can cover it all.

Speaker 3 (27:08):
Now we can have another talk about it once out.
Well you can talk.

Speaker 2 (27:12):
Well, well, there is that, but I'm interested in some
some tangential questions, if you like, the Your experience at
the u N would have patently given you a very
solid insight into the way that things work mm hmm

(27:36):
or don't work. Has the u N which has the
UN passed its use by date?

Speaker 3 (27:46):
I think so, And that goes back to the Security Council.
Now again, if you tell them to talk about the UN,
let's put it in the more general terms. To start with,
we think that most people don't realize about the United
Nations is that it is a meeting ground of realism
and argealism, in the sense that realism must be tempered

(28:11):
by idealism in order to retain the confidence and faith
of the people, because it represents a vision for an
international community where it's the one body that houses the
divided fragments of humanity, so one place where we express
solidarity as human beings, regardless of differences of nationality, religion, gender, race,

(28:37):
income levels, whatever, and that sense of solidarity as human
beings from which flows the entire theory and practice and
institutions of human arty, if you like, It comes from that.
On the other hand, idealism, without being grounded in the
real world, just becomes naivety and bears no relationship to

(29:01):
what is possible, what is feasible, what are the constraints,
what are the assets for achieving any goal, etc. Reconciliation
is never easy, it's exceptionally challenging, but is nonetheless absolutely fundamental.
Now you see that in the Security Council, you have
the General Assembly as the equivalent of one person, one vote,

(29:22):
it's one member state, one vote. So you have one
hundred and ninety three hundred and ninety four I think
it's one hundred ninety four now member states. And so
the smallest, weakest, poorest country has the same one vote
as the United States, as the biggest economy, the most
powerful country, huge population, and the same one vote as

(29:44):
China and India the two billion plus populations. On the
other hand, the world affairs has always been regulated, governed,
enforced by major powers. They have the greatest capacity to
disturb any existing international order, and they have the greatest

(30:04):
material capacity to underpin and underwrite the existing order. And
in recognition of that, you give them exceptional continuity and
authority in the executive body, in this case the Security Council,
So the five permanent members with the power of veto

(30:26):
the United States. So which union now Russia, China, France,
and the UK. That is nineteen forty five. You think
of the extent to which in New Zealand has changed
as a relatively small country. You think of the extent
to which the United States has changed since nineteen forty five.
In nineteen forty five, India was still a colony of

(30:48):
the United Kingdom. Most countries in the Africa and Asia
were colonies of European powers. If you try to run
Australia or New Zealand, lettle On, the United States or
India today on the basis of these structures political structures
that were in place in nineteen forty five, all of
us would come to a coach stands it's difficult enough

(31:10):
as it is running these countries now. It's very difficult
governing challenges, governess challenges, but they'll come to her. The
world has changed even more ramatically, and yet you're still
trying to run it in terms of the structure put
in place in nineteen forty five. So unsurprisingly it's completely
out of date. If you were to have a Secrety
Council of permanent members today, how many would you have

(31:32):
and who would there be? And let me just finish
his answer with that example. Of all the serious reform
proposals I have seen, not one contains a list of
those that will be dropped from permanent membership. But if
you don't do that, then you just expand it and
make it completely unwieldy and unworkable. Would we include Russia

(31:55):
as a permanent member today? I doubt it. Would we
include both the UK and the France, or even one
of them as a permanent member? I am not convinced.
Would we include injure? Almost certainly? Would we include result
I think very likely. Would we have a system where
you don't have a single permanent member from Africa, especially

(32:15):
as the agenda of the United Nations in both the
development side and the peace and security side have been
dominated by African issues and African supitits again, I doubt it.
So if you can't drop and change and add to
have let's say, expand the Security Council from fifteen to
twenty five and have eight instead of five permanent members,

(32:37):
and by permanent making maybe make them fifteen year terms,
but then renewable by election rather than just forever, because
the world can change again, And think about whether you
want veto for everyone or whether you want a single
veto anymore longer in order to have a better balance
between permissive and restrictive authority of your supreme decision making

(32:59):
body in the world. Then you have a different structure now,
because this is considered to be so difficult to reform.
Proposals end up tinkering with that which is double rather
than that which is most important and most urgent. And
since that's not feasible in the for semial feature favor,
I think we have to convene another San Francisco type

(33:21):
conference to redesign United Nations two point zero because the
need for it still remains. So the answer, the strong
answer to your question is I think it is no
longer fit for purpose, and I don't think it's capable
of being seriously, substantively, substantially reformed. So we do need
to think of a replacement. And the failures are there.

(33:41):
I don't have to go through that. Everyone knows.

Speaker 2 (33:43):
Yeah, all right. So the problem, the problem that then
confronts anybody involved is how do you how do you
re establable, how do you re establish it from its
present existence, or how do you in this day and age,
go about setting up something that is competitive or a replace.

Speaker 4 (34:05):
You identify who are the major powers, to identify which
major powers and which additional countries may be have its
history and traditional and the depth of experience as skill
sets to be able to engage in what we call
normative entrepreneurship in orders to provide the normative leadership, bring

(34:28):
them together in an expert group first, and then with
the political leadership, engage into reimagining a new United Nations
and then send out invitations to bringing them together in
another location to negotiate the doctor final eyes and procestees

(34:49):
in terms of a new United Nations to zero charter
and get them to agree to that sign off and
ratify it if they have to in their constitutional processes.
So exactly how the United Nations was set up, exactly
how the League of Nations was set up. It means
leadership by champions with the relevant experience and weight, so

(35:13):
diplomatic heft is important.

Speaker 2 (35:16):
That's a lee to that you didn't mention that you
didn't mention.

Speaker 3 (35:19):
That I was going to say. That means you have
to have the United States as one of the leading actors. Now,
United States always comes with some baggage, so there is
an instinctive suspicion if the United States takes it up.
But you can't get very far with any international effort
these days without the United States. And that's going to

(35:41):
be a factor regardless of who is present at any
given time. So it has to be there, but the
United States cannot do it on its own. And that
is a problem that I think affects trump approach to
world events. He takes decisions and then asks others to

(36:01):
join him. But he's going to be in child sort
of thing. It's not going to work like that. It
takes the leadership, but it's not the only one at
the top table. They have to be others and they
come together and do that. That's the only way to
go forward.

Speaker 2 (36:16):
Sorry, the I I saw in my in my mind
as you said that, that that picture of the first
time that Trump went to Europe and was confronting European leaders,
world leaders. He was sitting. They were standing over him,

(36:38):
most of them, you know the one I'm talking about,
And that was.

Speaker 3 (36:41):
Angel and Mercle leaning intoward the rest. You got it,
that's the one.

Speaker 2 (36:47):
How do you how do you avoid that? It doesn't
matter whether it's him or Ronald Reagan or whoever it
might be. You can't. You can't really forever avoid the
strengths of an individual or a country combined to play
everybody else's game.

Speaker 3 (37:06):
No, you can't. And I'm not sure that Trump would
necessarily be the best person for that sort of role.
You know, he's a deal maker. Deal Maker is almost
sort of well, it's clocked into winners and losers for
room bok, isn't it? And the best deal for one
party the other the other. I mean, you can't have

(37:27):
today any international organization without having the United States and China.
Let's begin with these two without having both of them
at the table for designing the new institutions and for
agreeing to break up how and who is going to
run the new institutions. At the moment, the statuscore powers,

(37:50):
shall we say, represented in the G seven, have been
so resistant to giving any meaningful role to the rising
powers that the latter group gave up in frustration and
set up their own grouping called the Bricks, which has
now expanded to be un sustainable membership I think, But
that's a different issue. And Bricks emerged as a direct

(38:15):
competitor on economic financial governance arrangements globally to the G seven,
which was the old western colonial powers essentially. And then
they realized that this isn't going to work, so they
came together in the G twenty. But in looking at
the G twenty, they didn't quite get it right in

(38:36):
terms of numbers at the table because it destroyed the
all purpose of having a relatively small group. Again, I
was involved in that in a small group that was
running that as a I feel like simulation exercise. That
this was in Canada, and we thought the ideal number
of participants at the table should be around fourteen or fifteen.

(38:59):
But we also thought that we already had in existence
the G twenty finance minister's meeting and it will be
easier to move that to a leader's level meeting. And
the idea essentially originated with Paul Martin, the former Finance
Minister and then Prime Minister of Canada, and he and
Larry Sommers, who has now been disgraced as part of

(39:21):
the Epstein's scandal, But he and Larry Sommers initiated the
G twenty Finance Ministers after the Asian financial crisis of
the mid late nineties and Paul's experience with that was
that this personal relationships of the leaders will facilitate a

(39:45):
degree of intimacy and comfort levels where they can make
the decisions. It's only leaders who can engage in trading
apples for oranges. If you like ministers grunt because their
responsibility is a per portfolio. Leaders have overall responsibility back
to the policy trail of argument, and if they have

(40:06):
the trust and can speak without the presence of their
advisors and bureaucrats, then they can go back and tell
the bureaucracy what they have decided and instruct them to
make it possible. And if the leaders are committed, it's
possible to overcome built in institutional hurdles. Now this is

(40:27):
before we realize just how entrance and powerful the socord
blog is the blob I mean is so that was
the idea, but for that he said, we agreed you
only need fourteen or fifteen people, but you can work
with twenty. But in practice, the G twenty now has
any number of hangers on what is it? It's closer to
forty than twenty. Actually, when you start once you start

(40:49):
looking around as to who else is there? The UN
Secretary General is there? The OEC these Secretary General is
there a lot of other real organizations secretaries general are
also there. I've lost interest, you know, they just expanded
all over and then you still face the problem of
the G twenty that is still a self selected group

(41:11):
and it will have the efficiency and effectiveness but it
lacks the universal legitimacy and that can only come from
the United Nations. So our conclusion then was that even
the leaders of the most powerful or the phrase that
we use, was the systemically most significant actors in the
world order okay in terms of the economic weight, populations, size,

(41:36):
military power, et cetera. If they can make an agreement
that covers pretty close to one hundred percent of economic
activities and a vast majority of population, et cetera, they
will still need to have that decision validated and gratified
in the UN system, because at the moment, there is

(41:56):
no other organization that has universal legitimacy and doesn't have
So the cross between legitimacy and efficiency, you get the
efficiency from Z twenty, you get the legitimacy room United Nations.
So if you were to have a new United Nations,
you need to see how you can combine these two
requirements in that as well, and then get rid of

(42:17):
these minilateral and multilateral or lateral periferating g groups as well.
At the moment, you just got a dog's breakfast of
doble governance arrangements, so you need to rationalize and bring
them together.

Speaker 2 (42:33):
I can't find fault with what you're saying, but I
can I can question it. In part, it's very easy
to talk about this is how it will work or
must work or whatever. But you were right in drawing
attention to all the other all the others that are
holding conferences all over the world all the time, et cetera,

(42:55):
including the World Economic Forum, which I despise, but.

Speaker 3 (43:03):
There you have a growing followership in that.

Speaker 2 (43:06):
How can you on a continue basis prevent corruption from
creeping in?

Speaker 3 (43:12):
It's again a much larger problem we you know, come
back to states where it should be easier to control it.
What we have seen is, again we've talked about this before,
we were going from national security state and surveillance state
to the administrative state, where parliaments have delegated responsibility to

(43:35):
quongos and experts. Executives have done the same, and the
expert class has even started acting in quasi judicial manner
in various things. So that growth of the administrative state
has now been replicated at the international level with an
international technocratic elite. And that's where in that democracy art

(43:57):
all I made the point that the old left right
divide based on economic governing philosophy has been overtaken by
a divide between the techmocratic elites at both national and
international level and the massive people and the reaction to
that which is very strong. And you know, I give
the example, and we've talked about it of the so

(44:19):
called Voice in Australia a couple of years ago, when
all the elite, different dimensions or domains of the elite
were united in supporting it, and yet the proposal was
defeated sixty forty when put to the vote, and then
the people rejected it. But did the elites accept that verdict. No.
I mean, just as you have efforts of foot in

(44:40):
the UK to reverse Brexit vote. Similarly at the state
level they've been doing quietly equivalent to the Voice into
the system, and there is a massive answer against that.
And again polls have shown overwhelming rejection of this welcome
to country and acknowledgment of country and stuff like that

(45:01):
in Australia. But if anything, is still seemed to be proliferating,
and so you have the decline of conference and faith
in the democratic system as a system. I think the
same applies into global things as well. We need to
recognize that any bureaucracy that exists for eight decades, will

(45:24):
have a set of vested interests, and that affects even
its governance arrangements. I was with the Inachnaesian University at
a senior level. If we went to our governing council
and said we have fourteen institutes around the world, we
like to close the following four, the automatic instinctive response
is that's a backwards step. But as we say, I

(45:47):
want to add another four and these are the sources
from which we have funding for this, including endowment fund,
can you please approve, the assumption will be that they
would say yes because they think it's a sign of
success that they are growing, so that means we have
more authority, we have more reach, we have more budget,

(46:08):
and then at some point doing this in terms of
growth of the bureaucracy overrides the region why we set
up to as an international bureaucracy in the first place,
and that has happened, as I said, even nationally. And
it was one of the arguments sincidentally against the boys,
that if you have a new department, it will have

(46:30):
a vested interest, you know, the executive of that and
the personnel and that want to keep their jobs on
to expand their authority, want to expand their budget, and
that's how it goes. Over eight decades, that becomes very
much entrenched. Now at the national level, we do have
elections at precent democracies, we do have political ministers who

(46:51):
are supposed to be the posses of that. We've seen
that has become less and less true. And in fact,
the entrenched bureaucracy, you know, going back to Yes Minister
and Yes Prime Minister committee series, that's become more of
a problem rather than less of a problem in the
decades since. And the reason that was such a successful

(47:13):
TV round I was they've got it exactly right in
terms of the relationship.

Speaker 2 (47:18):
Is democracy Well, actually this trainscends into another discussion, but
it's not meant to be connected to the article that
you wrote at this point anyway. But do you think
that it would be legitimate to say that democracy as
we've known it is finished?

Speaker 3 (47:38):
I don't think it's finished, and I think the reaction
shows that people want to re estate control take that control.
And again after the South Australian elections over the weekend,
Colin Hansen actually said in her victory speech, well, I
shouldn't say victory speech. But you know what I mean,
the celebratory speech that do you want to take back

(48:00):
our country? That is a fairly widespread sentiment now across
the Western world in terms of the feeling that and
that's also reflected in the feeling of people that we
have lost control of our lives. We want the country
back that we grew up in, that has centuries of
tradition and history behind it, that we love, and we
want to change patriotism to be a positive sentiment again

(48:26):
rather than want to be derided and dismissed, et cetera.
So these are the shorthands for saying they feel they
have lost control over their lives and destiny and they
want to retake it. And if that means a reaction
against globalization, so be it. If it means breaking the
stranglehold of the so called uni parties in favor of

(48:48):
insurgent parties, so be it as well. So this whole
notion of dismissing Nail Ferage or Pauline Hansen or the
AFT in Germany, or even Georgia Milonei earlier in Italy,
or Marine le Pen in France as populist leaders, what
does that mean populist means they are responding to concerns

(49:08):
shared by a substantial segment of the population, perhaps even
a majority, in terms of what they want at the moment,
particularly with respect to mass amigration, but also with respect
to energy security, with respect to cultural that cultural identity
is respect to national identity. And if the majority or

(49:29):
a substantial segment of the population wants that, and there
are leaders and the parties responding to that, well that
is what democracy is supposed to do, translate what people
want into governing and governance arrangements and public policies exactly.
But in fact they're trying to resist that and verify

(49:51):
those who do that and dismiss them and make them anathema,
and that in turn means people begin to lose confidence
in that. So just this morning reading the telegraph from
the UK overnight, and one of the things I don't
know if you've seen that, is how the slump in

(50:11):
conference in the police and criminal justice system is in
fact being led by people who identify as reformed UK voters.
So I don't know if you've seen that. I've just
got on my screen. I kept it for this reason.
Only thirty percent of the party's voters said they had
confidence in the digital system, compared with sixty seven percent
of labor and sixty three percent of Conservatives voters. Fewer

(50:34):
than half of reform voters, forty seven percent say they
have confidence in the local police force. This dissatisfaction amongst
reform voters contributed to the biggest annual drop in confidence
in the judicial system on record, from sixty nine percent
twenty four to fifty seven percent in twenty five, while
those voicing a lack of confidence arose from thirty to

(50:57):
forty three percent. That is a general phenomenon. It just
happens to be measured there. So that's I thinks relevant
to this. And there's also this other thing which if
I can find it somewhere.

Speaker 2 (51:18):
While you're looking, there's there's a couple of things that
that that I need to ask with regard to what
you've said the for a democracy you need you need
good education. Yeah, uh, we don't have good education or
haven't had it in Australia and New Zealand and other

(51:39):
countries for for some considerable time. Now let me justify,
let me justify that we haven't seen it just well,
not this year anyway. But kids get taught things in school,
encouraged to believe things in schools that are that are
not true. And I would I would utilize the climate discussion,

(52:02):
the Great Climate Discussion is as one of them, because
they're they're getting they're getting mine blown with with one
with one perspective and don't even get the chance to
appreciate what alternative there is, let alone dwell on it
and come to a different conclusion. So they they even
get pushed into taking Fridays off and going marching in

(52:25):
the city. And that's happened all over Australia, it's happened
in New Zealand. And so these kids are voting for
idiots in parliament and we've only just dispensed with one
government that well a little while back, with one government
falls into that category. So how can you establish a

(52:46):
decent democracy when you've got new arrivals in the country
that don't know anything about it, and lots of them,
and you've got kids that are being pushed out of
out of schools here with totally wrong beliefs, and the
inability to track down.

Speaker 3 (53:03):
On the private martyrs looking at you, Yes, okay, that
acucizing with the thing I was looking for which I
found on the twentieth on Friday, just on the literally
on the eve of the South of student intelection, one
nation put out a little statement of just sixty four words,

(53:26):
which I think is the best summary, distillation, best success
statement of this problem with the energy thing that you're
talking about. Let me just read it out. I'm porting
directly from the entirety of their statement. Okay, we need
a secure, reliable energy future. Every leaf forward in human
progress has come from mastering energy, from fire to steam,

(53:50):
from coal to oil. Each step has powered stronger economies,
lifted people out of poverty, and secured our future. Energy
isn't a luxury, it's the backbone of prosperity. Get it
wrong and everything else suffers. Get it right and then thrives.
Now that is a remarkably concise and success statement of

(54:15):
what energy policy should be aiming for, and what is
benefits are and what the cost star if you get
it wrong. So that is one nation, and that is
something that I think is wrong. A lot of support
to these, as I said, populist insurgent parties. They recognize
that their primary duty is to their people and energy

(54:36):
security is fundamental to that. As opposed to ratings. The
second part of my response to your question is, yes,
education is important, but I wouldn't begin with school. I'd
begin with the universities because it is we in the
tertiary institutions who train the school teachers, who train these
days unit in your time and you began, it may

(54:59):
have impossible to go straight from school to journalism. Now
you need undergraduate degrees or qualifications in journalism. So we
train the journal we train as a financial expert. We
train pretty much close to one hundred percent, certainly of
the senior levels of the bureaucracy. Most of the politicians
now begin as students, get blooded in student politics and universities.

(55:24):
So you begin with universities and with the university is
what we have is a complete lack of viewpoint diversity.
Instead we have a geological uniformity. You know, university equals
lack of diversity. Put it that way, and as a result,
we have a misalignment with public sentiments. So talk. Here's

(55:46):
some from two of the world's leading universities. A study
by Yale University's Buckley Institute in December auster so it's
a new study examine the political leanings of faculty members
across all degree granting undergraduate departments plus the law and
management schools. See nearly seventeen hundred faculty they surveyed eighty

(56:12):
two percent were registered Democrats and two percent were Republicans.
Then the Yale Daily News looked at official federal election parlies.
Now this is easier with the US because that's the
only country that requires people as registered political affiliations to
be declared, and we don't have that in Australian New Zeeland,
and I hope you don't, but it's there anyway. The

(56:33):
Yale Daily News looked at and showed that ninety eight
percent of faculty donations in twenty twenty five last year
were to Democrats and not a single one to Republicans,
and a majority of undergraduate departments didn't have a single
Republican either. Similarly, a matching faculty survey by the Harvard Crimson,

(56:57):
their student newspaper in twenty twenty two, I don't know
if they've had more reasent ones showed that eighty two
point five percent of Harvard faculty identified as liberals stroke
very liberal, and only one point seven percent as conservative.
So your cates as situation in universities in the faculty
is highly surprising that they pass on that to the students,

(57:21):
and the students come from all these elite domains in
public life, and so that then gets reflected and transmitted
into schools and the kids get indoctrinated and hence that
feeling if you like that. Universities and schools therefore have
changed people from places and institutions where students are educated

(57:48):
into transmission channels for indoctrination of the prevailing orthodoxy in
the cultural and educational and intellectual elite. And that is
a problem, and it is fundamentally as orts de democracy.
I agree, Yeah, go.

Speaker 2 (58:04):
On, where do you get where do you get the
educators the staff to make that transition even to roll
it because those that are graduated fall into the categories
as you've just described them. So there is so there
is very little, highly restricted number of shall we say,

(58:26):
possible educators who could do it. So you start, you
start the movement, and it gets overwhelmed.

Speaker 3 (58:33):
Again.

Speaker 2 (58:33):
I can think of two or three two or three
American professors who who lost their jobs.

Speaker 3 (58:40):
And you know, m h.

Speaker 2 (58:42):
And there is a there is a great fear that
if you side with them, So somebody say somebody who
has the courage two and the balls, as they say,
to stand up. Yes, well, different language and and if
you're just trying to do politely, yeah, well would that

(59:05):
be polite in Mexico?

Speaker 3 (59:08):
I don't know, but they are talking in the English
speaking context.

Speaker 2 (59:12):
The well, the word is now. I avoided it for
a long time, but it's one of those words. It's
now become acceptable and its utilized quite quite frequently. But
if you make a stand in a university, you'll struggle
to find people to support you because they're too scared
of losing their own jobs.

Speaker 3 (59:34):
Is that right? It says the number of polls have
confirmed that people are self censor quite a lot. So
I think again, you need to begin in politics, and
you need to identify parties and leaders who are prepared

(59:54):
to confront this and address it and readdress it. So
it has to begin from that, and you need people
with the confidence to go after that. In a sense,
I guess you could say that that Trump has tried
to do that in taking all the culture wars directly
and frontally instead of start stepping it in and ignoring

(01:00:17):
it with polities, and that's been the part of his attraction.
So the very things for which again Paulin Hansen has
been dismissed. She's not come around to being trusted because
she's been saying these things for thirty years and has
consistency and authenticity, and therefore from that I think she
is now gaining the trust of a wider cohort of

(01:00:40):
Australian voters who are giving up on the two main
parties because you go back to procedures and appointments at
top level, where one side believes in what it wants
to do and appoints its people to engage in that
agenda as CEOs of what the institution, and you have
the other side that's embarrassed and ashamed about that and

(01:01:02):
thinks this is a war that is not worth fighting,
whereas in fact we have evidence again from around the
world that for many people culture is important. So if
you make a change and I object to that on
terms of my beliefs, then you accuse me of fighting
a culture war, when in fact you're the ones who
started to do that. A very good example, certainly from

(01:01:25):
Australia is the E Safety Commission and the inaugural E
Safety Commissioner who has been appointed. The thing that was
done by the Coalition government, and Labor had been happy
to exploit that and take it even further in terms
of electronic censorship if you like, or censorship of the
digital media, etc. So, yes, it is part of that,

(01:01:49):
but you do need a top leader committed to that,
with a force of character and courage of conviction. I
don't think they have to be quite in the same
if you like, publicly vulgar mode as the American president,
but they need that strength of character to be able
to do it. So again, from the American context, someone

(01:02:12):
like Ron Dissenters in Florida or Vice President Jadvans in
the administration as well, a politer version slightly well not slightly,
quite a lot polier, but nonetheless with the same forceful
personality and strength of convictions and character to carry the
thing forward. You need that if you're going to reverse it.

(01:02:32):
Because the extent to which public purse subsidizes a lot
of this rubbish, it's not just quite astonishing but quite
frightening in a way in terms of how much of
our money it goes into subsidies for renewables, goes into
subsidies for arts then engage in indulging their luxury beliefs

(01:02:58):
and so on. So I think I'm not sure that
there is an alternative to voting identifying a market niche
or a market gap, if you like, in the political
party and then citizens recognizing that and voting for that.
Now that means they will need to build up a

(01:03:19):
core of quality candidates, which is where one nation still lacks.
This is where Reform UK has recognized that, and the
people that Nigel Faraj has brought in starting people like
the use of the use of or Robert Jeneric and others,

(01:03:43):
and some of the people that he has encouraged defection
from the old conservatives with the experience. You need to
be able to project credibility initially, that you have sufficient depth,
sufficient breadth of competent skilled people who know the system,
who know how to operate it and can break the

(01:04:04):
stranglehold of the blob from within, because again you have
fears and genuine I think genuinely based fears that the
blow will defeat you if you try to make changes,
and you to be able to persevere and do that
you begin with day one.

Speaker 2 (01:04:23):
There's a lack of political leadership as well. There is
and it doesn't matter what you think of Trump.

Speaker 3 (01:04:32):
He has it, he has it yet And just so
I'm not misunderstood on that point, Can I just point
to your audience in particular, mostly in New Zealand. That
is what the Labor Party did in the mid nineteen
eighties with Roger Douglas and David Loner. So it's the
same thing. You need that on the center right now

(01:04:53):
because it's going too far in the other direction. But
that's what you need, a small group that knows what
it wants and is prepared to smash through the existing
barriers in order to get that, because that reflects the
popular will.

Speaker 2 (01:05:07):
And you've got that. You've got that in Australia at
the moment, albeit that in terms of.

Speaker 3 (01:05:14):
The depth and breadth of people behind her, it's getting there,
but it's a long bit ago.

Speaker 2 (01:05:18):
Well, that's that's true. I think it was in the
Australian on on the weekend that the headline wash and
the columnist was I remember correctly, who does Sky Australia
TV at seven o'clock our time?

Speaker 3 (01:05:37):
Was that beach On?

Speaker 2 (01:05:44):
Think I've lost that though too.

Speaker 3 (01:05:46):
In the Australian.

Speaker 2 (01:05:47):
Yeah, front page or at least the it was front
page on online oh yes, I know what it was.
And the and the headline was the headline was politics
has final I think it was politics has finally caught

(01:06:07):
up with with with her rather than Yeah that was
Tris Kenny.

Speaker 3 (01:06:13):
Yeah, yeah, he has his arm Swan Sky correct, Yeah, yeah,
he's right.

Speaker 2 (01:06:19):
So that that linked me to to Trump because because
of the he's being criticized about Iran not knowing anything,
et cetera, not knowing what he's doing, where he's had
anything about Iran when he was of course the film
did an interview back in the eighties, was was it
Rhan Barrett?

Speaker 3 (01:06:39):
Uh?

Speaker 2 (01:06:41):
Where he where he was talking about exactly that He's
been consistent on that exactly. That's the That's the point
I was.

Speaker 3 (01:06:49):
I was, he has he he he. I think what
this has brought home, certainly to me in a way
that I hadn't appliciate before, is the extent of which,
whatever his other faults might be, Trump is genuinely an
American pair shot. If he got back to his early
statements at that time and he hadn't even thought about politics,

(01:07:10):
or if he had, I'm not aware of it. He
felt that sense of national humiliation starting with the US
embassy hostage crisis in Tehran after the Islamic Revolution in
seventy nine. He has been very consistent saying that we
can never permit Iran to acquire nuclear weapons. He's been

(01:07:31):
consistent to saying that they will respect us when we
present strength, not to be through weakness, and he's been
after that in that sense. Having said that, I think
on Iran, he also shows some of the weaknesses that
you can see, for example in his Board of Peace idea,

(01:07:52):
the very notion that America can dominate over everyone else
and be he, as a president president can do it
on his own in not necessarily a violation of the
US Constitution, but certainly in disregardless aspects of it. I mean,

(01:08:13):
you know, you go to not Trump but his secretary
of Warner Pete Hexit, and you see his statements. The
transfer is gloating about the fact that we're not going
to be shackled by any rules of engagement and any
normative constraints. They are down, we know it, and we're
going to beat them even more when they're down. That

(01:08:34):
sort of thing I don't think is quite the way
to go in terms of being able to sustain this.
And if you look at the Real Clear Politics poll
of poll's average, Trump's unfavorability is now crossed minus fourteen.
So he's losing his audience within the States, he's losing

(01:08:55):
a lot of his audience globally, even people and countries
who have been supportive of him in the past. And
I think as a result, he's increasing the risk of
a re capture of the House and Senate about the
Democrats in November. Should that happen, he's finished. He will
be subjected to impeachment, but with much greater chances of

(01:09:19):
actual conviction this time around, and he'll be completely hobbled
in the last three years of his final administration. So
I think there are those dangers to him in that.
But yes, I agree with you that he has been
consistent on this. But then it's not clear to me

(01:09:39):
that he had thought through the full consequences and options
before he launched into this attack. It seems more likely
than not. In fact, it seems almost certain that he
thought by this time it will be over, that they
would have the leadership, would have been decapitated, they may
have been a populist popular uprising against the regime, or

(01:10:02):
they would have surrendered rather than continue accepting more severe punishment.
The fact that he failed to anticipate the closure of
the Strait of Hormos and the Iranian attacks on the
shipping and now the energy infrastructure. That shows a lack
of forethinking as well. And then you get into other

(01:10:24):
issues that you know, he's given statements of multiple objectives,
a lot of the contradictory in terms of goals, in
terms of timeline, in terms of progress achieved. And then
you go back to what was the June last year
or the July, the attacks on Tehran and his insistence
that Iran's nuclear program has been completely obliterated, and when

(01:10:48):
anyone questioned it, he directed his ire and fury at
those questioning it. For example, that's sorry again in the
Washington Post where they quoted Defense Intelligence Agency assessment that
you know, they hadn't been quite obliterated, and they quoted
intercepts on Iranians officials saying that damage was less than
they had and Trump got very angry with them.

Speaker 2 (01:11:11):
I don't disagree with you necessarily, Yeah, but when it
comes to the Iranians, I don't believe anything they say.
Nothing I'm talking about I'm talking about the administration.

Speaker 3 (01:11:23):
I don't believe them what they say as well. But
then you go back to the system we had. I
think one of the few mistakes that Trump made in
his first administration, which has doubled down now, is the
way he rejected or we called, you know, the JCP
or a Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, which was the
nuclear deal that Obamas und twenty fifteen. Set aside the

(01:11:44):
money that Obama administration gave to around that's a different issue,
but in terms of the deal, over a decade of
sanctions before that, Iran's nuclear ambition had progressed at remarkable
speed and to remarkable depth. And you can demonstrate that
with the IAEA beliefs and documents about the number of

(01:12:07):
centrifuges they had acquired, the extent to which they had
advanced stockpiled envested uranium, and the capability that they had
in terms of the time required to actually assemble a
new bomb. Okay, in twenty fifteen, you have the agreement,
and as part of the agreement, they destroyed what was it,
ninety eight percent of their existing stockpile of dressed uranium

(01:12:32):
put limits of three point six seven percent investment, which
is well below even the minimum concern that you have
at five percent, well below the twenty percent that they
had been aiming for. Then they completely closed off the
plutonium pathway to the bomb. They introduced unprecedented inspection rights

(01:12:53):
for the IAEA, unprecedented in terms of country that had
not been defeated on the battlefield, and the IAEA kept
certifying that they had honored all these essential obligations. And
so you had that twenty eighteen at the time that
Trump exists the JCPO, despite the fact that it does

(01:13:14):
multilacturally negotiated in which the US took part, despite the
fact that it does unanimously endorsed by the UN Skirity Council,
which meant the US had endorsed it as well. And
once Trump withdrew, he freed Iran of all these restrictions.
And then they went back to enrichment. They brought in

(01:13:35):
more modern centrifugius, newer generations of centrifugus. They began enriching,
and we now think that they have what is it
four hundred programs or something of uranium enriched to sixty percent,
which is very close to the full weapon grade ninety
percent enrichment, and it already is capable of making bombs.
It just takes a bit longer so they can make

(01:13:57):
and it takes more uranium, so they make fewer bombs.
But the assessment was that they're now in a position
they could this is before this struck last year in
June July, that they are now in the position where
they could make the bomb in a very quick period
they wanted to. So by pulling out Iran a sorry,
by pulling out Trump actually accelerated Iran's reorganization capability efforts

(01:14:21):
as he stayed in. Those restrictions were in place and
applied until twenty thirty. So you tell me, would we
not have been much better off in terms of what
worries you and what war is me, which is a
bomb by Iran? Would you not have been much better
off if he had stayed in that deal? And if
Iran violated, going with full un Secrety Council backing to
enforce it.

Speaker 2 (01:14:44):
Well, it didn't happen that way, and it's now happening.
It didn't another another way. And yeah, we wait, we
wait for a result, all right, So I have one
last question for you. Sure the when you when you
were talking about putting putting together a replacement at the

(01:15:05):
at the UN or or with any thing else for
that matter, and the and the emerging, the emerging powers,
et cetera. Where would you put Iran? Would you include
them in the round table?

Speaker 3 (01:15:25):
I'm not the present regime, no out, But this is
the this is.

Speaker 2 (01:15:29):
This is this is the regime though that's been that's
been there for what is it forty seven years or something?

Speaker 3 (01:15:35):
Yeah, but I'm not. I'm not. I'm not including every
country in the world at the around table. So on
what places would I justify having them?

Speaker 2 (01:15:41):
I wouldn't know, because because because of their power, the science.

Speaker 3 (01:15:45):
Of that, they're not they're not They're not very powerful.
That there's a regional nuisance. They're not globally powerful. It's
not a globally systemic country. I mean, all, all right,
so powerful country.

Speaker 2 (01:16:00):
So the the while this is, while this is all
being formulated, they they show that they have a tommy
weaponry that is as good as anybody's got, or at
least you know, in the same category anyway, enough to
do enough damage and buy them buy them a future.

(01:16:21):
Would you include them or not?

Speaker 3 (01:16:24):
Then no, No, I open based it on atomic I
would include from the Middle East, I would consider including
Soudi Arabia thirty and Egypt.

Speaker 2 (01:16:38):
Nobody talks about Egypt, not anymore, do they?

Speaker 1 (01:16:41):
No?

Speaker 3 (01:16:41):
No? And again, if you want to go beyond the
Middle East, what from the Islamic world? I would include Nigeria.
In Africa, I would include South Africa.

Speaker 2 (01:16:49):
So yeah, all right, now, the date that this is
going to make a public appearance.

Speaker 3 (01:16:56):
Thirteenth April, available thirteenth April US time from Amazon.

Speaker 2 (01:17:02):
And shall we enkindle and paperback? I'm sorry, in ebook,
kindle and paperback in that case, I hope it's a
big seller. And on that note, that note, we'd better
we'd better go our separate ways.

Speaker 3 (01:17:23):
Well, good luck, And as I said, once it's out,
you can talk to David and get the medical perspective
on it as well.

Speaker 2 (01:17:30):
Yes, but there's much more that I'd like to talk
to you about along the way too. Sure, So okay, Yes,
it's been a pleasure and always is. And I release
you for some considerable time.

Speaker 3 (01:17:45):
Thank you, and I'll let you get back to thinking
what your wife wanted.

Speaker 2 (01:17:55):
All right, thanks, thank you. Rummis. I went to the

(01:18:16):
mail room for podcast number two hundred and thirty one,
the date being the twenty fifth of March twenty twenty six.
I thought i'd throw that in, why not so that
people know when it was done. You see, and things
change between now and when people might hear something, and
there's a bit of that going on this weekend now.
I asked for well, I suggested that your commentary on

(01:18:39):
the interview with Patrick Basham, no, let's call it the
discussion with Patrick Basham would be interesting and so it
has proved to be. Missus producer, Good morning Layton.

Speaker 3 (01:18:50):
Hi, how are you very well?

Speaker 5 (01:18:51):
Thank you go for it, Chris says, I have just
listened to your interview with Patrick Bashaman podcast three twenty.
I agree people in Iran are opposed to the regime
because of the state of the economy. However, I think
it is only part of the reason, particularly for women
who want to be able to chew what they wear
and how to wear it. Also, people, particularly the young,

(01:19:13):
are concerned about freedom. They want to be able to
access the Internet when they like without fearing it will
be closed down at the women of the authorities. They
also want to be able to criticize the regime without
fear of negative consequences, such as imprisonment, beatings, torture and death.

Speaker 2 (01:19:32):
Sort of summarizes it, doesn't it. In other words, they
want freedom like we think we have and we do
by comparison. So from Gary, after listening to the latest episode,
can I conclude that Patrick Masham believes the US invading
Iran would be a mistake and that the US or

(01:19:53):
should I say, the Republicans would lose the war and
the midterm election. He seems to be ignoring one major
factor which you already brought up. Whether Iran may or
already does have an nuclear missile. If they do, Israel
would be wiped out and millions would die. How did

(01:20:14):
they justify that point? And if the US doesn't act now,
how would they respond if Iran launches a strike at
the time, specifically at that time. One important thing after
your interview is that over the weekend Iran fired two
mid range missiles at Diego Garcia military base. I wonder
if his view will change because of that. I love

(01:20:36):
to listen to your pridecast. Keep up the good work, regards, Gary.
Let me just say this, Patrick and I have known
each other on thirteen years, since twenty thirteen, and we
are friends and we remain friends and some people who
seem to think that World War III had broken out

(01:20:57):
on the podcast last week. No it hadn't. And our
conversation after we stopped recording was the best.

Speaker 5 (01:21:06):
Friends should be able to disagree all times.

Speaker 2 (01:21:09):
This is my thought.

Speaker 5 (01:21:11):
Leighton Shane says, really enjoyed the conversation you had with Patrick.
He made sense of a lot of things if you
look at it from the conservative versus liberal perspective and
his interpretation of President Trump's support base. I have been
following Barbara Boyd and Susan Kakinder from Promethean Action, who
look at the Iran situation from another angle. Their view

(01:21:33):
indicates that the Iran war is hidden in underlying battle
where the actual target is the UK or in particular
London and their control over the trade routes which affects
the global economy, especially where oil is concerned. They indicate
that President Trump is quietly knocking over all the chess
pieces to stop London's decades of historical and deliberate influence

(01:21:58):
of chaos in the Arab nations, in particular Iran, and
Shane goes on to say, I'd love to hear your
opinion on this or maybe even talk to them, and
then he says, I listened to all your podcasts and
just love the honesty and sincere on Beyonce of your show.

Speaker 2 (01:22:16):
Very nice. Indeed, I only came across the Promethean action
recently by accident, actually, and I've watched a little bit
of it, and I haven't formed an opinion, to be honest,
but I'm going to go back and have a look
at what you're suggesting. So from James, we attach a
podcast of a conversation between Chamin Nawi, an Iranian Canadian

(01:22:39):
journalist with a master's degree in international relations from Columbia University,
and Victor Gao, a Chinese lawyer, an international relations expert,
and a professor at su Chow University. We urge you
to listen to it as it could well alter your
perspective on Iran away from the US generated propaganda which

(01:23:01):
permeates Western media. Anyone who thinks about the unfortunate turn
of events in the Middle East would realize as the
possibility of Israel using a nuclear weapon as their desperation grows.
Victor Gow's comments on this are enlightening. We continue to
enjoy your weekly podcast, Beamed all the way to Columbia.
With all the best wishes to you and missus Producer

(01:23:23):
and related congratulations on your award. Jim, I can only
say thank you. There are as I've just gone through. Well,
as I've just said a moment ago, there is advice
coming my way about what I should do and how
I should think, and where I'm wrong, etc. With the
greatest of respect. I appreciate being passed on things that

(01:23:46):
are useful or that you think are useful. But if
I don't think so, then you have to forgive me
for not being, shall we say, a productive recipient.

Speaker 5 (01:24:00):
Leydon Evan says, in relation to Patrick Basham, brilliant interview,
balanced views, pretty honest accounts from him, which some may
find difficult to digest. However, digest we must if we
wish to be open to varied opinions. I had thought
myself the move to assault around may have been a
gamble regarding their ability to come back with vengeance.

Speaker 2 (01:24:23):
Meanwhile, well done. I agree with you, Evan, Thank you,
Thank you Evan, much appreciated. The interesting thing is that
when you think you have an opinion, well you do
have an opinion, but you might doubt it a little
bit or you might reconsider it when you get a
bit more of an opinion from somewhere else. And so

(01:24:44):
the only thing you can do, really is to pursue
the doubt that you might now have and analyze it
and see where you come out.

Speaker 1 (01:24:53):
Isn't it?

Speaker 5 (01:24:54):
Isn't it called being human?

Speaker 2 (01:24:55):
The problem is, I don't know. The problem is that
once you go down that trail, you get led from
one to the other, to another to another, and in
the end you end up as confused as you as
you might have been at the beginning, or even more so. Well,
there's the danger of that. It can drive your nuts,
especially in circumstances like these. So I always enjoy the

(01:25:17):
Patrick Basham podcasts, although this latest one was a little
more difficult to listen to than the previous one. This
may have been due to my bias against Iran and
my bias for Donald Trump. Is there a difference between
bias and belief? You can argue that amongst yourself. In
my opinion, Trump was elected as an anti politician because

(01:25:39):
the American public was so disillusioned by American politics, So
why then are people surprised that he doesn't act like
a politician? Goes off script and speaks to his opinion
or his opinion at the same time he's speaking. However,
I think the actions he's taken are far more logical
than his oratory. Trump is the only president who would

(01:26:02):
have attacked Iran at this time because he's not concerned
about personal or political attacks on him. That may make
him more dangerous than most politicians, but it also makes
him more decisive. This war will not last ten years
or even two years, and this is because the fact
that he's not worried about any political fallout. If he

(01:26:23):
backs down, he'll just say that the victory was in
slowing down Iran's nuclear ambitions, and he'll probably be right.
If nothing else, he sent the Iranians a message that
their nuclear ambitions won't be tolerated, and for that we
owe him thank you. The Iranian public may not have
risen up in arms to overthrow their government, but Trump

(01:26:46):
gave them the opportunity to do so. Nobody else has
done that. As an aside, I recently had a decent
political conversation with an American couple recently retired who apologized
to me that America voted for Trump. My reply was that,
having had a dern as our prime minister. Given the
options America had at the last election, that I would

(01:27:11):
have voted for Trump. When the wife went to the bar,
the husband said quietly to me, I've always been a Democrat,
and I've always voted, but I didn't cast a vote
last time because I could not bring myself to vote
for Karmera. Please don't tell my wife. We clinked glasses
and had a silent toast. Now back to the Iranian

(01:27:33):
public who did not rise up in arms. There's another
aspect to that, and I'll get onto that with the
I'll get onto that with the next letter.

Speaker 5 (01:27:42):
Layden Chris says, I still remember where I was when
your morning radio program had a Palestinian caller explain why
there were so many Palestinians still in refugee camps. He
explained that if they were freed, there would be no
reason to fight and no reason to hate Israel. For
the record, Palestinians were offered independence and statehood nine times,

(01:28:05):
but they rejected it every time. The years Palestinians rejected
this offer where nineteen forty seven, forty nine, sixty seven,
seventy eight, two thousand, two thousand and one, two thousand,
and eight, two thousand and fourteen, and two thousand and nineteen.
The other problem of Palestinian statehood is that it would

(01:28:26):
require acknowledging Israel as a country, which is something that
Palestinians are unwilling to do.

Speaker 2 (01:28:33):
That's from Chris. Chris, very good, thank you. And finally,
I won't even name the author of this. I just
had to respond to the above and how Basham demolished
your beliefs on Trump's invasion in Braggan's by choice. On Iran,
Basham was one hundred percent correct on his honest assessment

(01:28:55):
and showed you, well, this is full of the literary
mistakes and showed you complete ignorance on the matter. Whatever
one thinks about the regime in Iran, any treat meaning
any threat, any threat they may pose with any nuclear
program doesn't stack up. If you did your homework, no know,

(01:29:17):
let me do this the way it's written. If you
did your homework, you'd realize that successive religious leaders of
Iran were completely against nuclear program for military purposes. I'll
go no further because it's not warranted. Anybody who knows
anything knows that lying in Islam is legitimate in certain circumstances,

(01:29:42):
three of them in the main, one of which involves war,
perfectly legitimate to lie. So you want to tell me
that you believe these religious leaders that they are against
nuclear program for military purposes. If you believe that, you
need attention. But thank you for your suggestions. As a producer,

(01:30:04):
Thank you, thank you, lasam. See you next week. Now
before we go, I'll leave you with this because it
amuses me nothing more, nothing less. As the Iran war rages,

(01:30:26):
they ran has rolled out a new ten million reeal
real I think it is real banknote. Ten million real banknote,
its highest evor denomination, as authorities seek to manage soaring
inflation and meet demand for hard cash, but mostly to

(01:30:46):
manage soaring inflation, apparently similar to how Venezuela would add
a new zero to its currency every week in the
late days of the Maduro regime before everyone simply gave up. Banks,
which have been targeted on at least one occasion by
Western strikes, began distributing this new note this week. It's

(01:31:08):
currently worth about seven US dodders. As Iranians waited in
long lines at cash points to withdraw currency over fears
of electronic systems could fail, many quickly ran out. Now
it's a new pink bank note, which features a vignette
of the ninth century Jame mosque of well I've got

(01:31:32):
to struggle here, yazard yazzd, while the back displays an
image of the two and a half thousand year old
Bam Citadel Bam. It is now the highest denomination in circulation,
overtaking the five real note. Sorry, that's the five million
real note introduced in early February, which at this rate

(01:31:54):
will be equal to roughly one US dollar in a
few weeks. Iran's Central Bank said the bill was introduced
to ensure public access to cash, adding that electronic systems,
including debit cards, mobile and internet banking would continue to
serve as the main platform or platforms or financial transactions,

(01:32:15):
at least until the Mossad cripples all domestic electronic payments. Yet,
despite government's assurances of a continuousupply of cash after the
war broke out, banks are providing limited currency to clients
seeking to withdraw funds. Quoting a couple of people, one
who said, I waited my turn for an hour and

(01:32:36):
the clerk said he could only give me ten million rials.
But when I made a fuss telling him I had
no money and needed cash. I got thirteen million instead.
She was an eighty year old, by the way, resident
of Teyran. Now that will take us out the podcast
three hundred and twenty one. We shall return clearly rapidly

(01:32:56):
with three twenty two, and in the meantime, as always,
if you would like to write to us Layton at
NEWSTALKSIB dot co dot nz, LIGHTO and Latt Newstalks AB
dot cod NSID or Carolyn with A Y C A
R O L y N at Newstalk SEDB dot co
dot nz. And again I say, as always, thank you

(01:33:18):
for listening and we'll talk soon.

Speaker 3 (01:33:27):
Thank you for more from News Talk sed B.

Speaker 1 (01:33:31):
Listen live on air or online, and keep our shows
with you wherever you go with our podcasts on iHeartRadio

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Leighton Smith Podcast #321 - March 25th 2026 - Ramesh Thakur

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Leighton Smith Podcast #321 - March 25th 2026 - Ramesh Thakur