October 21, 2024 • 18 mins
In this bonus episode, Michael and James welcome special guests Matt Kelly and Matt D'Ancona, hosts of The Two Matts podcast. Kelly, founder of The New European, and D'Ancona, a journalist and former editor of The Spectator, offer a European perspective on the ripple effects of Donald Trump’s campaign. They delve into how Trump’s populism resonates across the Atlantic, its potential impact on the 2024 election and global politics, and the lessons Europe can teach us about navigating the Trump era.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:04):
We're here with two old friends of mine, Matt Kelly
and Matt Dankona, who do a podcast in the UK
called The Two Mats. They are two of the smartest
political pundits that I know. And the fact that they
are not American political pundits, frankly a breath of fresh air.
(00:30):
Welcome to Fire and Fury the podcast.
Speaker 2 (00:32):
I'm Michael Worth and I'm James Truman.
Speaker 1 (00:35):
Okay, it's November sixth, and he's what what does the
world look like on a day by day basis and
for the next quite a number of years.
Speaker 3 (00:47):
Well, I can say that I've not been gripped by
any election anywhere as much as this one in sort
of thirty years of writing about politics, and it's been
eighty months of obsession. I mean, I think that there's
enormous repidation on this side of the Atlantic about a
second Trump term, and Trump does not poll well in
(01:09):
the UK. The point is that there is a concern
that a second Trump term would be altogether more deranged
and destabilizing than a first, and that this would have
serious consequences for the whole international order, specifically what's going
on in Ukraine and at least but there's a strong
(01:30):
British interest in his put it mildly wavering feelings about NATO.
Every American presidential election is watched very closely in the UK,
of course, but I think this one will be watched
with a sort of feeling of existential stakes.
Speaker 4 (01:44):
Really, can I just build on that slightly to say
that I think it's true that there will be if
Trump wins, a lot of popular excitement in the UK
amongst a certain sector of people, because it's exciting, it's entertaining.
There's no question that people you aren't obsessing around the
ramifications of what a second Trump presidency actually means for
(02:07):
world order and democracy will be quite turned on by it.
And where that troubles me particularly is how that then
feeds into the popular nationalist narrative that's building in the UK,
and whether people like Nigel Farrh see this as leverage
for demonstrating to his audience, Hey, we're on the side
(02:28):
of the winners here. You know, this is the rising tide.
And I think that could certainly play out in the
UK and definitely in places like Germany and Austria. It's
already playing out in Hungary obviously, you know, So this
popular narrative can't be overstated how dangerous that could be
for us.
Speaker 1 (02:46):
Do you think that there is an appreciation at this point,
some twenty four days out from the election, this is
a real likelihood that he could win.
Speaker 4 (02:56):
I won't speak for the other Matt, but from my
point of view, and it's just got instinct, it now
feels like there's a sort of creeping inevitability about this now.
And I hope to god I'm wrong, but it just
feels like there's not enough blue water between them. He is,
he's not diminished in the way that one would hope
(03:17):
by this point, and he's eaten, digested and excreted the
Republican Party to an astonishing degree that it feels like
he's the one with momentum again. Funnily enough, from here.
Speaker 3 (03:32):
I think there was a certainly in the UK before
Biden dropped out, Harris was assumed to be not a
great vice president, and I think people were impressed in
the media by the speed which she seized the opportunity,
framed the race, held a very well choreographed invention trans
Trump in a debate. You know, she's been disciplined and
(03:54):
on message, and the poles are still locked. From that alone,
and bearing in mind the unpredictabilities of the electoral college,
one has to assume that she hasn't broken through. And
there's a tell us if we're wrong. But we detect
an element of panic in the Harris campaign now that
(04:14):
they haven't broken free.
Speaker 1 (04:15):
Really, I think that the Harris camp certainly is face
to face with the fact that what they've done may
not work, may not be working, and may not work.
She said yesterday the day before, when sort of confronted
about her of being on script all the time, that
that was discipline, and the downside of discipline, or at
(04:37):
least the downside of discipline as compared to Donald Trump,
is you're not showing who you are.
Speaker 2 (04:43):
I wanted to ask you guys a question in relation
to Kirs Stamer, who is obviously the new Prime Minister
of the UK for the last three months. Something about
him makes me think of how a lot of Americans
feel about Kamala Harris. Similar he's being obviously that he's
a good legal mind, unproven political mind, elected somewhat because
(05:06):
he stood for decency, and yet when he got into power,
the first hundred days have been deemed to be a fiasco,
and I think in many liberal leaning minds there's a
similar anxiety about Kamala Harris because she hasn't shown herself
to be this genius political mind by any means, and
(05:27):
it's possible she would not be good at the job.
Do you see any comparisons yourself with what's going on
in the UK.
Speaker 3 (05:33):
Well, it's a great question. One thing worth signaling is
that Starmer's team opened communications with the Trump court quite early,
in fact, before the election, principally sending David Lammy, who's
now Foreign Secretary over to talk with various people around Trump,
principally JD. Van So, of course wasn't yet the VP pick.
(05:57):
And more recently, Trump had dinner with Starmar in Trump
Tower last month. So Starmer is clearly working his head
in his bets. But to your question, I mean, yes,
there are obvious symmetries. They're both prosecutors, they have both been,
to put it politely, ideologically mobile. Matt and I have
(06:19):
worked on the basis that we wanted to give Starma
a fair shake. The thing that I think we were
hoping for, which was a measure of audacity once he
got into power with a big majority has been conspicuously lacking.
There's a big sense of in office but not in power,
which is a very bad look for the first one
hundred days.
Speaker 4 (06:39):
I would just challenge whether Starmer was perceived as distinctly
being the candidate for decency. I think anybody up against
fourteen years of that Tory government would have had a
fair wind behind them, and it was more about change,
which strains it slightly differently from what's happening in the States.
The expectation is that there'll be a great social vision
(06:59):
on depending the legislation, and that's been utterly absent. They've
allowed the narrative to be swamped in the press with
stuff that is of no consequence but is a really
bad look for them.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
Matt dan Kona's word audacity. Let me spend just a
second on that, because I think one of the Trump
effects is that he owns audacity. That actually it's very
hard to be more audacious than Donald Trump. Therefore, no
one is audacious, because we all exist in the shadow
(07:31):
of Trump's constant, unremitting audacity.
Speaker 3 (07:36):
Well, it leads to an interesting corollary on this side
of the Atlantic, which is that on the face of it,
the conservative Party, which has been, as Ba said, been
powerty for fourteen years. It was exhausted, it was smirched
by all sorts of scandals, had rapid turnover of prime ministers,
(07:56):
of decreasing use. It's only got one hundred and twenty
one seats in the House of Commons. It's in a
terrible state. But if you take that sort of audacity energy,
theatricality criterion ridiculously given that there's just been this big
change election with a labor majority, a big magor labor
(08:19):
majority new administration, the energy does frankly lie on the right.
There's a sort of there's been a process of magnification
of UK politics in the last couple of years, and
you can trace it back to was that big National
Conservatism conference in London in May twenty twenty three where
a lot of then Cabinet minister's attended advance came over.
(08:42):
It was a big, big moment, and you know, you
were going through what is a pitiful side show in
many respects, which is the battle to succeed Rishie Sunaker's
leader of the Conservative Party. But what's interesting is that
Trump is sort of the maypole around which the contenders
(09:05):
are dancing. So there are two contenders remaining. Robert Jenrick
is one very strongly anti immigrant, and he said he'd
vote for Trump. Kenny Bede, not the other contender, hasn't
said that, but she's close to Ronda Santis, and he
actually did a video clip saying he would vote for
(09:25):
her if he had a vote. And then, of course, inevitably,
because all roads always lead here. Boris Johnson, who's at
the moment of private citizen, has popped up with his
memoirs and in the publicity around that, he said that
the invasion of Ukraine wouldn't have happened if Donald Trump
had been president in twenty twenty two, and that he
(09:46):
Boris Johnson thinks that January the sixth, or specifically Donald
Trump's part and it was not unconstitutional. So it's very
interesting to see the Tory Party, which is a very
old party, used to be very straight laced, starting to
import the habits, the thought processes, the methods of maga.
Speaker 4 (10:06):
I think also the audacity is so closely intertwined with
the performative nature of some of this politics, and Trump
quite clearly is the performer in this three act play
that we're watching unfold and I fear that the performance
is now so important to impacting the public that it's
(10:28):
someone like keirst Armor who's not a performer, and you know,
his quality would be that he's an anti performer. You know,
you would say he is this steady technocraty will manage
the country with competence and probity. Actually it's his lack
of performance that makes him vulnerable to the right wing
populists like Nigel Farage.
Speaker 1 (10:50):
As Ever, similarly, it's part of Karmala Harris's problem at
this point. She doesn't perform, doesn't want to perform, I'm sure,
as not particularly capable of a rousing performance.
Speaker 4 (11:04):
Which doesn't necessarily mean well, in fact, objectively doesn't mean
that she would be a bad leader of the country,
but it gives her a disadvantage when everything is so
infected by how people play out on social media now
and the attention span that you can command, even if
the commanding performances is ridiculous, you know, as so much
of Donald Trump says, it's attention.
Speaker 1 (11:27):
We'll be back right after the break.
Speaker 3 (11:37):
What I feel is that it's almost like there's two
forms of politics now which are almost completely distinct. One
is represented by Kamala Harris and Kirstarmer, which is, you know,
a kind of what we're used to, which is evidence
based policy, formation, discussion and attempt to build bipartisan consensus
(11:58):
when necessary, all the kind of methods that were used to.
And then there's another form of politics, which is all
about populism, the attribution of blame to enemies, whether it's
migrants or the press, or the deep state or imagined conspiracies.
And there's an asymmetry here because I think that the
(12:23):
center left parties of the free world are still baffled
by the endurance and the durability of the new populist
rite approach. Why doesn't it go away? Why isn't it receding?
Speaker 1 (12:37):
I mean, one of the reasons I can give them
an answer is because it isn't parallel as you've described
the latter. That is to say, the Trump view is
a rejection of the former. So it's not only that
these are alternatives, it's like, we don't trust you. Your
way is on a sliding scale, anathema to us.
Speaker 4 (12:59):
Yeah, and that's what we see with Farrage over here.
Speaker 3 (13:03):
No, I was just gonna say that Matt and I
were talking to someone very close to the Prime Minister
Kastama the other day, who was saying that the biggest
problem they the new government have is that the voters
think politicians are all the same. And of course if
that is what people think, that plays into the hands
of the populace, right, it always does, and it's a contagion.
Speaker 2 (13:27):
Yeah, could you explain to us a little bit about
who Nigel Farage is and where he stands right now?
I mean, from a distance, he just seems like this
sort of marginal wanna be And yet I know many
english people who think he's a very legitimate threat. Perhaps
also from an American point of view, the idea of
a dictator being called Nigel it has a sort of
(13:50):
life of Brian absurdity to it as well. But how
nervous should we be about Nigel Farage and why is
he always coming over to the States and what's his game?
Speaker 1 (14:00):
And we should also emphasize how close he is to
the Trump inner circle.
Speaker 4 (14:06):
And in particular to Steve Bannon as well, or though
I mean Bannon's no longer part of the Trump in
a circle, but he's very close to Steve Bannon.
Speaker 1 (14:13):
I have spent my time in a hotel room with
Nigel and Steve. Two of us were sober.
Speaker 4 (14:25):
Yeah, well, he likes a drink.
Speaker 3 (14:27):
I mean the Nigel Farage phenomenon is perhaps, in some respects,
you know, alongside the Boris Johnson phenomenon, the most interesting
of the last couple of decades in this country because
he took a fringe party which was then called the
UK Independence Party and essentially made his own personal franchise,
and then it became the Brexit Party. Now it's Reform UK,
(14:50):
and I think he sees himself well. He perhaps is
the sort of local ambassador in the UK for the MAGA.
He's closed to people in the Trump campaign. He's very
strongly in favor of Trump being re elected. And you
know it's interesting. I mean, if Trump becomes president, Verage
(15:12):
will be one of the most powerful people in Europe.
Who else has better links with Trump? Alburn maybe, but
for Will suddenly his kind of stop will rise instantly.
Speaker 1 (15:26):
I think it's definitely Nigel. I mean he's around all
the time. I mean I'm sort of around the Trump
camp all the time myself, and I'm always tripping over Nigel.
Speaker 4 (15:38):
For listeners who don't know the backstory. One thing that
Nigel Farage is absolutely is tenacious and persistent, and he
waged a thirty year long war against Britain's membership of
the European Union and actually sat in the European Parliament
as a member of the European Parliament arguing from within
(15:59):
for its destruction and having won Brexits, having won that battle,
then kind of set himself apart from the consequences and
said they've ruined Brexit. They haven't delivered the Brexit that
we should have got. We it's all about migration. And
then Nigel Faraja's topic, like much of the far right
(16:20):
agenda across the world, is focused almost solely on migration
now and he has nothing but the cheap populist answers,
the nationalistic answers. But there is a huge ground swell.
I think the latest polling was close to twenty percent
now of people who would vote for his party reform
if there was an election tomorrow.
Speaker 1 (16:42):
Wow, twenty four days. What happens up or down?
Speaker 3 (16:45):
Call it just Trump win?
Speaker 1 (16:47):
Yeah, you're calling you think Trump? Is it is Etra
calling Trump wins?
Speaker 3 (16:53):
Yes.
Speaker 4 (16:55):
The most similar emotion I get to right now, although
totally different circumstances, is Kerry versus Bush and my sense
of and Britain's shared sense of shock that George Bush
won that election, and it kind of feels like we'll
be in for a shock on November the sixth.
Speaker 1 (17:16):
Listen. Thank you, guys, and if we are in for
that shock, then I guess our podcast continues for the
next four years, so we will be calling you back.
Speaker 4 (17:27):
Michael, you asked for tips on growing your podcast audience.
I can give you two. One is you need to
swear more. We swear a lot on our podcast. We
haven't sworn once yet out.
Speaker 3 (17:38):
Of deference to well behaved.
Speaker 4 (17:40):
The second one is Matt dan Coner does an amazing
Donald Trump impression, which is.
Speaker 3 (17:45):
A terrible guy. I mean, we went on Michael Wolf's podcast.
I mean it was amazing, and that is sick.
Speaker 4 (17:53):
That's our number one driver of traffic.
Speaker 3 (17:55):
So there you go.
Speaker 1 (17:56):
Now you tell us the whole time.
Speaker 3 (18:03):
Eating dogs while they were podcasting. Guys.
Speaker 1 (18:08):
Thanks, we'll speak to you soon.
Speaker 3 (18:10):
Pleasure to be continued.
Speaker 1 (18:12):
That's all the time we have for today, and we'll
be back next week.
Speaker 2 (18:19):
Fire and Fury the podcast is hosted and executive produced
by Michael Wolfe and James Truman.
Speaker 3 (18:26):
The producers are Adam Waller and Emily Marinoff. Executive producers
for Kaleidoscope are Mangesh had to get A and O Valascian.
Executive producers for iHeart On Nikki Ito and Katrina Novell
We're here with two old friends of mine, Matt Kelly
and Matt Dankona, who do a podcast in the UK
called The Two Mats. They are two of the smartest
political pundits that I know. And the fact that they
are not American political pundits, frankly a breath of fresh air.
(00:30):
Welcome to Fire and Fury the podcast.
Speaker 2 (00:32):
I'm Michael Worth and I'm James Truman.
Speaker 1 (00:35):
Okay, it's November sixth, and he's what what does the
world look like on a day by day basis and
for the next quite a number of years.
Speaker 3 (00:47):
Well, I can say that I've not been gripped by
any election anywhere as much as this one in sort
of thirty years of writing about politics, and it's been
eighty months of obsession. I mean, I think that there's
enormous repidation on this side of the Atlantic about a
second Trump term, and Trump does not poll well in
(01:09):
the UK. The point is that there is a concern
that a second Trump term would be altogether more deranged
and destabilizing than a first, and that this would have
serious consequences for the whole international order, specifically what's going
on in Ukraine and at least but there's a strong
(01:30):
British interest in his put it mildly wavering feelings about NATO.
Every American presidential election is watched very closely in the UK,
of course, but I think this one will be watched
with a sort of feeling of existential stakes.
Speaker 4 (01:44):
Really, can I just build on that slightly to say
that I think it's true that there will be if
Trump wins, a lot of popular excitement in the UK
amongst a certain sector of people, because it's exciting, it's entertaining.
There's no question that people you aren't obsessing around the
ramifications of what a second Trump presidency actually means for
(02:07):
world order and democracy will be quite turned on by it.
And where that troubles me particularly is how that then
feeds into the popular nationalist narrative that's building in the UK,
and whether people like Nigel Farrh see this as leverage
for demonstrating to his audience, Hey, we're on the side
(02:28):
of the winners here. You know, this is the rising tide.
And I think that could certainly play out in the
UK and definitely in places like Germany and Austria. It's
already playing out in Hungary obviously, you know, So this
popular narrative can't be overstated how dangerous that could be
for us.
Speaker 1 (02:46):
Do you think that there is an appreciation at this point,
some twenty four days out from the election, this is
a real likelihood that he could win.
Speaker 4 (02:56):
I won't speak for the other Matt, but from my
point of view, and it's just got instinct, it now
feels like there's a sort of creeping inevitability about this now.
And I hope to god I'm wrong, but it just
feels like there's not enough blue water between them. He is,
he's not diminished in the way that one would hope
(03:17):
by this point, and he's eaten, digested and excreted the
Republican Party to an astonishing degree that it feels like
he's the one with momentum again. Funnily enough, from here.
Speaker 3 (03:32):
I think there was a certainly in the UK before
Biden dropped out, Harris was assumed to be not a
great vice president, and I think people were impressed in
the media by the speed which she seized the opportunity,
framed the race, held a very well choreographed invention trans
Trump in a debate. You know, she's been disciplined and
(03:54):
on message, and the poles are still locked. From that alone,
and bearing in mind the unpredictabilities of the electoral college,
one has to assume that she hasn't broken through. And
there's a tell us if we're wrong. But we detect
an element of panic in the Harris campaign now that
(04:14):
they haven't broken free.
Speaker 1 (04:15):
Really, I think that the Harris camp certainly is face
to face with the fact that what they've done may
not work, may not be working, and may not work.
She said yesterday the day before, when sort of confronted
about her of being on script all the time, that
that was discipline, and the downside of discipline, or at
(04:37):
least the downside of discipline as compared to Donald Trump,
is you're not showing who you are.
Speaker 2 (04:43):
I wanted to ask you guys a question in relation
to Kirs Stamer, who is obviously the new Prime Minister
of the UK for the last three months. Something about
him makes me think of how a lot of Americans
feel about Kamala Harris. Similar he's being obviously that he's
a good legal mind, unproven political mind, elected somewhat because
(05:06):
he stood for decency, and yet when he got into power,
the first hundred days have been deemed to be a fiasco,
and I think in many liberal leaning minds there's a
similar anxiety about Kamala Harris because she hasn't shown herself
to be this genius political mind by any means, and
(05:27):
it's possible she would not be good at the job.
Do you see any comparisons yourself with what's going on
in the UK.
Speaker 3 (05:33):
Well, it's a great question. One thing worth signaling is
that Starmer's team opened communications with the Trump court quite early,
in fact, before the election, principally sending David Lammy, who's
now Foreign Secretary over to talk with various people around Trump,
principally JD. Van So, of course wasn't yet the VP pick.
(05:57):
And more recently, Trump had dinner with Starmar in Trump
Tower last month. So Starmer is clearly working his head
in his bets. But to your question, I mean, yes,
there are obvious symmetries. They're both prosecutors, they have both been,
to put it politely, ideologically mobile. Matt and I have
(06:19):
worked on the basis that we wanted to give Starma
a fair shake. The thing that I think we were
hoping for, which was a measure of audacity once he
got into power with a big majority has been conspicuously lacking.
There's a big sense of in office but not in power,
which is a very bad look for the first one
hundred days.
Speaker 4 (06:39):
I would just challenge whether Starmer was perceived as distinctly
being the candidate for decency. I think anybody up against
fourteen years of that Tory government would have had a
fair wind behind them, and it was more about change,
which strains it slightly differently from what's happening in the States.
The expectation is that there'll be a great social vision
(06:59):
on depending the legislation, and that's been utterly absent. They've
allowed the narrative to be swamped in the press with
stuff that is of no consequence but is a really
bad look for them.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
Matt dan Kona's word audacity. Let me spend just a
second on that, because I think one of the Trump
effects is that he owns audacity. That actually it's very
hard to be more audacious than Donald Trump. Therefore, no
one is audacious, because we all exist in the shadow
(07:31):
of Trump's constant, unremitting audacity.
Speaker 3 (07:36):
Well, it leads to an interesting corollary on this side
of the Atlantic, which is that on the face of it,
the conservative Party, which has been, as Ba said, been
powerty for fourteen years. It was exhausted, it was smirched
by all sorts of scandals, had rapid turnover of prime ministers,
(07:56):
of decreasing use. It's only got one hundred and twenty
one seats in the House of Commons. It's in a
terrible state. But if you take that sort of audacity energy,
theatricality criterion ridiculously given that there's just been this big
change election with a labor majority, a big magor labor
(08:19):
majority new administration, the energy does frankly lie on the right.
There's a sort of there's been a process of magnification
of UK politics in the last couple of years, and
you can trace it back to was that big National
Conservatism conference in London in May twenty twenty three where
a lot of then Cabinet minister's attended advance came over.
(08:42):
It was a big, big moment, and you know, you
were going through what is a pitiful side show in
many respects, which is the battle to succeed Rishie Sunaker's
leader of the Conservative Party. But what's interesting is that
Trump is sort of the maypole around which the contenders
(09:05):
are dancing. So there are two contenders remaining. Robert Jenrick
is one very strongly anti immigrant, and he said he'd
vote for Trump. Kenny Bede, not the other contender, hasn't
said that, but she's close to Ronda Santis, and he
actually did a video clip saying he would vote for
(09:25):
her if he had a vote. And then, of course, inevitably,
because all roads always lead here. Boris Johnson, who's at
the moment of private citizen, has popped up with his
memoirs and in the publicity around that, he said that
the invasion of Ukraine wouldn't have happened if Donald Trump
had been president in twenty twenty two, and that he
(09:46):
Boris Johnson thinks that January the sixth, or specifically Donald
Trump's part and it was not unconstitutional. So it's very
interesting to see the Tory Party, which is a very
old party, used to be very straight laced, starting to
import the habits, the thought processes, the methods of maga.
Speaker 4 (10:06):
I think also the audacity is so closely intertwined with
the performative nature of some of this politics, and Trump
quite clearly is the performer in this three act play
that we're watching unfold and I fear that the performance
is now so important to impacting the public that it's
(10:28):
someone like keirst Armor who's not a performer, and you know,
his quality would be that he's an anti performer. You know,
you would say he is this steady technocraty will manage
the country with competence and probity. Actually it's his lack
of performance that makes him vulnerable to the right wing
populists like Nigel Farage.
Speaker 1 (10:50):
As Ever, similarly, it's part of Karmala Harris's problem at
this point. She doesn't perform, doesn't want to perform, I'm sure,
as not particularly capable of a rousing performance.
Speaker 4 (11:04):
Which doesn't necessarily mean well, in fact, objectively doesn't mean
that she would be a bad leader of the country,
but it gives her a disadvantage when everything is so
infected by how people play out on social media now
and the attention span that you can command, even if
the commanding performances is ridiculous, you know, as so much
of Donald Trump says, it's attention.
Speaker 1 (11:27):
We'll be back right after the break.
Speaker 3 (11:37):
What I feel is that it's almost like there's two
forms of politics now which are almost completely distinct. One
is represented by Kamala Harris and Kirstarmer, which is, you know,
a kind of what we're used to, which is evidence
based policy, formation, discussion and attempt to build bipartisan consensus
(11:58):
when necessary, all the kind of methods that were used to.
And then there's another form of politics, which is all
about populism, the attribution of blame to enemies, whether it's
migrants or the press, or the deep state or imagined conspiracies.
And there's an asymmetry here because I think that the
(12:23):
center left parties of the free world are still baffled
by the endurance and the durability of the new populist
rite approach. Why doesn't it go away? Why isn't it receding?
Speaker 1 (12:37):
I mean, one of the reasons I can give them
an answer is because it isn't parallel as you've described
the latter. That is to say, the Trump view is
a rejection of the former. So it's not only that
these are alternatives, it's like, we don't trust you. Your
way is on a sliding scale, anathema to us.
Speaker 4 (12:59):
Yeah, and that's what we see with Farrage over here.
Speaker 3 (13:03):
No, I was just gonna say that Matt and I
were talking to someone very close to the Prime Minister
Kastama the other day, who was saying that the biggest
problem they the new government have is that the voters
think politicians are all the same. And of course if
that is what people think, that plays into the hands
of the populace, right, it always does, and it's a contagion.
Speaker 2 (13:27):
Yeah, could you explain to us a little bit about
who Nigel Farage is and where he stands right now?
I mean, from a distance, he just seems like this
sort of marginal wanna be And yet I know many
english people who think he's a very legitimate threat. Perhaps
also from an American point of view, the idea of
a dictator being called Nigel it has a sort of
(13:50):
life of Brian absurdity to it as well. But how
nervous should we be about Nigel Farage and why is
he always coming over to the States and what's his game?
Speaker 1 (14:00):
And we should also emphasize how close he is to
the Trump inner circle.
Speaker 4 (14:06):
And in particular to Steve Bannon as well, or though
I mean Bannon's no longer part of the Trump in
a circle, but he's very close to Steve Bannon.
Speaker 1 (14:13):
I have spent my time in a hotel room with
Nigel and Steve. Two of us were sober.
Speaker 4 (14:25):
Yeah, well, he likes a drink.
Speaker 3 (14:27):
I mean the Nigel Farage phenomenon is perhaps, in some respects,
you know, alongside the Boris Johnson phenomenon, the most interesting
of the last couple of decades in this country because
he took a fringe party which was then called the
UK Independence Party and essentially made his own personal franchise,
and then it became the Brexit Party. Now it's Reform UK,
(14:50):
and I think he sees himself well. He perhaps is
the sort of local ambassador in the UK for the MAGA.
He's closed to people in the Trump campaign. He's very
strongly in favor of Trump being re elected. And you
know it's interesting. I mean, if Trump becomes president, Verage
(15:12):
will be one of the most powerful people in Europe.
Who else has better links with Trump? Alburn maybe, but
for Will suddenly his kind of stop will rise instantly.
Speaker 1 (15:26):
I think it's definitely Nigel. I mean he's around all
the time. I mean I'm sort of around the Trump
camp all the time myself, and I'm always tripping over Nigel.
Speaker 4 (15:38):
For listeners who don't know the backstory. One thing that
Nigel Farage is absolutely is tenacious and persistent, and he
waged a thirty year long war against Britain's membership of
the European Union and actually sat in the European Parliament
as a member of the European Parliament arguing from within
(15:59):
for its destruction and having won Brexits, having won that battle,
then kind of set himself apart from the consequences and
said they've ruined Brexit. They haven't delivered the Brexit that
we should have got. We it's all about migration. And
then Nigel Faraja's topic, like much of the far right
(16:20):
agenda across the world, is focused almost solely on migration
now and he has nothing but the cheap populist answers,
the nationalistic answers. But there is a huge ground swell.
I think the latest polling was close to twenty percent
now of people who would vote for his party reform
if there was an election tomorrow.
Speaker 1 (16:42):
Wow, twenty four days. What happens up or down?
Speaker 3 (16:45):
Call it just Trump win?
Speaker 1 (16:47):
Yeah, you're calling you think Trump? Is it is Etra
calling Trump wins?
Speaker 3 (16:53):
Yes.
Speaker 4 (16:55):
The most similar emotion I get to right now, although
totally different circumstances, is Kerry versus Bush and my sense
of and Britain's shared sense of shock that George Bush
won that election, and it kind of feels like we'll
be in for a shock on November the sixth.
Speaker 1 (17:16):
Listen. Thank you, guys, and if we are in for
that shock, then I guess our podcast continues for the
next four years, so we will be calling you back.
Speaker 4 (17:27):
Michael, you asked for tips on growing your podcast audience.
I can give you two. One is you need to
swear more. We swear a lot on our podcast. We
haven't sworn once yet out.
Speaker 3 (17:38):
Of deference to well behaved.
Speaker 4 (17:40):
The second one is Matt dan Coner does an amazing
Donald Trump impression, which is.
Speaker 3 (17:45):
A terrible guy. I mean, we went on Michael Wolf's podcast.
I mean it was amazing, and that is sick.
Speaker 4 (17:53):
That's our number one driver of traffic.
Speaker 3 (17:55):
So there you go.
Speaker 1 (17:56):
Now you tell us the whole time.
Speaker 3 (18:03):
Eating dogs while they were podcasting. Guys.
Speaker 1 (18:08):
Thanks, we'll speak to you soon.
Speaker 3 (18:10):
Pleasure to be continued.
Speaker 1 (18:12):
That's all the time we have for today, and we'll
be back next week.
Speaker 2 (18:19):
Fire and Fury the podcast is hosted and executive produced
by Michael Wolfe and James Truman.
Speaker 3 (18:26):
The producers are Adam Waller and Emily Marinoff. Executive producers
for Kaleidoscope are Mangesh had to get A and O Valascian.
Executive producers for iHeart On Nikki Ito and Katrina Novell
Hosts And Creators
James Truman
Michael Wolff
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