Biden

Thursday

Freddy Gray

How much pressure is Biden under?

From our UK edition

26 min listen

As more Democrats call for Joe Biden to pull out of the presidential race, Freddy Gray is joined by Damon Linker and Jacob Heilbrunn to discuss what could happen next. Who is influencing his decision and how transparent are top Democrats being with the public? They also discuss potential contenders to replace Biden, including Vice-President Kamala Harris; how well could they do against Trump? Produced by Patrick Gibbons and Natasha Feroze.

Spectator Editorial

Safetyism and the 2024 election

"My country has in its wisdom contrived for me the most insignificant office that ever the invention of man contrived or his imagination conceived.” So spoke the nation’s first vice president. Of all the indignities that come with the office, the most insulting is being forced to stump for a beleaguered party mate in what was once safe territory. No one plays “Hail to the (Almost) Chief” as the 4,092nd most powerful leader in the free world — sandwiched between the prime minister of Nauru and the 2006 American League batting champion — enters the local rec center or middle school gymnasium.

safetyism
Spencer A. Klavan

The Biden-Trump rematch is a nationwide exercise in denial

Neither Donald Trump nor Joe Biden is the other guy. This, we are frequently reminded, is their principal advantage in the eyes of many. It may be the only advantage Biden has left after decomposing in real time on the debate stage. Ironically, though, not being each other is one of the few important things these two men have in common. In 2024, a sizable portion of the electorate — maybe the majority — will vote not for a presidential candidate but against his opponent. It’s enough to make you wonder whether the whole affair is an apotropaic exercise, a mass effort to stave off something worse. Maybe we are scared — not just of Biden, or of Trump, but of what the alternatives might be. We have chosen to stick with the devils we know.

Biden
Bridget Phetasy

If Trump or Biden actually cared about America, they would step aside

I’ve written ad nauseam about how much I hate this election, about how Trump-Biden 2.0 is even more demoralizing than the first season of our never-ending reality show, Electile Dysfunction: America Has Gone Soft. “For me, the prospect of a Trump-Biden rerun makes me so disillusioned about politics that I find myself wanting to sit this election cycle out completely,” I wrote last October. Those feelings have only intensified since. Trump is now a Convicted Felon™, with more cases pending. He will likely be in court for the rest of his life. Hunter Biden, who has no problem with ED despite the heaps of cocaine he was on, is also a Convicted Felon™. Biden is, well, Biden. We are ruled by criminals and Olds.

Biden
William Moore

Is Donald Trump now unstoppable?

From our UK edition

37 min listen

This week: bulletproof Trump. The failed assassination attempt on Donald Trump means that his supporters, more than ever, view him as America’s Chosen One. Joe Biden’s candidacy has been falling apart since his disastrous performance in the first presidential debate last month. Trump is now ahead in the polls in all the battleground states. The whispers in Washington are that the Democrats are already giving up on stopping a second Trump term – and eyeing up the presidential election of 2028 instead. Freddy Gray, deputy editor at The Spectator, and Amber Duke, Washington editor at Spectator World, join the podcast to discuss. (02:45) Next: meeting the mega MAGA fans.

Biden
Charles Lipson

Joe Biden, naked emperor

Sometimes, a fairytale provides the best description of a real-world crisis. That’s true of President Joe Biden’s cognitive decline. The best description, sadly, is the tale of the naked emperor, who parades through his kingdom without clothes but is never called out until a child cries out the truth. Once the child speaks, the crowd joins in. For Joe Biden, the yelling child was the split screen that kept his face on camera throughout his late June debate with Donald Trump. Observers could finally see — and call out — what the Biden team and the mainstream press knew for months but refused to say. In fact, the Biden communications team is still refusing to acknowledge the obvious. How can they and still claim Joe is fit to serve as president for another four-plus years?

Soviet
Daniel McCarthy

Soviet America’s revolutionary wars

Niall Ferguson is far from the first intellectual to compare the United States today to the Soviet Union of old. But Ferguson’s Free Press essay “We’re All Soviets Now” stirred up more discussion, and outrage, than earlier forays by others on the same theme. (Ferguson himself credits the Princeton professor Harold James with originating the phrase “Late Soviet America.”) Joe Biden already seemed like America’s analogue to the superannuated Soviet premiers of the 1980s even before his disastrous June 27 debate with Donald Trump — who is himself older in 2024 than Brezhnev, Andropov or Chernenko were when they died.

McKenzie
David J. Garrow

A superbly written and insightful account of the contemporary American military

Four-star Marine General Kenneth “Frank” McKenzie headed US Central Command — CENTCOM, covering the Middle East — from spring 2019 until spring 2022. It was an eventful, and stressful, three years: taking out long-time Islamic State head Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in 2019, then notorious Iranian Quds Force commander Qasem Soleimani in early 2020 and overseeing the disastrous final withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021. Prior to CENTCOM, McKenzie had spent four years in two top-level Joint Chiefs staff posts, and before that he served multiple tours of duty on the ground in Afghanistan. As a younger officer he had been in the Pentagon on September 11, 2001, when American Airlines Flight 77 hit; he was commissioned in the Marine Corps right out of the Citadel in 1979.

Thursday

James Heale

Has Nato been a success for Starmer?

From our UK edition

18 min listen

Keir Starmer is on his first big diplomatic trip to Washington, attending the Nato summit. He has called on member countries to increase defence spending, had a meeting with Volodymyr Zelensky, and enjoyed a dinner with Joe Biden - all in his first week of the job. How is the trip going, are there any tensions arising, and has it been a success for the new PM?  Oscar Edmondson discusses with James Heale and Sophia Gaston, head of foreign policy at Policy Exchange.

Freddy Gray

What will the Democrats do next?

From our UK edition

29 min listen

As speculation over whether Biden will remain in the presidential race continues, Freddy Gray speaks to journalist and founder of News Items John Ellis about what could happen next. How did Democrats end up in this situation and who holds the most power in influencing Biden's decision? They also look ahead to next week's Republican National Convention and discuss who is in the running to be Trump's VP. Produced by Natasha Feroze and Patrick Gibbons.

Saturday

Freddy Gray

Freddy Gray, Angus Colwell, Matthew Parris, Flora Watkins and Rory Sutherland

From our UK edition

30 min listen

On this week’s Spectator Out Loud: after President Biden’s debate disaster, Freddy Gray profiles the one woman who could persuade him to step down, his wife Jill (1:05); Angus Colwell reports from Israel, where escalation of war seems a very real possibility (9:02); Matthew Parris attempts to reappraise the past 14 years of Conservative government (14:16); Flora Watkins reveals the reasons why canned gin and tonics are so popular (21:24); and, Rory Sutherland asks who could possibly make a better Bond villain than Elon Musk? (25:00).  Presented by Patrick Gibbons.

Saturday

Michael Evans

Is America fit to lead the West?

From our UK edition

Foreign policy rarely plays a significant role in a US presidential election. Domestic issues, the economy, money in the pocket, jobs, immigration, these are what voters are most concerned about. But this time, it could be different. The first TV debate between President Biden and Donald Trump seemed focused on one thing: is Biden the man to trust to lead the western alliance for another four-year term? Or, as Trump insinuated, is he so weakened and fragile that none of the adversarial leaders in the world have any respect for him, let alone fear him? For America’s allies, Biden’s lacklustre performance will have caused considerable anxiety Fear, it seems, is the former president’s trump card.

Friday

Steerpike

Will Michelle Obama run? The runners and riders to replace Joe Biden

From our UK edition

After a lamentable performance in Thursday’s debate, much of the Democrat press corps is demanding that Joe Biden step aside. Last night, the New York Times ‘Editorial Board’ said that, ‘to serve his country’, the President must go. If the octogenarian President were to throw in the towel, who could possibly replace him? Below are the bookies’ favourites, with Mr S running an eye over their odds and likely chances come November against ‘The Donald’... Gavin Newsom - 10/3 (Getty Images) ‘You don’t turn back because of one performance’, said Gavin Newsom after last night’s debate. ‘What kind of party does that?’ He knows the answer: the kind of party that wants to win and thinks it’s more likely to do so with him at the help.

Freddy Gray

Biden’s debate disaster

From our UK edition

16 min listen

Freddy Gray speaks to pollster Patrick Ruffini about the first 2024 presidential debate between Joe Biden and Donald Trump. Just how bad was it and can Biden survive his performance? They discuss the reaction to the debate, including a surprising theory going around Republican circles.  Produced by Patrick Gibbons.

Matthew Lynn

Markets are readying for a Trump victory

From our UK edition

If you didn’t have time to watch the presidential debate between Donald Trump and Joe Biden last night you could have just watched the share price of a little-known Chinese company called Wisesoft instead. Its Chinese name ‘Chuan Da Zhi Sheng’ sounds very like ‘Trump Wins Big’ in Mandarin, and local speculators piled in as it became clear just how catastrophically the incumbent had performed. In reality, that verdict is going to be repeated when Wall Street opens later today. Investors, though, have already made up their minds. Trump is going to win, and nothing can change that now.  The markets are already buying up all the assets that will benefit from a Trump victory in November It was probably the most painful TV debate any of us have ever watched.

Freddy Gray

After last night, nobody believes in Joe Biden

From our UK edition

‘I really don’t know what he said at the end of that sentence. I don’t think he knows what he said either.’  Donald Trump, for all his flaws, has always had a knack for expressing what everybody is thinking. With those words, delivered on the CNN debate stage last night after Joe Biden had stumbled and mumbled through yet another answer, he all but buried the 46th presidency.  ‘Joe you did such a great job,’ Jill Biden said, as if talking to a small child Biden might stagger on through the Democratic National Convention in August. But it’s hard to see how his presidency can last much longer. Either he must stand down, be brushed aside, or the American public will soon put him out to pasture. At this rate of decline, he might not even live to see 2025.

Steerpike

‘That was painful’: Democrat pundits mourn Biden implosion

From our UK edition

Oh dear. The Democrats are reeling from Joe Biden’s disastrous performance in the first presidential debate of the election. After the US president stopped and started, looked puzzled and struggled to answer questions, commentators are out in force suggesting Biden is not fit for a second term. Yet this time something has changed. It's not just the usual critics. For a sense of how this time, Biden is in real trouble take a look at what Democrat pundits are saying. The CNN debate panel was a case in point. The US broadcaster is known for being the channel for Democrats – and against Donald Trump at all costs. Yet during and after the debate, there was a funereal feel to proceedings. Joe Biden’s former director of communications could not hide her disappointment.

Friday

Freddy Gray

Why are Joe Biden’s poll numbers improving?

From our UK edition

After several weeks of almost daily embarrassing senior moments on the campaign trail, Joe Biden is somehow improving in the polls. The FiveThirtyEight website's average now puts him 0.1 per cent ahead of Donald Trump in national surveys — the first time this year he’s lead his rival.  The current president is still behind the former president in nearly all the swing-state polls, his ‘job approval’ numbers continue to worsen, and bookmakers still have Trump as strong favourite to win again in November. But Trump is not pulling away towards victory.

Friday

Freddy Gray

How can you stop Donald Trump?

From our UK edition

29 min listen

Freddy Gray is joined by Alex Castellanos, Republican Party strategist who has served as media consultant to seven U.S. Presidential campaigns. They discuss Donald Trump's presidential campaign, his search for a vice president, and if there's any way Joe Biden can tarnish his image.

Wednesday

Freddy Gray

What’s the matter with America’s media?

From our UK edition

28 min listen

Freddy Gray speaks to Ben Smith and Nayeema Raza from the Mixed Signals podcast. They discuss the state of American media, whether the US has any appetite for public service broadcasting, and whether America is too cynical about the press.