From CAFE and the VOX Media Podcast Network, welcome to Stay Tuned. I'm Preet Barara. If you're looking for, you know, is it the left or is it the right? The numbers don't bear out that the progress of left is winning all over the place. The numbers bear out that incumbents are getting thumped. That's what we're seeing. That's Ian Bremmer. Does he even need an introduction anymore? Well, just in case. Ian is the founder and president of GZRO Media and Eurasia Group, a political risk research
and consulting firm. He's a leading expert on international affairs and joins me this week to talk about the geopolitical news making the headlines. Namely, the national elections happening all over the world, in France, the UK, India, and of course, the United States. And that's only some of them. Just how much is the world shaking up? That's coming up. Stay tuned. Support for this podcast comes from Washington Wise, an original podcast from Charles Schwab.
Decisions made in Washington affect your portfolio and your money every day. But what policy changes should investors be watching? Washington Wise is an original podcast for investors from Charles Schwab. The show unpacks the stories making news in Washington and how they may affect your finances and investments. Listen today at Schwab.com slash Washington Wise. That's Schwab.com slash Washington Wise.
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Now let's get to your questions. This question comes in a tweet from Christie who asks, are you encouraged by the UK and France elections? I'll add that it heartens me to not be the only country that's struggling. Hashtag asked, breed, hashtag stay tuned. Well, so I was feeling kind of encouraged and hardened in those two elections where the conservative right was defeated in two elections in two important countries in Europe. But I put that question, Christie that you have
asked more or less to my guest this week in Bremer. And as he's more expert and thoughtful on the issue than I am, I'll let him answer it and you can hear what he says. This question comes in a tweet from Max's mom Anna who writes, I believe Rahimi, the recent Supreme Court gun case, had five concurring opinions. What role
if any, do the concurring opinions have on the case? What about the sense? Aside from striking us with fear for our democracy, thanks for helping us non-lawyers understand the chaotic activist scotus hashtag aspreied. Max's mom Anna, thanks for your question. Given the number of concurrences in a case as big as Rahimi, it's definitely worth explaining for folks what a concurrence really
does in practice. And the short answer is not a whole lot in most circumstances. For those of you who may not be familiar, a concurring opinion is one that's separate from the majority opinion, but that's written by a justice who is voted with the majority on the outcome of the case. So they agree in the result, but not necessarily in all the reasoning. So sometimes, justices who vote with the majority have a different legal basis or rationale for supporting the ultimate decision
or part of the ultimate decision. And they want to explain that different rationale in a concurring opinion. In other words, they concur in the judgment or result, but not completely in the rationale set forth in the majority opinion. So the majority opinion is the only opinion that functions as binding law. Concurring opinions mostly have no binding legal force and to answer the second
part of your question, neither do dissents. That said, there have been some watershed dissents that were later resurrected in decisions overturning those precedents, perhaps most famously, in a case called Plessy V. Ferguson. The 1896 case upholding the racial segregation doctrine of separate but equal, there was a lone dissenter. And it was Justice John Marshall Harlan, who wrote at the time in his dissent, quote, our Constitution is colorblind and neither knows nor
tolerates classes among citizens. End quote. And that view would ultimately become law in the unanimous opinion in the 1954 case of Brown v. Board of Education, when the court ruled that segregation was unconstitutional. Now, that dynamic sometimes plays out where dissent becomes a majority
in cases that you might not necessarily cheer. For example, recently, in the case of Dobbsv Jackson Women's Health Organization, the 2022 case eliminating the constitutional right to an abortion, Justice Samuel Alito cited to dissenting opinions in previous cases that had safeguarded that right, like Justice Rehnquist's dissent from Planned Parenthood versus Casey, and Justice
White's dissent, in fact, also from Roe versus Wade itself. And let me just say one more thing, what dissents and concurrences don't mean a whole lot with respect to the legal question. They do provide clues about the ideology and jurisprudential thinking of the particular
justices who write them. And they enable both scholars and litigants alike to make certain kinds of predictions about how a justice might interpret a statute or think about a constitutional provision, even if in those concurrences and dissents, they don't have a lot of meaningful effect. This question comes in an email from Terry who writes high-preet, Long Time Listener,
Keep Up The Good Work. I live in Australia, and from this distance, it seems clear that President Trump is a particularly selfish individual who's willing to say or do anything so he can once again enjoy the trappings of power and apparent respect that comes with being president. I have what I hope might be an easier question. Is there a quick slash easy way to define what's an
official presidential act? Apparently, Trump's lawyers want to argue that some of the evidence presented in the recent New York case involved conversations that Trump and Ho Picks had when he was president and that those conversations were official acts. Couldn't it be argued that if a discussion relates to anything that happened before the person became president or by the same token will happen after the term of office will be complete, it's not an official act. Thanks, Terry.
So that's a great question. It's a complicated question. And of course, you're referring to the recent Supreme Court case involving Trump and his claim of absolute immunity. And Justice Roberts didn't clarify a whole hell of a lot in that decision. You will recall from previous conversations on this and other podcasts that effectively the court decided that certain kinds of core functions that the president has exclusive authority to conduct. Those are core things with respect to
which he has complete and absolute immunity. And I mentioned one such category of conduct. The conversation that the Donald Trump had that are alleged in the DC indictment relating to his conversations with his Department of Justice and people within the Department of Justice are off limits for the Roberts court. So those are not only official acts, but they're so central to the core of the president's responsibilities duties and authorities. They're completely immune and
must be struck from the indictment. But there's a whole separate category of official conduct that the court does not do a terrific job in explaining the parameters of essentially the court wrote when the president acts pursuant to quote constitutional and statutory authority and quote, he takes official
action to perform the functions of his office. And what the heck does that mean? Well, the court goes on to say determining whether an action is covered by immunity thus begins with assessing the president's authority to take that action. But the breadth of the president's discretionary responsibilities under the Constitution and laws of the United States frequently makes it difficult to determine
which of his innumerable functions encompassed a particular action. Further, the court says the immunity of the court has recognized therefore extends to the outer perimeter of the president's official responsibilities covering actions so long as they are not manifestly or palpably beyond his authority. So the court didn't decide with great precision what other things named in the indictment or alleged in the indictment fell within his official conduct and instead
remanded those decisions to the district court. Judge Chuck and will have to decide now with respect to all the things alleged in the indictment where the official acts or not and obviously and of course as you may remember to the extent there's a finding that something was an official act there's presumption that Trump is immune from criminal prosecution for engaging in those actions
that presumption can be overcome but the presumption is quite strong. So essentially the short non-answer to your question is the lower courts beginning with Judge Chuck and probably also other courts as well because he has indictments pending in multiple jurisdictions these lower courts
are going to be shaping what the law means and what the court intended to mean when it comes to official versus unofficial acts and I think and expect it'll be a long and winding journey and at some point in the not too distant future the Supreme Court itself will probably weigh in with more detail and concreteness on what's official and what's not official.
This question comes in an email from Al who writes to your pre. Yesterday there was a general election in the UK and the results so far suggest that the labor party will have a significant majority. I myself spent the last 22 hours staffing one of the polls and counting the votes when
it closed. What I thought might be of interest to you is that the labor leader and likely prime minister in a few hours through a cute starmer KC used to be a prosecutor between 2008 and 2013 and not just any prosecutor but the director of public prosecutions who is the most senior prosecutor in England and Wales. Prior to this he spent many years as an accomplished human rights lawyer and Al tells us KC stands for King's Council and is a designation given to barristers
who have reached a certain level of skill and experience. My question to you is do you think prosecutors make good leaders and statesmen yours exhaustedly Al. Well that's an interesting question. I don't think there's a sweeping answer to that question. I think it depends on the person. I think they're good leaders and statesmen who come from all walks of life. They may have been teachers. They may have been business people. They may have been community organizers. So I don't
think prosecutors as a general matter necessarily make good leaders and statesmen. I'd like to think still exhibiting my prokyl bias that people who have served the public as prosecutors in the public interest who are loyal to their faith who upheld the constitution and were fair and just in their treatment of people both defendants and victims in other parties and cases have a loyalty to the rule of law understand the constitution understand how to present the
face of the government to the public. And so maybe in circumstances where they have done their job well and they were well respected hopefully you think that they would be good leaders because they've been leaders in a fashion in doing their public interest job as public prosecutors.
And I think examples about a people who have been prosecutors and then served ably as leaders and elected her other office Adam Schiff who's been a guest on the show was an assistant US attorney for a period of time the current vice president of the United States was both a DA in San Francisco
and the attorney general of the state of California. There are Republicans as well who were well respected when they were in office Tom Ridge who became the governor of Pennsylvania was an assistant district attorney our inspector who was a Republican then I think was an independent
then became a Democrat. He was a local prosecutor in Pennsylvania as well. So I think they're good examples of people who have been prosecutors who serve in Congress or serve as governors and I think they did a good job and I think largely they were good leaders or good statesman because of their character and the kinds of people they were not necessarily because they have been prosecutors. There are also examples of people who have been prosecutors who I don't think
were good leaders in good statesman. I'll mention four Rudy Giuliani Chris Christie Andrew Cuomo and Elliott Spitzer all four of those men were prosecutors either state or federal but I think in my view as my personal political view about their leadership styles I think they as a group generally
exhibited a toxic arrogance lack of humility and belligerence now whether or not that came from their experiences prosecutors is an open question but I don't think so and I go back to my first answer which is I don't think necessarily being a prosecutor makes you a good leader of a statement I think those qualities are determined by something apart from that particular narrow experience. I'll be right back with my conversation with Ian Bremer.
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I'm custom blinds, shades, shutters and drapery. For a free no charge no obligation consultation just head to three day blinds.com slash preet. That's buy one get 150% off when you head to three day blinds.com slash preet. One last time that's the number three d-a-y blinds.com slash preet. 2024 is politically as Ian Bremmer called it the Voldemort of years, the year that must not be named. The geopolitical expert and dear friend of the show joined me to discuss the elections
changing the world. Ian Bremmer my friend welcome back to the show. Preet I have missed you so much. I think this is like your 89th appearance. I think it is. I think it is. We're not going any younger it's certainly true. Can one designated an appearance if it's a podcast? Is it the wrong word to use? I've always thought of it as an appearance. Right although I can't see you nor can the audience. There's a lot to talk about. Very serious stuff.
I thought we'd start with the weather. You tell me before we started recording that you are in the District of Columbia which I think as we record this at 9 a.m. on Wednesday morning, it's about 130 degrees. Yeah my god. Even for people that like the swamp and a lot of people around here do it's been it's been revolting. I had one set of meetings yesterday that required about a six block walk. I had a car and I said don't bother with it. I'll just walk and that was
immediately a mistake. I showed up pretty much drenched from head to toe. We're dignitaries avoiding you. They didn't know until it was too late. That's the way you said. You snuck up on them. That's the way. And there was a breeze in their direction. Yeah. Yeah. Okay so I'm sort of failing in making small talk. No you're not. You're doing a great job. I think it's a little you approached me in a bar. I'd find you very charming clearly. Isn't that how we met? It is actually. I don't think it is.
If you remember I don't think it is. I don't make it. What the Aspen that a bar and Aspen was an Aspen. I think it was. Yeah. Or Liverpool. Yeah. I think it was at the hotel Jerome. I think we were now you're oversharing with everyone. Am I oversharing really? Yeah. You could take us to that. Keep your elitist nonsense. You asked. You said isn't that. That's where we met. Turns out it was. Yeah. Absolutely. I think you were
summering. If I remember correctly, you were summering there. I don't I don't summer is a verb. Sometimes I spring is a verb. There you go. And I don't winter either. And sometimes I fall. Exactly. And speaking of that, there's a good transition. I don't autumn, but I will sometimes fall. So I don't want to talk about the US presidential election. Just yet I want to ease into that. Okay. And I want to talk about some other stuff. I want to talk about France.
Yeah. I want to talk about UK. I want to talk about Iran. Why don't we start with why you're in DC? Well, the NATO 75th Summit and their anniversary. And it was I will say that last night was was pretty spectacular. You had all the heads of state in the same auditorium that the treaty was signed back in 1949. Apparently Spielberg was involved in the production of of the ceremonies last night. And and you could tell. I mean, the quality was your next to terrestrial on scene of the stage
craft. Well, it depends on your views of the president, but leaving that aside. Oh, no, I thought it was very, very well done. I thought it was very, very well done. I will say that everyone in the room, there was like a collective gasp, holding the breath when Biden decided to give the presidential medal of honor to outgoing NATO secretary general, Ian Stoltenberg. And of course, that meant that he was going to clasp it around the back of Stoltenberg's neck. And so that,
you know, all of a sudden, there's that everyone is is hoping, please don't drop it. Don't fumble it. It's going to be okay, which is stupid. It's insane. But it kind of shows just the level of concern to panic that exists in the country and in the world right now. Yeah, I didn't want to get to Biden just yet. I don't really either. But frankly, that is that is the topic on everyone's I know. Mine's no, I mean, in NATO, the leaders that are coming in for NATO, they should be talking
about Ukraine, but they're talking about Biden, right? But they're talking about Biden presumably because they're concerned he will not win. And the other guy, I was going to say the new guy, but it's the new guy and also the old guy. The old guy. What will he do to NATO? Yeah, I don't look,
I don't I don't think I don't see him as an existential threat to NATO. I mean, you'll remember over the last two, three months, how many times have you heard members of the media talk about Trump saying, if you're not paying your bills, I'd tell Putin to do whatever he wants to you. You've heard that probably at least 10 times in various formats, right? Yeah, so that is that
not true? Well, I mean, let's remember that all of the countries that are on the front lines of Russia are spending far more than 2% because they're the ones that are on the front lines with Russia. I was talking to the polls yesterday, my good friend, the foreign minister. And I mean, they're at 4%, they're going to be at 5% of GDP on defense next year. That's a significantly
higher figure than the Americans actually spend the Baltic states are way outspending. So, I mean, if what Trump is saying that he's not prepared to help the Canadians defend Newfoundland when the Russians invade it fair enough, not very analytically interesting. Secondly, 23 of the 32 NATO member states right now are spending over 2% and everyone is trending up. And the reason for that in part is the Russian invasion and in part has been pressure from the United States and particularly
from Trump. So, I think that Trump is much more likely if he becomes president to take credit for that. Say, it's because of me and that's why NATO is stronger today, point out that the Europeans are spending more than the Americans are on Ukraine, which is true. Can we shift our focus to the great nation of France? So, they had an election. Who did you vote for? For a free? Did you? Confusing to people. I wrote in Ian Brummer.
Oh, okay, cool. It's about time. Yeah. Yeah. Which you're allowed to do in the French system. Yeah. Absente ballot from the United States of America. Radical centrism. Yes. Can you first just do us the favor of explaining how the French system works? What do they? They got a president. They got a prime minister. They have a provost. Like what? They have a president and a prime minister. The president is elected
every five years. And Macron is not up until 2027 unless he were to call an early election, which he could do. They also have a parliament. And the parliament had a majority that was controlled by Macron and his centrist party. But because of the European parliament, who had elections across the entire EU a month ago, and fewer people turn out for the European elections in individual countries than they turn out for their own individual country elections.
But in those European elections, the far right performed wildly over people's expectations. And Macron's centrist got thumped historically. They lost by like 17 points. And so rather than face that embarrassing loss and the likelihood of censure votes that he would win, but would still undermine his ability to govern, to get legislation passed. Because as president, he's in charge of foreign policy and national security policy. But it is the prime minister
and the government under the prime minister responsible for domestic policy. And if he doesn't have control, if they're not aligned politically, he can't get any of that done. So he was looking at three years of being very weak, essentially a lame duck leader in his own government. So he decided to call snap elections, which are in just a matter of weeks, for his own parliament, betting that he'd be able to convince the French people that they needed to vote for the center,
because it would be too scary. It's not like the European parliament where nothing is at stake for the French. It'd be too scary for them to vote for the far right or the far left. So that's what happens. And that was the, that was those were the antecedents for the election that we saw over the last week. And then explain what happened. I think it's confusing to folks, at least to me, as an American. Usually you have one election, you know, people cast their ballots one time.
This is twice. This is twice. Why is that they have a do over policy in France? Yeah. They have a, the first round, if you gain a majority in the vote, then that's it. Then you go ahead. If you don't, they take the two, or depending on performance, the three people that come in in top and each constituency, and then you have a second round to determine who will actually get that seat. So few of the ballots are determined in the first round. It's basically a filtering process that gets
you through to the second round. And what was very interesting is that in the, in the first round, again, the far right performed very well, scared everybody, just like it's scared everybody after the European parliamentary elections. And then Macron convinced his own center party, which had very, very little support, to coordinate with a, an alliance of the left from moderate left to communist left. And they agreed that they would not stand any competitive candidates in places that
they were essentially fighting against each other. So as opposed to in the United Kingdom, where the conservative party got destroyed by Nigel Farage, even though Farage only got four seats, as party got completely destroyed. They're nowhere in parliament, but they still competed and took away enough votes in all of these constituents. Two thirds of the seats that the conservatives lost in the UK, they lost not because labor outperformed them, but because they lost a whole bunch of
their support to Farage. And the far right reform party in France, that didn't happen at all. The exact opposite happened in France in France. You had the center and the left saying, we're going to work together to make sure that the right doesn't come in. And we're going to do that even though we hate each other, we don't agree on any policies. We don't want to govern together. But we're going to do that just because we hate the far right even more. And it worked. They ended up having like 160
different individual candidates standing down. So you didn't have what's called this triangular, where you didn't have a three way run that would have led to the national front winning. So even though or the national rally, they rebranded themselves. So even though the national rally got the largest percentage of support, they came in third in the number of seats. So you know, you talk about how in the United States, you can have someone can win the popular vote, but can still easily lose
the election because of the nature of the balloting system. In France, this was even more dramatically so. And so what happened was the left took the most seats, then the center, and then the far right actually came in third. They still now now, now, pre they still doubled the seats that they had in French parliament compared to the last election. But they underperformed dramatically compared to the European Parliament and compared to the percentage of support that they actually have. So that
I did that's I know it's super it's super complicated. It hardly reflects the quote unquote will of the people in a representative way, but it is the way the election system works. It is fully legal. It's not corrupt. Um, it's not rigged. But you can understand why a lot of people looking at it, including inside France would feel like this government doesn't represent me. Just so people have context and an understanding, when you say the Macron's party is center left
or center. Yeah. Where would you place him and his party and his party's values and principles and policies on the American spectrum? Pretty close to Biden. Pretty close to Biden. Pretty close to Trudeau someplace in there. So I mean, if if Macron really represents the center in France, I would say that makes him center left in the West. And I say that I mean, it depends like on migration. I would say he has tacked farther to the right than even where Biden is today never mind where he
was two years ago. But on things like, you know, social benefits and labor, the entire French system basically says you don't need to work. I mean, look, when when Biden's handlers came out and said that, you know, he only his working hours, you know, were really only from 10 to four. I mean, in France, that's more than a full work day. Right. So I mean, there is a there is a I kid I kid, but not but not completely. And so the left in France is equivalent to what in the US?
Oh, the left in France. We don't really have that kind of a left. Yeah. If you were to talk about, you know, Jean-Luc Melanchon, who is, you know, in charge of the major far left party, those are like, faux on from socialist to communist. I mean, you would find student groups in universities that represent them at Berkeley or Columbia, but you wouldn't find any anyone useful politically
that would correspond to them. I mean, the far even the squad, the left the left alliance pre just yesterday came out in France and they said they want 90% taxation on anyone that makes over 400,000 euros. I mean, the squad, I can't see a. This is why Ian Bremmer can't move to France. Oh my god. That's why I pre-bar now that you're like a big time partner in a law firm. You're bringing in millions. You get destroyed. Okay. You get destroyed. Back with your ass
pentuck. Okay. So because if you're going to go, let me finish, we've got to be a club in here. I'm waiting for you to work out the Rolex. You know, with the context because I have a question. There's a question brewing here. I don't even know what you charge for an hour now. It's got to be astonishing. You can if you have to ask. I know exactly. So then on the right wing side in France, tell us about where they would be in the American system Marie Le Pen and her courts.
So Le Pen is assertively pro-Russia and I think a way that would be unattractive to the Republicans. I think her migration policy is pretty similar to what you would see from the MAGA right in the Republican party. Her identity politics are pretty similar, though still a lot of what she would end up saying and supporting in terms of she's no longer in favor of Frexit. She still supports the European Union. She wants more autonomy in the way that France
is subsidizing slash promoting industrial policy that would be anti-EU. I'd probably put her in economic policy a little to the a little more centrist than MAGA Republicans. Migration policy straight on and Russia national security to the right of MAGA Republicans. The question is, or my set of questions is about, is it a recent thing that within the borders of one country, you have a popular party that gets a lot of votes that's right wing?
And another popular party that gets a lot of votes in the same election, that's way, way, way to the left, including communists and socialists. Is that a recent phenomenon? Is that always been true in Europe? And then the adjacent question is is that a recipe for disharmony or is it a recipe for compromising coalition building? I think that the European political spectrum and most political spectrums of democracies have been both broader than the United States and have also
generally been more to the left than the United States. And that's been a pretty consistent and long run thing. The United States has an orientation towards more decentralization of power to the States and to localities. It generally is society that lionizes the individual as opposed to community. It is more private sector friendly, less intrusive in terms of the regulatory state. Those are things that I think generally define the political spectrum in the United States.
In a way that like Bernie Sanders and a lot of his policies and most Americans would need your consider Bernie Sanders, you know, a social Democrat to socialist, I think he would be reasonably center left across most of Europe in the Nordics, in Germany, in France, for example. And it is certainly true that in Europe and in the United States, it's not that the far right and the far left are becoming farther right and farther left, but they are attracting larger percentages
of popular support. That is definitely happening. It's happening in Germany and in the Netherlands and France and in the UK. And those are the big countries and some of the small countries, of course, they're actually taking over. So it does matter and the US is vulnerable to that. Going back to my question, is that a good thing? Is that a recipe for disaster or a recipe for
compromise and solidarity? I think it's a cyclical thing, Pete. It's not, I mean, so it's a good thing in so far as when your political system and leaders are no longer seen as representing the will of the people, you will end up with more radical solutions to force, to pressure, and if that doesn't work to eventually break the system so that you get greater alignment with what the people actually
want. I mean, the United States has been a strong force for free trade and globalization for decades. Most Americans increasingly think that they don't benefit from that. They're angry about it. And so they've forced the American political system away from free trade and a center right position that represented the so-called Washington consences. And now both parties are doing much more industrial policy. And we see someone like Bob Lighthizer calling for 60% tariffs
against all Chinese exports. Ten years ago, that would have been an anti-American policy way outside the realm of the normal. Today, that's a policy that is seen as overdue in many circles supporting the workforce and punishing the Chinese for taking advantage of American and large assets. And so, yeah, is it a good thing? I think it's an understandable thing. And it can also, you can see excesses that can come from algorithms that sort of get people information
that makes them believe things that just ain't so and creates polarization. It can come from external disinformation countries that are enemies and adversaries of the Americans and their Western allies who see these divisions but want to pile on and make them sharper and more violent than they necessarily are. I mean, so it's complicated for me to answer that question, Pete. Is it a good thing? But I think I can help give some understanding to everyone listening
of why it's happening. Can we go across the channel to the UK? The UK? Sure. I mean, we teased that a little bit. We did. Nice preview. Nice foreshadowing. A foreshadowing. My listeners really appreciate the foreshadow. Yeah. As smart listeners often do. So there it was a route. Describe in historical terms how much of a route it was by the labor party. So this time around, the labor party got 34% of the vote.
And I mean, just to show you how much of a route it was pre in 2019, which was the last time you had a general election in the UK, labor got 32% of the vote. So I mean, that's just a staggering virtually zero change and percentage of how labor did. So why are we calling it a route, man? You called it a route. I didn't call it a route. I was just following you. Steamed political scientists and commentators. Yeah. So it's pretty wild, right? Same
percentage. And yet, I mean, this was an enormous, rubbing the Tory party, the conservative party is out of power, out of power for a long time. And it happened in part because nobody wanted to vote for the Tories. So they voted for anyone else they could find. And they went to other parties, not labor, most, most importantly, they went to this reformist party, Nigel Farage, who tried seven times to be elected in his constituency of Clackton in Essex, kind of working class place that I
spent a year of my life, how back when I was in college and lost seven times in a row. But eight, the eighth time, he is now a member of parliament. And he's what they call it, Chancellor. He is not a, he's not in any way a serious political figure. He is now in parliament with three of his reformist colleagues. Others were forced to stand down because they said, you know, sort of criminally stupid race, this things and got caught out. And it's a pretty
horrible group. Some of them are, are clearly fascists. But, but they got enough of the general vote, 14% that they were able to undermine the Tories dramatically. And that, that's why we saw the shift. And this is, again, we only, we didn't have a general election since 2019. But we've had lots of different prime ministers who the people didn't vote for. They were brought in by the conservative party membership leadership. And by the members of parliament of the conservative party.
And, you know, they went from, they went from calamitous to embarrassing to abject failure. I would say that, that, that, that, that Sunak, Rishi Sunak, who was the final PM of that group, was certainly the most effective of them. But also it was way too late. They were seen as the party of Brexit. They were seen as the, as the party of incompetence. They were seen as the party of lies. And, and they were well passed their sell by day. Yeah, they had a lot of prime ministers,
which is the higher number. The number of times you've been in the show or the number of prime ministers the UK has had in the last five years. Obviously, close. It's, no, it's not even close. But, but even in the last five years, it's not even close. But how long was, how long was Anthony Scaremucci prime minister of the UK? Scaremucci was prime, you know, you barely even noticed him. He was right after, not a lot of people know that he was right after trust. He basically lasted
a weekend. Yeah. And he was out before, before parliament was in sessions. It was kind of a fun weekend. I mean, I know that the parties were good. Right. Blink of an eye. Blink of an eye. Yeah. Moote should be allowed to run all democracies for a very short period of time. That could just have 11 days. Yeah, just go in in 11 days, just clean it up. A Western democracy. Yeah. And then like me podcast. It's funny. When you look back on it, it's hard to believe
that he actually had that position for 11 days. Prime minister? Yeah. No. I mean, but, right? I mean, like, because you and I know him, like, he's a very, he's an enormously personable guy. But I'd be like, the idea that he's the actual spokesman for an administration seems alluded to. What is the, what is the vend, so I don't know how people are going to react to your comments. We think the Venn diagram is of stay tuned listeners and Skarmuchi fans.
I hope it's at least 20 or 30 percent. Really? I mean, I hope so. Because well, first of all, because he speaks extremely plainly and honestly. Like what? I mean, he's, yeah, a little rough you and, right? And he's a little clownish. But actually, he has a heart of gold. And, and he over the last few years is one of the people that I think has spoken most, most plainly and from the heart about the way he has felt about how the Trump administration has conducted itself.
So in that regard, I'd like to believe, okay, there's knee jerk tribalism and most stay tuned listeners are, you know, here Skarmuchi, they associate him with Trump and therefore, they say bad. But, but, but I, but I know you also have a very educated listenership, at least all of those that say that they love that what I'm on the show, they must be. And so in that regard, I'd like to believe that there'd be some support. We have now talked about Anthony Skarmuchi
Longodden. He was in office. So we move on from that. I mean, literally, I mean, that's like, that's insane. That's a long plug. Yeah. And you know, the funny thing is, what happens is you bring this stuff up. You take you bring up something because I'm curious to know your reaction, because you don't, you don't react in necessarily predictable ways, which is a good thing. And then I run with it. If you give me something fun, I like, I want to think and then you try
to read me in immediately. You don't let me run. It's not fair. Well, you can jog. It's like, my god, I feel like, you know, dad, dad, come on. Like I just got out. Don't call me back in. I'll be right back with Ian Bremmer after this. Support for the show comes from liberties. If you're looking for a source of serious,
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about a historic moment. They're president dropping out of the presidential race. Mixed feelings, I think it's sad, but overall I think he might be making the right decision. I'm sad to see him drop out, but I think it needed to be done. So I think like hopefully it brings out more young voters. Joe Biden is considered as an anti-Christ. I wanted to stay in this way. I know Trump would have won. Now it's up in here. But I just feel like it's America ready for a woman
and also a black woman. So that's what scares me. No, I just don't really see Kamala. I really anyone else being a Bible threat to Trump. Kamala. Kamala. We need the facts, man. I don't know. You know what I mean? I think it's some fishy going on, but you know, don't pull me. Yeah. I'm going to quote you. Yeah. We're going to ask Vox's Andrew Prokop and David Axelrod how they feel on today explained. Amen.
His unpredictability in politics, a good thing. I mean, the reason why I was talking to somebody recently who's a very well known person who does interviews on television. And I said, what is the category of guest? And now I'm going to offend people. Also listen, what is the category of guest that is least interesting and most boring when the options were, you know, actor, author, academic, politician and you know, the number of other categories as well.
And hands down this person said politician. And part of the reason for that is you kind of know in advance how a certain breed of politician is going to answer any question. And we're jumping around a little bit here. But why melee is great, for example, right? From Argentina in terms of intriguing. I just had them on my show a couple of days ago. We're airing it next week. And I mean, you have, I mean, there were a number of times I asked in questions and he just went in completely unexpected
ways that in unexpected and smarter unexpected and nuts. Mostly the former, mostly the former. He's a very smart guy. I mean, he's a very unorthodox guy. And he used that to his advantage to become president at a time when again, like everyone was so sick. I mean, easily more sick of the prognos in Argentina than the Brits were of the conservatives in the UK. He took great advantage of that. So this discussion of France and UK is a lead up to a question that I that I've been getting.
You've been getting and you've been answering because as we head into the looming election in the United States of America, home of the free land of the brave, such as it is. The question from people on the progressive side is, are those signs, is that foreshadowing to use that term again of an anti right, an anti conservative movement in Europe that could sweep America too? And I believe your answer is not what people might expect. My answer is that we're seeing anti-inconvency.
And we've been through, I think there are two big reasons for that. The first is people forget about because it's not in front of us. The pandemic, it's in the rearview mirror. We don't need to worry about it. We get our flu vaccine. We can get the COVID vaccine at the same time. Find out someone has COVID. We don't we don't scream. We're not watching the news of how many people are dying anymore. All that kind of stuff. But, you know, the fact is that it affected our lives in a huge way.
It seized up economies. It stopped people from leaving their houses, their communities for years. And then everything opened up. And there are, you know, big long-term implications of that. The first being extended historic levels of inflation. And the second being extended historic levels of migration. Right. And if you are a president or prime minister that is holding the bag when those chickens come home to roost, that is a mixed metaphor, then you are going to get
punished. And that's what we're seeing happen. That happened in South Africa, in India, in across the EU, in France, in the UK. And I think it's happening in the United States. So, I mean, if you had two reasonably competent and popular democratic and republican characters running for the presidency, and we don't, but if you were, this is a likely election where you would expect that the opposition
would win fairly handling for that reason, right, for that reason. And then on top of that, you have the greater general anti-establishment sentiment that is being driven by disinformation and algorithms. Just people are more willing to, you know, sort of give chaos a chance and act in more politically tribal ways than they would have when they were all listening to the same media and reading the same sources and less divided algorithmically. So, I think those are the reasons
why for me, this is not about far left. It's not about far right. It's about incumbents having a really hard time. Now, the first two things I mentioned will go away. They're temporal. They're not structural. They'll go away over time. And so, you know, the next round of leaders might do better as a consequence. The last point is structural. It is driving more polarization every day, every month, every year. And I'm not sure what's going to turn that train around.
So, to summarize, for the people who have been asking the question and taking some hope because of progressives in the US, it's not about a victory for the left. It's about change. That's right. Again, we just talked about Argentina and Miele. I mean, that was a huge victory for the right. In France, the left did not win. In France, the far left has the most seats now
in parliament, but Le Pen has double the seats that she had before. In Germany, the AFD, the Alternatives for Deutschland, you know, significantly outperformed, despite massive internal scandals and a leader that is clearly a fascist. And they did very well, not only in former East Germany, but also in the wealthy north of Germany, in the Netherlands, in Portugal, far right parties did very well. In the UK, the left did quite well, but again, only 2%
better than they did before. So, if you're looking for, you know, is that the left or is at the right, the numbers don't bear out that the progress of left is winning all over the place. The numbers bear out that incumbents are getting thumped. That's what we're seeing. So, my question is, hasn't it always been the case that people become impatient with the status quo and they want change? Or are we less patient now with the status quo? Are we more anxious and
interested in change? Because we think standard issue politicians, you know, do we give them less room to make change and make people's lives better? And, connectedly, are we just sort of generally lacking in attention span in patients because of lots of other things in society as well, or those two things not connected? I think that people do have shorter attention spans and shorter patients levels. I also think that people are more frightened of a world that is moving faster.
But whether you are... Right, but then if that translates into more change and more replacement of regimes with other regimes, those two things seem to be at odds with each other. Not necessarily. I mean, it can translate... I mean, the latter can translate into a whole bunch of people that are more conservative, more nativist and populist on the right and are saying, migration is a real problem for us. We want to keep the nature of the country the way it feels
like a community does. And these are frequently the people that have had the least exposure to immigrant populations themselves. But that's a tendency. So I'm confused. Isn't that a tendency then in those populations and those constituencies against change? Well, see, let's unpack it. Well, if you have a country that has been supportive of free trade and open borders and welcoming immigration for a long time and you're saying, no, I don't want
that anymore. The ideology you're supporting is conservative, but you are pushing for significant change from your existing policies. So, right? I mean, the United States has been a pro-globalization power, depro-globalization power for roughly three generations now. That is changing. The United States is now the world leader in industrial policy. That's what the Inflation Reduction Act bipartisan inflation reduction act reflected the chips act reflected that 18 billion in tariffs
against Chinese electric vehicles and other areas of export reflected that. This is not the United States that is trying to lead a globally open and free marketing competitive economy. This is the United States putting its thumb on the scale in favor of Americans. Very different, right? That's change, but it's a change that reflects a more conservative sensibility of how economic policy should be run. Yeah. And just in having this discussion, I'm thinking back to the middle of
the last century in the US. And there was a Democratic president for like 80 terms for Franklin Roosevelt was in office for he elected four times four times. They had to change the rule. They amended the Constitution after that as high school students know. And you had huge Democratic majorities in the Congress as well. And it took a long time for people to want to change that. And so that's why I wonder 80 years on can no party have a president who serves two or three or four terms
anymore. What do you think about that? I believe the biggest democracy by population in the world right now has a leader that is prepared to serve for 15 years. And okay, 8% growth. And despite that, he's now leading in coalition with two state-based regional parties as opposed to running it by himself. So he didn't do as well same same challenge that I've spoken about more broadly. I thought he was I thought he did compare to expectation quite poorly. Less well. Yes.
Am I correct or talking about India? Yeah. I know. You wouldn't call it even I figured that out. You wouldn't call it poorly. Well, I guess in life in politics, it's a question of how people do compared to what the expectation was. Well, internationally, I think people are very comfortable that they're working with the same administration, same policy, same ability to get things done.
I think international investors feel the same way. JPMorgan just brought India after the elections into their emerging market funds from lead to billions more of a portfolio investment into India. I mean, I think that people are very comfortable that this guy is still in charge for five more years. And if anything, some of his Hindu nationalism successes will be tempered by his coalition partners who have significant Muslim minorities populations in their own states, their home states.
So that's it's a this was a very good outcome in terms of stability in India's trajectory. But when you ask me like, can you still win for a long period of time? The answer is yes. But it's getting harder for the reasons that we've been talking about. Like again, anti-incumbency trends are getting more challenging. Now, one way that leaders try to react to that, if they can,
is they undermine democratic checks and balances. So in Hungary, it's becoming much harder to displace, despite the fact that it's ostensibly a democracy, the sitting president in Turkey, Erdogan, trying very hard to change the constitution so he and his party can run things forever. Now, they still have a robust competitive party system in last elections, Erdogan didn't do so well, but he's still running the country. And he is in an anti-incumbened environment. He is
trying to change the rules. So he still gets to rule the rules. And that of course, Trump's been trying to do a lot of that himself. So we've sort of been saying that as an ideological matter, what happens in the UK or in France or other countries doesn't portend anything necessarily ideologically for the US other than there's an appetite for change and against incompetency. However, if I recall correctly, some years ago, when the UK did Brexit,
yeah, people said that well, that is a preview ideologically of Trump. And that you could have predicted Trump a little bit from across the pond because of Brexit. Does that still stand? Yeah, I mean, I think that absolutely the level of it was a big FU. Yeah, it's the elite. And the Americans are like, yeah, we kind of like FU also. Yeah, that's right. I think that's right. I think that's still true. But the point is that's, but I'm sorry, I've just paused up for a second.
Yeah. My understanding is that now the population of the UK regrets that FU do. And the majority of folks were like, what the hell were we thinking? Yeah. That's right. And how does that play into this dynamic as well? Well, that plays into, you could argue that played that played into the Biden dynamic for four years, right? So you got for four years in the United States, you returned a pretty
competent, more technocratic kind of boring leadership in government. And, you know, yeah, you had a whole bunch of progressives that yelled a lot about DEI and about climate change. And about, you know, sort of open borders and sanctuary cities. But in the reality, Biden has governed as a centrist. And I mean, you know, maybe what Lena Cun is trying to do, but failing is an exception to that. But the general, the chair of VFTC. Yeah. It lose doing all the
anti-trust stuff that's not standing up in court. But generally speaking, he's governing as a centrist economically, internationally on social and identity policy on an even now on immigration policy. And that the UK is now set for five years of very similar sorts of policies. So maybe you make the argument that in this case, I mean, the Americans quote unquote learned from the Brits with Trump after Brexit. Right. So we already had that we already had the backlash.
But the Americans have already had the backlash. And now the Brits are about to see that. Yes. That's the way that is the right way to look at. And now we may have the backlash to the backlash. That's right. That's right. Yeah. This is dependent. Well, and again, the peb you can't sleep on the fact that in between all of that, you had the pandemic. That's I mean, it's just a massive, massive, it's a single biggest
external impact on global lives that we have had post-World War II. And so I mean, the idea that that wouldn't have a structural, a systemic impact on political cycles is insane. So we have to talk about the US election. And I guess my first question is, you know, you're a political scientist. You observe democracies and non-democracies all over the world and draw conclusions about trends. And you do this report about risk every year that we talk about
at the beginning of the calendar year. And I wonder if generally speaking and more specifically in the US, we overinterpret polls and election results as being a consequence of people's ideological views or policy views or interest in change or in convincing all these other things we've been talking about. When literally the collection of flaws and negative and positive attributes that are inhabiting the bodies of these two very specific men makes more of a difference than all those
other things. The polls in the US have moved very little over this election cycle. Most Americans are pretty set on who they like and more importantly who they hate. So I mean, you know, when you are talking about an election that is in likelihood going to be determined by a few hundred thousand voters in a small number of swing states, the polls don't matter all that much. Right? That's not what so you're talking about what's going to affect
turnout. And the polls are talking about likely voters, but they're not giving you a lot of information about turnout. And are people going to be turned off or not care? How much unwee is there in the United States? A poll of unwee would probably be pretty useful in this environment. Right. You have you have now used my favorite word on we that on we as your favorite
word. It's one of my favorite words. You don't get to use it much. What's sort of interesting to me and saddens me is the is the internal strife and debate and and angry name calling within the Democratic Party. I suppose to the cult that is the Republican party, which is, you know, obviously some people are suggesting there's there's this assemblance is smaller, less nutty, but you know, sort of similar cult of Biden. I don't think that's necessarily true. I think
that's clearly false. I think it's clearly false. I think this is a dispute about strategy. Yeah. Everyone on the progressive side of the Democratic side is pretty much on the same page. We can't have another Trump. And some people think based on a variety of factors, including Biden's debate performance that Biden has no chance of winning. Not because those people necessarily think that Biden can't be president, at least for a while, but that other people, including more specifically
and relevantly independence, can vote for that guy they saw on the stage. And other people say and think, well, it's kind of useless to try to push Biden out because he's not going to go. And even if it did go, you're going to have chaos and no new candidate Kamala Harris or anyone else is going to be able to garner the support of 80 or 85 million Americans in the course of 100 days. So that's a stupid way of going about it. And neither position is enviable. And it's all
about strategy. Or do you think about it's about something else? No, I think you're absolutely right, great. And I think that they shouldn't be fighting in the way that they're fighting. I think, you know, this is a, this is a situation that I think is there's no good answer. Every outcome is extremely risky. And it's extremely risky with limited information. I don't know about you. I don't mind taking big risks when I have really good information. But I really,
isn't it by definition in less of a risk if you have really good information? No, not at all. I mean, you can have great information about like a poker hand. And you know, you know, that you have a 95% chance of winning and you can bet everything. Your tournament entry on that. And there's a one in 20 chance that you're going to lose. But you know what that chance is.
In this case, you are people are putting their careers, they're putting their party, and they're putting to an extent, they're putting the country on the line on the basis of a decision that they have vastly less ability to have confidence in what they're betting on. That's a serious problem. Right. And I see this all the time. My view, I'll tell you, I'll be, let me just put my
cards on the table. So you understand how I'm thinking about these percentages. If I thought that Biden had a team around him that was capable of strongly executing on a strategy. And I thought that he would be able to continue to operate more or less as he had prior to the debate. So as Pelosi said, this is an event, but it's not a condition. Then I would want him to stay because I think changing to Kamala at this stage is dangerous. But I don't believe either of those
six. I think that in the week and a half since the debate, he has been advised his team has managed this abysmally. They should have been putting him out immediately, both in terms of making phone calls the next day to the donors, to the governors, to the senators as opposed to four days later and hearing nothing from it over the weekend. What's the logical conclusion? And I hate to say this, what's the logical conclusion of why they didn't that's so obvious
of a strategy? Right? Yeah. I mean, it's like even an idiot knows that that's the strategy. And the people around Joe Biden are not idiots. They're not idiots. Not at all. So why don't you do that? You don't do that because I think you don't do that. You think it's going to turn out worse. You think either you think it's going to turn out worse and or these people defer too much to the president. And if the president, how much are you how much are you supposed to defer or not
defer to the commander in chief? Well, I mean, I think that in an environment, this is a very White House centered group. They don't have when you see cabinet and policies, for example, a lot of it is there's a lot of strategy around they are meant to implement. Yellen is meant to implement on White House policy. She is not meant to drive her own policy for treasury. Lloyd Austin defense same thing. These have been the same people for four years, almost nobody's left.
They love the president. They're very loyal to the president. They don't leak at all. They're very coordinated on strategy. Those are all good things, but they don't you don't see an enormous amount of pushback. So when Biden makes a mistake like sticking with not Niyahu and not wanting to push him publicly in the early days of this war. And therefore the Americans get isolated and don't have a policy together with their allies. That's a mistake driven by the president.
But and his people are not saying we really need to do something else and need to push him hard. And I fear that a lot of that is going on here, but either way, whatever the reason is for it,
they have not managed this well. And especially because I have heard so much from the CEOs, the world leaders, the senators, the congressmen and women that have been meeting with Biden over the past months that have seen him deteriorate, that have watched him deteriorate, that I think that the four months away from this election that is a long time, the likelihood that they are going to be forced to make this decision. If they don't make this decision now, I think is going way up.
So as a consequence, my view would be rip off the bandaid for some out now. And it is he remembered Congress that you would join the nine or 10 that have said he should step down. Well, first of all, it's not the nine or 10. I think it's the majority. No, the nine or 10 who have had the temerity to come out and say it publicly.
Yeah. So I don't know. I think I would probably be more in Warner's camp, where I would be saying it privately and I would be working very hard to get a large group of senior senators together so that it's more effective as opposed to coming out by myself. Yeah. Right. So I don't know if I'm not sure I would be in the in the Sherrod Brown, sort of Bennett, tester, first couple days camp. I'm not sure I would be, because I think there
are advantages in numbers. But a perfect example of the aphorism if you're going to come at the king, you best not miss. Right. Exactly. And you know, to the extent that people reasonably have thought it was a futile exercise to persuade Biden to drop out of the race, to the extent that you have all these voices, you just hurt him and damaged him more. And he's in a worse position than he would have otherwise been in. Yeah. I mean, that's not a crazy. That's not a crazy.
The thing is when you've got four months to come at the king, you know, you probably have at least a few shots on goal. It's not really four months. The conventions in a few weeks, or I know that, I know that, but I'm still saying like at the end of the day, if he has a serious crisis and is not able to actually run, there is, I mean, in principle, they could switch him out with Kamala after the convention in principle. Yeah. I think it's a tough one.
Where do you put the odds? TARBLE. Where do you put the odds of Biden prevailing in the election if he remains in? I mean, certainly well sub 50 at this point. Again, your four months out. So a lot can happen. Is that because no Democrats, I don't think, are changing their mind and planning to flip their vote to Trump? Let me answer it this way. Yeah. There is not a single, a single domestic leader or foreign leader that I know and have spoken to that believes that Biden
is capable of running the country for four more years. Number one, number one, and number two, there's almost no one that I know in that camp that believes that it is 50% or more likely at this point that Biden will win in November if he remains the candidate. That is, I think, the most useful way I can answer the question. So they know they are in serious trouble. They know that. And the question, as you said, is one of strategy. Given that they are in serious trouble,
what is the least damaging, most effective way to respond to? What is a crisis without any question? What is a crisis? And it's not that he lost the debate. That's not the problem. He could have lost the debate. The problem is that the debate confirmed in the most public and dramatic way, the single biggest vulnerability that Biden has had since he's decided to run for a second turn. That's the problem. If you've been a Biden advisor and were clear right about his capabilities and how
he sometimes is not as sharp as he is at other times. And all the reporting is, he varies. He is as up and as down as in any given day or work cycle. Would you throw in your body in front of the train and prevent that debate? Yeah, I would have. I was very surprised that he gave that debate. And I understand that they attempted to make the rules so favorable to a normal politician and not to Trump that they thought that Trump was going to say no. And then it wasn't going to be Biden
ducking it. It was going to be Trump refused to accept the rules and they both can blame the other for why there isn't a debate. That was a risk that they were taking. Trump wisely accepted all of the rules, didn't debate it at all, and then Biden destroyed himself. So I think you and I've talked about this. I was quite surprised that they were going to allow him to debate, but it's it's obviously hard to run someone where you're scared for them to debate. And I think the more
relevant point is I don't think he should have run a year ago. I mean, it's just like when he was when he first became president, no one close to him thought he was up for two terms. But here's the problem, Pete, is I think that if it wasn't Trump, I think that if it were Nikki Haley or DeSantis or someone else, it's not clear to me that Biden
would actually be still the candidate right now. I really, I really do believe that because remember that when Obama forced asked Biden to step aside for Hillary Clinton, and this was at the time that Biden was frequently in tears. I mean, breaking down because of the tragedy of Bob Biden dying. I mean, it was going to be very hard for him to be up for this, but whatever, however you want to describe the narrative, the fact is that Hillary Clinton lost that election,
and Biden blamed himself to a degree. Biden thinks that he had been standing instead of Hillary that he would have won. Yeah, isn't that quite arguable? Then in 2016, Biden would have beaten Trump? I think so. And I think that if you're Biden and you believe that and you're the guy, Trump is president, Trump became president because of you. And now you're thinking people want you to stand aside, and you're thinking to yourself, I'm the only guy that knows that I can beat him. And I've got to
do it again. I mean, whether or not that reflects the state of reality in July 2024, I feel quite confident that is Biden's mindset. And so I think it is harder to get him to step down as a consequence of that. Yeah, look, part of the problem is found in your analysis on two different things. One, if it is the case that it was a mistake to debate because of your mental acuity
and deafness. And then that is exposed to the world. It cannot be the right strategy to do the thing that you said one should ordinarily do, which is to get out there a lot more and provide more opportunities for that to be witnessed as well. And that's the conundrum, right? Well, no, but the upside of doing that, my view is you have to do that and you have to do that precisely because you have to prove that this is a right. But if you're incapable of proving that, then if you're incapable
of proving that then he should be stepping down. That's the whole point. And by the way, we saw this this morning, like Nancy Pelosi's comments, right? She has already said he's staying in. So the fact that she is now saying it's up to the president to decide and we're all encouraging him to make that decision because time is running short, that is obviously reflecting a position from Nancy and for many others that he should get out. But she won't say it, which I think is spineless.
Right? So I mean, that's that's the problem is that the Democrats are all in the position that Pelosi is basically in right now. That is absolutely the strong. On behalf of his Madam Speaker, Emerita, I don't know that it's spineless. I think it goes back to the strategy because you don't know if he's going to step down or not. And you want to encourage it if you're her, but sort of hedge and not inflict maximum damage in the eventuality that it doesn't step down.
But everyone knows that what I'm saying is I think that most people at this point believe that the right strategy is for him to be out. No, I don't know that that's true. I think there's a large group of people who rightly believe, I mean, the point of this is that there's no good strategy who rightly believe that the chaos that would ensue in a scramble for to be the replacement.
And in particular, whether it is Kamala or is in Kamala, will alienate specific constituencies incredibly important longstanding constituencies of the Democratic Party in your totally host. I think it still comes back to I hope and I like to think a good faith difference of opinion as to what puts you in the best stead for the election. None of what you're good. I understand and I get why this is so hard for them to say, but I'm just saying that there's
inconsistency. Pelosi was just saying after he put his letter in, he's running and that's what he said. And then they're back and away from it. That's not good. What you don't want is to be inconsistent and changing in your position all over the map. This is a strength of the Republican party. Is that when they're making a decision, they stick with the decision, whatever it is. And I think that here, the fact that they are all hedging all over the place is likely to continue
to allow this to fester and it ends up being worse. They should have been talking to Biden about this in much stronger terms a year ago and they were unwilling to do so in part because there is just much more open diversity, much less party discipline, much less party loyalty. In that regard, in the Democratic party, I think that's a challenge for them. Ian Bremmer, my friend, you've been very generous with your time once again. Thanks for being with us. My pleasure, Pete.
My conversation with Ian Bremmer continues for members of the CapA insider community. In the bonus for insiders, we discuss the future of NATO. I actually don't think that there is, you know, a possibility that NATO would fall apart or that the Americans would leave NATO if Trump were to be president. I don't believe that. I don't believe he would try to do that. To try out the membership for just one dollar for a month, head to cafe.com slash insider.
Before we wrap up this week, I just want to say that I know there are, of course, a lot of feelings and concerns surrounding the election. Since the debate fears about President Biden's ability to win another election and then lead the country for another four years are at an all-time high.
So too is anger at Biden's detractors. Long before the debate, I was kept up at night by my deep worry about Donald Trump winning again in November about what it would mean for this country, for democracy, for justice, for the climate, for immigrants and women and marginalized people, for the DOJ, for the world, for the future, and for all of us.
And as major Democrats sound the alarm about Biden, and as we all think back to that evening on the CNN debate stage, I can't deny that I'm worried about the sitting president too. I don't know the best path. I'm not a pollster, and I'm not clairvoyant. We are four months out from the election, and a lot can happen in that time. And as we all try to make sense of this moment and what is to come, and as we keep bringing you experts and analysis on this show, I want it to hear from you all.
You're engaged and thoughtful and smart people, and I know you care deeply about these issues, like I do, and about our country. So call me and leave a voice mail with your thoughts and feelings about the election, about Joe Biden, about Kamala Harris, about this process, about our prospects, be our focus group.
What are you worried about? What are you hopeful about? Who do you want to lead this country? What's helping you cope with election-related stress? Are you planning on getting involved at all? We want to hear from you. And just a note, if you leave a voice mail, it may end up on the show. Call and leave a message at 669-247-7338. That's 669-247-7338. I look forward to hearing what you all have to say. Well, that's it for this episode of Stay Tuned. Thanks again to my guest, Ian Bremer.
If you like what we do, rate and review the show on Apple podcasts or wherever you listen. Every positive review helps new listeners find the show. Send me your questions about news, politics, and justice. Tweet them to me at Prit Barar with a hashtag AskPreet. You can also now reach me on Threads or you can call and leave me a message at 669-247-7338. That's 669-24Preet. Or you can send an email to letters at cafe.com. Stay tuned is presented by Cafe and the Vox Media Podcast Network.
The executive producer is Tamara Seper. The technical director is David Tattaschor. The deputy editor is Saline Roer. The editorial producers are Noah Azalai and Jake Kaplan. The associate producer is Cloudy Hernandez. And the cafe team is Matthew Billy, Nat Weiner, and Leanna Greenway. Our music is by Andrew Dost. I'm your host, Prit Barara. As always, stay tuned.