Has US politics poisoned the UK? With Jon Stewart | Armando Iannucci | The New Statesman
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- Despite many differences the UK and US “make the same sh*tty mistakes” - Jon Stewart
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Armando Iannucci and Anoosh Chakelian host Westminster Reimagined on the New Statesman podcast. They explore why Britain's politics is broken, and how to fix it. In this episode they are joined by comedian Jon Stewart and podcaster Sam Walker to discuss the so-called "special relationship" between the UK and the US.
Successive Prime Ministers have lauded the "special relationship", whether Margaret Thatcher's friendship with Ronald Reagan, David Cameron's (unrequited?) bromance with Obama, to comparisons between Boris Johnson and Donald Trump.
But is the "special relationship" beneficial - or even reciprocal? Armando Iannucci argues UK politics is becoming increasingly 'presidential' and identifies some concerning similarities in political discourse on both sides of the atlantic.
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The writer, satirist and broadcaster Armando Iannucci, returns to the New Statesman Podcast to co-host our third series of Westminster Reimagined. In six special episodes Iannucci explores parts of British public life he believes to be broken, and is joined by guests from inside and outside Westminster to work out how to fix things
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The New Statesman brings you unrivalled analysis of of the latest UK and international politics. On our TH-cam channel you’ll find insight on the top news and global current affairs stories, as well as insightful interviews with politicians, advisers and leading political thinkers, to help you understand the political and economic forces shaping the world.
With regular contributions from our writers including Political Editor Andrew Marr and Anoosh Chakelian - host of the New Statesman podcast - we’ll help you understand the world of politics and global affairs from Westminster to Washington and beyond.
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I would add a comment that I think is very important for anyone in the UK reading it. Withstanding the importation of American political attitudes, one thing that the British public must do is protect the NHS at all costs. This is not an exaggeration, all costs. As a canadian, I have seen US citizens cross our borders to purchase pharmaceutical drugs, I have family in the United States where one person was denied pretty important healthcare because their insurance company wouldn't allow it. Health outcomes in the United States are abysmal because people who can't afford to go to a doctor or have poor insurance, which is about 50% of the population, will not go to seek medical attention. Ambulance costs, costs to hold your newborn child, etc, represents the takeover of healthcare by private for profit corporations at the direct cost of US lives. There are many heartbreaking stories, I would strongly encourage that the NHS be boosted to what it once was and protected for what it is, a national jewel...
A national jewel?
Sorry to break it to you, but the NHS is not a national jewel, not even close, its a disgusting corrupt money pit and here's how it really operates.
Why the squalid cover-ups in the NHS?
The NHS cover-up deaths from negligence and bully anyone who tries to blow the whistle when anyone tries to bring to light the failings of putting patients’ lives at risk.
There is a culture of bullying, intimidation, and lies in the NHS reaching the very top, and If anyone tries to uncover bad practices their messages go unanswered or are stonewalled.
Patients died needlessly through NHS incompetence and negligence by the staff.
The NHS could/have commissioned psychiatric reports that labels people - wholly falsely - as a paranoid schizophrenic if they try to blow the whistle. It is of course, the old Soviet Union which was given to silencing its critics by certifying them as insane.
Roger Davidson lost his job as the CQC’s head of media and public affairs just before the 2010 General Election after revealing that one quarter of NHS trusts had failed to meet basic hygiene standards.
The NHS and everyone associated with them attempt to 'restore public confidence in the NHS', by lying.
At the very root lies an appalling litany of serial incompetence, indifference and even cruelty by front-line staff. Let us not forget the dreadful events themselves in Morecambe Bay hospitals, where at least 16 babies and two mothers are estimated to have died through neglect, and in Mid Staffs, neglect and cruelty reached such a pitch that patients drank from flower vases to relieve their thirst.
14 hospitals were investigated for unusually high death rates. And we know from example after sickening example that too many elderly patients are treated all too frequently with a callousness that defies belief.
While thousands of NHS staff are highly professional and dedicated, far too many have simply lost the ethic of caring, and these failings are not being addressed; because what rules in the NHS, from top to bottom, is a culture of ruthless unaccountability in which the buck stops nowhere.
Patients have no power to vote with their feet - as they do in insurance-based systems. Meanwhile, the regulators developed into a crazily spiralling bureaucracy answerable to no one and looking after their own interests instead.
The NHS wash their hands of responsibility when things went wrong, Instead, they dump that burden upon the myriad quangos set up for that purpose -while wrapping themselves in the mantle of the potent NHS myth as Britain’s sanctified temple of compassion and altruism, as a result, the entire service knows it has to conspire to pretend that everything was for the best in the best of all possible health care systems - and anyone trying to tell the truth is threatened with the sack, gagged when they left or otherwise bullied by amoral apparatchiks.
The CQC cannot be put right because the NHS cannot be put right for the root of this moral and professional corruption is that the entire bureaucracy of the NHS - up through the Secretary of State to the Prime Minister himself - conspires to tell the public the big lie that the NHS remains a national treasure because no other system matches it for decency and compassion, in fact, the opposite is true. And until that fact is honestly faced and its consequences translated into a radical rethink of healthcare delivery, the horror voiced in official circles at Morecambe Bay, Mid Staffs and the rest will be no more than crocodile tears.
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That's just the tip of the iceberg btw.
As important as safeguarding social healthcare is, I am afraid that it doesn't matter if people decide they find other factors more important/if a government seeking to undermine it isn't sufficiently exposed (that is, to those who have supported/voted for said government).
Narrative can trump actual issues. And reaching people is difficult especially when that narrative is being fed and reinforced. I guess the point I'm making is that misinformation and disinformation are a huge problem for our societies leading to other problems coming into being and/or growing and being very difficult to combat once they take root.
But you're right, of course (although I'm not from the UK).
Too late my friend. The Tories spearheaded by unrepentant atlanticist Oliver Letwin have already crippled the NHS, they're gagging to get some Big Pharma 6 figure board positions to go along with the various City of London ones they normally get after their political career is done.
Too late! Was the cry...
Unfortunately, it is going to be destroyed.
The cons have learned to point and shout “trans people! Immigarants!”, and people can be made to vote for their own demise.
UK: It's from you. US: It's not from us. Australia: Have you met our Rupert Murdoch?
If we stop telling everyone he's Australian people might just assume he's American. Just sayin.
@@SineN0mine3 It's sort of like how California doesn't like to talk about how Nixon and Reagan were from California. I only brought it up because I noticed that where you find climate denial, you will find a lot of Australians. All that coal and natural resources.
@@ejtattersall156 I would say that Nixon was from California but Reagan was from Hollywood which produces fantasists across the political spectrum.
Name one TV news outlet that - at the time - ran with the Hunter Biden laptop story. Except Fox, because that was literally the only one. At least at the time. Only after the Republicans have Congress, and are going to investigate, have the non-Murdoch media been FORCED to admit the story. The point is not that Rupert Murdoch is a good person or trustworthy - he is not - but having both the right and the left helps keep each other in check. Jon was always at his best debunking Fox's lies and coverups, and similarly Fox is at their best when they debunk liberal lies and coverups.
i wonder how many russian cable channels or chinese newspapers he owns
Armando Ianucci and Jon Stewart: two of the most insightful, incisive and witty observers of contemporary politics either side of the Atlantic. Always worth listening to.
Have you seen Jon Stewart's program? It is an extreme leftist view of the world...counterpointing in EXACTLY the same way the right-wing media in the US.
Ianucci seems to understand what is going on, Stewart is trying to pursue an agenda.
We are importing into Europe the worst of America. The Daily Show Stewart is long gone.
Just a pity about the other two, particularly the blonde woman ranting without pause. Hard to listen when someone shouts without drawing breath.
@@ianworley8169 she is a brit living in USA; discussions on politics understandably bring out the infuriation.
Except Jon Stewart gives medals to Neo Nazis for patriotism these days as long as they have the decency to cover up their tats
@@grahamcook9289 who? You?
The common denominator is Rupert Murdoch.
Yes, but the initial cause may be right-wing politicians who allow Murdoch and his ilk unfettered control of the media.
@@massdave2 gullibility and the freedom to not vote are the two major factors Murdoch exploits .
Australians only have gullibility but there are enough rational voters to make a difference often enough.
The common denominator is Murdoch. He runs the press in the UK and USA
He's originally Australian, and has the same press influence there.
@@ejtattersall156 arguably more, our state media has a fraction if the budget thay the UK or the USA has. Through lobbying and brainwashing the public, Murdoch has basically dismantled and defunded the ABC to the point of uselessness.
I definitely don't want to get rid of the ABC, but it makes me so sad to see them directly ripping articles from american tabloids without even running a spellcheck over them and posting ten clickbait opinion pieces a day.
There are a handful of actual journalists left in this country and a lot of them aren't getting work at the ABC.
I'm also largely in favour of independent journalism, but sadly the modern media landscape doesn't seem to allow them to get the reach they need, despite the fact that the internet seems like it would be perfect for achieving it.
For the last decade or more the internet has been run like an old school media conglomerate, so independent journalism is in direct competition with the "services" provided by social media companies.
In the early days of the internet, it really seemed like we were going to get access to not only more information, but more accurate information validated by a huge number of people. Instead we have centralised outlets producing all of the content, and they aren't interested in much more than pleasing advertisers and their stakeholders.
@@SineN0mine3 Honestly, Murdoch just capitalized on a set of distinctly Anglophone ideas. Hyper-individualism, anti-collectivism, anti-tax animosity, free trade, etc. It was once called Reagan Thatcherism, except Thatcher got there first. People like to blame the US, but the US imports many of its bad ideas from the very people who claim to be victims of them.
@@ejtattersall156 I agree. Also, middle-class British pseudo-left-liberals love living their political lives through the US. For example, anyone would think we (in the UK) were about to adopt the US's abortion and gun laws and that our police were murdering black people in the streets. British pseudo-left-liberals love demonising the US, but they also love living and working there; a la, Iannucci and Sam Walker.
@@thelostboy9884 "For example, anyone would think we (in the UK) were about to adopt the US's abortion and gun laws" HAHA! Yes, these are distinctly US issues. Gun religion dod not even exist in the US before the 1970s, and it was hung on a willful misreading of the Constitution.
As an Irishman, someone with a foot in both camps as it were, I would say the answer has to be some sort of PR system. It would basically end the Laurel and Hardy politics in both jurisdictions. Of all the western democracies the US and UK are probably the least democratic of them all.
There are no real democracies, we are actually ruled by an international Corpocracy, where capitalism ultimately decides who rules and what laws are made.
@@neilbradley3146 Yes as a socialist I agree, but some countries make a decent attempt at controlling the beast. Unfortunately the US and UK are not one of those. They allow the corporations run riot while they champion the cause of being upright democracies, and the UK is still a skingdom!!!
As a Brit living in the US, I can categorically say, yes and yes!
The last thing the UK needs is American politics. Which is both chaotic and profoundly corrupt!
Too late. The UK already has the political corruption. The current Conservative Govt has sold the country to oligarchs.
Thatcher got your neo-con movement going. At least the UK has more than 2 sides of the same corporately purchased and minted coin. We spread societal disease, not... democracy.
I mean. Too late. PPE scandals abounds. Conservatives making loads off the backs of people.
It's everywhere
Agree wholeheartedly! Donations of corporations, or rather the donations of individuals who just happen to have a vested interest in corporations, is a big enough problem in the UK already. Last thing we need is even less transparency and limits of how much one can 'donate' to a politicians campaign!
EDIT: Theres a great account of how Blair took donations from Imperial Tobacco and then announced ending cigarette companies being able to advertise at sports events. Literally the day after the policy was announced a self invited 'guest' from imperial tobacco paid a visit to No10 and it was announced the day after that for a certain period cigarette advertising would still be allowed in formula 1. I'm sure it was a coinidence though...
Dark money in politics. Same is occurring in Canada, Australia. Poisoning politics and dehumanizing your opponents.
having lived in the US and Canada now back in the UK for sure dark money is exporting US cynicism and paranoia people in both countries are becoming more angry and unkind and negative
We should not talk about governments, they might arrest us.
@@keithscothern4859 it seems to me that because of the very British trait of being able to laugh at yourself, we won’t go down the same road as the US. That’s not to say the likes of Farage et al won’t try and take us down that road though.
@@Peter-dr9ch Not all Americans are the same.
@@PlannedObsolescence No, of course not. I was simply saying why I don’t think we’ll go the same way as the US when it comes to division.
Jon Stewart at his most eloquent and honest self. Thanks to all of you. Now we can all go safely to sleep, at least for tonight.
Well, one common denominator: the Murdocks...fox news in the US, and multiple media in the UK.
Well they don't own Sky UK anymore he sold that to Comcast, he still owns Sky Australia.
So true, I know so many people that repeat what is in the sun newspaper and sky news, some true, many exaggerated to give the wrong idea, some just lies, so many that it would take an army of academics years to find the proof to displease
@@Lousy_Bastard Rupert still owns The Sun & The Times to pump out the propaganda & hate
@@zetectic7968 As do every other media outlet on this planet they pump out their side/team propaganda, they are all as bad as one another.
@@Lousy_Bastard Very good argument 🤣
Most Americans (even highly educated and traveled ones) have no idea of the “special relationship” reference… that’s a UK reference
Also, 1+ on observation that America is not one country
Well, a lot of Americans do feel it if they don't know it.
You do if you're a bit older.
@@garryferrington811 how do you know my age? ;)
I know the reference and I’m not well traveled. It’s been mentioned enough in speeches by American presidents whenever addressing us relationships and in American entertainment that it’s not completely foreign.
It’s very weird how people import American political and social issues and ideologies. For example the BLM movement. Black people have a unique history in the US and have been there since the beginning of the USA and obviously long before that. In the UK however, the country has only been multiracial for about 70 years, and black migrants came from completely different circumstances and were no better/worse off than migrants from East Asia, the Middle East or elsewhere. Therefore the way American racial identity politics has tried to be pushed into the UK (Labour have tried to get in on this) is absurd, the UK is and always has been class based, not racially divided, and white privilege (if it even is a thing) has never existed in the British isles with the white working class in terrible conditions until post-war Britain.
Question Time was the greatest promoter of Brexit. In the campaign it put a minority Brexit movement on an equal pedastal to mainstream and indifferent viewpoints and made a star of Farage purely to chase ratings, shafting the country in the process. Subsequently they have, by their own admission, frozen the opinion split in the audience to a snapshot of the May 23, 2016 vote, despite puublic opinion having long since turned.
The Question Time crowd is always stocked like the that. A few weeks ago it was in Scotland. Despite the SNP cleaning up in election after election, the crowd seemed to be almost entirely made up of unionists intent on attacking the SNP. Whatever anyone’s stance on Scottish independence, it was quite clear there had been manipulation which made it unrepresentative of the wider public.
Many of the "ordinary members of the public" are Toerag activists, even councillors. I stopped watching it years ago, and even back then I used to call it _Gammon Time._
Almost. QT was the greatest promoter of "brexit" as an immigration issue.
It's amazing how the Left perceive debates as promoting rightwing ideas.
@@carlsmith8593 Fud
Such a good discussion, terrific insight. Stewart went into the wilderness, and really came back with perspective from a higher perch.
I think he'd spent sooooo long trying to get justice and better treatment for the firefighters who died and those who retired after 9/11, that maybe that showed that he could affect things. It certainly wasn't a wasted 'wilderness' from our screens.
I came looking for a good discussion, what was said was insightful, but it was all one sided. For example, there was no analysis of how social justice politics has moved from the US to the UK over the last decade. Instead of the British public being inexplicably beguiled by the national flattery of Boris Johnson, we can explain it as an antidote to the daily critiques of British identity and British Institutions (that come from identity politics, from the US political left).
The difference in media treatment of politicians used to be much greater than it is now. I recall a major Republican figure from the Shrub II era on Newsnight being shocked that he was paired with a Democrat and expected to produce a coherent response to them and that the presenter was asking critical questions of him. These days the Tories get a very easy ride particularly on Brexshit where the BBC refuses to ask any questions and tries to shut down outside voices if they raise the issue.
Newsnight, especially Paxman, is where the political debating rot started. He wasn't interested in any discourse and just kept interrupting and insulting his guests. That created a 'gotcha' culture in which politicians just avoided debating or not answering the questions properly.
Yea are media has fell on its ass this past 12 years with the government I found it so shocking that today people are still blaming Labour for policies that have been done by the tory party they still think Labour are in power which I find shocking for a country we always brag is more educated that America
The Right always gets preferential treatment. This is a social thing. We always progress, with new realizations of freedom, but this means grandparents & teens will be very different. Conservatives slip in and claim ownership of the existing average social views while claiming the newest pursuits of freedom are "too far". The most popular media will average this (partisan RW Murdoch stuff aside). Now they try and drag us back...and the rebellion arises & suddenly many see even better, countering the Right. Trump & Nixon are both examples of this. They both lost & the world shifted thanks to their attempts to reverse things.
I know someone who was vox popped during the referendum debate. He made some good points about why it would be a shite idea to leave. The journalist thanked him, told him he'd made some good points but then said, you know they won't show this.
Jon Stewart is a US and global treasure. Humour, empathy, and ethics - a rare combination these days
Two absolute heroes of comedy (what a treat!) and (who knew?! Do they?) they share exactly the same birthday -- one year apart?! 😀
Yes. Comedy. Altered absolutely nothing, politically.
@@happinesstan How do you know? It's kind of difficult to measure, isn't it?
Read Bill Eddy’s “Why We Elect Sociopaths and Narcissists And How We Can Stop!”
Honestly - there’s really good suggestions in his book.
You ARE right - it will turn into permanent minority rule - which results in massive numbers of lives lost.
Matrix!!! That’s correct.
John’s tripartite problem was faced by the earliest recorded democracy.
They split these factions (for them it was rural, urban and coastal) into segments and then made a bunch of administrative groups that combined three segments: one urban, one coastal and one rural.
It was enforced compromise. And mostly it worked.
Excellent points, has led me to make comparisons with Australian conservative political life 1996-2021. There has been a debate in Australia about Australian politics and politicians borrowing tactics and method from the U.S. since at least the 1980’s. We have, like the UK also periodically had the ‘special relationship’ debate too never realising that the U.S. doesn’t care about us either, except to do as they want; however, now the Chinese seem to be demanding we ditch the Americans for themselves. Who said imperialism is dead? A PS: as an Australian, from Sydney, visiting family in the UK, I have been asked if I am Canadian or from New Zealand. And a PPS: from the future, the Truss era is over.
Before engaging in the hokey cliche of "Blame America" Rupert Murdoch, the single most politically influential media magnate across the English speaking world, is Australian.
@@ejtattersall156 “…is Australian.” And? Yes, he is by birth, but he since the mid 1980’s has been an American citizen, and all of that has nothing to do with my remarks, which are simply an observation that Australian conservative politicians have borrowed from the American conservative political playbook since the 1980’s and had many of the same debates as their U.K. counterparts, e.g. the ‘special’ relationship with the U.S. many times over. Goodbye and have a nice life.
@@peternakitch4167 He is an Australian. He started his media empire in Australia. He expanded his empire into the US. He took his Australian ideas to the US and UK. He became a US citizen at 54 for tax purposes. He's an Australian. Throw all the tantrums you like. He's an Australian.
@@ejtattersall156 nope, he's America's now, no takesy backsy's.
I am willing to accept partial responsibility when it comes to his funeral. I suggest a burial at sea, over the Mariana Trench, sorta between America and Aus as a compromise. In fact I am happy if we don't wait, do it straight away.
@@peternakitch4167 uncle rupert has owned australian politics since 75
We need you guys more than ever. What a star to have Jon Stewart here. What a bril team with Iannucci and that durable sense of British ‘fairness’ that Sam reflected, up that has now seen off Truss and others…
This a great demonstration of the idea that 'if you want to tell people to the truth, you've got to make them laugh'.
Great discussion, and great comments section. I think both of these together sold me as a subscriber. This is the kind of online community I wouldn't mind discussing politics with.
This has been going on in the US for decades, state by state--the undermining of the voting process. It's been happening in Wisconsin and Missouri for at least 20 years.
I'm Australian but went to college in America (U. Illinois) so I know both Wisconsin and Missouri.
I used to have plenty of interesting discussions with friends on the US Constitution. I did engineering but a bunch of them we pre-law. My policy sci was mostly studying Orwell (AF & 1984) in high school. So I used to argue that any country or society could fall into a totalitarian nightmare because that was Orwell's warning - _"Look after your country or it can turn into a nightmare."_
Their main argument (and they studied this stuff) was that it was impossible in America because the US Constitution was specifically written to prevent it through its system of "Checks & Balances"
One thing that we never discussed because it was inconceivable was what would happen if somebody corrupted that system of checks & balances so that they could start undermining other parts of the US System.
Look at what a small group of billionaires have done funding Mitch McConnell's corruption of the Senate. They now have a completely corporatized SCOTUS making judgements that suit what they want. My friends used to explain to me that SCOTUS would protect the Constitution from abuse. and that SCOTUS was impossible to corrupt because the Senate would provide the checks & balances. The House could pass new laws but the Senate would check what they wrote and make sure it was balanced. The president would make the necessary executive decisions if and when needed and the Senate would reign him in if he went to far.
If you think I have misread what my college friends told me 30+ years ago (it was the late 80s) then tell me what they got wrong. A bunch of them are now lawyers and I can't wait to eventually make it to a Homecoming and ask them about this stuff and hear what they have to say now.
Are you questioning the legitimacy of our elections?
@@laniefeleski7288 Gerrymandering has been practiced all over the world in various forms
Here in Australia we used to joke that in Queensland sheep and bulldozers had more voting rights than people.
In Western Australia its dump trucks, bulldozers and diggers with voting rights.
In Tasmania its salmon that vote.
While in South Australia tuna vote.
In parts of Victoria and News South Wales, sheep, cows, dogs and tractors can vote but they aren't allowed to run for office *YET.*
Meanwhile back in the motherland of Britain its worked like this for centuries.
th-cam.com/video/h6mJw50OdZ4/w-d-xo.html
@@tonywilson4713
We talk about the corrosion of Checks & Balances all the time. Usurpation of power by the President from Congress. Likewise, by the Judiciary from the Congresses. Likewise, by the Federal Government from states. Likewise, Regulatory Agencies from Congresses.
There's only one party trying to control every single citizen, from every single state, from the top, down. Think about it.
Purely by fund-raising numbers, Democrats have more large-entities and Billionaires on there side....
And when you say "corporatization of SCOTUS," it actually is, not reading whims/wants/likes into law (like the activist/legislating judge) - that's been done since the Warren Court - and returning the power it took, back to Congress on the people.
@@tonywilson4713 Please read what I wrote, but I believe the one thing that changes minds the most is saying this -
There's only one political party that wants complete top-down authority to tell every citizen, from every state, what to do and how to govern, from the Federal level.
Brilliant video, please keep producing them. Hopefully some of it will get through to people.
I absolutely agree with Jon when he said (of American people), "We are narcissistic to our core." 20:38
Saying "We are the greatest (fill in the blank) in the World." is one of the proves.
Never really watched Jon Stewart, comes across as a bright, thoughtful guy. His point about the ineffectiveness of media to protect us from malevolent politicians is spot on.
Stewart is genuinely one of the most intelligent social thinkers in the United States today. Brits need to listen to their comedians, they're the banana peel in the coal mine.
“An operative in the Nixon administration” just tells you soooo much about one person in six words.
Chilling.
The world needs more Jon Stewarts...
Being interrupted from John Stewart's ruminations on the inevitability of chaos by an advert for a house full of plastic mice was a bit of a wrench.
TH-cam Premium! I haven't looked back since
What, there were adverts? (Adblock + user here) - :0)
I have lived in the US for some 20 years and the topics that were brought up in this podcast are spot on - I’ve been saying it every time I visit the UK - over the last twenty plus years each time I come back I find the UK becoming more like the US. And yes the US is a collection of separate “countries” - I would say it’s more like 6 rather than 3 - held together very tenuously by a constitution that at its heart is well meaning but, as Trump did, largely ignored or manipulated for power. Nevertheless, it is still my home - good and bad.
One thing I’ve heard is that the UK will fail quickly in its attempts to become more like the U.S. because the US has the natural resources and military power to cover for its blunders.
That turn to camera and "What do you think?" at the end genuinely really creeped me out, I was briefly worried I'd been in a zoom call the whole thing and had forgotten I'd joined.
Brilliant discussion from both sides of the pond, and Jon Stewart is someone I could listen to without pause.
This was a magnificent summary from impressive minds, expressed concisely. Thank you, very much.
Jon Stewart is always an absolute pleasure. Funny, down-to-earth, well spoken, and has a strong moral core.
I've also noticed that the UK is becoming more like the US. Think of the introduction of tuition fees, the increasing levels of obesity, the polarisation, the crumbling healthcare system, the plastic politicians who aren't particularly serious, voter ID laws, TalkTV and GB News - the list goes on. However, the US has the advantage of an enormous population with a huge spectrum of views and values, the world's de facto currency, and a rich cultural heritage borne out of its independence from the British, as well as the vast influx of immigration over the centuries.
The UK has none of this and I fear for the future. I fear that if Starmer were elected, he will not change the circumstances which have led us to the state we're in right now. I fear that if serious change doesn't happen then fascism or fascism-lite will become entrenched in our politics.
Well said.
Yep, I'm an American and have been intensely interested in and worried about British politics since around 2016. The parallels have made me want to take yall by the shoulders and wake everyone up to warn them, especially after Jan 6th. It's also seeping into politics around the world. There's a global effort to seize control and move key democracies closer to autocracy. Australia seems to have dodged it (getting Morrison out) and it makes me wonder if mandatory voting is at least part of the antidote
@@sempressfi Mandatory voting could be a partial solution. I would also suggest a PR voting system for both pur countries, because the FPTP we currently have is not fit for purpose.
I'm conflicted about your comment. On one hand it's comforting to have someone agree with me, on the other hand I wish you and I were both talking nonsense and we're both simply wrong.
@@mitsterful Sounds like a Toerag trying to play the "both sides" game.
The UK has been turning into the US for 50/60 years. Drip, drip, drip, through Hollywood, TV, and music. They exported the Hollywood dream, globally, and we lapped it up. They redefined what it meant to be British, to the British.
This was a fantastic podcast! Two absolute legends, please do a few more!!
Thanks folks.
You brought up the wonderful point that (no matter what people's personal politics) they've still a tendency to reject crass and nasty behaviour toward any particular group (whether from Truss, Johnson, or Braverman, sadly still on the front bench) - unless for the purpose of comedy, of course!
I hope a British compass of sensible, decent and reasonable behaviour toward each other remains part of the national character, if nothing else… even if many of us are too skint to do much beyond that.
@DoubtingThomas I hope you are right. It's optimistic.
I'm not generally good at optimism. And although it may have sounded otherwise, I'm not a fan of the nation state as a defining institution either. Where, when and to whom we're born seems quite arbitrary to me. And national pride tends to be used more to make bombs than welcome mats. But, unfortunately, folks find tradition, belief and tribe easier to hold and shape their habits than ad-hoc logic and altruism.
It may be silly, but it would seem quite a positive ethic for people to hold onto certain characteristics as part of a shared culture. And can't many, or all, share the same positive characteristics without invalidating each other?
Anyway, even though you were kinda dismissive, thanks for the thought.
@Wraithing which is one way the high conflict personalities split the 2/3 to 3/4 of populace that does not support them - by causing a significant # to not vote at all.
two of my absolute favorite modern political satirists. cant overstate the importance of these commentators to upholding the sanity in a decaying democracy. from Armandos “The Thick of It” to Jon in Half Baked, “have you tried it on weeeed?”
Fantastic interview - always great to hear from Jon Stewart and Armando was great as usual.
Armando is my comedy hero as he's been involved in almost all of my favourite UK comedy for almost three decades. And love Jon Stewart too, it's a shame he came back at such a fractured time in America politics and society. He speaks so much sense, but it seems pretty much irreparable at this point.
Viewed from Portugal. John Stuart is brilliant. Missed the guy.
Fantastic discussion thank you.
such a good , smart show this : please keep it up❤
Glad you like it! More coming - next episode on Saturday
As a British expat in the USA, I think that not only is the UK becoming more like the USA politically (we have a Supreme Court! yay!) , it's going in that direction culturally too, at a faster rate than ever. We never used to have trick or treat at Halloween, high school proms, Black Friday, wedding and baby showers, graduation from kindergarten complete with little people in their gowns and mortar boards - and over the last few years there seems to be an attempt to introduce Thanksgiving too. I give it five years before the UK is obediently celebrating Thanksgiving along with the USA. But they're absolutely right about the attitude toward the "special relationship" by the two countries. It's still quite important in Britain, and it's completely ignored in the USA, which is possibly the most inward-looking of any of the industrialised countries. Above all, I hope the UK isn't bamboozled into swapping the NHS for an American-style private health insurance system. But since, as far as I can remember, Ted Heath has been the only Prime Minister ince WW2 who valued Europe more than the USA (while PMs like Thatcher and Blair seemed to prefer the USA to the UK, never mind just to Europe), I'm not all that confident that British politicians find anything worth keeping if there's an American version to change it for.
For the most part I agree with your comment, but I just have a slight nitpick. Trick or treating is something that has been in the UK for longer than the USA (or even the UK for that matter) has existed. Halloween was originally very much a Scottish and Irish tradition, and trick or treating specifically was invented in Scotland. Although I will say that the tradition has been extremely Americanised here over the past couple of decades, the name probably being the most obvious American change (it was originally called guising).
Well at this rate we’ll soon be celebrating Chinese New Year instead
A truly brilliant conversation!
The USA gave us infantism in poltics. I can still not get over adults shouting "USA" or "four more years" without any shame. It's weird.
Or maybe the Americans got that from English football fans. St. George in the heart, and all that.
Except that's football, not governing the fucking country.
But the comparison has a merit in that parties have effectively become "tribes" akin to football fans and their teams.
The only thing I’ve come away from this comments section with is that some Brits will blame anything and everything bad with their society on others.
Be fair, it is important for Meal Team Six, indoctrinated since birth by swearing an oath to a flag every day, to have a slogan they can actually spell (most of them)
For “Four more years” see “We won, you lost, get over it.”
I'd rather be waterboarded in Guantanamo than watch 1 hour of Fox News.
Going a little too far there perhaps, but I get the gist.
Ennh, it's kind of a long flight. The bag on your head is obnoxious. And it's not like waterboarding is quick....
@@LordOfLight Yes, but I can survive waterboarding. While Fox News will turn your brain cells to braindead mush.
I used to think that but it's not as bad as people who never watch it imagine it is.
@@LuisCarruthers Erm, yes it is. Not as bad as being waterboarded perhaps, but indescribably mendacious and unscrupulous.
British politics is becoming more Australian, not more American
The Uk has been owned and owed to and played second fiddle to the US growing hegemony since the last two wars when the US took over and was stated clearly that Britain had to give up its empire and open its colonies and markets for the US goods and services and the Pound Sterling was to ride on the backs of the dollar. In effect, Britain was to play the role of America's lieutenant. This also applied to other major European Powers who were bankrupted as well as devasted by the wars and America to take over the former colonies. You can check this out by Michael Hudson and his book, also on youtube "Changes in superimperialism"
Never really listened to Jon Stewart before, what an eloquent and knowledgeable man.
I'm glad Jon Stewart said it... where the UK is concerened, the US does not care. Many people here think UK folks speak American with a funny accent... it's that bad. Do yourselves a favor and don't let your politicians lie to you about some special relationship between the UK and the US, protect your NHS, get along with your closest neighbors.
It's a joy to watch inteligent people talk. Thank you for posting this.
I live in Romania. And what I find interesting is that we have all the troubles of nationalist parties like the Republican Party, but none of the benefits of something like the Democrat Party. I mean, we have the PSD (social democrat party) which is an offshoot or offspring of the old Communist Party, which used to be left, now it's right somehow. And we have another one even more right called AUR (which translates to gold, but it means Alliance of Union of Romanians), which is basically just a Moscow mouthpiece, but we have nothing else. Further more, we are close to Victor Orban, and Russia, and usually when things go wrong between West and East, it will happen in Romania, even though nobody can point at the map and say where it is. So I kinda feel we import a lot of our problems, but none of our solutions. Only the civic society is moving Romania forward. The politicians are all just the worst, not even original.
On the discussion re Americans being ignorant/disinterested in anything outside the US, I teach English to many Chinese students and I am also astounded at their lack of knowledge about global geography. International politics is understandable given Chinese media, but I wonder if it is a side effect of living in a global superpower as opposed to being a trait specific to the US. "Why should we care about these little insignificant places outside our exceptional nation?"
It's not even a trait peculiar to living in a current superpower. Nostalgia for the British Empire is often accompanied by a profound ignorance of its history, as well as of the culture, politics, and history of other countries including the ex-colonies.
@@roderickjoyce6716 Brits still believe they are a superpower. The delusion is strong.
I don't think it's specific to a country, but the US version of it is different in its contributions to exceptionalism. Even growing up in the 1980s/early 90s USA, schools focused a lot more on US history. (History is generally written from the perspective of the victor, as they say.) News media coverage of international events from what I remember was relatively scant and filtered through the media of the time (generally liberal, US/Western-world or Cold War focus).
You had to dig deeper to get world history in school (usually by taking electives), and news wasn't too much better unless you subscribed to major papers like the NYT and Washington Post where they had extensive foreign offices/journalists. For me it was getting a shortwave radio in the 1990s (showing my age a little) and listening to other countries' English transmissions. I wouldn't specifically listen to shortwave now, but reading another country's news media that produces well-respected journalism would have the same effect.
This happens with huge countries...it's the same in for example Brazil
Why would you expect anything different from the citizens of the Middle Kingdom? It is even embedded in the Chinese script that China is the centre of the world and everything revolves around it.
Excellent video: entertaining & informative.
A few months ago, a guy I know told me that I ought to watch GBNews because, "they are the only ones who tell you the truth". My answer was: "How do you know? Even if the BBC, ITV etc are actually lying, how do you know that GBN aren't lying also?" His answer: "They don't lie, like the BBC."
This argument works both ways. I know GB News is the favourite bete noire of Twitter liberals, but it's quite simple to work out when a media outlet is lying. The 'news' they broadcast is later proven to be false, either by another media outlet or the same one. The same way liberals correct fictitious news that's appeared in the Mail and the Sun. For example, "grooming gangs", according to Gavin Esler on Newsnight was a "racist conspiracy theory". Guess what? It wasn't....
I wouldn’t talk to him anymore
William Gibson had an American character in one of his books who called the UK "Mirror World", where everything was subtly different. Like the accents and the electrical sockets.
Brilliant discussion.
jon is a gem.
Starting about minute 38+
Yes Jon… excellent point.
Jon Stewart, still playing at the top of his game.
Incredible stuff.
In my experience of the US, Americans know little of the UK and could really care less. If fact, many have never even heard of the UK and could not tell you where it is on the planet.
“Couldn’t” care less.
They care so little that to care less would be impossible.
Do you see how English works now?
I've never met an American who isn't aware of the existence of the United Kingdom. Some may mislabel it England.
Great discussion
This is one of those conversations that I wish the wider public were invited to participate in. There is still a middle ground in politics that is open to reasoned and honest debate (even in the States). The more spaces that are created for dialogue in an era of increasing polarisation can only be a good thing.
This wasn't middle ground at all. There was no critique at all of the American left or any analysis of how their issues have entered British politics. Even though this discussion mentioned that the US public were given two sets of facts, this broadcast was still only working from one of those sets of facts.
@@davegold No. I meant that reasoned and honest debate can appeal to a middle ground, not that this show was the definition of 'middle ground'.
Taking a balanced and honest view on the efforts of Jeremy Corbyn to become British Prime Minister might provide some answers to some of the questions being discussed here.
There. Is. Absolutely. No. Left. Media. None.
Other than online.
Corporate media by definition can not be leftwing.
The window is between centrist and far-right.
The only mainstream media which is vaguely left is the Daily Mirror.
I am in the UK and would describe myself as 'Left wing' but i read the Daily Mail for 2 reasons, one it is cheaper reading it online that buying a comic and it is good to know what they are trying to push as their agenda.
In fairness to The Heil, it does have a very good sports section.
Me too, I often read it because they cover obscure stories outside the main headlines that offer real insights and interest, as long as you don't take it too seriously. They embed videos and pictures much better than say the BBC, although the ads are just cancer.
In a bar in Florida I was having a lively discussion about the Falklands War with two liberal Americans and mentioned Vietnam. As a Brit I didn’t hear the silence that followed in the bar. I didn’t understand why we had to leave a half full jug of beer. Until I was told what had just happened. That and several other things that happened on that holiday in the late eighties made me realise the America wasn’t the same as the U.K.
Yes. British politics have been negatively influenced by the US example. However, it is my opinion that the UK is worse off because of the dominance of the Conservative party amongst the English voters allows for very little chance of the UK recovering from the fiasco they find themselves enmeshed in. Labour is near death & gasping it's last breaths, insuring a Tory majority in the UK parliament for the foreseeable future. All they have to look forward to is one incompetent PM after the other serving shorter & shorter disastrous terms at #10.
That’s because Labour really isn’t a representative of a class anymore. The U.K. is a post industrial economy where the majority of middle to lower class employment is in the service sector. Also after WW2 most of the Labour wish list was implemented, so where do you really go from there? The worst thing for a political party is getting everything you want. The Democrats in the U.S. had a somewhat similar situation after the war and more recently after the Obama Presidency with the implementation of expanded health care and same sex marriage rights. I think the time has come for the Labour Party to simply merge with the old Liberal Party. Labour has no Marxist affiliation anymore so why not. It won’t happen but if Labour really wanted to be relevant again they should adopt the Constitutional, and abolition of the Monarchy as platforms. That would get people interested I think and at least provide a clear alternative. Corbin should be a lesson that really far left platforms are unpopular on a mass scale
Thank you.
Has he tried storming parliament?... Jon you do make me laugh.
Hats off to Jon Stewart for getting a really good web camera. Must be 4k.
good lighting as well
Excellent stuff. Thanks to Jon Stewart and Sam Walker (and of course to Anoosh and Armando). Scary stuff, but then I scare easily, and yes this has been going on for a very long time, accelerating in the era (to borrow a phrase) of Reagan/Thatcher. I don't trust politicians of any stripe, frankly, saving a few (very few) noble exceptions and they exist in both the US and the UK. But politics,on both sides of the Atlantic, seems increasingly to exist to support the activities of big business and with the support of propaganda from various useful media outlets, which I suspect we have borrowed, or are learning from the US. I suspect though that that has more to do with the fact that it looks shiny. It behoves us (Sorry, Jon) to keep a very - very - close eye on what politicians are doing anywhere and everywhere. This is only going to get worse.
I think you're giving America a little too much credit for the perceived backslide of UK politics into right-wing authoritarianism. The UK has plenty of bad actors within it's political apparatus to try to push for these policies, they're just using some American tricks to get through what they would have wanted either way.
As for Americans being completely disconnected from the UK in the way described by Jon Stewart and Sam Walker, I would disagree and say that it IS in fact regional. The Northeast of the US going to be the strongest connected region. There is definitely a segment of the population which pays close attention to the UK and feels the "Special Relationship", I highly doubt they are prevalent in Phoenix though.
The same could almost certainly be said for the UK general population. If you were to go up to a random person in a tiny village like... [goes to Google Maps and clicks on random spot in the UK and zooms in] Sutton on Trent and asked them how often they thought about America, they would probably say "Not that much...".
Anyone who is remotely aware of international politics or the UK/US cultural connection in general knows that our countries are very close. That doesn't mean we have to ALL be completely consumed by thoughts of one another.
Its ALL about money! End of ...
Jon Stewart for President. Of the UK.
With Armando for Prime Minister!
Absolutely. I’d definitely vote for him.
Jon Stewart 2024 🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸
Bingo; if we realized the CONSEQUENCES of our actions, we would not engage in actions we have in other countries.
It’s an interesting “special relationship” where the only people who have ever heard the term are on one side. I doubt anyone from the USA has heard the term let alone know what it means.
Armando and Jon had a short tv series together decades ago before Jon Stewart took over the daily show where discussed different between us and uk - was really good but short lived
What was it called? Is it on TH-cam?
With all due respect to Jon Stewart, he did not launch the Daily Show. Some of us are old enough to remember that it was hosted by Craig Kilborn first!
"The Daily Show -- When News Breaks, We Fix It"
He never claimed that he did: the intro was incorrect.
It was once thought the UK would never fall for the same aspirational politics as the US. This was the hope of the left and the explanation of the difference between the two systems. However, manipulation of social media has now changed that hence the fall of the working class red wall.
The working class went with Blair and the classless society.
Contrary to common perception, between the two of them it is not the US which is the most unhinged and crazy, but the UK, well and truly. Thatcherism was more extreme than Reaganomics. Also in the USA the President's power is curtailed by several institutions (Congress, governors) and there are strict limits to what they can implement. In the UK a Prime Minister with a majority enjoys almost complete freedom over a period of 5 years. There's the House of Lords, but they'd never get in the way of a Conservative government given the profile and background of the members.
"There's the House of Lords, but they'd never get in the way of a Conservative government given the profile and background of the members."
That may have been true in Thatcher's era but it isn't now. The HoL threw the kitchen sink at trying to stop the triggering of article 50 and us leaving the EU.
I have felt it to be so for some time now...and sadly not for the best of what American politics has to offer the UK.
Love this! From America!
Once you fake the art of sincerity you have it made!
MY GREATEST CONCERN IS HOW TO RECOVER FROM ALL THIS ECONOMIC AND GLOBAL INFLATION AND STAY AFLOAT, ESPECIALLY WITH THE POLITICAL POWER TUSSLE GOING ON IN THE US 🇺🇸.
you dont have to shout
Ironically, the caps make people _less_ likely to read your comment, not more. Just a bit of advice to take as you will.
Oh right, it’s financial spam bots. Please report.
Please find out how far up your back passage you can ram your head.
In 1981 I was in a taxi in Dallas when the driver said "Hey you're English! What part of England are you from?". Well I'm from Barnsley but he won't have heard of that so I said the place where I was working, "Cambridge about 60 miles north of London", so he says "That near Paris?".....
“London is the island and the rest is England?” Was the best/worst question on the UK’s geography I once received
I am American, I pay very much attention to UK and European politics. That said, I am very alone and get blank stares often if I bring up anything outside of the basics
13:14 What this guy says here is absolutely bang on, I've been pulling my hair out for years trying to get people to see this, no one can accept the left and the right are two sides of the same coin and we have to accept that they're both important. I don't know about any one else, but I really struggle to call myself left or right because of this. I see the value on both sides. I think people need to understand this and start respecting each others differences instead of shaming them because differences always compliment each other in the end, it's like the ying to the yang.
It’s the strategy as old as politics itself whereby politicians and their friends in media, PR & Think Tanks etc like dividing people up into tribes they can set against one another while positioning themselves as the voice of one of said tribes. Divide and rule.
The "success" of American style opinion driven TV formats in the UK gives us reason to relax on that front.
Recent events have shown how UK politics is similarly under the sway of the billionaire class.
Being 70, learning, understanding, observation, experience and re-examination 247 365.
Here in the UK the Americanisation began way back in the late 1940's, it took a tentative hold during the post ww2 austerity and fortune that permeated through the 50's into the 60's and by then the populous of the UK were firmly embedded into the Americanisation of the majority of the Western zeitgheist.
The years between 1945 and 1970 saw the virus of the U.S.A and its influences permeate across continents, one only has to mention the bomb, the Kennedy's, Cuba, the cold war, the Berlin Wall, television, and many more recollections from my own early days.
The politics and the media guruism began in the late 70's and flurrished in the 80's bringing its full virilant core to all authorities from politics to education, and all institutions that fell under its spell in the 90's.
The 911 shock was the final nail in the coffin of coercion, future now past is the conduit of innocent ignorance that permeates all human conditioning.
What to do about it?
Can it be eliminated?
Is there another way?
The perennial philosophy is to question and revise, reveal anomalies and conflicts of interests to find a solution, but in all my days there have been many solutions
Yet the analysis is still this, "things come and go and everything remains the same."
The world is run by human beings.
Go figure.
Love always
Jesus, I guess you guys really can do no wrong.
Jon Stewart was remarkably astute in this. I think he pinpoints something important with his concern about the "democratization of destruction", as he put it. Perhaps I shall listen out for his opinings in the future.
deep discussions here, but can't stop looking at Ianuccii's collar.
It is very interesting as an example that language is not, in of itself, a uniting factor.
If the date of when this was filmed was put up it would help.
Halloween was mentioned in a reference to something, so it was around then I presume.
Liz Truss was apparently still PM, so it’s a pretty small window of time.
I'd literally never heard "Atlantisist" before. I honestly wondered why Atlantis was being mentioned; I assumed it would be explained later.
My opinion from the EU: Both has the same underlying problem. Both countries still have an imperial mindset and a superiority complex. None of the countries handle it well, or even understand, when fx. the EU has on some points become an equal or even (as a trade block) larger entity. And both then go toxic, when they dont just get to dictate terms to their own sole benefit.
Also, both countries have the antiquated, not-very-democratic fptp election system, that allows a minority to rule without having to even listen to the majority. The US being worst there with the awful Electoral College for presidential elections, but the entire system is very undemocratic. In both cases, that has allowed a very small, very rich ruling class to control their politics. And very much engendered deeply partisan divides, coz no1 has ever learned to compromise, whichever of the 2 parties in this unhealthy system is in power have ultimate control and bulldoze through, whatever they want. Everything is seen as deep black or blinding white, coz everything is boiled down to 2 choices.
And the partisan divides are getting worse and worse, as in both countries increasingly 1 party has been able to rig the already unfair system, so they can remain in power most of the time even with a shrinking minority of the vote, indeed in some US states its been completed to, where the Republicans have full control of state legislatures, where they draw their own districts to have almost no chance of being defeated and having a majority even with 40% or less of the vote and a super majority with not even half the vote. Helped along by an awful judicial system based on politically appointed judges, who in the last 40-50 years have grown increasingly openly ideological, to where the US now has a very political Supreme Court, that is an extremist arm of the Republican Party, who appointed them based on their politics, not their legal qualifications. A system the Tories want to use in the UK as well, so they, like the Republicans in the US, can control the judicial system. And that partisan divide and undemocratic structure and control of the judiciary is also, how capitalism has been allowed, even hurried along, into a mutated state, that no longer meets the definition of capitalism nor is anywhere near the free market, the right in both countries claim to want.
Between antiquated and deeply undemocratic election systems and that toxic imperial mindset, both countries are more and more removed from an evolving modern world.
Anyway, just my viewpoint from having followed both countries for several years, trying to understand wtf is going on. And just to be clear, since Im very critical of both the Tories and the Republicans, Im not a leftist. Im actually center right in my country, I have never voted left of center, and as long as they continue as now, I never will. But thats how different the parties are in other countries. At least I have several different parties to choose from.
We liked trading with Europe. We didn't like free movement and having our laws dictated by Europe.
Not-very-democratic? lol. The EU is one of the least democratic structures on Earth.
I appreciate the mention of the electoral college and the minority standing of right wing opinions here. Too many euros think these awful policies have majority support here and talk to us in a condescending manor as if we’re not struggling against this ourselves.
@@cockoffgewgle4993 Hungary and Poland do not seem to care about what the EU wants. Also, on the topic of free movement, you guys are still getting refugees in like there is no tomorrow for whose stay you have to pay, but not Europeans that want to work. Let's be real! you got the raw end of the Brexit deal.
@@cockoffgewgle4993 I can see what you wrote in the small comment tab, but not on the main page so I can't read much of your comment.
😂
It’s true, when I was in Alaska we would pretend to be from Australia.
Greetings from the west coast of Ireland 🇮🇪
Why on Earth would you do that? Are you responding to something said in the video? I didn't watch all of it.
Time for your admiration to end, Jon. (Question Time's a mess now.)
I am a simple man,I see Jon Stewart I click like
Me too. Always.