Global Roaming with Geraldine Doogue and Hamish Macdonald

Giorgia Meloni has become Italy's longest continuously serving prime minister since Mussolini - no small feat in a country that usually burns through leaders in under a year. 
Once written off as a fringe far-right risk, she's since charmed Brussels and shared a book preface with Donald Trump. That was until Trump attacked the Pope and made a demeaning remark about her at the G7, and the honeymoon soured. 
At home, she's just lost a referendum, wages are among the lowest in Europe, and a more radical challenger, retired general Roberto Vannacci, polling at eight per cent and rising, is squeezing her from the right. 
Dr Marina Cino Pagliarello joins Global Roaming to unpack the split between Meloni's international and domestic image.
Guest: Dr Marina Cino Pagliarello, senior visiting fellow at the London School of Economics and senior research fellow at the European University Institute.
Mentioned in this episode: Giorgia Meloni Cuts the Hard Right a Path to Power, New York Times
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A far-right party is on the verge of forming a German state government for the first time since World War II.
The Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) has surged in Saxony-Anhalt, raising questions that extend well beyond one regional election. 
Is this the latest chapter in a political shift that has been building across Europe for more than a decade? Or could it mark a deeper break with the post-war order that shaped modern Germany, the European Union and NATO?
Hamish Macdonald and Waleed Aly examine the rise of the AfD, why eastern Germany has become its strongest base, and what reunification left unresolved.
They trace the broader populist wave from the global financial crisis to Orbán, Brexit, Meloni, Le Pen and Trump, and ask whether Germany's political "firewall" against the far right is beginning to crack.
Plus: Waleed reflects on the arguments behind his new Quarterly Essay, What Future for Liberalism? and why he believes the challenge facing liberal democracy runs deeper than any single election result.
 You can find Waleed's Quarterly Essay hereGet in touch:
We'd love to hear from you! Email us at global.roaming@abc.net.au
Find all the episodes of Global Roaming now via the ABC Listen App or wherever you get your podcasts.

China shock 2.0 has arrived and this time it's not the US rust belt in the firing line, it's Germany's beating industrial heart. Geraldine Doogue and Nick Bryant are joined by Jeremy Shapiro of the European Council on Foreign Relations to unpack how a flood of Chinese exports is hollowing out the car industry that Germany built its post-war identity on.
With up to 1.1 million jobs exposed and the far-right AfD looking increasingly competitive, Chancellor Friedrich Merz is clinging to the lowest approval rating of any German leader in memory.Plus, the Pentagon has sent a leaked questionnaire asking NATO allies to prove their loyalty to Washington, including whether they backed the recent strikes on Iran, and Shapiro makes the contrarian case that Obama's much-mocked Syria "red line" retreat wasn't weakness at all, but one of the smartest diplomatic wins in modern US history.Guest: Jeremy Shapiro, European Council on Foreign Relations
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After a week examining the history, logic and limits of the ANZUS alliance, Hamish Macdonald and Geraldine Doogue turn to the American perspective.
Former Trump White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci joins the podcast to discuss how alliances are viewed in Washington, whether America's partners should trust Donald Trump, and why he believes the next few years could test the West's security architecture.
Along the way, Hamish and Geraldine reflect on what they've learned from former prime ministers, historians and defence thinkers: Was ANZUS always driven more by interests than values? Is Australia more strategically important to the US than we realise? And in an increasingly uncertain world, can Canberra say no to Washington and still rely on the alliance when it matters most?
It's the final chapter of The Alliance series and a conversation about the question at the heart of Australia's foreign policy: if the old assumptions no longer hold, where do we go from here?
Guest: Former White House Communications Director Anthony Scaramucci.
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Andrew Hastie, the Liberal MP for Canning and Shadow Minister for Industry and Sovereign Capability, joins Geraldine Doogue and Hamish Macdonald for the fourth instalment of The Alliance, marking 75 years of ANZUS. 
A former SAS soldier who deployed to Afghanistan and Middle East, Hastie traces his own path into the military back to a family story from World War II, and argues that Australia's deepening reliance on the US, from Pine Gap to AUKUS, has come at the cost of diminishing Australia's sovereignty. 
He makes the case for Australia investing in its own drone and AI capability, questions whether the public is being prepared for what the alliance might demand of them in a future conflict, and reflects on why he still sees the US as indispensable to Australia's security despite his reservations about the Trump administration.
Guest: MP and former military officer, Andrew Hastie.
Coming up on The Alliance: former White House Communications Director Anthony Scaramucci.
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We'd love to hear from you! Email us at global.roaming@abc.net.au
Find all the episodes of Global Roaming now via the ABC Listen App or wherever you get your podcasts.