Warren Harding was the 29th President of the United States, serving between 1921 and his death from a heart attack in the Summer of 1923.Harding famously proclaimed a "return to normalcy" following a frenetic period defined by severe economic downturn, race riots, anarchist bombings and labour strikes in the aftermath of the First World War. Though Harding’s presidency turned out to be relatively brief, two things remain highly interesting about Harding today. Firstly, despite being very popular at the time of his death, he is now frequently ranked as one of the worst presidents in American history. And secondly, his railing against progressivism, and desire to return the country to a more limited form of government, sounds eerily familiar to even the most casual followers of American politics in 2024. Why has Harding’s reputation collapsed so disastrously in the century since his death? Is this deserved? If Donald Trump intends to change American government in the fundamental ways he and his followers claim to, what can he learn from Warren Harding along the way? These are the questions at the heart of today's podcast.
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EP132: Olaf Scholz
Olaf Scholz has been Chancellor of Germany since December 2021. Following the collapse of his government a few weeks ago, he seems headed for electoral defeat early next year. Where did it all go wrong?As a character, Scholz is muted and impersonal almost to the point of being dreary - famously described as the “personification of boredom in politics” by Der Spiegel. Such qualities make a profile like this difficult, so today’s episode is more policy heavy than previous ones. But it does nonetheless achieve its principal aim in telling the story of a Germany that, nearing the midpoint of the 2020s, seems weary, directionless, and insecure. My returning guest for this conversation is Oliver Moody. Oliver is the Berlin Correspondent at the Times and Sunday Times, a post which sees him cover Germany, Scandinavia, Central Europe and the Baltics. IN this vein, Oliver will be publishing his first book next year; that book is Baltic: The Future of Europe, which seeks to uncover how this Northeastern corner of Europe will decide the course of the West in the coming years.
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EP131: Patrice Lumumba
Patrice Lumumba was the first prime minister of the Democratic Republic of the Congo for just ten weeks in 1960. The brevity of Lumumba's time in charge reflects he difficulties of governing an enormous, ethnically diverse country deliberately underdeveloped by its former Belgian colonial masters. But it was the fomenting rivalry between the US and the Soviet Union over Africa that had the largest impact on Lumumba's time as prime minister.My guest today is Stuart A. Reid. Stuart is a Senior Fellow for History and Foreign Policy at the Council on Foreign Relations, and was previously an editor at Foreign Affairs between 2008 and 2024. He is also the author of The Lumumba Plot, which has just been released in paperback.
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EP130: Daniel Noboa
Daniel Noboa has been President of Ecuador since November 2023. The youngest democratically elected state leader in the world, Noboa has had a highly tumultuous introduction to high office.In January this year, violent crime in Ecuador, which had been increasing for nearly a decade, reached a terrible crescendo when two of the country’s gang leaders escaped from prison, and a series of armed attacks, including bombings, were inflicted on prisons, markets and TV stations. The result was a declaration of a state of emergency by Noboa’s government, only six weeks old at the time. To try and fight these forces, Noboa has reached out to the US, painting himself as a defender of democracy. As you’re about to hear, the US has given Noboa some considerable leeway in how he has prosecuted Ecuador’s war on the gangs.My guest today is Isabel Chiriboga. Isabel is an assistant director at the Atlantic Council’s Adrienne Arsht Latin America Center, where she contributes to the center’s work on the Andes, including on Colombia, Ecuador, Chile, and Peru. She is also a frequent opinion contributor, and her work has been published in Foreign Policy, Miami Herald, the National Interest, Global Americans, and the New Atlanticist.
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EP129: Robert Fico
Robert Fico has been the prime minister of Slovakia since 2023, and has served in that position three times since 2006. The thankfully unsuccessful attempt on Fico's life came at a time when the prime minister had become genuinely controversial internationally for the first time. This followed an increasingly erratic approach to the Slovakian media, pronounced lockdown and vaccine skepcitism in the aftermath of the pandemic, and opposition to military assistance to Ukraine - a country which shares a border with Slovakia. What you’re about to hear is that there was a time when Fico was a much more conventional politician. So why has he changed? Was he responding to changes at home in Slovakia - a country with a distinct political trajectory to its neighbours - or did the World change around Slovakia, with Fico looking abroad for inspiration?My guest today is Dr Michal Ovádek. Michal is a lecturer and assistant professor in European Institutions, Politics and Policy at University College London, who primarily researches issues related to EU institutions, and the rule of law. As well as Fico, we discuss the post-communist transition in Slovakia, the origins of Slovak ambivalence towards the Ukrainian war effort, and associated Russophilia, and the cultural divide inside the country today.
Kissinger said that ninety percent of politicians give the other ten percent a bad name. Each week, a guest and I discuss the life and legacy of one politician from recent times. Some are well-known, others obscure; all have left an indelible mark on our world, and often for the worse. Join me, Tom Leeman, in a journey through the corruptible and the controversial.
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