Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
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Getting the electric car was the big decision. A smart EV charger is the easy one. Visit fuseenergy.com slash EV. Welcome to the Restless Politics Question Time with me, Alistair Campbell. And with me, Rory Stewart. So here we are in Davos again. So we're going to talk about...
actually how Trump's actions in Greenland might result in boycotts around the World Cup, and in particular, whether Alistair should be going to the World Cup. We're also, though, going to be talking about what we've seen in Davos, what we've learned about the world from Davos. We're going to be getting into Robert Jenrick's defection from the Conservative Party.
So this was the heir apparent to the Conservative Party has now gone over to Nigel Farage's reform. And does that mean that reform is on track to replace the Conservative Party or the opposite?
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Chapter 2: How could Trump's threats about Greenland lead to World Cup boycotts?
then I think that's a different level of thing. But if we're just carrying on in this stage of Trump's bullying, Trump's intimidation, there'll certainly, to my mind, be no pushback from within FIFA.
He won a Peace Prize, a FIFA Peace Prize. He also got a second Peace Prize we didn't talk about enough, which is that the recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize handed over. It's really great. It would be like, I don't know, maybe I was lucky enough to get into a university and then I decided that I could just let my mate get into the university.
Or if Usain Bolt were here, you could put his gold medal around your neck. And I'd be the fastest person on the earth. I mean, it's pathetic. It's truly pathetic. It's like... In fact, if I can plug the New World, I've just seen our front page this week. It's Trump with a green dummy in his mouth saying, we're about to see what happens when a baby doesn't get what it wants.
His thing to the Norwegian, I mean, anybody who hasn't followed this amazing tweet.
It was a letter, though.
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Chapter 3: What impact does Robert Jenrick's defection have on the Conservative Party?
It was a letter. To Janus Karsora, who we've interviewed, in which he says, listen, you guys, the Norwegians, didn't give me the Nobel Peace Prize. So to be honest, I'm not that interested in peace anymore. I mean, of course, I'm still going to do a bit of peace.
Yeah, but you can't see me purely as the president for peace. Anyway, I'm going to take what I want because you didn't give me the peace prize.
But look, I don't know what happens if the – because it would be a huge thing for any of these countries to say to their football associations, we don't want you to go to the World Cup, given how much it means to them, given the financial, economic situation attached to it, and so much else that goes on with it. So, yeah, we'll see.
But look, I feel settled in my opinion, but I know I'm going to feel very, very sad when the World Cup comes around.
I think there should be a boycott, even though Trump will use it to his benefit, even though it won't change US foreign policy. I think it will actually be very useful domestically in the United States for opponents for Trump to say. This is unbelievable. Every single European country and many other countries around the world.
But it would have to be that.
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Chapter 4: Is the Reform Party gaining strength through Jenrick's move?
It would have to be that if it was another divide and rule.
I don't know who else is qualified. I mean, are there any other countries which might be amused to team up with us and refusing to tell?
Oh, who are not in Europe?
Yeah. Are there Asian countries that could come along?
Yeah, they could. Is China qualified? No. Thanks to Infantino's money-making expansion of the whole thing, there are more countries than ever at the World Cup. Look, it could become a thing. I don't think we're far from that. Here's one for you to think about, Rory. Should the king go to the 250th anniversary celebrations? Because that's the plan.
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Chapter 5: What is the current situation regarding the ceasefire in Syria?
Well, definitely not if that anniversary involves making another claim on Canada, because he is the King of Canada. Canada's a sovereign nation.
But just in Greenland alone, if this is still going on, should Keir Starmer and the King sit down and say, you know what, bad idea?
I think first thing is it's very unfair to the king because of course the king doesn't make these decisions on his own, right? This is a decision for Keir Starmer. But I'm afraid this Greenland thing crosses the line beyond anything we've seen and that we have to respond so firmly, so clearly and above all together. I keep coming back to this. Everything coordinated.
Carney, Macron, stand together. Right, next question.
I just want to give a little sense of the flavor of the issues raised, particularly by American listeners. about why they felt this is, they may have crossed the line. And these are the things that they've sort of put up with up to now.
Politicization of law, delegitimization of courts, attack on a free press, normalization of rule breaking, reframing of minorities' security, that's personality cult, aggressive foreign policy, and of course all the lying and everything else that we know about.
Okay. Jackie, who's from Derby. Hi, guys. I caught wind that you're at Davos this week. During what's a pretty significant week geopolitically, what's the most interesting thing you've heard? Well, first thing, before I get onto that, I mean, my goodness, there is a lot of nonsense. I mean, if you wanted to tease this amazing gathering, I mean, it's extraordinary.
I mean, it's such a ragbag of peculiar different types of people. People quite understandably running small charities, trying to raise money, hoping they're going to meet some Saudi trillionaire who's going to give them $50 million because they met him over a cup of coffee. People trying to reignite issues that seem to be dying. And other people who... You can kind of imagine sort of thing.
When you're having a conversation, we'll sort of stand up and say, the one thing I want to say is treasure your parents. It's a lot of that stuff, right? It's a lot of kind of kooky self-help stuff going on, which probably is a sign that we are in massive, massive decline because actually... the whole spirit of this thing is being sapped from within.
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Chapter 6: What are the implications of a potential boycott of the World Cup?
And what can you really say when Trump is going to Greenland except be nice to your parents.
Be nice to your parents. Give them a big hug. Look, as you have seen, Rory, I get very, very irritable at these events. I cannot stand the sort of status consciousness that goes on. We're lucky enough, Rory, we've got white badges. They're very good. We're very important. We walk around with your white badge. Yes. And then you meet other people.
I met this other guy who only had a green badge, would you believe? And he said, how much do you have to pay for that? And I said, well, I don't want to upset you, but nothing. Oh, my God. He paid $40,000 to be here.
To have a less good badge than you.
Chapter 7: How do recent events in Syria affect the Kurds and the government?
Yeah. Yeah, that must be annoying.
It must be really annoying. But the friend that he was with, however, said, you will not believe how much business I do here. Right. He was in sort of tech world, but he said, I will do – I will have meetings – The follow-on from meetings I've already had or that create new meetings I will have.
But he reckons his business benefits to a factor of about a quarter by coming to Davos and being there.
And the network thing. I mean, if we think about we were here last year and we were up in the main street, which you can only get into with a fancy type of badge. And that's where we saw the Syrian foreign minister.
Yeah. And that's where we fixed up the trip to Syria.
That's where we saw John Kerry. That's where we saw the former Swedish prime minister. I mean, so just standing in that street, Bill Gates was wandering around, I think.
So that part of it is fine. But I'll tell you what, it absolutely does my head in in a way that I can't even tell you. I'm thinking of getting a gigantic badge made on here and say... Do not ask me when I arrived in Davos. Do not ask me when I'm leaving. Do not ask me where I'm staying.
Do not ask me how I get from my hotel to the Congress Center because you don't really care and I can't stand all the small talk that goes on. Whereas there is this thing develops. Breakfast this morning, I overheard these six, I think they were from Mongolia. And they were sitting there and they talked for 25 minutes about the different ways that they had found to get to the Congress Center.
Just do it. Don't talk about it. Do it.
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Chapter 8: How does public opinion play a role in political actions regarding the World Cup?
And this is, I think, the edge. She needs to say that the world has changed. And therefore, we need strategic autonomy. We need economic growth. We need different values in our economic system. And it's particularly on the economic growth story. enough time has now passed. Labour's struggling 18 months on.
There is a sense that Labour has been captured by left-wing backbenchers who cannot contemplate cuts to welfare, cuts to disability payment. We need to spend more on defense. We need to get British industry going. We need to deregulate. We need to get all the stuff actually that Peter Kyle, I think, has been doing really good stuff on. I want to really support Peter Kyle. I
But unless Keir Starmer gets behind Peter Carlin and lets him drive an agenda that's going to help entrepreneurs, business and investment, that'll be a huge opportunity for Kemi Badenoch.
Yeah. Anyway, there we are. I don't know whether Kemi will welcome me saying that. I think she's improving hugely. Of course, it does help. It sort of does help Labour if the Tories and Reform stay sort of fighting each other on this ground. And there is a possibility that the next election becomes...
in terms of the way it's framed and the outcome, a sense of who is going to lead either a progressive alliance or a right-wing alliance. I think that is kind of maybe where we're heading. But I think we have past-Pete reform, and I think that the other two main parties need to put more pressure on him.
In which case, Generic made a huge error.
I think Generic has made a huge error. And the reason for that is that he's gone right across the spectrum. And he doesn't look to me like somebody who really believes what he says. He just thinks it's all about how you say it.
Farage says it's a one-man band. And the chance that Generic gets rewarded by being part of the reform brand seems extremely unlikely.
But also he'd have pissed off. I imagine Farage has pissed off the sort of Richard Tices and Zia Youssefs who thought they were the main kind of second in command, as it were. He's brought in another one. So anyway, we'll see how it pans out. Now listen, I want to ask you about Syria. Josh from Liverpool.
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