Newsweek's Foreign Service

Chad Wilcox and Margo Miller are this week’s guests as Josh Lowe and Mirren Gidda discuss the Second-in-command. The 2016 U.S. Presidential election has been the loudest and angriest in living memory, with two presidential candidates who each have plenty of baggage and are both ready and willing to dial the rhetoric up to 11. Amid the noise, its been easy to miss Tim Kaine and Mike Pence in the coverage. But while neither man is as divisive or as eyecatching as their would-be bosses, both have deep convictions, complex politics, and are set to play substantial roles in American political life in the coming years, win or lose. So what drives Kaine and Pence? What would they do for the next four years and beyond? And what really makes a great—or terrible—vice president?  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Mark Bergman and Diana Shaw Clark join hosts Josh Lowe and Mirren as they figure out how important an issue the Supreme Court is in the 2016 election. What with Muslim bans and "locker room talk" on one side and a plethora of leaked emails on the other, the 2016 U.S. presidential election has had plenty of scandals. So many, in fact, that they've sometimes drowned out one of the most important issues facing Americans at the ballot box; appointments to the supreme court. With an unresolved deadlock in the court one of the first jobs in a new President's in-tray, and up to three further appointments likely to arise during their tenure, whoever enters the Oval Office in November could have enormous power to shape U.S. law for generations to come. So what would Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump do with that power? And how much is it going to change what happens on the day of the Poll? Newsweek's Foreign Service is recorded and edited by Jordan Saville.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out i

Nina Burleigh and Michele Gorman from Newsweek’s U.S. Office join Mirren Gidda and Josh Lowe to discuss what women want from this year’s election. The choice before women at the 2016 U.S. Presidential election is absurdly polarised. On the one hand, they have Hillary Clinton, who not only places issues like childcare at the heart of her platform, but would if elected become the most powerful woman ever in the modern Western world. On the other, they have Donald Trump, a hyper-macho man's man whose misogynistic language culminated in the release of a tape of him bragging about sexual assault and a string of allegations of improper conduct toward women (all of which he denies.) That in mind, it's perhaps not surprising that polls show a growing gender gap, with women increasingly likely to vote in their overwhelmingly majority for Clinton. But this isn't just about personalities. In recent years, American women have increasingly leaned Democrat. Why do the republicans have a woman problem? Why don't all...

Elizabeth Linder and Charlie Wolf join Josh Lowe and Mirren Gidda discuss the future of the Republican Party as the election hots up. The U.S. Presidential election is far from over, and Donald Trump is not yet out. But after horrified reactions to the emergence of a tape in which Trump could be heard condoning sexual assault, as well as lackluster TV debate performances, the Republican presidential nominee is starting to seriously struggle. It prompted us to consider: If Trump cannot recover and is defeated on November 8, where will this leave the Republican party? His unrelenting comments about women and minorities have driven those voters even further away from the G.O.P, and disagreements over how to respond to his chaotic campaign have left senior party figures divided. The fallout could breed problems for the Republicans into 2020 and beyond. Charlie Wolf is a political commentator and talk show host, and Elizabeth Linder is the founder and CEO of the Conversational Century and former politics... &#

Donald Trump is a whole new phenomenon; a larger-than-life public personality for decades, but only recently a major politician. The success of his wildcard bid for the presidency took political journalists by surprise—his previous flirtation with politics as the Reform Party candidate was cut short far earlier. Trump courted public controversy with pronouncements on immigration and trade, but his private dealings were far less well known. But Trump was no stranger to Newsweek's Kurt Eichenwald, who in his career as a financial reporter first encountered the tycoon in the late 1980s. This election cycle, Kurt decided to look in-depth at Trump's shadowy business history, and his scoops—on Trump's conflicts of interest overseas, on his dealings with China, on an alleged breaking of the Cuban trade embargo and more—have each proved explosive. For this special episode Josh Lowe and Mirren Gidda spoke to Kurt about his history with Trump, the presidential campaign, and the intriguing web of connections on...

David Hawkins and Stacy Hilliard join Mirren Gidda and Josh Lowe as the foreshadow the possibility of Donald Trump winning the election. Few people ever thought he'd get here. And yet, with weeks to go until the U.S. presidential election, Donald Trump, the property mogul who was thought of as variously too lightweight, too rich, too erratic, too right-wing or too uninterested to win, could feasibly take the Oval Office. Trump is only a couple of points behind Hillary Clinton in some polls. Will Trump start a trade war with China? How would life change for minorities? And will Mexico really pay for the wall? David Hawkins is the events chair of American Voices International and a former events chair of Republicans Overseas who has provided informal advice to the Trump campaign, and Stacy Hilliard is the Chair of American Voices International and Vice Chair of Republicans Overseas. Newsweek's Foreign Service is recorded and edited by Jordan Saville.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out

Sarah Churchwell and Joseph Downing are this week’s guests as Josh Lowe and Mirren Gidda tackle the thorny issue of privacy within politics. All week, the U.S. has talked of little but Hillary Clinton's health, after a bout of pneumonia led Donald Trump to demand that the Democratic presidential nominee release her medical records. Meanwhile, the clamor for Trump to put out his tax return is growing. It led us to ask: where is the boundary between public and private? Clearly, politicians have to disclose more than the average member of the public, but what, and when, is it reasonable to ask for? Do the benefits of such an approach outweigh the downsides? Sarah Churchwell is a professorial fellow in American literature at the School of Advanced Study at the University of London, and Joseph Downing is a fellow in European politics at the LSE. Newsweek's Foreign Service is recorded and edited by Jordan Saville.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Alicia Barrett and Sunder Katwala join Josh Lowe and Mirren Gidda as they address Immigration. The Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump has long railed against immigration, threatening to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border and ban Muslims from entering the country. His extreme stance has won him supporters. Anxieties over immigration policy trouble governments worldwide. In Britain, many of the people who voted to leave did so in the hope of reducing the numbers of EU migrants coming to the U.K. So, how should governments address the issue of immigration? Does espousing its economic benefits convince people that immigration is beneficial, or should it be discussed differently? Alicia Barrett is the American outreach officer at the Institute of Economic Affairs, a free market research organization, and Sunder Katwala is the director of British Future, a think tank focussed on the issue of immigration. Newsweek's Foreign Service is recorded and edited by Jordan Saville.  See acast

Elizabeth Cotton and Doug Segal join Mirren Gidda and Josh Lowe to discuss how governments across the world should be treating mental health. Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton is turning mental health into a core part of her campaign platform. She wants, she says, those who have a mental illness to get the same standard of treatment as those who have a physical one. But nice as it sounds, how can they actually make it happen? And beyond the politicians, when many ordinary people remain confused about mental health, or feel unable to discuss their own problems, what cultural change is needed to get to the goal? Doug Segal is a stand-up comedian who talks about mental health, and Elizabeth Cotton is a writer and educator in the field of mental health who runs the organization Surviving Work. Newsweek's Foreign Service is recorded and edited by Jordan Saville.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Katie Ghose and Mark Bergman join Newsweek’s Josh Lowe and Mirren Gidda as they discuss changing spending regulations and whether they can change the underlying political cultures that have cultivated it. Donald Trump has often sought to damage Hillary Clinton with allegations that she's trying to spend her way to victory, backed by Wall Street donors. But every firebrand has to sell out some time, and this month, Trump began airing his first ads. In the American system, where there are limits on donations but not on spending, a cash-based arms race between candidates is probably inevitable. It got us thinking about how rules governing election spending affect a country's politics. There are different systems in the U.K., across Europe and elsewhere, each with their upsides and downsides for voters. So what's the best system for managing the relationship between politics and money? Where should public funds come into play? Katie Ghose is the chief executive of the U.K.-based Electoral Reform Society... &

Hussein Kesvani and Baroness Shaista Ahmad Sheehan joins host Josh Lowe to discuss the rise of Islamophobia in the U.S. and Europe and how we can combat it? On Saturday, Imam Maulama Akonjee and his assistant Thara Uddin were shot and killed as they walked through Queens, New York, after prayers. The incident, at the time of recording, was not formally classified as a "hate crime," and many in New York's Muslim community have argued strongly that it should be, it highlights the growing threat to Muslims living amid rising Islamaphobia in the United States. In Europe, Muslims are being subjected to mounting Islamophobia, particularly in the wake of a spate of terrorist attacks carried out by people allied with the Islamic State (ISIS). Hussein Kesvani is a consultant at Theos, a religion and public affairs think tank, and Baroness Shaista Ahmad Sheehan is a Liberal Democrat Member of the House of Lords. Newsweek's Foreign Service is recorded & edited by Jordan Saville.  See acast.com/privacy

Larry Sanders, George Galloway, James Schnedier, Isabel Oakeshott and Robert Rowland Smith were guests on Newsweek’s Outsider Politics panel at the Wilderness Festival on August 6 and was chaired by Newsweek Europe's Digital Editor Serena Kutchinsky. Politics is changing, possibly forever. On both sides of the Atlantic, establishment politicians and mainstream parties are being pushed out of power by an electorate angry at what they see as a morally bankrupt elite. Campaigns are won and lost on social media. The traditional axis of left and right is redundant. But is this a passing fad—the result of lingering anger over government’s mismanagement of the financial crisis or a more significant shift which will redefine politics for the 21st century? Larry Sanders is an academic and Green Party Health Spokesperson and older brother of the US Senator Bernie Sanders. James Schneider is the National Organiser of Momentum, the left-wing political organisation. George Galloway is a politician and author. Isabel...

Heather Williams and Jacob Parakilas are on Newsweek's Foreign Service this week as they look at Russian President Vladimir Putin's attempts to influence the political processes in Europe and the U.S. Much has been made of Donald Trump's support for Putin, though the pair maintain that they have no direct relationship, their seeming closeness has prompted questions. Over in Europe, Putin has lent his support to far-right and far-left parties who tend to be anti-EU. So, what is Putin's eventual aim for both the U.S. and Europe, and how influential is he really? Heather Williams is a lecturer at King's College London with a focus on US-Russian relations and nuclear policies, and Jacob Parakilas is assistant head of the U.S. and the Americas program at the U.K. think-tank, Chatham House. Newsweek’s Foreign Service is recorded and edited by Jordan Saville.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Brian Klaas and Stacy Hilliard join Newsweek to explore what happens when voters are fed up of traditional parties and candidates. Ilya Shapiro, a senior fellow in constitutional studies at the Cato Institute, has calculated that if an independent candidate wants to run for U.S. President he or she has until next week, August 2, to register, to be able to win an Electoral College majority. It got us thinking: given neither Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump is particularly beloved among voters, why has no strong third candidate emerged? And is it time that American politics was changed, to open up the system, make it easier to run, and offer voters more choice? We also look at Spain, which offers a cautionary tale: there, two new parties, the centrist Ciudadanos and leftist Podemos, burst onto the national scene in the past three years. Each sought to provide an alternative to the two tired traditional parties of power: the center-right People's Party and center-left socialists. But in the event, they...

Hilary Hurd and Erin Marie Saltman join Newsweek's Josh Lowe as he asks how governments can prevent erratic and unpredictable attacks by so-called “lone wolf” extremists. Gavin Long, the man who killed three police officers in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, had past links with radical groups. But in politically charged YouTube videos infused with violent rhetoric, he insisted he acted alone. In Nice, where Mohamed Lahouaiyej Bouhlel killed at least 64 people and wounded dozens more with a truck, the Islamic State militant group (ISIS) took credit for the carnage. But Bouhlel’s links with the group are unclear, and likely indirect. So how do you prepare for attacks that come without warning or large-scale planning? Do we now live in a world where any angry, isolated person who comes across a specific message can become a terrorist? Or, with the right knowledge, can governments and security services separate genuine dangers from false alarms, and turn those most at risk of perpetrating appalling crimes back from...

Leslie Vinjamuri and Charlie Wolf joins Newsweek's Josh Lowe to debate the question—what happens when populists face off against the professionals? July 18 marks the start of the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, Ohio. For Donald Trump, the party's presumptive presidential candidate, this has to be the moment when he unites his fellow Republicans and proves to the party and the U.S. that he can be president. This question is relevant to British politics too. The country's EU referendum saw anti-Europe campaigners surge to victory by masterfully manipulating mass discontent with traditional politics.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.