Best of the Spectator

In this week’s episode: Will the Red Wall crush Boris Johnson? In this week’s Spectator, our political editor James Forsyth and our deputy political editor Katy Balls report on the plot to oust the Prime Minister by Red Wall MPs, and No.10’s battle to save Boris. They join the podcast to give their up to date diagnosis.  (00:43)Also this week: How to save the BBC?This week Nadine Dorries announced that she is planning a licence fee freeze. In the Spectator this week Paul Wood, a veteran journalist of the BBC writes about his love-hate relationship with the broadcaster. He joins the podcast now along with Domonic Minghella, writer, producer and former showrunner of the BBC’s Robin Hood. (14:45)  And finally: Is it moral to do good with bad money? The Sackler family - whose fortune was built on getting thousands of Americans addicted to OxyContin, contributing to the country’s devastating opioid crisis - are now returning to philanthropy in the UK. But should their ill-gotten money be accepted for good causes? That’s the question Sam Leith and Matthew Parris have both asked for the Spectator’s website and magazine respectively. They both join the podcast to continue their moral musings. (28:07)Hosted by Lara Prendergast and William MooreProduced by Sam HolmesSubscribe to The Spectator today and get a £20 Amazon gift voucher:www.spectator.co.uk/voucher Listen to Lara's food podcast Table Talk:https://www.spectator.co.uk/podcasts/table-talk  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this week's Book Club podcast, my guest is the gallerist James Birch - whose new book Bacon In Moscow describes how he achieved the seemingly impossible: taking an exhibition of Francis Bacon's work to Moscow in the late 1980s. James tells me how he negotiated between the volatile artist and the implacable Soviet bureaucracy with the help of a suave but menacing KGB middleman; and how, along the way, he nearly acquired an original Francis Bacon painting and nearly acquired a Russian wife.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Ed Smith is a food writer and chef who started his acclaimed blog Rocket and Squash while he was working as a solicitor. On today’s podcast, he tells Liv and Lara about how his passion for good food started, why he left the world of law, the changing nature of the London food scene, and the ingredients for the perfect restaurant review.  Since 2017, he has authored On the Side and The Borough Market Cookbook, and his latest book, Crave: Recipes Arranged by Flavour, to Suit Your Mood and Appetite, was published last May. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On this week's episode, we'll hear from Katy Balls on who may take Boris Johnson’s place if he resigns.  (00:49)Next, Nicholas Farrell on the potential return of Silvio Berlusconi. (06:21)And finally, And Lisse Garnett on what’s it like to date and influencer.  (18:00)Produced and presented by Sam HolmesSubscribe to The Spectator today and get a £20 Amazon gift voucher:www.spectator.co.uk/voucher  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Michelle Donelan was elected in 2015 as a Conservative MP for Chippenham. Since then, she has been re-elected twice and has risen in her political roles. Starting as a member of the education select committee and becoming a whip, to then being appointed a minister, first of children and families, and then in the latest cabinet reshuffle, becoming minister of state for higher and further education. On the episode, Michelle talks about how she had decided on a career in politics at the age of six, working for World Wrestling Entertainment, and what surprised her when she first entered politics. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this week’s episode: Is Boris Johnson done for? In this week’s Spectator cover story, our political editor James Forsyth and our deputy political editor Katy Balls write about Boris Johnson’s perilous position in the aftermath of the Partygate scandal. They join the podcast to predict the Prime Minister’s fate. (00:40)Also this week: Is there a dangerous side to self-improvement?The hashtag manifesting has had billions of impressions on social media in the last year. Younger generations love it and Mary Wakefield explores this viral phenomenon in her column this week. She joins the podcast along with Ally Head, the health and sustainability editor for Marie Claire UK who has interviewed a number of manifestation experts. (14:36)  And finally: how attractive are your feet? Kate Andrews, the Spectator’s economics editor, made an unusual discovery at the end of last year. Pictures of her in flip flops had made it onto a particular website, Wikifeet – ‘the internet’s largest collaborative celebrity feet website’. Kate wrote about her surprising discovery in this week’s magazine, and she joins the podcast along with Theresa Bedford, a personal finance and investing expert who has written about the best ways to sell pictures of your feet online. (28:59)Hosted by Lara Prendergast and William MooreProduced by Sam HolmesSubscribe to The Spectator today and get a £20 Amazon gift voucher:www.spectator.co.uk/voucher Listen to Lara's food podcast Table Talk:https://www.spectator.co.uk/podcasts/table-talk  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week's Book Club podcast addresses one of the most misunderstood and vilified concepts in the culture wars: postmodernism. How did this arcane theoretical position escape from academia to become a social media talking point? What the hell is it anyway? What does Jeff Koons have to do with Foucault? Is postmodernism out to destroy capitalism, or is it capitalism incarnate? And what comes after postmodernism? Stuart Jeffries - author of Everything, All The Time, Everywhere: How We Became Postmodern - puts it all in quotes for us. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

'If table tennis set the stage for China’s international diplomacy, then volleyball rebuilt the nation’s confidence', ran one article in the People's Daily around the time of the 2016 Rio Olympics. Sports has had a long political history in China, Cindy Yu's guest in this week's Chinese Whispers tells her. She is Dr Susan Brownell, Professor of Anthropology at the University of Missouri. She has been in and out of China since the 1980s, when she went to Peking University as a student and ended up represented the institution as a track runner.On this episode, Cindy finds out why exactly China cares about the Olympics just so much. And it certainly does – Susan and Cindy reminisce about 2008, when China spent $100 million on a four-hour long opening ceremony and $7 billion on the whole Games. Working in Beijing that year, Susan saw, firsthand, the excitement that local officials and people put into the preparations ('There were huge programmes to teach English to everybody, especially in Beijing. You know, the old ladies and the taxi drivers'), but also the fear and intensity that came with this – 'all the government officials involved in the effort were just kind of quaking'.The reason for all this – and the reason why a snub at the imminent Winter Olympics, as numerous countries around the world announce boycotts, will be remembered by China – is because sports has long been political. In the ping pong diplomacy of the 1970s, games played between Chinese and American teams allowed Nixon's America and Mao's China to get closer to each other. In the five women's volleyball team world victories of the 1980s, China was able to find a new source of national pride, as its people tried to recover from the wounds of the Cultural Revolution. In 2008, seven years after accession to the WTO and at a time when a more liberal China could still be imagined, the Summer Olympics provided a chance to show the world what 21st century China was all about. 'It was China's coming out party', Susan says.To be sure, this Olympics matters less – winter Olympics always do, and after all, China has 'already emerged as a superpower'. But even so, it will have a political dimension – just see how China eagerly invited President Putin last year. On the episode, they also make a brief digression into the demolitions that happened in Beijing – leading to headlines in the New York Times like 'Olympics Imperil Historic Beijing Neighborhood'. Susan corrects media reports and says that, in fact, in the areas reconstructed for the Games, it was mainly small shops not residences that were destroyed. She befriended one man who was dislocated from his mechanical repair shop there and became a taxi driver because of the Olympics, and Cindy reflects on her memories of a 'demolition era', where China's rapid growth meant the words chaiqian (demolish and relocate) were commonly marked on old buildings across Chinese cities. But tune in to hear how some ingenious Chinese – including members of Cindy's family – welcomed the destruction of their property as it allowed them to game the system of government compensation. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On this week's episode, we’ll hear from Douglas Murray on why he thinks that the Coronavirus is over. (00:51)Next, Nyrola Elimä on her family’s experiences as Uighurs living under the rule of the CCP. (08:27)And finally, Theo Hobson on why the different factions of the Church of England need to come together. (16:54)Produced and presented by Sam HolmesSubscribe to The Spectator today and get a £20 Amazon gift voucher:www.spectator.co.uk/voucher  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

2022 has only just begun but a lot of minds in American politics are already looking towards the next presidential election in 2024. For the Republicans, the big question is will Donald Trump be their nominee and if he isn't who will fill that very large hole? Freddy Gray sits down with the editor of Modern Age, Daniel McCarthy.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.