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The Lowdown from Nick Cohen

Nick Cohen

Get The Lowdown from Nick Cohen as he investigates a world that seems to get ever more crazy, with leading commentators, columnists and politicians.


Each week, leading commentator Nick Cohen talks to the country's leading movers and shakers - to cut the through much of the noise and commentary that passes for so much political discourse these days. Nick - a long-term columnist for The Observer and The Spectator - teams up with other commentators, journalists, authors and politicians to make sense of our ever stranger and troubling world. Nick aims to help keep you sane! So please get The Lowdown from Nick Cohen and subscribe to his Substack column - Writing from London.

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  • 134 episodes
  • Updated Yesterday

Episodes134

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  • Sep 14, 2024 · 49 min

    Ep 38: Labour's chance to salvage the UK with Rafael Behr

    Send us a text Nick talks to Lowdown regular, author and Guardian columnist Rafael Behr about what Labour does now in government after 14 years in opposition on the sidelines of terrible Tory governments delivering austerity, brexit, a bungled pandemic response, five failed prime ministers, economic decline and collapsing councils and public services. Will the UK inherited from the Tories prove to be a poisoned chalice for PM Sir Keir Starmer and co or can Labour rescue and rejuvenate a country battered by years of Tory misrule? Rafael concludes Labour may have the policies and the right people to carry them out but wonders whether Sir Keir and his chancellor Rachel Reeves have the political vim to sell their vision and plans to the electorate. Already, the BBC has declared Labour's blink-and-you'd've-missed-it political honeymoon to be "over." Rafael @rafaelbehr concedes Labour has its work cut out - as latest opinion polls suggest - and a rocky passage lies ahead. But the Conservatives have not even begun to examine the reasons for their crushing defeat in July. Most media attention has been focussed on the split on the Tories' far right, and with Nigel Farage\s latest vehicle, Reform, while steadfastly ignoring the hemorrhaging of one-time rock solid Conservative seats to the Liberal Democrats, including the Witney and Maidenhead constituencies of former prime ministers Lord Cameron and Theresa May. Rafael contends that the famous "Disgusted of Tunbridge Wells" - which the Tories also lost to the Lib Dems - remain particularly disgusted by brexit and its abject and predictable failure. Rafael's recent book Politics: A Survivor's Guide: How to stay engaged without getting enraged is published by W.F.Howes Ltd and available at Amazon and in all good bookshops. Support the show Listen to The Lowdown from Nick Cohen for in-depth analysis of the issues and events that shape our lives and futures. From Ukraine to Brexit, from Trump to the Tories - we hope to keep you informed - and sane! @NickCohen4 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

  • Sep 7, 2024 · 36 min

    Ep 37: The rise of the Far Right in Germany with Annette Dittert

    Send us a text Nick Cohen chats withAnnette Dittert, London Correspondent and bureau chief for ARD, Germany's first and celebrated post-war public broadcaster - also known as "Das Erste" (The First). The Far Right AfD (Alternative for German) made stunning gains in recent state elections in eastern German in Thuringia and Saxony, throwing mainstream parties into a funk and causing shockwaves across Europe. What does this mean for Germany 80 less than 80 years after the defeat of the Nazis? Annette, @annettedittert also a filmmaker, columnist and author, talks about the huge widespread disillusionment Germans share about the current coalition government led by the Social Democrat chancellor Olaf Scholz. There is also growing popular dismay over the state of Germany itself where nothing, as with spades in the UK, seems to work any more. What can be done to counter the threat of the AfD which is profoundly anti-EU, and anti-immigrant and is seen to be a cheerleader for Vladimir Putin and opponent of aid to Ukraine? Anglophile Annette also talks about her depression over the state of the UK under the 3 year Boris Johnson shit show and how Brexit has helped destroy the UK's reputation and and power in Germany and elsewhere, to the point where few Germans now appear interested in what happens there. Support the show Listen to The Lowdown from Nick Cohen for in-depth analysis of the issues and events that shape our lives and futures. From Ukraine to Brexit, from Trump to the Tories - we hope to keep you informed - and sane! @NickCohen4 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

  • Aug 3, 2024 · 41 min

    Ep 36: A new age of authoritarianism with Anne Applebaum

    Send us a text Nick talks with Anne Applebaum, the celebrated American journalist, author and historian about her new book Autocracy Inc., The dictators who want to rule the world, published by Penguin. Putin, Xi Jinping, Jong Un, Trump, Maduro - dictators great and small - wannabe or real deal - dominate the news space these days. Democracy hasn't been under so much pressure since the 30's and 40's. Anne talks about the forces driving this new age of autocracy and the men with the often little iron fists who want to rule their part of the world. Meanwhile, some are doing their patriotic duty to themselves by enriching themselves at the cost of their country. "L'etat - c'est a moi!" After seventeen years as a columnist at The Washington Post, Anne became a staff writer at The Atlantic in January 2020. She is the author of five critically acclaimed and award-winning books: Twilight of Democracy, Red Famine, Iron Curtain, Between East and West, and Gulag, winner of the Pulitzer Prize. She divides her time between Poland, where her husband Radoslaw Sikorski is foreign minister, and Washington, D.C. Support the show Listen to The Lowdown from Nick Cohen for in-depth analysis of the issues and events that shape our lives and futures. From Ukraine to Brexit, from Trump to the Tories - we hope to keep you informed - and sane! @NickCohen4 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

  • Jun 23, 2024 · 38 min

    Ep: 35 Torygeddon - can the polls be right? With Tory expert Professor Tim Bale

    Send us a text Nick talks to Professor Tim Bale of the Queen Mary University of London, who is widely looked on as the UK's keenest academic observer of the Conservative Party. Poll after poll indicates a near-extinction event for the Conservative Party on July 4th. The disasters of Brexit, Johnson and Truss coupled with the Tories' tedious and interminable culture wars have long exposed the supposed go-to party of government as more of an electoral suicide cult than anything else. Tim and Nick discuss the potential scale of defeat for the Tories and whether or not -post-election - they will try to recapture the vote-rich heartlands of the political centre ground or cling to its Farageist-Brexity wet blanket, a strategy that looks guaranteed to condemn them to the fringes of British politics for years to come, and possibly leave them exposed to a Reform Party reverse take-over. @ProfTimBale 's latest book The Conservative Party after Brexit (published by Polity) charts the Party's dizzying descent into nationalist and radical hard right Brexit populism. Don't forget to read Nick's regular Substack column Writing from London. Support the show Listen to The Lowdown from Nick Cohen for in-depth analysis of the issues and events that shape our lives and futures. From Ukraine to Brexit, from Trump to the Tories - we hope to keep you informed - and sane! @NickCohen4 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

  • Jun 16, 2024 · 49 min

    Ep: 34: The Twighlight of the Tories with Rafael Behr

    Send us a text @NickCohen4 and Guardian political columnist @rafaelbehr discuss the potential for an extinction-level general election result for the Tories on July 4th. Time and events seem to have caught up with the Conservative Party at last as they face retribution at the hands of an exasperated electorate after 14 years of chaos and 5 prime ministers, plus policy disaster after policy disaster including Brexit, Austerity, the bungling of Covid, the Tufton Street insanity of "Trussonomics", turds in rivers and seas and the endless Rwanda/immigration fiasco. And then there is the serial buffoonery and malfeasance of Boris Johnson. Rafael and Nick discuss how the Conservatives find themselves beached on political territory between the rabid right they tried and failed to appease and the centre ground where people have become increasingly repelled by Tory incompetence and hard right, populist antics. E.g. Tories may boast of "getting brexit done" but scarcely of brexit itself. Rafael is one of the Guardian's leading columnists and observers of the political scene. Rafael's book - "Politics - A Survivor's Guide" is published by Atlantic. Don't forget to read Nick's regular Substack column Writing from London. Support the show Listen to The Lowdown from Nick Cohen for in-depth analysis of the issues and events that shape our lives and futures. From Ukraine to Brexit, from Trump to the Tories - we hope to keep you informed - and sane! @NickCohen4 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

  • Apr 26, 2024 · 25 min

    Episode 33: Will Hutton on Labour's path ahead

    Send us a text Nick talks to celebrated author, columnist and editor Will Hutton about his new book, This Time No Mistakes: How to Remake Britain (Bloomsbury), described as "a brilliant book" by no less a figure than Sir Keir Starmer. If Labour wins - as currently expected - how does it pull the UK out of the doom cycle it's been put into by the Tories? Will explains how much work has to be done by Starmer and his team to put the country back on its feet after the Tory-inflicted disasters of austerity, Brexit, Boris Johnson and last, but not least, Liz Truss and her notorious mortgage-doubling "mini budget". How do you re-boot an economy growing when Brexit alone is forecast to eventually knock a ruinous 10 per cent off GDP and when wages have stagnated during 14 years of Tory misrule? Support the show Listen to The Lowdown from Nick Cohen for in-depth analysis of the issues and events that shape our lives and futures. From Ukraine to Brexit, from Trump to the Tories - we hope to keep you informed - and sane! @NickCohen4 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

  • Feb 25, 2024 · 38 min

    Ep 31: Pulling Brexit Britain out of its economic death spiral - with economist Danny Blanchflower

    Send us a text Nick Cohen gets The Lowdown from leading economist Danny Blanchflower CBE - onetime external member of the Bank of England's interest rate-setting Monetary Policy Committee. Danny foresaw economic woes mounting up in 2007 and predicted a crash - a year or so before the start of the bank collapses that led to the Great Recession. Since then, the Tories have visited on the country one failed economic project after another - austerity, Brexit, Trussanomics. Now the average Brit is forced to pay what's been called the "Moron Premium" for their chronic incompetence - higher food prices, extortionate energy bills and more expensive mortgages, while a failing economy stagnates in recession. The Tories have predictably descended into in-fighting and sinister culture wars as they await their inevitable rout at the next election. But what can Labour do to pull the UK economy out of its current death spiral? Support the show Listen to The Lowdown from Nick Cohen for in-depth analysis of the issues and events that shape our lives and futures. From Ukraine to Brexit, from Trump to the Tories - we hope to keep you informed - and sane! @NickCohen4 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

  • Feb 18, 2024 · 29 min

    Ep 30: The Tories' by-election blues and the stench of electoral death with Professor Tim Bale

    Send us a text Nick Cohen gets The Lowdown from Professor Tim Bale of the Queen Mary University of London, who is widely looked on as the UK's keenest academic observer of the Conservative Party. The Tories have been left reeling and predictably even more mutinous by their catastrophic defeats in last week's two by-elections in their hitherto safe seats of Kingswood in south Gloucestershire and Wellingborough in north Northamptonshire. Not only did they lose Kingswood with a 16.4 % swing, where Labour only needed a relatively modest 11-point swing. They also lost Wellingborough, where the swing was 28.5% - the second highest swing from Conservative to Labour in any post-war by-election. Tim - @ProfTimBale - discusses the shatteringly few options now left open to an incompetent populist governing party that is becoming more and more loathed by voters. Seemingly, all they have left to clutch are the meagre straws of their deranged Rwanda policy and the tattered flag of a failed Brexit project. So, will delaying Rishi Sunak's inevitable day of judgement only make a terrible situation even worse? Tim's latest book The Conservative Party after Brexit (published by Polity) charts the Party's dizzying descent into populist and radical hard right Brexit populism. Support the show Listen to The Lowdown from Nick Cohen for in-depth analysis of the issues and events that shape our lives and futures. From Ukraine to Brexit, from Trump to the Tories - we hope to keep you informed - and sane! @NickCohen4 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

  • Feb 11, 2024 · 54 min

    Ep 29 How Labour wins big & stays in power with former Blair adviser John McTernan

    Send us a text Nick Cohen gets The Lowdown from John McTernan, one-time political secretary to Tony Blair and seasoned political strategist and commentator. How does Labour not only win but replace the Tories finally as the natural party of government? 14 years of Tory misrule have brought the failed projects of Brexit and austerity and the Boris Johnson and Liz Truss shitshows. Now Rishi Sunak and his divided rabble fester low down in the polls, waging their culture wars, while the country falls apart around them. John argues that people are crying out for real change and Labour has an opportunity to win big and stay in power. Will Keir Starmer grasp the opportunity and give people the change they want and that the UK desperately needs? Support the show Listen to The Lowdown from Nick Cohen for in-depth analysis of the issues and events that shape our lives and futures. From Ukraine to Brexit, from Trump to the Tories - we hope to keep you informed - and sane! @NickCohen4 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

  • Feb 4, 2024 · 40 min

    Ep 28: The Left's failure to confront the Trumpism menace with writer Matt Johnson

    Send us a text Nick Cohen gets The Lowdown from US journalist and author Matt Johnson on the threat posed - yet again - by Donald Trump and his deranged far right MAGA cult that has captured the Republican Party. Matt - @mattjj89 - the author of How Hitchens can save the Left, explains how there is little evidence so far of a tangible centre-left coalition to confront Trump - who is a dead cert to be the Republicans' nomination to run for the presidency in 2024, despite facing 91 felony charges.. Incredibly, despite trying to overturn the result of the 2020 general election and provoking the January 6th insurrection, Trump is running against the incumbent Joe Biden who is 80 now and will be 86 were he to survive a second stint in the White House. Trump himself is 78 but exudes a certain demonic energy in comparison with Biden whose age and unpopular running mate, Vice-President Harris Kamala Harris, could prove to be telling factors counting against a successful re-run. Nick asks Matt what can be done to save the US and the world from the undoubted calamity of a second Trump presidency? Support the show Listen to The Lowdown from Nick Cohen for in-depth analysis of the issues and events that shape our lives and futures. From Ukraine to Brexit, from Trump to the Tories - we hope to keep you informed - and sane! @NickCohen4 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

  • Jan 28, 2024 · 42 min

    Ep 27: Breaking the Brexit Taboo with Professor Chris Grey

    Send us a text Nick Cohen gets the Lowdown on the UK's greatest taboo - the ever-deepening Brexit crisis - from Chris Grey, emeritus Professor @RoyalHolloway, and author of the highly-regarded and must-read blog, Brexit and beyond. Extra Brexit food checks come in from next week - threatening food price rises and shortages. Meanwhile, the Tories fail to get one of its promised "Canada-style free trade agreements" with Canada! Every week, @chrisgreybrexit - also author of the book Brexit Unfolded - exposes the many absurdities, lies and disasters of the Brexit Britain clown show and explains how the Brexiteers' preposterous promises were never remotely deliverable and were always likely to cause huge damage to the UK's economy and standing in the world. For example, we should now be seeing the Silicon Valley of the East End's Hoxton - as promised by @DanielJHannan. Er...where is it? Both Chris and Nick lament the chronic failure of the BBC and other MSM to hold to account the charlatans like Hannan , Boris Johnson and Nigel Farage who mis-sold Brexit. But how can Labour handle the Brexit mess they are set to inherit when so many people who voted for it refuse to accept the mayhem they were conned into inflicting on all of us? Support the show Listen to The Lowdown from Nick Cohen for in-depth analysis of the issues and events that shape our lives and futures. From Ukraine to Brexit, from Trump to the Tories - we hope to keep you informed - and sane! @NickCohen4 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

  • Jan 21, 2024 · 32 min

    Ep 26: The Post Office scandal & the curse of British managerialism with economist Chris Dillow

    Send us a text Nick Cohen gets The Lowdown from Chris Dillow, the economist, and author of the Stumbling and Mumbling blog. Chris - @CJFDillow - is a keen commentator on British managerialism - the curse of incompetence and privileged entitlement that led to the Post Office scandal and blights much of modern Britain today. Chris explains how modern Britain seems to reject competent management - opting instead for psychopaths and incompetents - often a combination of the two - who practise "managerialism" rather than efficient management that prioritises the good over bad. All too often, today's hirers prize over-confidence - preferably relayed with private school tones - over quietly stated and competent management. The result is a UK - beset by management scandals - where nothing seems to work. Support the show Listen to The Lowdown from Nick Cohen for in-depth analysis of the issues and events that shape our lives and futures. From Ukraine to Brexit, from Trump to the Tories - we hope to keep you informed - and sane! @NickCohen4 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.