Debate and switch? Biden’s stumble

2024-06-26

Our correspondents were the first media to see the American-built JLOTS pier, intended for aid deliveries into Gaza. Things have not at all gone to plan. After years of slipping, house prices are on the rise (https://www.economist.com/finance-and-economics/2024/06/16/why-house-prices-are-surging-once-again?utm_campaign=a.io&utm_medium=audio.podcast.np&utm_source=theintelligence&utm_content=discovery.content.anonymous.tr_shownotes_na-na_article&utm_term=sa.listeners) again; we ask why (16:51). And a trip to see the Savannah Bananas, a goofy exhibition-baseball team that has serious lessons

2024-06-17

Much of Sudan has already collapsed into chaos (https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2024/05/24/sudan-the-war-the-world-forgot). Now a crucial city may fall, the United Nations is belatedly scrambling to avert a bloodbath. Gary Lineker (https://www.economist.com/britain/2024/05/25/footballer-broadcaster-podcast-mogul-the-career-of-gary-lineker) is a former footballer, broadcaster and podcast mogul. He also embodies Britain’s social aspirations (10:52). And the women in Japan (https://www.economist.com/culture/2024/05/21/the-controversial-cult-of-the-host-club-in-japan) who pay men to praise them (18:49).

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For

2024-06-04

There has been a slow strangling of freedom (https://www.economist.com/china/2024/05/30/hong-kong-convicts-14-pro-democracy-activists?utm_campaign=a.io&utm_medium=audio.podcast.np&utm_source=theintelligence&utm_content=discovery.content.anonymous.tr_shownotes_na-na_article&utm_term=sa.listeners) in the territory where pro-democracy activists have been convicted; an annual vigil for the victims of the Tiananmen Square crackdown in Beijing in 1989 has been replaced by a food fair. A boom in startups suggests America is recovering its pioneering spirit

2024-02-29

Four years ago Belarus’s dictator, Alexander Lukashenko, stole a presidential election. Belarusians have just voted again, in parliamentary and local polls. This time there was little chance of a repeat of the protests that followed the rigged vote in 2020. How has Mr Lukashenko tightened his grip?

00:00 – Why Lukashenko is called “Europe’s last dictator”
00:57 – How Lukashenko came to power
01:29 – Why Lukashenko is dependent on Putin

Sign up to The Economist’s daily newsletter: https://econ.st/3QAawvI

Read more about the region: https://econ.st/3OV7JP1

Belarus prepares for another fraudulent election: https://econ.st/49OehXU

How much power does Alexander Lukashenko have?:https://econ.st/3SVVeUH

Why Belarus is called Europe’s last dictatorship: https://econ.st/3SVVeUH

Belarus’s

2024-02-19

The Economist interviewed Alexei Navalny, who has reportedly died in an Arctic penal colony, in the run-up to Russia’s 2018 presidential election. He discussed the breadth of his political support, his experiences in prison and offered some predictions for the future of Vladimir Putin’s Russia.

00:16 – The death of Navalny
00:41 – Navalny in prison
02:00 – Putin’s goals

Sign up to The Economist’s daily newsletter: https://econ.st/3QAawvI

Alexei Navalny didn’t just defy Putin—he showed up his depravity: https://econ.st/48mUUE0

What Navalny’s death means for Russia, Putin and the world: https://econ.st/3T366RZ

Russia’s opposition has lost a crucial leader but gained a martyr: https://econ.st/3I2qa0u

Graphic detail: A short history of Russia and Ukraine: https://econ.st/4bLbwZ6

2024-02-16

Alexei Navalny, Russia’s most prominent opposition leader, has died in a penal colony near the Arctic Circle, according to the Russian prison service. Listen to this excerpt on Navalny’s life and career from our podcast series “Next Year in Moscow”.

Original podcast: Producers: Sam Colbert, Pete Naughton, Ksenia Barakovskaya, Lika Kremer; Sound design: Weidong Lin; Original music: Darren Ng; Executive producer: John Shields.

00:00 – Alexei Navalny has died
01:14 – Navalny’s poisoning
07:26 – Returning to Russia
11:40 – His political work
18:50 – Navalny’s prison sentence
21:27 – Alexei Navalny’s legacy

Sign up to The Economist’s daily newsletter: https://econ.st/3QAawvI

Obit: Alexei Navalny didn’t just defy Putin—he showed up his depravity:
https://econ.st/3OMDcmq

Read our 2020

2024-02-08

Things look bleak in the Middle East after Binyamin Netanyahu scorned America’s push for an end to the fighting. But in private he’s said to be more flexible. Could diplomacy actually work?

00:00 – The Saudi normalisation deal
00:42 – Israel and Saudi Arabia’s history
01:10 – How to solve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict
02:26 – Will the deal happen?

Sign up to The Economist’s daily newsletter: https://econ.st/3QAawvI

To read more on the conflict, visit our Israel and Hamas hub: https://econ.st/3HPfwtU

Israel scorns America’s unprecedented peace plan: https://econ.st/3SO4knJ

How to end the Middle East’s agony: https://econ.st/3OCHrRw

Listen to our podcast on Antony Blinken: the hardest working man in diplomatic business: https://econ.st/3OyKkCQ

America’s shuttle diplomacy to