Politics

Read about the latest political news, views and analysis

Does Mark Carney believe in democracy?

Mark Carney is swaggering about Canada with his new majority government, acting as if he’d just received a landslide mandate from the electorate. The truth is he acquired his precious majority not by climbing up on his soapbox and convincing voters, but by whispering sweet nothings to five MPs from other parties, upon which they mysteriously lost their political principles and crossed the floor. Does Carney believe in democracy? It’s hard to be sure. Yes, his party did just win three special elections. But only one of those counted (the other two were held by Liberals already and in safe Liberal ridings, so made no difference to the number of

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The lesson of Orbán: Trump must tackle corruption

The landslide defeat of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán carries lessons across the ocean for Donald Trump and both MAGA and non-MAGA Republicans. Trump pulled out all the stops for his ally, sending Vice President J.D. Vance to Hungary for a three-day endorsement tour and promising the day before the vote to “use the full Economic Might of the United States to strengthen Hungary’s Economy” if Orbán won. Well, he didn’t, and the Democrats are in full gloat mode after Orbán’s Fidesz party fell from 135 seats in parliament down to just 55. Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer quickly made a comparison to the US, writing on X: “Pay attention, Donald

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Sorry, but America still holds all the cards

“Negotiations.” Are you heartened or dismayed by that word? Those who remember or who have read up on the seemingly interminable Paris Peace Talks designed to bring an end to the Vietnam War have reason to be dubious. A negotiation, if it is to be successful, requires that both sides be candid and in earnest. The Vietnamese were not candid participants. They stalled. They prevaricated. They acted out. It seems that the Iranians are hoping to reprise that melodrama. They will be profoundly disappointed. On the second weekend in April, Vice President J.D. Vance, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner met some 70 Iranian representatives in Islamabad to hammer out a

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What’s really behind Trump’s clash with the Pope?

Donald Trump’s latest clash with the Catholic Church stunned even the most hardened veterans of culture-war X. According to the President of the United States, the Chicago-born Pope Leo XIV, the conspicuously holy spiritual leader of 1.3 billion people, is “WEAK on crime and terrible on foreign policy.” He also claimed that, “If I wasn’t in the White House, Leo wouldn’t be in the Vatican.” For commentators accustomed to the fog of modern diplomatic platitudes, such trash talk was the equivalent of a Holy Roman Emperor hurling insults at a medieval pontiff. In the year 963, for example, the Emperor Otto I accused Pope John XII of fornicating with his

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With Orbán’s loss, Russia has lost its European foothold

Péter Magyar’s landslide victory over Viktor Orbán is not just political earthquake for Hungary. It is Moscow’s worst result in the European Union since the war began. Orbán served Russia in a way no overt ally could. He was never Putin’s puppet – he was something far more useful: a democratically elected, Brussels-based veto-wielder who could slow sanctions, obstruct aid to Ukraine, and dress it all up as principled neutrality. A leaked call recorded him telling Putin that Hungary was like a mouse to Russia’s lion. Leaked tapes of his foreign minister, Péter Szijjártó, conversing with Sergey Lavrov revealed the same cringing loyalty. Yet Orbán always extracted payment for his

Swalwell’s fall was electoral math not morality

Eric Swalwell’s fall from viable gubernatorial contender to political casualty was swift and surgical. He was among the frontrunners to replace Governor Gavin Newsom until allegations of sexual misconduct from years ago were published in the San Francisco Chronicle. The response from major Democratic operatives was immediate, with labor unions and party figures quickly withdrawing endorsements. Swalwell formally announced the suspension of his campaign two days later, followed by his resignation from Congress the following day. Some of the allegations are serious. In addition to claims of inappropriate and predatory sexual relationships with staffers, Swalwell has been accused of sexual assault. In a video statement, he denied any criminal wrongdoing.

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republicans Steve Hilton

Will Republicans blow the California governor’s race?

Eric Swalwell has dropped out of the race for California governor after a series of sexual misconduct allegations. Republicans may be celebrating the demise of the prominent Democrat, but they should hold off on the champagne for now. Swalwell’s exit only increases the chance of two Democrats moving through to the run-off, depriving the GOP of a place on the ticket. However some Republicans still believe that the two GOP candidates in the race – Steve Hilton and Chad Bianco – can make it through California’s jungle primary and face each other in November. While it sounds exciting and makes a good social media meme, such wishful thinking could cause

The truth about Pakistan’s role in the US-Iran conflict

Pakistan was always an unlikely mediator for peace negotiations between the United States, Iran and sotto voce, China. It would not be an exaggeration to describe Pakistan as a failed state. Having outperformed India economically in the aftermath of partition, Pakistan went into steep decline after the arrival on the political scene of a corrupt chancer, socialist and demagogue, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto. Today, bankrupt Pakistan is kept afloat by loans from the IMF, China, and the Gulf States. Trump can be in no doubt that, with regards to political power in Pakistan, it is Munir who wears the pants Bhutto’s political dynasty continued under the aegis of his daughter Benazir and

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Israel won’t stop in Lebanon until Hezbollah is crushed

Direct US-brokered talks between Israeli and Lebanese representatives are set to take place in Washington this week. The Israeli delegation will be headed by Yehiel Leiter, Jerusalem’s ambassador to the US. Lebanon will be represented by Nada Hamadeh, the Lebanese ambassador to Washington. The State Department will host the negotiations. In his statement on Thursday announcing the talks, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu framed their purpose as “disarming Hezbollah and establishing peaceful ‌relations between ⁠Israel and ⁠Lebanon.” Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam, for his part, expressed his hope that Beirut should become a “demilitarized city.” Even as the talks were announced, Lebanese Hezbollah’s attacks on Israeli population centers and Israel’s

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The best response to Trump is to pray for him

Imagine that Martin Luther had scrawled his 95 Theses on the back of a Denny’s menu and nailed it to the doors of the nearest church and you get the picture of Donald Trump’s polemic against Pope Leo XIV. The faithful should be careful not to overreact to the President’s provocation, which is objectively hilarious The President’s TruthSocial rant against the Holy Father is highly offensive, of course. Show some respect for the Vicar of Christ. That’s not to mention the follow-up post in which he shared an AI-generated image of himself mocked up as Jesus Christ healing the sick. Given the condition of his second term in office, Trump

What will happen to Iran now?

What now after the collapse in peace talks between America and Iran in Pakistan? The gap between the two sides on the two critical issues – Iran’s nuclear program and the Strait of Hormuz – proved too big in the end. Is it back to war? What does the failure to reach a deal mean for the fragile, two-week ceasefire the two sides agreed? Whose fault is it that the discussions, which lasted for a marathon 21 hours, broke down? So far, there is little in the way of concrete facts about what exactly happened in Islamabad but the blame game is already under way. First out of the blocks

Of course these peace talks would fail

The US and Iran have failed to reach an agreement after 21 hours of peace talks in Pakistan. I can’t say I’m surprised. After all, we didn’t have to wait for the negotiations to finish to make an informed guess of the outcome. America and Iran agreed a ceasefire conditional on the Islamic Republic’s complete opening of the Strait of Hormuz. It has so far refused to honor that condition. Earlier this week, President Trump responded with fulminations: Iran “better stop now” if it’s charging tankers to pass through. But, in practice, all he has done is apply more pressure on NATO allies and send Vice President J.D. Vance to

Swalwell sexual assault accusations detonate California governor’s race

Is it Swal-over for Swalwell? Congressman Eric Swalwell – the longtime anti-Trump crusader, MS Now and CNN mainstay, and a leading candidate in the California gubernatorial race – has now been accused by an anonymous ex-staffer of sexual assault. The allegations, published by the San Francisco Chronicle, turn mainly on inebriation and the so-called power imbalance between the two: Driving him to another event weeks later, she said Swalwell pulled out his penis in the car and asked her to perform oral sex on him. She said she did so in a parking lot. In September 2019, the woman said, Swalwell invited her out for drinks and she became so severely

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If only TACO were true

A useful rule, when trying to understand current affairs, is AAL: Acronyms Always Lie. A case in point would be the acronym of the year so far: TACO (Trump Always Chickens Out). It means that Donald Trump is always bluffing and, when push finally comes to shove, he folds. TACO has caught on since Liberation Day and the onset of Trump 2.0’s tariff agenda, and is now deployed again and again to describe the President’s latest ceasefire with Iran.  Over free trade, Greenland, and the Middle East, he’s shown himself to be a playground bully who loves to intimidate adversaries only to cave whenever the going gets tough. Market analysts

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Melania Epstein

What the hell is going on with Melania Trump?

Melania Trump’s bombshell statement yesterday on the Jeffrey Epstein affair needed subtitles. As she spoke it was all so odd. There had to be a subtext. Her choice of words and tone was so loaded it felt like there was another shadow statement underneath, and her shock appearance was just act one of this drama, prefiguring a much bigger statement to come. It was so astonishing for her to deny allegations that most of us had never heard about. We were left wondering what she was really trying to say. Her statement raised questions that hadn’t ever been asked before, and now we’re all wondering what the answers are When she

The Pentagon’s holy war with Rome

America is having its Golden Age, Iran is about to get blasted into the Stone Age… and Elbridge Colby wants to go back to the Late Middle Ages? According to a Free Press report by Mattia Ferraresi, the Under Secretary of War for Policy summoned Cardinal Christophe Pierre, the Vatican’s then-ambassador to the US, to a meeting in which the Avignon Papacy was invoked. (For those of you who didn’t go to Catholic school: in the 1300s the king of France had Pope Boniface VIII captured and beaten after the pope excommunicated him; a few years later the papacy moved to Avignon amid continued threats from the French crown and instability in Rome.)  During this meeting, Pentagon officials allegedly picked apart Pope Leo XIV’s “state of the world” address. This was the

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NATO

What Trump gets wrong about NATO

The idea that the United States has been swindled by its NATO allies is not new. Robert Gates, in his valedictory address as secretary of defense in June 2011, warned bluntly that future American leaders might not consider the return on defense investment in Europe worthwhile. He spoke of a “two-tiered alliance… Between those willing and able to pay the price and bear the burdens of alliance commitments, and those who enjoy the benefits of NATO membership… but don’t want to share the risks and the costs.” Gates was no populist. He was a career intelligence officer and establishment Republican, and his warning carried real weight precisely because it came

What will the Iran ceasefire cost Trump?

Might Donald Trump travel to Tehran this spring to open an American embassy and declare that he’s fallen in love with the new Iranian leadership? His volte-face on Tuesday night – announcing a two-week ceasefire with Iran – suggests that Trump is embarking upon a new course in the Middle East. After threatening to bomb Iran back to the Stone Age, Trump announced that it’s time to call the whole thing off: “We received a 10-point proposal from Iran, and believe it is a workable basis on which to negotiate.”  What that negotiation will look like is an open question. Early reports suggest that Trump, not Iran, caved on everything from Iran’s control over the Strait of Hormuz to acceptance of uranium enrichment, from the lifting of sanctions to

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Why Trump is tempting 25th Amendment talk

During his remarks in Budapest, Vice President J.D. Vance, who is trying prop up Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán as he runs for reelection, appeared to think the unthinkable. Vance, who has been a hero for MAGA anti-interventionists, went all-in on attacking Iran. He indicated that America might resort to “tools” in its arsenal that “we so far haven’t decided to use.” Now the White House is denying that it plans to deploy nuclear weapons against Iran, after frenzied social media speculation that it might. Negotiations with Tehran are ongoing – and Trump told Fox’s Bret Baier that “if negotiations move forward today, and there is something concrete” that tonight’s 8 p.m. deadline “could change.” As Iran’s refusal to capitulate has exerted a maddening effect upon President Trump,

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special envoy

Who’s the most special envoy?

On the final weekend of her tenure as Homeland Security Secretary, Kristi Noem was in South America meeting the President of Guyana. Photos posted by the US Embassy in Guyana show Noem’s “senior advisor” Corey Lewandowski sitting alongside her. It would, of course, be “tabloid garbage” to repeat rumors of an affair between the two, to use Noem’s phrase when questioned (both Noem and Lewandowski have vehemently denied the affair, although she didn’t explicitly deny “sexual relations” when under oath in Congress). Noem’s South American jaunt seemed to straddle the role she was leaving and the one she’s just started. She was officially in Guyana on DHS business but has

The new battle over American airspace

Last month, a mysterious drone swarm led to a lockdown at Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana. Nothing was damaged and none of the 40 B-52 bombers or their cruise missiles were hit. At least not this time. But modern war no longer starts with an open attack. Instead we see hybrid actions: cyberattacks, information and psychological operations, GPS disruptions, damage to undersea communication cables and, increasingly, drone incursions into military sites and critical infrastructure. There is rarely a formal declaration. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the largest war in Europe since the Second World War, was labelled a “special military operation.” Even before the invasion, Russia launched thousands of Orlan-10

Trump’s threat to destroy Iran is detailed and credible

Monday’s White House press conference came in two distinct parts. The first was an extraordinary tale of heroism in the rescue of two downed pilots. America’s military and intelligence leaders provided details that were new to the public. The danger of a daytime rescue mission in the face of enemy fire. The harrowing climb by one officer to a crevice in the mountains. The technical sophistication needed to find him. And the misdirection executed to confound Iranian forces in the area, determined to capture the American serviceman before help arrived.  It was impossible to listen to that tale of bravery and professional excellence without an overwhelming sense of patriotic emotion,

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