224 | Super Tuesday Special: Biden's Back!

A special live edition recorded on the morning after Super Tuesday: we try to make sense of where the Democratic race now stands. How did Biden pull it off?  Is there a path back for Sanders?  And what role was Obama playing behind the scenes?  Plus we ask which strategy now makes sense for the general election and whether Trump has got the candidate he wants or the one he fears.  With Helen Thompson and Gary Gerstle, recorded at the McCrum Lecture Theatre in Cambridge.

223 | Blair's Labour and Johnson's Brexit

David and Helen catch up on the state of British politics, from Blair's advice to the Labour party on its 120th birthday to growing divisions in Johnson's Tory party.  Is there really a liberal progressive coalition in Britain?  Can Brexit deliver both free trade and levelling up?  And what does Cummings really want?  Plus we talk
about Helen's lecture on Britain, the EU and geopolitics: (listen here).

222 | Michael Ignatieff on the Future of Democracy

A special live edition recorded in front of an audience in Cambridge: David talks to writer, broadcaster, academic and politician Michael Ignatieff about his personal experiences of democratic politics.  From his bruising time as Liberal party leader in Canada to his recent confrontations with the Orban government in Hungary, from climate change to populism, from Johnson to Trump, we discuss what's happened to
democracy and where he sees the grounds for hope.  A wide-ranging conversation about the good and the bad of contemporary politics.

217 | Trump vs Iran: Is it for Real?

David and Helen talk to Shashank Joshi, Defence Editor at the Economist, about the fallout from the killing of Soleimani and the future of American power.  Is Trump a madman or is he a realist (or is he neither)?  What sort of threat does Iran pose to American interests in the region and the wider world?  And what has all this got to do with oil and climate change?  Plus, in the week Trump's impeachment trial gets underway, we ask who or what can limit the power of the presidency.

214 | The Great Abortion Switcheroo

 In the final episode of our American Histories series, Sarah Churchwell tells the incredible story of the politics of abortion during the 1970’s.  How did evangelicals go from supporting abortion to being its die-hard opponents, what did the switch have to do with the politics of race and what have been the lasting consequences for American democracy?

212 | The 15th and the 19th

Sarah Churchwell tells the tortured history of the campaign to secure votes for women and how it was tied up with another campaign to suppress votes for black Americans.  From the 15th amendment in 1870 to the 19th amendment in 1920: why the promise of enfranchisement is often not what it seems.