@robertsaunders.bsky.social
Historian of modern Britain, singer and political nerd. Author of "Yes to Europe! The 1975 Referendum & Seventies Britain". "A jaw-dislocating page turner"(Andrew Marr). Deputy-director @mileendinstitute.bsky.social, Reader @QMHistory
8 March: Trump tells UK not to send ships to the Gulf as "We don't need people that join Wars after we've already won".
14 March: Trump asks UK to "send ships to the area so that the Hormuz Strait will no longer be a threat".
It's a tragedy that so many lives hang on the whims of this angry child.
Thank you! Glad you enjoyed it.
Thank you! That's great to hear.
Fancy a podcast for the weekend?
I joined David Runciman on @ppfideas.bsky.social to discuss Churchill's "Iron Curtain" speech, delivered 80 years ago in Fulton, Missouri.
We talked about the "special relationship", the Cold War and why Churchill vested such hopes in the United Nations. Enjoy!
I can see that for someone like Liz Truss, whose fall must have been a harrowing & humiliating experience. There's something horribly brittle about her post-premiership persona, as if she has to keep shouting because the silence is unbearable. But I don't see it in Neil, Ferguson, Farage or Johnson.
This is cruel to the young people concerned, self-destructive for the UK and will not win over a single Reform voter.
"For your people have corrupted themselves. ... They have made themselves a molten calf, and worshipped it and sacrificed to it, and said, ‘This is your god’" (Exodus 32:7-8).
10/10 for the alt-text here!
Shame can be a destructive emotion, but this is what a culture without shame looks like.
And it's consistently rewarded and indulged.
Watch back our full event with Dr Saunders on the history of Lords reform, how it became a "complete mishmash, a kind of Frankenstein's monster", and how we might want it to function in future 👇
buff.ly/DyfrSKE
As @robertsaunders.bsky.social told us at an event last year, "we do have to think about how the chamber would actually work in a scenario in which it's not just the Conservatives, Labour and the Liberal Democrats who matter politically."
That task has become even more necessary since.
Should Nigel Farage be able to create 200 life peers after the next election?
How will the House of Lords work if a party of government or the official opposition has no - or next to no - representation in the Lords?
The House of Lords is unprepared for today's multi-party politics.
In theory, the ECHR could fulfil that role: a body of law that sits outside the control of a govt with a parliamentary majority. But it's never had that emotional status or been seen as "our" law; it tends to be seen as something from outside, rather than as "the rights of the freeborn Englishman".
That was important for Chartists & suffragists, many of whom actively denied the right of parliament to overrule ancient liberties & who saw themselves as upholding the laws of the people agst lawless rulers. But it's harder to make sense of in an age when most laws are assumed to be *made by* govt.
I wonder whether the idea of law as something that protects citizens against the state had more resonance with the public when there was a stronger sense of the "common law" as a possession of the people, inherited from history, that could be wielded against parliaments and governments? ...
Wombles on banknotes would definitely be a winner.
The one candidate on whom we can all agree: both a great historical figure AND a cute animal.
The one candidate on whom we can all agree: both a great historical figure AND a cute animal.
Surely there's an easy solution to the historical figures/cute animals on banknotes dilemma...
Surely there's an easy solution to the historical figures/cute animals on banknotes dilemma...
On 19 March the @mileendinstitute.bsky.social is delighted to be launching @morganj0nes.bsky.social's book "No Second Chances: The Inside Story of the Campaign for a 2nd Referendum".
Join us to explore an amazing period in modern history, & the lessons for today
www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/no-second-...
Thank you!
80 years ago, Churchill spoke at Fulton of an "iron curtain" falling across Europe.
He called for a "special relationship" with the US, a "settlement" with Stalin & an army under the UN.
I joined @ppfideas.bsky.social to discuss one of Churchill's most important, contested & misunderstood speeches
Thanks for listening! I’m glad you enjoyed it.
"For your people have corrupted themselves. ... They have made themselves a molten calf, and worshipped it and sacrificed to it, and said, ‘This is your god’" (Exodus 32:7-8).
Thank you! I'm glad you enjoyed it.
What did Churchill mean by "the special relationship"?
Why did he vest such hopes in the United Nations?
Why was there such anger in the US press?
I joined @ppfideas.bsky.social to explore Churchill's "Iron Curtain" speech, 80 years after it was delivered. Available wherever you get your podcasts
We're looking forward to it too!
More book events:
I could not be more delighted that I will be speaking about Fantastic Kingdom with @robertsaunders.bsky.social at the brilliant @mileendinstitute.bsky.social in London on 17 June. Details to follow.
NEW EPISODE OUT NOW!
Today David & historian @robertsaunders.bsky.social explore the 80th anniversary of Churchill’s ‘Sinews of Peace’ speech given in March 1946. It's best known for introducing the idea of the ‘Iron Curtain’. What was Churchill trying to achieve?
Find us at...🎧 ppfideas.com