This is a global player original podcast.

I'm going to do a very formal introduction to the podcast this week.

Welcome to this week's episode of the For the Many podcast with me and, cue drum roll.

It's not Jackie Smith because it's her birthday. She's been whisked off to Paris this weekend. So we are delighted to be in the company of Zoe Williams for her second co-presenting stint, I think, on this podcast, isn't it?

I don't know because I'm so blown away by that instruction.

You did do it once before.

I don't think you've ever sounded so pleased to see me.

I am very pleased to see you.

I'm always pleased to see you.

Well, this is thrilling.

Now, for those who don't know who you are, of which maybe it's 1% of our listeners,

who are you? I am right for The Guardian. Don't let that put you off though. You can let that

put you off because there's really not very much else I do. I come on your show every now and then.

I come on cross questions. I go and I chat to Nick Ferrari once in a blue moon.

So you're a bit like me, a rent-a-gob. Yeah, I'm a head on a stick. I prefer. I prefer a head on a stick.

Well, we've got a lot to cover this week, but I've just, a thought has come into my head, so I'm going to ask you this now in case I forget later. Have you read this article on the Jewish news website by a Guardian? I have read it, yeah. I mean, I've sort of, I was so gobsmacked by it last night that I kind of didn't know what to make of it, and I sent it around to everybody I knew,

and I'm still kind of ruminating on it.

Now, it doesn't sound like any guardian I've ever encountered.

Like, it just doesn't sound like the guardian.

The guardian is quite a staid place, you know.

It's like the idea that anybody's like laughing or capering about or talking about

Israel in anything but the most sober and devastated tones is completely alien to me.

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