Hello and welcome to the Intelligence on Economist Radio. I'm your host, Jason Palmer.

Every weekday we provide a fresh perspective on the events shaping your world.

This week, the oldest travel agency in the world went under, leaving hundreds of thousands

of its customers stranded. You might think that's simply the continuing impact of the internet

bricks and mortar travel agencies, but it's not as simple as that.

And there's a new movie out in China about infrastructure.

Common Destiny is about China's Belt and Road initiative, and as propaganda goes,

it's pretty subtle. But reviews reveal lukewarm attitudes both about the film and about Belt and Road itself.

First up, though.

President Donald Trump is engulfed in another political scandal, involving allegations that his critics are calling the most troubling yet.

It all revolves around a phone call. One that Mr. Trump says was of no significance.

I will tell you it's a great call. It's a very honorable call. It's a nice call.

In July, Donald Trump called Vladimir Zelensky the newly elected president of Ukraine to congratulate him on his victory.

John Prado is our United States editor.

And he also said something in that call that gave rise to a complaint to sort of red flag from a whistleblower within America's intelligence services.

Now, there's a lot of dispute about what exactly was said on that call.

What we do know is, depending on the reporting you read, either shortly before the call or shortly afterwards,

the White House took the unusual step of freezing $250 million in military aid to Ukraine.

And a lot of the reporting has suggested that there was a quid pro quo implied where the White House would release that military aid,

which did indeed happen later, if Ukraine's government agreed to investigate the business dealings of Hunter Biden,

the son of the Democratic front runner.

Now, I guess we're both fairly familiar with a fervent media response to Trump-related scandals.

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