Can political rhetoric kill?
Radical with Amol Rajan
BBC
4.5 • 919 Ratings
🗓️ 15 July 2024
⏱️ 35 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Amol and Nick look at whether the language of politics might now grow less heated after the assassination attempt on Donald Trump – and what effect the shooting will have on the US election.
Keir Starmer will put the disappointment of the European Championships result behind him and look forward to this week’s King’s Speech – but will he face his own problem from the left wing?
Plus, pollster and friend of the podcast James Kanagasooriam joins Amol to get into the data and dispel the myths surrounding the general election results.
If you have a question you’d like to Amol and Nick to answer, get in touch by sending us a message or voice note via WhatsApp to +44 330 123 4346 or email us Today@bbc.co.uk
Episodes of The Today Podcast continue to land twice a week post-election and look out for bonus Q&A episodes. Subscribe on BBC Sounds to get Amol and Nick's take on the new government, with insights from behind the scenes at the UK's most influential radio news programme.
The Today Podcast is hosted by Amol Rajan and Nick Robinson, both presenters of BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, the UK’s most influential radio news programme. Amol was the BBC’s media editor for six years and is the former editor of the Independent, he’s also the current presenter of University Challenge. Nick has presented the Today programme since 2015, he was the BBC’s political editor for ten years before that and also previously worked as ITV’s political editor.
You can listen to the latest episode of The Today Podcast any time on your smart speaker by saying “Smart Speaker, ask BBC Sounds to play The Today Podcast.”
The producer is Hatty Nash, the editor is Tom Smithard. The executive producer is Owenna Griffiths. Research and digital production from Joe Wilkinson, technical production from Antonio Fernandes.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, podcasts. |
| 0:04.8 | Well, it is the morning after the night before, |
| 0:09.2 | and we all think we've got a hangover. |
| 0:11.0 | We, that is, if you're an English football fan. |
| 0:14.3 | And it just feels like the mood is a bit bleak. |
| 0:18.0 | But bleaker for a much deeper reason, I think. |
| 0:22.3 | Bleaker because of what happened in the United States, |
| 0:25.4 | the near assassination of the former president, |
| 0:29.2 | the man expected to be the next president, Donald Trump, |
| 0:33.6 | has to make us all pause and think, |
| 0:39.2 | why is politics like this? |
| 0:43.4 | Yeah, and we must never lose the capacity to be shocked by political violence. |
| 0:47.3 | I mean, I don't know about unit, but when I woke up on Sunday morning to all those news alerts saying that in Pennsylvania, a sniper had taken aim, there had been tragically a death, |
| 0:54.1 | but Donald Trump survived, he got up, and he started shouting fight to the... sniper had taken aim, you know, there had been tragically a death. |
| 0:58.8 | But Donald Trump survived. He got up and he started shouting, fight to the crowd. |
| 1:01.5 | It still retains that extraordinary capacity to shock. |
| 1:06.0 | It's got big implications for what may happen in America in November, of course. |
| 1:10.4 | But we're also going to talk today about what it reveals about politics more widely. Can political rhetoric till should the language of politics here as well as there change? |
| 1:18.3 | So much to talk about. Let's do it. Nick, it's one of the truisms of politics, isn't it, that often the highest stakes are decided by the smallest of margins. |
| 1:40.3 | And Donald Trump was shot at. I mean, there's no two ways about it. He was hit by a bullet from a sniper who got far too close to him. And if Donald Trump had been a few inches in the other direction, that bullet or one of the bullets shot at him which glanced his ear would have said have entered his head and he would have been assassinated. And the assassination of Donald Trump would have entered political history as one of the biggest |
| 2:04.2 | events in any of our lifetimes. |
| 2:05.9 | Instead, it's the attempted assassination. |
... |
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