And now, from the University of Chicago Institute of Politics and CNN, the Axviles, with your

host, David Axelrod.

Tony Blair burst on the scene in the 1990s as the leader of New Labor, the Labor Party

in Britain, and led the Labor Party to victory in 1997, after which he served ten very

consequential years as Prime Minister of Great Britain.

During those years, he helped modernize the social safety network, propel Britain's

economy forward, and then ultimately ran into significant opposition for his close relationship

with George W. Bush and alliance over the Iraq War.

I sat down in London last week with Tony Blair to talk about today's political environment

and the future under Brexit.

Tony Blair, it's great to be with you here in London.

You are a globally known person, but a lot of people who listen to this podcast, certainly

in America, are not all that familiar with your personal story, and in preparing, and

I know you've written an autobiography and so on, in preparing for this, I was struck

by some things in your biography, particularly how you grew up, because you had a very

sort of interesting childhood that changed very dramatically.

And I just wanted to ask you about that, about your folks.

Yes, I was brought up actually in a very conservative household.

My father was a member of the Conservative Party.

My father had come from a very poor background himself.

He was a foster child in a poor part of Glasgow.

He was actually a secretary of the young communist of Scotland when he was a young guy.

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