May-poll dance: Poland’s presidential race
Economist Podcasts
The Economist
4.4 • 4.9K Ratings
🗓️ 19 May 2025
⏱️ 23 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Rafal Trzaskowski, the liberal mayor expected to win the first round cleanly only squeaked by. We ask what’s at stake in the NATO-front-line country now the second round looks so uncertain. In the new world of weight-loss drugs Wegovy, from Novo Nordisk, has reigned supreme—perhaps not for much longer (9:40). And people really do look—but also act—like their dogs (16:51).
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | The Economist. |
| 0:10.2 | Hello and welcome to the intelligence from The Economist. |
| 0:14.0 | I'm Rosie Bloor. |
| 0:15.3 | And I'm Jason Palmer. |
| 0:16.7 | Every weekday, we provide a fresh perspective on the events shaping your world. |
| 0:25.0 | You'll have heard of Wagovi, a weight loss drug popular with many people who want to shed some pounds. |
| 0:31.0 | But another medicine could soon be eating Wagovi's lunch. |
| 0:34.5 | Our correspondent choose over which pharmaceutical company might get to have their cake |
| 0:38.8 | and make money from it. |
| 0:42.0 | And you know that thing where people seem to look a lot like their dogs? Some German researchers |
| 0:47.7 | decided to put the weight of scientific inquiry behind that notion and now they have data. It's not |
| 0:53.7 | your imagination and it's not a coincidence. |
| 1:01.6 | First up, though. |
| 1:06.7 | In Poland, presidents can rarely impose their own agendas, but they can certainly frustrate the governments. |
| 1:17.4 | Just ask Prime Minister Donald Tusk. |
| 1:20.1 | He came to power in 2023 in coalition with Greens, liberals, and leftists. |
| 1:25.6 | This was after years of rule by the Law and Justice Party, |
| 1:29.2 | which had gleefully dismantled Poland's institutions and civil services. Yet for all the reforms |
| 1:35.5 | that Mr. Tusk promised, he repeatedly locked horns with Andre Duda, a law and justice politician |
| 1:41.1 | who's now been president for a decade. |
| 1:47.9 | Time's up for Mr. Duda, though. So who will replace him? |
| 1:54.5 | It's not just that frequent question of how the populist right is doing. Poland is on NATO's front line. Its integration into Europe, in particular its changing defense posture, |
... |
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