I'm John Batchelberg. I welcome Joseph Sternberg, member of the editorial board of the Wall Street Journal.

He writes to the political economics column. He's in London, observing the European Union and

NATO, the European continent, and the persuasion of voters these last years. The presumption was

the populist's right is rising, rising, rising, and inevitable. But, Joe, a very good evening to you. Funny thing

happened on my way to the White House was one of the great lines of Adley Stevens in all time.

I think it'll outlive the centuries that he spoke it in. However, what we have now is a funny

thing happened on the way to the populist right, taking all of Europe

away from the United States, toward Russia, away from transnational organizations, towards

individual expectations.

What happened, Joe, and it happened in Great Britain of all places.

Good evening to you.

Hey, John.

Well, I mean, the theme that is unfolding in Europe so far

in the first quarter of 2026 is that these right-wing insurgent populist rebellions haven't

quite rebelled or insurged, as it were. So we're just starting to see a series of election results and some upcoming

elections that are not going to go particularly well for the insurgent parties. And it is

raising a question about exactly what this right-wing insurgent wave means for Europe. So,

I mean, let's go down the list of some of these examples. You mentioned

the UK. Last month, there was a parliamentary by-election in the northwest of England. This was a seat

that the Labor Party has held for decades. And there had been some real speculation about what

was going to happen there because the insurgent right-wing reform UK party has often been performing pretty well in the former heartlands of the

labor and the former industrialized regions of the country, you know, really successfully pulling

...