Hello and welcome to the Americano podcast. My name is Freddie Gray. I'm the deputy editor of the

spectator and the editor of its US edition. We thought that 2020 was going to be all about the

presidential election, but now it will forever be the year of the

pandemic. So instead, Americano is going to look at how COVID-19 is transforming the United

States and its politics. There's a lot to talk about, perhaps even more so than before.

So please keep tuning in. I'm joined today by Jacob Heilbrun, who is a Spectator USA contributor and the editor of the national interest.

And we're going to be asking, what's the matter with John Bolton?

Now, Jacob, yesterday, the Wall Street Journal published an extract from John Bolton's new book, which was quite a

bombshell. It revealed that President Trump had sort of kowtowed to Jeezing Ping in trade negotiations.

And various other bits of the book have come out and reveal lots of details that will embarrass and annoy Trump.

And indeed, we know now that the Trump administration tried to block the book from being published,

which, of course, is great publicity for the book in itself.

Why do you think John Bolton has put the dagger into Trump like this?

John Bolton has always been a knife fighter inside the Republican Party.

You might recall that in 2000, he played a pivotal role in ensuring that George W. Bush became

president by acting as his advocate in Florida during the recount.

Bolton is a skilled and agile lawyer.

I also should say that I've always found him to be remarkably frank and upfront about his own views.

When I visited him before the second Gulf War,

he was a State Department official

and made no secret of his disdain for the idea

that you could convert Iraq into a democracy.

...