March 19, 2024 - 6:30pm

→ Bernie Sanders: the new Joe Rogan?

Bernie Bros couldn’t believe their luck this week as the Vermont Senator announced he was launching his very own podcast. The first few episodes, according to the man himself, will focus on Sanders’s most recent book, It’s OK To Be Angry About Capitalism — another nice little earner for the 82-year-old politician, who has made over $2.5 million in book advances and royalties since 2011.

On this side of the pond, politicians joining the podsphere has become increasingly common, with Rory Stewart, Ruth Davidson, George Osborne and Ed Balls doing their best to offer the listening public 50 shades of centrism. In America, the podcast space has been largely occupied by the Right, featuring rumoured Zodiac Killer Ted Cruz and headbanger-in-chief Matt Gaetz. Bernie has a more devoted personal following than either of the two Republicans, so he might find himself climbing into the upper reaches of the podcast charts before too long. Joe Rogan should watch out…

→ Tory Twitter’s cringeworthy output

The Conservatives seem to have a new social media manager, and they might be getting a bit overexcited about defending the Government’s record. Harry Maguire was the latest victim of Tory Twitter-brain, as the party’s official account posted a meme which managed to be short on both sense and laughs. An earlier effort from today also riffed on football, with similarly cringeworthy results.

Both tweets were attempting to highlight the introduction of a bill to the Commons which would set up a new football regulator to, among other things, help combat the plan for a European Super League. Yet recent weeks have brought a steady stream of awkward posts onto Conservative supporters’ timelines. The now-infamous “Starmer Sutra” jibe might be the most excruciating of the bunch though, in fairness, Labour aren’t exactly doing any better in the banter stakes. Another development in the very serious world of UK politics.

→ NYT comes out for Deep State

“It turns out the ‘Deep State’ is actually kind of awesome”, a New York Times opinion piece remarked this morning. It’s a classic in the genre of “it’s not happening and it’s good that it is”: in 2017 the outlet insisted that the Deep State didn’t exist. Americans, the new article argues, ought to embrace and celebrate the “everyday heroes” of the Deep State for making such good use of our tax dollars.

Government employees are just like us, the author notes —- they even like Taylor Swift! But if mean old Donald Trump is elected come November, “he would have the power to eviscerate the so-called Deep State and replace our public servants with people who work for him, not us.” Voters beware: there are livelihoods at stake…