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THE volumeOTMPVATOtriptriptriptrip OTRIPUKOYour browser does not support the element. is thundering, the lighting dazzling. Some in the crowd who fill the 2 arena in east London on October 15th are downing burgers and beer; others wear -shirts bearing their heroes’ faces. And on a small stage in the centre of the venue, Rory Stewart, a 51-year-old former Tory in a Nehru jacket, is talking about the tax policies of the new Labour government. “They’ve ruled out income tax, which is the blue; , which is the silver,” he sighs. Around the arena 15,000 pairs of eyes study a colourful graph that fills the screens suspended over his head. “All the other stuff is rounding errors!” There is applause, and a shout of: “More!”Welcome to the most sensible show on earth, a surreal mixture of the wonkishness of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, a think-tank, and the razzmatazz of World Wrestling Entertainment. The 2 event was the last night of a live tour of “The Rest Is Politics” (“”), that Mr Stewart presents with Alastair Campbell, who made his name as the communications guru for the New Labour government of Sir Tony Blair. , launched in March 2022, is Britain’s most popular politics podcast.’s format is hardly revolutionary. In hour-long shows the pair talk about the state of their respective parties, the war in the Middle East and more. But its success reveals two things about British politics.The first is that the public has an appetite for a less cynical and less combative approach to political journalism. self-consciously harks back to an earlier age. The pair studied films of John Freeman, an interviewer of the 1960s, who would ask guests questions such as: “Are you on the whole more interested in ideas or in people?” Bickering is a faux pas; so is excessive partisanship. At one point in the 2 show Mr Stewart jokingly ticks off Mr Campbell for being too pro-Labour by pressing an emergency stop button; the arena is bathed in red light, a siren sounds and the word “tribal” flashes on the screens.The appeal of a quieter form of broadcasting points to ’s second ingredient—the transformation of centrism into a political identity, in response both to Brexit and to Jeremy Corbyn, a hard-left former Labour leader. “We have a degree of nostalgia for a kind of Fukuyama ‘end of history’ 90s era,” says Mr Stewart. “We share a sense that there was a time when the and its allies were part of a world that seemed to be getting more peaceful, more prosperous, more stable, and that something’s gone badly awry.” Only a smattering of those at the 2 say they would pick Kemi Badenoch or Robert Jenrick, the two remaining right-leaning contenders, for the . Asked whether Brexit is going well, a solitary arm goes up.Trippers, says Mr Campbell, “feel that they’re not taken seriously because they don’t have extreme views”. That may seem unlikely. To judge by the ticket price at the event (£91.25, or $118, for a mid-tier seat) and the conversations about house prices in the queue, the podcast’s listeners might be counted among life’s winners. But to be overlooked is a state of mind rather than an economic predicament. And although the victory of Sir Keir Starmer, a cautious anti-populist, ought to please centrists, his is what Mr Stewart calls an “anxious triumph”; if Sir Keir fails, the door may open to more dangerous forces.It is not all doom and gloom. Mr Stewart ends the show on a soaring oration. “These ideas, which as British people, we’re very embarrassed by, are foundational to our democracy: hope, truth, equality, justice, dignity,” he says. Then Mr Campbell’s bagpipes are produced, the audience links hands and 15,000 voices join in a chorus of “Auld Lang Syne”. “They are showmen,” says John Wilson, a 90-year-old audience member, with a touch of disapproval. “But enjoyable, nevertheless.”
