The coverage of the American mid-term elections on this morning's Today programme featured interviews with two BBC reporters (Dan Johnson and Jon Sopel), plus interviews with two US congressmen - the splendidly-named Representative Ted Yoho from Florida (Republican) and the more prosaically-named Senator Tim Kaine of Virginia (Democrat). In the non-partisan spirit of Senator Kaine's contribution, I'll happily say that both he and Ted Yoho came across well.
Justin Webb wasn't too bad either, particularly his interesting report from Levittown, though Mr Yoho got the less friendly set of questions and I smiled at his later summary of the two interviews: "We've heard from a Republican congressman who told us Donald Trump was not a racist but a unifier. We heard from Tim Kaine, Hillary Clinton's running mate in 2016, who told us the Republic itself is under threat if the Republicans are seen to win this election".
But the two 'expert' voices, a ex-CNN reporter called Bill Schneider and a best-selling author called Michael Lewis, were both unsympathetic towards the Republicans (especially Donald Trump) and so, balance-wise, the programme tilted strongly in a Democratic direction. Confirming my suspicions (grounded in what they said) I Googled and discovered from non-BBC pieces that Mr. Lewis considers himself a "liberal Democrat" and that Mr. Schneider belongs to a centre-left Democratic Party-aligned think tank called Third Way.
Michael Lewis was on Politics Live yesterday. Naturally. He's a Trump critic getting a platform and a plug. He's written a book about the danger of Trump, through his lack of interest in maintaining the structures and functions underpinning government, putting America at risk. There was a long review of it in the Standard a few weeks ago by Philip Delves Broughton.
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