Mallen Baker: Faultlines

One of the big stories of 2025 has been the plummeting rates of foreign tourists entering the United States. Whether because President Trump has insulted their countries, or because they just don't fancy visiting the...

European leaders and Ukraine's President Zelensky have been meeting yet again to agree a way forward in the face of Trump's pressure for Ukraine to sign a variation on its one-sided deal with Putin's Russia. And STILL...

The new Prime Minister of Japan, Sanae Takaichi, established a great rapport with President Trump right from the start - or so it seemed. But when she immediately lined up with Trump to draw a hard line with Xi...

In this news round-up of the week for Friday December 5th 2025 - The US launches its new security strategy, and it doesn't mince words in laying out the real thinking behind Trump's bizarre foreign policy. The question...

President Trump assumed that waving a big stick in front of Venzuela's Nicolas Maduro would result in him agreeing to step down, since the US has all of its economic and military might to bring to bear. But Maduro has...

NATO is realising that the hybrid warfare being waged against it by Russia, via sabotage, airspace incursions, disinformation and hacking attacks, are too serious to continue to be shrugged off. So today one of NATO's...

According to the Washington Post, President Trump's defence secretary Pete Hegseth ordered specifically that there should be no survivors from the first of the US military strikes against boats in waters close to...

In this news round-up of the week for Friday, November 28th 2025. President Trump faces a major legal backlash as analysis shows hundreds of judges have ruled his latest actions on deportations to be illegal - and now a...

This week, we saw the Trump Administration trying to blackmail the EU with steel and aluminium tariffs to get it to dismantle its regulations on big tech. We saw scandal in Switzerland over the donations to Trump of a...

A couple of weeks ago, Michelle Obama said that America wasn't ready to vote for a woman as President. Today, in the UK - which has had three women Prime Ministers and counting - another woman in a top position - Rachel...

We've talked before about the two sides of MAGA - the personality cult / ideological part, which is noisy and enthusiastic at times, and perpetually confused with Trump's frequent inconsistencies - and the tech...

As expected, European and Ukrainian leaders have been locked in urgent talks with the US as they try to negotiate down the Trump Ukraine Surrender Plan to something more acceptable. As they do so, Trump is plumbing new...

In this news round-up of the week for Friday, November 21st, 2025, we examine the text of Trump's Ukraine surrender plan and the attempt to force Ukraine to sign it, with the threat of letting Putin win the war if it...

It's just been revealed that Putin's Russia has been working in secret with the Trump administration to agree what is described as a 28-point plan, based on the Gaza peace plan. One thing is clear - if such a plan is...

With one abrupt and astonishing U-turn, President Trump has removed all doubt that he's prematurely entering the lame duck phase of his presidency. Faced with a massive revolt by Republican lawmakers to vote for the...

Lots of questions for this video to celebrate my long-delayed YouTube silver button! Lots on the United States and democracy, what the Trump administration end game is, whether the US will be able to recover its...

In this news round-up of the week for Friday November 14th 2025 - An announcement by Trump's War Secretary Pete Hegseth seems to signal a completely new focus for how America uses its military power in the future, and...

Boycotts rarely work, and even the ones that do, rarely stick. But Canadians are making themselves the exception. Ten months in, they are still avoiding travelling to the US in significant numbers. They are still...

The UK's Prime Minister Keir Starmer has gone to great lengths to stay on the right side of President Trump since he was re-elected. All the usual flattery, plus an unprecedented second state visit, with all the pomp...

On one level, the BBC made some pretty evident mistakes on impartiality - and most damagingly on a documentary on Trump, the echoes of which quickly reverberated across the Atlantic. And as a result, Tim Davie, the...

President Trump just unleashed a barrage on social media where he railed against the Supreme Court, against anyone and everyone who is against tariffs - and then he, apparently by-the-by, said that everyone would be...

In this news round-up of the week, Russia considers giving Maduro its latest hypersonic missiles to use to defend himself against Trump's America, even as China is protesting about his threats to its strategic partner...

Political fortunes can turn on a dime. One second, a major figure can seem immovable, all powerful - then suddenly something shifts and they're left trying to hold it all together as it slips from their grasp. This week...

The lower courts have both ruled that the bulk of Trump's tariffs are plainly unconstitutional. Now it has come to the Supreme Court, and it's arguably the moment the Conservatives on the court have been dreading. The...

The Trump MAGA base - with its mix of personality cultists, conspiracy theorists and uneasy traditional Republicans - is in uproar right now as Tucker Carlson's recent interview with Nick Fuentes was seen by many to...