Britain in the 70s: Scandal in Downing Street (Part 3)

**SPEAKER_1** (0:00)
Hey, I just Venmo'd you for rent.

**SPEAKER_2** (0:02)
Nice, now I can instantly spend it whether I'm checking out online with Venmo or using the Venmo debit card.

**SPEAKER_1** (0:07)
Say more.

**SPEAKER_2** (0:09)
More exactly, because the more you do with Venmo, the more you get, like earning up to 5% cash back with Venmo stash on a bundle of brands.

**SPEAKER_1** (0:16)
So, order more pizza.

**SPEAKER_2** (0:18)
The math demands it.

**SPEAKER_1** (0:19)
Get the Venmo debit card.

**SPEAKER_2** (0:21)
Venmo stash bundle terms and exclusions apply. See terms at venmo.me slash stash terms. Venmo checkout not available at all merchants. Venmo MasterCard is issued by the Bancorp Bank NA.

**SPEAKER_3** (0:30)
Now at McDonald's, a McDonald's is $2.50, so you can get your gym gains on or just get lunch for only $2.50. Get more value on the under $3 menu. Limit time only.

**Tom** (0:41)
Prices and participation may vary.

**SPEAKER_5** (0:42)
Prices may be higher for delivery.

**SPEAKER_1** (0:45)
Your favorite local grocery stores like Kroger, Ralph's, Fred Meyer and more are now delivering on Uber Eats. Get 40% off your order of fresh quality ingredients. Whether you just got home to an empty fridge or suddenly got a craving to whip up something new, you can get everything you need delivered in as little as 25 minutes. Get 40% off your order with code KROGER2026. Plus members get $0 delivery fees. Order now on Uber Eats. Orders of $30 or more save up to $25 and $430.26 YAP for details.

**Tom** (1:27)
Oh, I'd love to enter politics. I will one day. I'd adore to be Prime Minister. And yes, I believe very strongly in fascism. The only way we can speed up the sort of liberalism that's hanging foul in the air at the moment is to speed up the progress of a right wing, totally dictatorial tyranny and get it over as fast as possible.
People have always responded with greater efficiency under a regimental leadership.
A liberal wastes time saying, Well, now, what ideas have you got? Show them what to do for God's sake. If you don't, nothing will get done. I can't stand people just hanging about. Television is the most successful fascist, needless to say. Rockstars are fascists too.
Adolf Hitler was one of the first rock stars. Look at some of his films and see how he moved. I think he was quite as good as Jagger. It's astounding. And boy, when he hit that stage, he worked to an audience. Good God, he was no politician. He was a media artist himself.
So that was the rock star David Bowie interviewed in Playboy in September 1976 And the big question, what's going on there? Did he really mean it? Was he playing a part perhaps as he loved to do in the 1970s, the decade of Ziggy Stardust and Aladdin Sane? And of course, the part he's playing here is the thin white duke who Bowie described as a very Aryan fascist type. Or was he just completely off his head on Coke and speed? So many questions, Dominic. But whatever the explanation, the thing is that he was saying quite a lot of things like that in 1975 and 1976 So here he is being interviewed by the NME in October 1975, where he said, what Britain needs is an extreme right front to come up and sweep everything off its feet and tidy everything up. He said the coming of the far right would do something positive at least to cause a commotion in people and they'll either accept dictatorship or get rid of it. In April 1976, he was telling a press conference that Britain could benefit from a fascist leader. Then in May 1976, so the following month, came the most notorious incident of all, when he turned up at Victoria Station in I think an open top Mercedes and greeted fans with what was alleged at the time to be a Nazi salute and which Bowie, Elon Musk style subsequently said had just been a wave.
Then a few weeks later, he gives the interview that I've just cited.

**Dominic** (4:16)
So you can fall down a massive rabbit hole in the internet looking into all this because Bowie fans will often say, he was just waving and he's been very hard done by the press photographers.
On the other hand, as you say, there are a lot of such incidents in 1975 and 1976, and it's quite an odd part to choose to play. However, it's a very suggestive part because this is a period in British history, the mid 1970s when there's an awful lot of talk about Britain as the new Weimar Germany, about the ravages of inflation, about the rise of political extremism, the decay of the center, and about the possibility, even the probability that Britain will slide into some sort of authoritarianism.