We tend to think about American politics as being driven by the fight between the two major parties. But what if the conventional view of political polarization in America is missing the true divide: between elites and the working class. Batya Ungar-Sargon, Opinion Editor at Newsweek, discusses insights from her book ' Second Class ,' in which she interviews hundreds of Americans and posits that elites on both sides of the political spectrum have betrayed America's working men and women. 03:31 T...
Jul 30, 2024•32 min
Is Kamala Harris in an even better position than initial indications would seem to suggest, and can the Dem's big surge this week get even better? Also, were Joe Biden's limitations as a communicator really a legit demerit on how effectively he could do the job as president? Who should get the Dem VP nod? And did JD Vance say the most insulting and politically destructive thing in American vice-presidential history? 01:49 Inside Reactions and Polling Insights 04:23 Kamala Harris's Campaign Strat...
Jul 26, 2024•43 min
The surging beginning of Kamala Harris' presidential campaign is exactly what anxious Democrats were hoping for. Matt joins radio legend Howard Monroe to discuss all the new angles: the fundraising, the maneuvering, the messaging, and the polling. 03:00 Kamala Harris's Campaign Momentum 07:28 Debate on Biden's Resignation 17:35 Kamala Harris vs. Donald Trump Winning Messages 22:39 Polling and Public Perception 26:38 Republican Strategies Against Harris
Jul 24, 2024•32 min
The Pivot to Kamala: Trump, Biden, and the Divide in America. Matt is joined by Batya Ungar-Sargon, Opinion Editor at Newsweek, to discuss the sudden ascension of Vice President Kamala Harris, Donald Trump's influence, and whether Joe Biden should resign. 02:18 Boiling it All Down: Has This Been a Great Week? 07:18 Biden's Withdrawal and Kamala Harris 12:01 Economic Models and the American Dream 17:01 GOP vs. Democratic Party Elites 25:25 Conclusion and Next Episode
Jul 23, 2024•27 min
President Joe Biden has withdrawn from the 2024 presidential race. He's already a hero who saved America once. Now, will his selfless move increased the Democratic Party's chances of beating Donald Trump? And, Matt just wrote in Newsweek on SATURDAY that Biden should also resign in order to help Kamala Harris defeat Trump. Is the case now even stronger? 00:00 Breaking News: Biden Withdraws from 2024 Race 01:07 Analyzing Biden's Debate Performance and Media Influence 02:25 The Impact of Biden's W...
Jul 21, 2024•24 min
We tried to boil down one of the most eventual weeks in American political history into two questions: Is there really a new Trump following the assassination attempt, and if this is the end of the political road for Joe Biden as looks increasingly likely, what will happen next for the Democrats? 00:46 Assassination Attempt and Trump's New Promise 01:51 Analyzing Trump's Convention Speech 04:27 Trump's Economic Ideas and Their Impact 10:23 Biden's Potential Withdrawal and Democratic Party Reacti...
Jul 19, 2024•38 min
Voters consistently say the economic is the most important issue to them. Which is why it's baffling that there's been so little attention on Donald Trump's economic ideas, which would be an unspeakable disaster for the American economy, and especially for the middle class. Brian Riedl, a conservative economist from the Manhattan Institute breaks down why proposals like replacing the income tax with a massive tariff are mathematically and economically terrible. We also get into Trump's broader p...
Jul 16, 2024•40 min
Is the turmoil surrounding Joe Biden's potential dropout from the presidential race wrapping up, or ramping up? Is it even possible that the media is simply fueling this narrative for drama and traffic, obscuring where their focus should be on Donald Trump's controversial plans for America? Check out Matt's newest Newsweek article on the exceedingly dangerous Trump plan for a second term. 02:47 The Media's Influence on Public Perception 04:39 Internal Democratic Party Tensions 07:00 Public Senti...
Jul 12, 2024•38 min
It's one of the biggest questions looming over American politics: what will the centrists do? There are as many as 71 million self-identified centrists in America - people who don't feel entirely comfortable with either major political party, and largely agree on most issues - and these are the people who are probably going to decide which of two very different paths America follows. So why can't either party nail them down? And which way will they go? Former Republican Congressman and centrist ...
Jul 09, 2024•52 min
President Biden's candidacy is in what's increasingly looking like a death spiral. But "should he stick it out or should he drop out" is the wrong question. There is a much better and a much more important question that Democrats really need to ask. Also, is the Supreme Court's presidential immunity decision as bad as it seemed; should Russian athletes should be banned from international athletic competitions; and why sometimes scientific advance can be downright disgusting. 02:24 The Biden Ques...
Jul 05, 2024•47 min
"The president is now a king above the law. With fear for our democracy, I dissent." Those were the words of Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor about yesterday's Supreme court decision conferring what the press described as "partial immunity" on Donald Trump and future presidents for crimes they may commit in office. But the reality goes much deeper than that. Legal scholar Kim Wehle -- a former US Attorney who regularly explains rulings like this on ABC news (subscribe to her substack here )...
Jul 02, 2024•27 min
BONUS EPISODE: There are two paths in the road ahead for Biden and the Democrats after President Joe Biden's rough debate. There is a roadmap for how he can recover--but can Biden pull it off? And if he can't, what does the unprecedented pathway of him dropping out look like? CHECK OUT MATT'S NEWSWEEK ARTICLE COVERING THIS ISSUE IN DEPTH: https://www.newsweek.com/disastrous-debate-biden-leaves-path-forward-democrats-opinion-1918957 01:44 Analyzing Biden's Debate Performance 03:38 Media Reactions...
Jun 29, 2024•27 min
The debate went very badly for Joe Biden. And whether it's fair or not, the reality is that Biden's path to stopping Trump has gotten much harder. Matt, Paul, and Alicia delve into the key question of what happens next. Can Biden recover? What would that take? And if his team concludes that he can't, what would that look like? 01:32 Analyzing Biden's Performance 04:13 Media Perception and Reality 09:11 Debate Performance vs. Presidential Capability 12:12 The Elephant in the Room: Biden's Future ...
Jun 28, 2024•39 min
We're in the middle of a fight, as president Biden put it, for the soul of America. We face diametrically opposing visions of the future, and a ton of difficult questions. Even if we win the election, do we just have the bigger threat of everything Donald Trump has unleashed looming ahead of us? What about the way we're waging this fight? I just wrote an article in Washington Monthly arguing that the way we fight in American politics simply may not work in most cases anymore. So if the stakes ar...
Jun 25, 2024•44 min
Why did the Biden campaign decide to launch a blistering new line of attack right now? And what does it tell us about what his closest advisers are seeing from the inside? We connected a few dots to try to figure out the answer. Also, a flood of big news from the tech and political world, including. And, has the Trump campaign figured out how to manipulate the media as laziness and in attention. And we close with a really delicious story, which ends up with me asking: Is Alicia Preston a French ...
Jun 21, 2024•37 min
With Donald Trump's sentencing in New York rapidly approaching, we ask, what should we want out of the judges sentencing? It's really not that clear cut, since the answer invokes issues of justice, precedent and practical politics. What will this mean for the 2024 election? How would different sentences change voters' perceptions and each sides' message? 03:38 Trump's Legal Troubles and Political Implications 15:22 Sentencing Possibilities and Ramifications
Jun 18, 2024•33 min
So what happened when Donald Trump went back to the scene of the crime? We're talking of course, about his visit to Congress, the independent branch of government that he urged his supporters to attack as he inspired them to attempted insurrection. We also got into the hunter Biden verdict, and the question of whether Members of Congress really misplayed the political messaging about it. We also talked about the abortion pill ruling and how the media handled that. And then today is Donald Trump'...
Jun 14, 2024•43 min
Today, we look at the source of power that has driven the Republican Party for the last five decades, and has shaped the policies, politics, and politicians who in turn shape our lives. Political scientist EJ Fagan's new book 'The Thinkers ,' dives into the origins, methods, and extensive power that these institutions quietly wield. 01:07 The Power Behind the Throne 03:41 The Garbage Can Model in Policy Making 11:32 Heritage's Legacy and Modern Think Tanks 20:05 The Intellectual Orthodoxy of Con...
Jun 11, 2024•41 min
Int he aftermath of Donald Trump's felony conviction, polls are suggesting that critical voters are turning on him. So why are all the big name Republicans so determined to stick with him, and suggest dangerous, scary reprisals? Also is Biden's big border executive order going to make a political difference. Plus, President Biden boxed in Bibi Netanyahu on the peace deal that's on the table between Israel and Hamas. Finally, we have a bold prediction on the NBA finals. 01:03 The Aftermath of Tru...
Jun 07, 2024•39 min
ProPublica reporter Andy Kroll just went deep inside the epicenter of MAGA insanity, and found some unsettling things. What drives the MAGA movement is not policy or even support for Trump anymore, but something worse, something that's been on full display since Trump's conviction in New York. And it paints a troubling picture of the post-Trump future of the Republican Party. 01:40 A Disturbing Scene 06:47 The Ideological Divide in MAGA 16:17 The Rise and Fall of Christina Karamo 21:57 The Rise ...
Jun 04, 2024•45 min
A quick interview with Howard Monroe about the impact of the Trump conviction
May 31, 2024•12 min
We start with an emergency segment recorded late this evening on the news that Donald Trump has been convicted on all 34 counts int he New York fraud trial, and is now a felon. We sort through the legal next steps and the political implications. We then shift to our earlier recording and hit the big story from Congressman Jamie Raskin and his proposal about how to force Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito off of the Supreme court cases involving Donald Trump because of their obvious bias. And final...
May 31, 2024•41 min
It's a shocking story we hear almost nothing about: huge corporations exploiting some of the $900 billion a year in government programs aimed at helping America's poor, and pocketing hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars along the way. Anne Kim, a Contributing Editor at Washington Monthly, shares some of the most riveting stories from her book ' Poverty for Profit' (publishing TODAY at this link) a deep dive into what these companies are doing, who is being hurt, and why we decided as a count...
May 28, 2024•46 min
Yes, Donald Trump did kind of tell supporters that he's dead. Our round table discussion started with deep, interesting question: after all the talk about polarization and division, is there actually a powerful emerging centrist movement in America? But then, Alicia dropped something kind of fascinating and disturbing into the conversation, an email from Donald Trump that seems to imply the he is currently dead. And as if that wasn't amusing enough, we close the show on one of the deepest existe...
May 24, 2024•35 min
Are Democrats really shedding massive amounts of support from African American voters? There are certainly warning signs of trouble -- including a New York times poll showing Trump getting the support of more than 20% of Black Americans. But Mario Broussard and Ana Robinson of Global Strategy Group say that the actual picture is a lot more nuanced than that, and that if the numbers suggest anything, it's that there are things Biden and the Democrats can do to hold on to the critical core of the ...
May 21, 2024•35 min
After a major standoff, Trump and Biden have agreed to two presidential debates. Did Biden win this exchange? And how much does it really matter? Also, a quick breakdown of Michael Cohen's testimony, and the question of whether Trump's political defenses in the hush money trial are actually kind of working. Plus, a very weird New York Times poll from this week and a continued run of voting results that Donald Trump should be finding downright scary. Plus, our closing segment has snakes on a plan...
May 17, 2024•39 min
Lauren Goldstein of Change Research dives into a fascinating study aims to get inside the minds of voters and could help explain why they feel so negative about the most important issue of the 2024 election - the economy. Also, why they do things differently than most opinion researchers, and how that can help change the way we talk to voters. 01:38 Exploring the Real Economic Pain Points of Voters 05:20 The Psychological Underpinnings of Financial Comparisons 10:09 Addressing the Generational D...
May 14, 2024•42 min
Was the big, headline grabbing testimony from Stormy Daniel actually the most significant thing that happened in the Trump trial this week? We make the case that the answer is actually...no. Trump should be a lot more worried about three other developments. Plus, what's driving the Biden administration's pause on arms transfers to Israel? And why did RFK Jr. say that a piece of his brain is missing??? 00:53 Exploring the Impact of Stormy Daniels' Testimony 05:14 The Hypocrisy Surrounding Pornogr...
May 10, 2024•37 min
What are the things you have to get right to succeed in the world of politics? What's the secret sauce to winning a campaign? (hint: it's actually not what most people think) And what are the unwritten rules that you have to know to be a member of Congress or to work in Congress? We tacked these questions and much more this week, when Matt was honored to be a guest on one of the top podcasts in the world aimed at political insiders, the ProPolitics podcast hosted by Zac McCrary. We're bringing y...
May 07, 2024•1 hr
This week, politics has been kind of amazing because there's been such a strange mix of ultra serious issues filled with moments that are just hilarious. We unpack the latest developments in the Trump trial and how Donald Trump's own lawyer ended up introducing some really humiliating evidence about him. Also, the crackdown on student protesters and how Lauren Boebert managed to beclown herself. And then of course, we had to talk about the most bizarre story of political self destruction that an...
May 03, 2024•37 min
