Beyond Politics

The shape of what and how we view things on television is rapidly evolving, with the NFL moving to Amazon, NBC potentially dropping an hour of prime time, and sports looking to a streaming future.  Chris Hill, host of Motley Fool Money, explains the dizzying changes and what might be coming next.  Also, what will the homestretch of the business year look like?

By which we mean the homestretch toward the midterms, with 9 weeks until election day, and the outcome depending on voters' priorities between inflation and autocracy. But also, President Biden's big speech last week depicted a country on the brink of a total meltdown, with MAGA forces poised to upend 250 years of democracy. Are we actually that close to the brink, and if so, was his speech the right thing to do? Plus, if we're so close to a MAGA takeover of government, why are Democrats promoting MAGA candidates? 

Several years ago, Newt Gingrich created a bit of controversy when he said in an interview that feelings are facts, and that the way people perceive an issue has just as much to say about it’s reality as any set of statistics that you could gather. Many people scoffed or reacted with outrage...but the truth is, he was kind of right: for instance, the way people feel about the economy has a strong influence on the objective reality of the economy as seen in the kinds of statistics that we can measure. In fact, economists generally accept the idea that people's feelings and expectations about inflation -- the number one public issue in the country right now -- become self-fulfilling prophecies that manifest in actual inflation. That’s why if you listen closely to our nation's economic leaders like Fed Chair Jerome Powell and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, you’ll hear them talk so much about consumer confidence. The leading institution that measures people's feelings about the economy in America is the University of Michigan Survey of Consumers.  Their Consumer Sentiment Index is one of the most closely-watched metrics of what is happening, and will happen, with the economy. Their Director Dr. Joanne Hsu joins us to tell us what it means, why it’s important, and why we need to be paying extra close attention to it right now.

We’ve been talking a lot about President Biden's decision to give holders of student loan debt substantial aid by canceling up to $10,000 in debt for those making less than $125,000. It seems like the decision has made no one happy, and that's definitely true of today's guest. Brian Riedl is a Senior Fellow with the Manhattan Institute who is an expert in economic policy, having worked for six years a chief economist senator Rob Portman and Director of Budget and Spending Policy for Marco Rubio’s presidential campaign. He has plenty of policy critiques of the Biden plan...but surprisingly, he has even more criticism for the Republican response and what it says about where the Republican Party has landed today, lacking any kind of coherent domestic policy agenda. He's written an article about it for The Dispatch (image from their article) and he joins us to explain.

Or will it amp it up even further? The panel dives into why Democrats are gaining ground, and whether President Biden's big move on student debt is the right thing to do both economically and politically. Plus, Lindsay Graham makes the MAGA hostage threat explicit: stay away from Trump, or the base will attack (again). Does that mean prosecutors should back off?

In the past week, Republican attacks on the Inflation Reduction Act around how it funds tax enforcement have gotten downright scary, claiming that the IRS will use the additional funding to hire thousands of armed agents and threaten Americans’ life and liberty. It's nonsense, but it's nothing new. Back in December, we did an episode of Great Ideas that ran through the myths, realities, and partisan lies that were emerging then about tax enforcement...and most of it applies just as much now as it did then. 

We work very hard on this show to get out of our bubble and challenge our perceptions about what is happening, so that we don't end up just living in a political echo chamber. There’s no better way to do that for Democrat than to hear from one the very top Republican pollsters working today. Right now, the big question is whether there is a real shift going on in politics...is it just a case of Democrats over tilting on a bit of good news, or is it based on real, tangible signs that voters' fundamental views and drivers of politics are changing? We've heard from Democratic analysts, and now, we get insights from Whit Ayres, a leading Washington, D.C. political consultant with over 30 years of experience in polling and survey research for high profile political campaigns and associations. He’s the Founder and President of North Star Opinion Research, a national public opinion and public affairs research firm where he provides message development and strategic insights to high level political clients including Marco Rubio, Lindsey Graham, Jim Inhofe, John Kennedy, and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. Whit’s comments and analysis appear in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, USA Today,and numerous regional newspapers as well as National Public Radio.

This week, we're focusing on the question of the big vibe shift in politics: is it just a hazy feeling among Democrats, or a real reflection of a significant change in their favor?  Aliza Astrow is a senior political analyst at Third Way who conducts public opinion research and analysis on voter views, and she walks through whether, how much, and why voters may be warming to keeping Democrats in power. 

Numerous data points are suggesting that there may be some positive trends for Democrats, along with some troubling signs for Republicans.  Dems have been acting downright giddy about what they see as the recent turn.  But is it mostly in their mind?  Is it going to be enough? Or are they getting meaningful traction at just the right time? The panel weighs what we're seeing out there and separates what's real from what's not. 

Since the FBI search on Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home more than a week ago, the response from Republican office holders has been to demonize the Department of Justice, FBI, and law-enforcement in general. Republican firebrand Marjorie Taylor Greene called for the FBI to be "destroyed and defunded," and the echoes of that exact sentiment have sounded throughout Republican Party leadership. Our guest today  identifies a growing pattern of opposing the rule of law and celebrating lawlessness at the heart of the Republican Party. Caroline Fredrickson is a Senior Fellow at the Brennen Center for Justice at NYU Law. She’s served as the President of the American Constitution Society and she’s a frequent guest on television and radio, including serving as a regular on-air commentator during Donald Trump’s impeachments. She regularly contributes opinion pieces for The New York Times, The Washington Post, and other news outlets, the most recent of which was “The Lawless G.O.P. Response to the Raid at Mar-a-Lago” in the New York Times.