Matt Mackowiak's Mack On Politics

Our guest is EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt. He’s been in the news lately, with questions about a room he rented on Capitol Hill and the costs of his travel and security detail. This was not why we initially wanted to speak to him, though we did ask him those questions.  In this conversation, which was taped in The Washington Times newsroom with the video live-streamed online, my guest co-host Charlie Hurt and I discussed his mission at EPA, how it is working with President Trump, and what he believes he has accomplished in his first 16 months on the job.  We then specifically talked about the “Waters of the U.S.” regulation, Superfund cleanup, fuel economy standards for automobiles, ethanol and the renewable fuel standard, and the decision to pull out of the Paris Climate Accord.

The hottest nonfiction book in publishing right now is the newly released, “Secret Empires: How the American Political Class Hides Corruption and Enriches Family and Friends”) by New York Times bestselling author Peter Schweizer and he is our guest. He is the author of several other bestsellers, including “Clinton Cash” and “Throw Them All Out”, which revealed insider trading by members of Congress. His new book reveals how some of the most prominent names in national politics have earned tremendous wealth personally and for their friends and family, including the Bidens, the McConnells, the Obamas, the Kerrys and the Kushners. In this conversation, we explore the goal of the book, whether this ties into recent revelations from the Panama Papers, whether any of what he found is illegal, how this problem can be fixed and whether it will, what effect his previous books have had, what his next project is, and how his nonprofit advances its mission.

Our subject for the 75th episode is Cambridge Analytica and Facebook. Our guest is Sasha Issenberg, who has followed the use of data and digital targeting in campaigns for many years, culminating in his groundbreaking book, “The Victory Lab”, which was published in 2013 and updated in 2016. In this fascinating conversation, we delve into what Cambridge Analytica is, how the use of data and digital strategy have been converging since at least 2004, how addressable TV may be the next innovation, how these technologies may be used in the 2020 presidential campaign, whether corporate ad campaigns are more advanced than political ones, how the Obama, Clinton and Trump digital efforts were unique, to what extent truly fake news effected the 2016 campaign, and where this story is going for both Cambridge Analytica and Facebook.

Jonah Goldberg is our guest for episode 74.  He’s a senior editor for The National Review, a syndicated columnist, a Fox News contributor and a New York Times best-selling author whose new book, “Suicide of the West,” is available for preorder and will be released on April 24.  In this conversation we examine the Trump staff shakeup, how cable news is affecting his presidency, where the Mueller inquiry may be headed, how Trump’s first year went, what the PA-18 special election tells us, whether Trump can be reelected, and whether ideas matter anymore.