The latest economic numbers are out, and by the time you hear this podcast, Donald Trump surely will have told us all why they are great, why tariffs work, and why this economy is the best ever.But you know better. Or at least Washington Post opinion columnist Catherine Rampell does. While we may have one or multiple months of strong GDP, the key question remains: Is that growth sustainable? And as she wrote, “Right now, under Trump’s policies, the answer looks like a big fat no.”So today my goal was to better understand Trumponomics, and whether bad economics might just be good politics.After all, we’re running up debt, collecting fewer taxes, destroying free trade, fighting with trade partners, implementing tariffs, and then bailing out farmers with $12 billion of handouts to pay for the results. As I seem to ask every week: What is going on?About Catherine Rampell: As you surely know, her columns focus on economics, public policy, politics and culture, with a special emphasis on data-driven journalism. Before the Post poached her, she previously wrote for the New York Times.

Well, that was quite a week. And no doubt, in the few hours between my recording this intro and when the podcast drops, another extraordinary week will have passed.How to make sense of it? To fashionably employ the double negative – it’s so good to see grammar finally get its due on the world stage – I don’t think it’s unfair to ask: Where are we as a nation?For guidance, I turned to former U.S. Ambassador and current professor at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, Nicholas Burns. Without exaggeration, I don’t think I could have found anyone better.A full rundown of his bio could be a podcast on its own. Just some highlights:·     Served or participated under five presidents·     U.S. Ambassador to NATO – including on 9/11 – and Greece·     State Department Spokesman·     National Security Council, where he held roles covering Russia, Ukraine, Eurasia Affairs, and the Soviet Union·     Onsite service at the American Consulate General in Jerusalem and U.S. Embassies in Egypt and MauritaniaAnd don’t get me started on his 15 honorary degrees, Presidential Distinguished Service Award, Secretary of State’s Distinguished Service Award – all of which, I bet, Burns would rank below his true claim to fame: Life-long member of Red Sox Nation.  

Well, that was quite a week. And no doubt, in the few hours between my recording this intro and when the podcast drops, another extraordinary week will have passed.

How to make sense of it? To fashionably employ the double negative – it’s so good to see grammar finally get its due on the world stage – I don’t think it’s unfair to ask: Where are we as a nation?

For guidance, I turned to former U.S. Ambassador and current professor at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, Nicholas Burns. Without exaggeration, I don’t think I could have found anyone better.

A full rundown of his bio could be a podcast on its own. Just some highlights:

·     Served or participated under five presidents

·     U.S. Ambassador to NATO – including on

So here’s the timeline: Two days ago, I spoke with Dan Pfeiffer. As you surely know, he’s President Obama's former communications director and senior advisor and co-host of a podcast you might have heard of: Pod Save America. Then yesterday, Dan’s new book -- Yes We (Still) Can: Politics in the Age of Obama, Twitter, and Trump – debuts at No. 1 on the New York Times best-seller list. Co-incidence? I’ll let you decide. All I can do is accurately portray the facts.The other thing I can do: Tell you that the book is a terrific read, and the conversation was even better. He’s got a great sense of humor. That comes out in the book, too.We also discussed the serious side of politics today: I asked Dan about Democratic messaging for the midterms and beyond – what should their message be and can they possible overcome all of the noise? As well: Who’s the elected Democrat who can best lead that narrative? We also discussed the ways in which he feels the Barack Obama’s election helped lead to Donald Trump. 

In the face of jailing immigrant children, questions about capitalism amid tariffs and possible trade wars, and concerns about democracy as we reject western allies and warmly welcome authoritarians and dictators, a lot of us are wondering not just who are we, but also, how in the world did we get here?Steven Brill feels he has an answer.You likely know: Brill is a serial ideas entrepreneur. He founded, among other ventures, American Lawyer and Court TV. He has taken on some of our biggest issues and institutions – Law, Journalism, Healthcare, Schools. Now he’s at it again, and the topic is no less than the American decline.He has written it all down in “Tailspin: The People and Forces Behind America's Fifty-Year Fall--and Those Fighting to Reverse It”Tailspin is a vital and complicated story that Brill simplifies like this: About five decades ago, the core values that make America great began to bring America down.The story’s also complicated because, as you’ll hear, Brill himself is a beneficiary of the very system that seems to have gone haywire: Meritocracy. That well-meaning approach to success – where we all get judged by what we can do rather than from where we came – has been turned against itself. As the knowledge-based economy grew, those at the top have pulled up the ladders. We live, he argues, in a country of moats.

For many on the right and left, the question has been “what’s happening to the GOP?”

• Free Trade? Gone.


• Budget deficits? No problem


• Free movement of labor? Not so much.


• Military war exercises? Who needs’em?


• Russia as outlaw state? How about Russia in the G8?

I think a more fair – and probably more relevant question: What is the GOP?And frankly, the question comes more from the right than the left. Bob Corker basically asked it this week on the Senate floor. Conservative writers ask it in columns and tweets. GOP voters ask it, particularly as they primary established conservatives like South Carolina’s Mark Sanford and, perhaps, Alabama’s Martha Roby.Today I’ll ask it.Scott Jennings is a political strategist and co-founder of RunSwitch Public Relations in Kentucky. You’ve seen him on CNN, where he is resolutely polite and Republican. Among many roles: He served as Special Assistant to President George W. Bush and Deputy White House Political Director. He worked for Mitt Romney in 2012 and Jeb Bush in the last election. He also has worked on numerous campaigns for his home state Senator, Mitch McConnell. Just this spring he was a Fellow at Harvard’s Institute of Politics.

For many on the right and left, the question has been “what’s happening to the GOP?”

• Free Trade? Gone.

I think a more fair – and probably more relevant question: What is the GOP?

And frankly, the question comes more from the right than the left. Bob Corker basically asked it this week on the Senate floor. Conservative writers ask it in columns and tweets. GOP voters ask it, particularly as they primary established conservatives like South Carolina’s Mark Sanford and, perhaps, Alabama’s Martha Roby.

Today I’ll ask it.