Jim Kessler, executive vice president for policy with Third Way Democrats, had given a data-laden presentation at the 2025 Ideas Summit in Atlanta last spring.

His data? Strong. His takeaways? Ehh.

Naturally this progressive has some different perspectives, but I reached out to Jim to come on the show and he graciously did so.

Jim believes Democrats have to avoid trying to 'ace' special interest group questionnaires and answering questions no one is asking. I don't disagree, but we also don't see eye-to-eye on the importance of responding to GOP-led attacks vs doing/saying nothing as marginalized people get demonized.

Listen to the back-and-forth and see if you don't come away believing the gap between progressive and moderate isn't all that broad.