Whiskey Politics

We caught up with Emmy Award-winning CBS and ABC political news reporter and editor Linda Breakstone who covered Presidential elections dating back to the Reagan years. Her wealth of knowledge and experience made this discussion far too short. Get the inside scoop on fake news, polling, and why Linda no longer trusts the media when it comes to political reporting.

How would you feel being labeled "Dr. Evil" in USA Today, which is then repeated across national media including a 60 Minutes interview? When you fight against drinking and driving laws, smoking regulations, tanning bed restrictions, motorcycle helmet laws, minimum wage increases and of course unions, you can be called many things and for the most part none of them kind.

Meet Rick Berman, a lobbyist public affairs advocate whose successful firm Berman and Company most recently worked for the Trump Campaign (after working for Ted Cruz during the primary). If you haven't seen the 2006 movie Thank You For Smoking you missed one of Hollywood's better films detailing (in a humorous and entertaining way) free speech, individual choice and libertarian philosophy. It's been said the movie, based on Christopher Buckley's book of the same name, portrays Rick Berman who has testified before numerous committees of various state legislatures, the U.S. Senate and the U.S. House of Representatives. In this interview we discuss the issues Rick's firm works on to "change the debate", his role in the 2016 election and the media hits he's taken (and welcomes) including 4 straight nights of being attacked on Rachel Maddow's program to which he responded by flying up on his own dime and defending himself on live television.

What’s the future of talk radio and how can Conservatives counter-balance biased media while attracting the next generation of voters? The loquacious and hilarious Michael Graham’s background was in stand-up comedy, he coordinated several Republican campaigns including Pat Buchanan’s 1992 Presidential run, and was a talk radio host with millions of listeners in New England on WTKK and Washington DC on WMAL. Graham has appeared on Real Time with Bill Maher,  The O’Reilly Factor, Hardball with Chris Matthews, Fox & Friends, and the Dr. Phil Show. Michael is now a writer at Washington Examiner and Creative Director at The Weekly Standard where he writes and hosts several podcasts.

As posted at Ricochet. Earlier this year Stephen F. Hayes was featured on the Ricochet Podcast (@43m.) and partly defended his Never Trumpiness by sharing uncomfortable discussions with his children. So, what did he say to his kids after Trump won and how does he feel now? During this transparent interview Steve also talks about free markets, crony capitalism, repealing Obamacare, regulations, and the 3 reasons why the Obama administration should be considered an abject failure.

Stephen is (the new) editor in chief of The Weekly Standard and author of two New York Times bestsellers: Cheney: The Untold Story of America’s Most Powerful and Controversial Vice President and The Connection: How al Qaeda’s Collaboration with Saddam Hussein Has Endangered America. He is a regular Fox All Stars panelist on Special Report with Bret Baier. Before joining The Weekly Standard, Hayes was a senior writer for National Journal’s Hotline. He also served for six years as Director of the Institute on Political Journalism at Georgetown University. His work has appeared in the New York Post, the Washington Times, Salon, National Review, and Reason. He has been a commentator on CNN, The McLaughlin Group, the Fox News Channel, MSNBC, CNBC, and C-SPAN. Before becoming editor in chief, Hayes long served as a senior writer at The Weekly Standard. A graduate of Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism and DePauw University, Hayes was born and raised in Wauwatosa, Wisconsin.

2 time Pulitzer award winning Political Cartoonist Michael P. Ramirez joins Dave Sussman at Whiskey Politics to discuss law, Supreme Court, Cuba, the media and California and whether Hillary should be a pass on her emails and Clinton Foundation scandals. To see his cartoons, please check out the video.