Episode 2235: John Driscoll on why Kamala Harris lost
I did this interview with John Driscoll, co-author of Pay the People! Why Fair Pay is Good for Business and Great for America, earlier this week, assuming that Harris would lose the election. And let’s be clear: she did lose an election that should have been eminently winnable. Driscoll spelt it out clearly in a powerful The Hill article last week about how raising the minimum wage is the key to the White House for Harris. The problem with Harris, and most of the Democratic party, is their failure to offer a coherent and politically sellable economic alternative to Trumpism. John Driscoll and his group of successful business leaders at Patriotic Millionaires offer that alternative. It’s not socialism, but it is an undisguised and unapologetic attempt to recognize the economic predicament of the American working class and to resurrect the American Dream by leveling the playing field. That’s the way to defeat Trumpism. Not by smiling inanely and saying nothing.
John Driscoll chairs the Waystar Corporation and is a senior advisor at Walgreens Boots Alliance. Previously, he was CEO at CareCentrix, president of Castlight, group president at Medco, and SVP at Oxford Health Plans. John also served as a captain in the U.S. Army Reserve and is a longtime board member of the Alliance for Hunger and The Patriotic Millionaires. The co-author, with Morris Pearl, of Pay the People! (The New Press), he lives in Stamford, Connecticut.
Named as one of the "100 most connected men" by GQ magazine, Andrew Keen is amongst the world's best known broadcasters and commentators. In addition to presenting KEEN ON, he is the host of the long-running How To Fix Democracy show. He is also the author of four prescient books about digital technology: CULT OF THE AMATEUR, DIGITAL VERTIGO, THE INTERNET IS NOT THE ANSWER and HOW TO FIX THE FUTURE. Andrew lives in San Francisco, is married to Cassandra Knight, Google's VP of Litigation & Discovery, and has two grown children.
Keen On is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.
This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit keenon.substack.com/subscribe
How to Innovate: Sheena Iyengar on how, in our Age of Big Problems, we must learn to Think Bigger
On Mental Illness and the Mist of Consciousness: William Brewer explains how Psychedelic Therapy Saved His Life
On Roads Not Taken: Novelist Juliette Fay explains why regret is such fertile territory for fiction writers
Disrupting the Traditional Art World: Evrim Oralkan on how Collecteurs.com is transforming privately owned creative work into "public" digital art
A Tragic Grand Delusion: Steven Simon on the Rise and Fall of American Ambition in the Middle East
That Was the Week in Tech: Inspired by his wife, Gene, Keith Teare asks whether the market has hit the bottom
Nine Black Robes: Joan Biskupic on the historic significance of the Supreme Court's drive to the right
An Impossible Choice: Anjan Sundaram on the devastating personal costs of being a war correspondent in Africa
The Painful Joy of Remembering the Lives of Two Holocaust Survivors: Max J. Friedman on why he chose to write a memoir about his Holocaust surviving parents
Why We Should Blame Leaders, not Citizens, for Today's Crisis of Democracy: Larry Bartels on how democracy is eroding from the top
The Start-Up That Defines the entrepreneurial spirit of Silicon Valley: Jimmy Soni on the story of PayPal and its remarkable alumni who have shaped the 21st century
The Teen Mental Health Crisis: Hannah Murphy asks whether teens are paying with their sanity for their "free" social media
Complicate the Narrative: Rajiv Vinnokota on how to transform Americans into better citizens