InfluenceWatch Podcast
The podcast where we go beneath the surface to reveal the web of connected influence, money, and motivation driving the news.
We found 6 episodes of InfluenceWatch Podcast with the tag “business”.
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Episode 155: Party Realignment: Radical Republicans, Corporate Democrats?
February 6th, 2021 | 13 mins 23 secs
2020, business, capitol, commerce, conservative, culture, democrats, labor, left, liberal, libertarian, parties, politics, progressive, republicans, right, society, tech, wall street
In this episode: Continuing what has become something of a series on how American big business, big labor, and other “bigs” have gotten aggressively more aligned with progressive liberalism, today we turn to Big Business—Wall Street, Big Tech, and so forth. Groups like the Chamber of Commerce were once stalwarts of the Republican Party, but in the 2020 election they were far less aligned with their historical allies Joining me to discuss the realignment of Big Business support is my Capital Research Center colleague Shane Devine.
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Episode 152: Aggressively Political Philanthropy
January 15th, 2021 | 19 mins 24 secs
america, business, conservative, elections, foundations, government, labor, law, left, liberal, libertarian, nonprofits, philanthropy, politics, progressive, right, society
In this episode: In recent years, American big business, big labor, and other “bigs” have gotten aggressively more aligned with progressive liberalism—even those bigs, like Big Philanthropy, that are technically required by law not to intervene in elections. While Big Philanthropy might always have been liberal-leaning ideologically, it has gotten so openly Democratic that as conservative philanthropic scholar Bill Schambra noted, “it’s no longer suspect, or even noteworthy, to treat nonprofits and foundations as anything other than useful tools to “build a Democratic Party that can translate [progressive values] into public policy as a true governing majority.”” Joining us to discuss how we got here and the consequences of philanthropy losing its nominal political neutrality is Mike Hartmann, head of Capital Research Center’s Center for Strategic Giving and editor of the Giving Review blog at Philanthropy Daily.
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Episode 135: Today's Woke-Progressive Infiltration (with guest Naomi Schaefer Riley!)
September 4th, 2020 | 19 mins 12 secs
activism, aei, bagman, business, capitalism, conservative, dark money, donor, donors, ford, foundations, funding, george floyd, influence, intent, iwf, left, left-wing, liberal, libertarian, major institutions, money, naomi schaefer riley, philanthropy, police, progressive, public policy, research, right, rockefeller
In this episode: Since the initial demonstrations following the police-custody death of George Floyd, foundations have pledged over one billion dollars to support efforts to combat alleged “systemic racism.” In practice, that means more foundations have followed the path of the Ford Foundation, Rockefeller Foundation, and Pew Charitable Trusts and abandoned the business-friendly pro-capitalist outlooks of their founding donors and adopted the socialist and woke-progressive outlooks of their current year managers. Joining us to discuss this consistently troubling development this week is Naomi Schaefer Riley, a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and a senior fellow at the Independent Women’s Forum. We discuss the recent turn toward left-progressive activism at the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the broader problem of Big Philanthropy dishonoring donor intent, and what can be done about it.
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Episode 101: Teachers’ Union Funding Abortion and Higher Taxes
December 12th, 2019 | 7 mins 41 secs
abortion, business, conservative, dark money, funding, left-wing, libertarian, lobbying, national education association, nea, political involvement, round table, taxes, teacher unions, unions, wellspring
In this episode, we look behind the curtain of a massive “dark money” entity that funds left-of-center advocacy, the National Education Association’s annual report illustrates the teachers union’s massive left-wing political involvement, and we issue a caution to those pushing to restrain business from being business.
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Episode 95: George Soros' Big Money Lobbying
October 24th, 2019 | 6 mins 35 secs
business, chicago, chicago teachers union, conservative, federal government, general motors, gm, guilty, left, liberal, libertarian, lobbying, open society foundations, pac, philanthropy, right, scam pac, soros, uaw, union, united auto workers, welfare
Chicago Teachers Union members extend their strike while UAW members continue striking as they vote on the proposed GM contract, the government secures a guilty plea from an operator of a deceptive “Scam PAC,” and the “social welfare” arm of George Soros’s advocacy-philanthropic network spends eye-popping amounts lobbying the federal government.
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Episode 24: Local Union Scams
May 17th, 2018 | 42 mins 18 secs
afl-cio, amazon, big labor, business, card check, city officials, cronyism, government, head tax, independent contractor, influence watch, jobs, labor council, labor unions, left-wing, neutrality agreements, progress alliance of washington, real change, seattle, seiu, seiu 775nw, special interests, taxes, transit riders union, union loophole, unions
Local unions regularly manipulate their cronies in government to enact unfair policies for their own benefit. We detail such union scams across the country, with a special focus on a local union supported “head tax” preventing Amazon from expanding in Seattle.