Scott Rasmussen - Is America ruled by an out of touch elite?

A new book argues the biggest divide in America is no longer Democrat versus Republican, but everyday citizens versus a small ruling class that holds growing influence over government, media, and culture. Have America’s elites become disconnected from the public they govern?

Scott Rasmussen is an independent pollster, ESPN co-founder, and author of the new book “Out of Touch.” He joins the show to discuss new polling on public trust, the growing divide between voters and institutions, and concerns that political and cultural elites are becoming increasingly disconnected from core American values.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:05

Welcome back to the Lars Lyson Show. It's a pleasure to be with you. Well, a top pollster in America says America's divide is not left versus right. It's ruling class versus everyone else. It's a tiny elite deciding that you have too much freedom and they will make the decisions for you. Scott Rasmussen joins you now, ESPN co-founder and longtime independent pollster, the author most recently of a book called Out of Touch. Scott, welcome to the program. Great to be with you today. I want to tell you very quickly, a short little my evidence. Like thirty years ago, I'm pro-death penalty. I've got friends who are pro-death penalty. There's even a Democrat prosecutor I know who's pro-death penalty. I said, why doesn't Europe have the have the death penalty? And he said, no, Lars. He said, in Europe the elites decide. The public in Europe still supports the death penalty. The elites have decided, oh, that's oh, it's just we c we can't do that. So and he said, and the same kind of thing is starting to happen here. And you know what? 30 years later, he's absolutely right. The public still supports the death penalty, the elites do not. Is that the kind of divide you're talking about instead of right versus left?

SPEAKER_00 1:15

Absolutely the kind of divide. You know, I started, my experience was my first polling gig was for the term limits movement. 80% of voters wanted it Republican, Democrat, left, right. But when it was written up in the media, it was always called controversial. I'm thinking, what can be controversial about an 80% issue? Well, the elites thought it was controversial, therefore that's the term that mattered. It took me a long time to identify and get the research to back up those gut instincts. Uh, but that's where we are today. There's an elite 1% group. These are people with a postgraduate degree, they make a lot of money, and they live in densely populated urban areas. And to say that they have a different worldview than the rest of us is one of the great understatements of all time. But what makes it problematic is they don't see it. They actually think we agree with them on these issues.

SPEAKER_01 2:08

Well, it sounds like a kind of an arrogant elitist attitude that said the masses are asses, we'll decide for them. Is that what it boils down to? And is that compatible with a constitutional republic like the one we have?

SPEAKER_00 2:21

It that is a good way to summarize it. Uh, the way that I talk about it in the book is that the vast majority of Americans, the 80% plus who don't live and breathe politics, they still embrace America's founding ideals. They like freedom and equality and self-governance. The elites have rejected those ideals. And that's what I define as the battle for America's soul. Uh now the good news is this has been with us always. You can go all the way back to the Constitutional Convention and find these attitudes that this is not something new. Uh but we do have to be aware of it. And right now, the elites have a lot more control of our uh government, governing institutions than they have at other times in history. So we have a lot of fighting back to do.

SPEAKER_01 3:09

I'm talking to Scott Rasmussen, who co-founded ESPN, and his newest book is called Out of Touch. He's a longtime pollster. I mean, this goes back even before my time and your time. But there was a time where some Americans like the idea of a uh sort of an intelligentsia class uh that should be making all the decisions because the rest of us are too dumb to do it or too uninformed, whichever.

SPEAKER_00 3:31

Yeah, you know, and I talk in the book, I do trace it back, but the real turning point uh came after the Civil War. Uh Woodrow Wilson, uh a future president, and in my opinion, the worst president in our nation's history. Uh Woodrow Wilson wrote a book on the study of administration. And if you read this article, it was very influential at the time. Um, it describes people as ignorant, uh, that they should be kept out of the governing process. He openly advocated for a Prussian form of governance in which basically I call it the government by the unelected. You know, experts would be put in place, they would be uh empowered to make decisions, and in Woodrow Wilson's world, uh that would be better off for all of us. And just to give you a sense of scale, uh he's the only president with a PhD. One of his uh advisors during his doctoral uh process was the guy who founded the American Economic Association. But in the time, in those days in the late uh 19th century, to join the American Economic Association, you had to say that free markets don't work. What? That was yeah, that was one of their founding ideas that somehow and Wilson himself said basically anything gov uh the private sector can do, government can do better. He cited the post office as an example.

SPEAKER_01 5:02

Oh my God. I mean, because Scott, those those are usually the example. When I when people say to me, we ought to have the government do that, and I say, You want the folks who run the DMV, Amtrak, and the Postal Office to be running health care or something really complicated and and uh and uh and essential?

SPEAKER_00 5:20

Yeah, but this this was also a time in America when uh colleges were changing. Up until the Civil War, colleges were largely theological centers. Nine out of ten college presidents were clergy. Uh coming out of the Civil War, the the drive for higher education decided that America should be more like Europe. Um, and you know, you can there's a lot of steps along the way. Um it wasn't all done in the late 19th century, but what happened was from then up until the 1960s or 70s, everything in America kept getting more centralized. And you remember a time when there were only three television networks, they had 94% of the prime time audience. Um gatekeepers controlled everything. If your story didn't make the 22 minutes of the evening news, it didn't exist. Um, and so that was that gave them a tremendous amount of power.

SPEAKER_01 6:20

Can you imagine, Scott? Do you remember the book, The Boys on the Bus? And I can't remember the authors. And and he said, This guy, this poor guy was following a presidential campaign, don't remember which year. And he called the desk and say, Hey, I've got this great story, I've got a tip. It turns out it's really it's a great story. And they'd say, Uh, it's not on the AP wire. Uh, you know, don't bother us. And and then when the story actually broke on the wire, they'd call him back and say, Hey, that story you were you wanted to give us two days ago. Yeah, we need it now because because now it's officially approved.

SPEAKER_00 6:50

Right. Well, you know, and again, I I do remember the 70s, and you had uh those three evening newscasts were reading the New York Times and reading the AP wire, and that's what news was. Um and the good news, by the way, today is that the world is falling apart. I mean, there's a lot of things wrong with social media, there's a lot of things wrong with the way we communicate uh with each other, but at least we have voices that can be heard now. Um in the 70s, they would have been ignored.

SPEAKER_01 7:24

Yeah, exactly. And I mean that I I I see some, and even on social media, there's some of it there. Uh, there's some independent voices out there that are trustworthy. His book is called Out of Touch. He is Scott Rasmussen, the co-founder of ESPN and a longtime independent pollster. Scott, it is always a pleasure to have you on the program. Thanks so very much. Thank you. You betcha. That is Scott Rasmussen. We'll get to your phone calls and emails in a moment. At 866, hey Lars. That's 866-439-5277. Send your emails to talk at LarsLarson.com. And you're listening to the Radio Northwest Network, thirty years of serving the Pacific Northwest with honestly provocative talk.