Story at a Glance

• Our political system is shaped by vested interests that capture whichever party holds power, which is why policies with overwhelming public support so rarely become law.

• Republicans lost both chambers of Congress, as the strategy their leadership bet on largely failed. Notably, voters ranked government corruption as the most important factor in their vote.

• Days later, Calley Means, who led MAHA implementation at the White House until October, went on Joe Rogan and laid out how a handful of former lobbyists who controlled the policy process blocked popular MAHA reforms while advancing the priorities of the industries paying their firms. Hours after it aired, Trump announced the chief of staff he named was out.

• Much of what he described is in the public record: the executive order shielding glyphosate, the administration's brief that helped Bayer win immunity at the Supreme Court, the push for fruit-flavored vapes that preceded Marty Makary's exit, the reversal on "gas station heroin," and the record revenues of the lobbying firms tied to the chief of staff.

• Holding MAHA back "until after the midterms" was the same advice that cost Trump the 2020 election, when his advisers agreed the COVID policies were wrong but refused to "rock the boat" before the vote.

• The internet has broken the top-down messaging that once let a small group decide what the public cared about. This election (along with the data center revolt) showed voters are increasingly identifying the problems they feel matter independent of media messaging

• In this article, I will review what Calley revealed, why it reflects a structural problem in both parties rather than a single administration, and what I feel is the best path forward available to us now.