Hi, I'm Bill Crystal. Welcome back to Conversations. I'm very pleased to be joined today by Wit Ayers,

a very respected Republican poster, analyst, strategist, a long time friend as well, I should say,

and which has worked for many distinguished Republicans, many sane Republicans over the years, and helped them get elected,

as Wit joked to me before, that's a shrinking pool now of possible clients. For me, I'd forgotten about this,

Wit until I, until I looked at your bio for a second to remember the name of your firm, which I will now mention,

North Star Opinion Research, located here in Northern Virginia. But I've forgotten that not only were you,

A, you went to Davidson College, is that right? I think, which I had the pleasure of teaching a seminar at, in 2019, really enjoyed it.

B, you have a PhD in political science, so fellow PhD, you taught, fellow former professor, you got tenure, something I never did.

And then you'd served for Governor Carol Campbell in South Carolina, was that your home state, or at least close to your home state?

I'd, I've been there a number of years, yeah, I went to school in North Carolina, and then lived in South Carolina, taught in South Carolina.

Eighth grade too, before I went to college, before I went to graduate school, and then...

That's tougher than teaching college, right?

Yeah, it is, it's all the toughest job I've ever had, it was great job, and then I taught college as well,

before I went to school. And then you became Carol Campbell, who really was a great governor of South Carolina,

and unfortunately got secondized at a young age, but he was a governor.

Really, a governor can make a difference, a governor can make a difference in a way that no other office other than president can, can make a real difference.

And I'm, I'm a big fan of governors.

And you were his budget director, I think.

A budget policy director.

A job, and I've always forgotten that, but your analysis has always been more substantive, I would say, and I'm interested in the issues, and maybe some of your fellow pollsters and strategists.

So maybe that's the, that background is different to French issues.

Anyway, you're, with one of the most thoughtful analysts of politics generally in America as well as the Republican Party, and I thought we would take advantage of getting him on here for an hour to find out what, what do we think?

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