Podcast 605-Bannon's Fourth Turning

Podcast 605-Bannon’s Fourth Turning

Steve Bannon and The Fourth Turning

The President’s co chief of staff is obsessed with a book called The Fourth Turning. Podcast 605-Bannon’s Fourth Turning discusses reaction to the idea someone as powerful as Steve Bannon would formulate a political philosophy on a pop history/sociology best seller. The Fourth Turning co-author the late William Strauss was a playwright, theater director and lecturer. Co-author Neil Howe is a best selling author and consultant. Strauss and Howe coined the term ‘Millennial’. Both men described themselves as Amateur Historians. The Fourth Turning, Bannon’s apparent zeitgeist, was published in the early 1990’s. See a video of the two authors appearing on C-Span’s BookNotes here.

Chaos Dead Ahead

The book some say Steve Bannon has based his political philosophy on postulates every 80 years the United States is marked by crisis and chaos. Business Insider says Bannon believes the United States will soon reach our climax conflict and that Trump is in the White House to usher it in.

Is the United States in a Political Crisis?

Politicians tend to magnify the political challenges they face. Reporters play along. Divided since the beginning crises of one kind or another have been a way of life in the US. It’s very American to think of the government with distrust and apprehension. Especially when, as the saying goes, the legislature is in session. Are we in a political crisis?

Want To Know The Future?

Crisis will find the Trump administration. The response to crisis is what will determine it’s fate. Theories predicting ‘the’ crisis are questionable. Free Will is a gift to Human Beings. We think and act voluntarily. We can be the authors of our own stories. Controversy surrounding the Fourth Turning and Steve Bannon’s embrace of the theory encapsulates much of what is wrong with our politics. In Podcast 605-Bannon’s Fourth Turning I’ll tell you why.

One Day At A Time

Living one day at a time doesn’t mean avoiding passionate views. We do not remain passive and uninvolved but do the best we can with what we have. We will never know exactly what tomorrow may bring. Isn’t that the fun part of life?

Sponsored by X Government Cars and Ryan Plumbing and Heating of Saint Paul

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PODCAST 423

Republican Crack Up. A Republican Majority struggles to nominate a successor to Speaker Boehner. Moderate leadership is losing its grip because 40 ‘insurgent’ ‘freedom caucus’ Republicans refused to support top candidate Kevin McCarthy. Amid controversy over McCarthy’s Benghazi Hearing comments, and allegations of an affair, the collapse of order in the election of a new speaker, the candidacy of Donald Trump and the terrible performance of moderate candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, Jeb Bush, one must wonder whether the moderate leadership is finally losing its grip. They have no one to blame but themselves. The moderate leadership of the Republican Party seems more and more out of touch with an increasingly frustrated and angry base. ‘Going along to get along’ seems to be the wrong course of action. What does the base want? Can the Freedom Caucus lead the house? Those are turning out to be much more complex questions. In a free wheeling stream-of-consciousness podcast, we discuss the underpinnings of Republican rank and file political philosophy and find … none. Senator Ted Cruz recently suggested what is needed to change America is a ‘grassroots’ movement, only without organization, there is no movement. Without philosophical underpinnings, there is no organization. Republicans, tea partiers and others on the right might suggest a ‘freedom caucus speaker’ might lead them out of the wilderness. Lead them where? To What? How? Uh….yeah. Thus, the best opportunity to elect a Republican President in years begins to fade, with a moderate leadership that can’t even run an election for speaker of a house it controls, and a rank and file that wouldn’t recognize, or vote for Ronald Reagan today. With this kind of comedy in progress, Democrats never had it so good. Sponsored by Ryan Plumbing and Heating of Saint Paul and Pride of Homes.

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Podcast 343

Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas. The Road Trip continues all the way to California. Usually I do not write these notes for each podcast in the first person, but I am writing this from a Starbucks in Amarillo, Texas. The WIFI is being very temperamental and it’s driving me nuts! This has been a long day of travel, and doing podcasts. This is the second of two podcasts for your weekend, and there will be two on Sunday. In this podcast I wanted to give you a flavor of what being on the road is like, where my mind wanders and what I have been thinking about. Being on the road definitely has the effect of allowing me to take a more philosophical tone on some of the issues we’re dealing with these days. I love being on the road, and I love the new Mobile Podcast Command vehicle. My sister calls it the Bob Mobile. My friend Margaret calls it the ‘Wambulance’. Ed Johnson at X Government Cars calls it the “Bob Cat”. Cruising south on I35, on through to Oklahoma City, then picked up I40 through western Oklahoma, and onto Texas. I’m sorry but I forgot I have to go through Texas. Then its on to New Mexico, into Phoenix for a few days by the pool, and then onto California. This isn’t all fun and games though. This shakedown cruise is all about learning how to use all these tools on the fly, and integrate them into the systems in the Mobile Command Unit. That way when we scramble for a real story, I should be able to do everything on the fly. At least that’s what I keep telling myself. Thanks for your support and interest. Having a riot! Sponsored by Baklund R & D. 

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