Podcast 323

Obama Checks Out. After the President’s White House summit on ‘extremist violence’, a firestorm of controversy erupted when he refused to characterize the ‘extremists’ – the subject of the summit – in language that would actually describe them. Our current problem is, after all, referred to as THE ISLAMIC STATE! The President reminds us lowly peasants we are not to refer to the Islamic State as Islamic Terrorists, or even ‘Islamic’. This is apparently so that the President will still be invited to cocktail parties with the nuanced and beautiful. Obama also took care this week to describe the ‘root’ of the problem in the Middle East as a ‘lack of jobs and democracy’. This is a statement which is patently false, since almost all top Islamists hail from upper middle class families, and are well educated. Critics say the President is never going to be able to defeat the Islamist Threat if he can’t name it. The bottom line? Whether President Obama knows it or not, he has telegraphed to the American people and the world he has checked out. Its clear he just wants to make it to January 2017 with his ‘legacy’ intact. For this, we are grateful. We do not want this president conducting a major war, as long as we can get through the next 22 months or so without being blown to smithereens, burned in a cage or beheaded by ‘extremely violent people’. If you’re upset about the possible threat, channel the angst into the 2016 presidential race, because the next guy in is going to have a lot of work to do. It will fall on the next President and Congress to figure out how to clean up this mess, because the current President isn’t going to do a damn thing about ISIS, Putin, or anything else. Do we really want him to? It seems all the world’s leaders are at a loss to figure out what to do about anything. The EU is on the verge of a financial crisis and is probably in a recession, while its leaders burn the midnight oil feverishly negotiating cease fires that are apparently meaningless to people like Putin. As fighting between Ukrainian government troops and ‘separatists’ in eastern Ukraine intensified, ending in a rout for the Ukrainian troops, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said of the short lived cease fire negotiated just last weekend in Minsk, “It’s not Munich’. Is there anyone in charge these days? Or are they all waiting for their people to tell them what to do? Do they know what to do? (Wait! Don’t answer that.) The real question is what the US role in the world should be, and how this country should handle itself. This is a question that is clearly being left up to the people. Some final updates and conclusions on the foreign policy front to end the week. Sponsored by Ryan Plumbing. 

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Podcast 320

The Islamic State Threat. What should the United States do about the Islamic State? As attacks, beheadings and burnings become more extreme, the west’s response seems muddled. The public discussion of the issue is emotional and often devoid of facts, lately centering on whether the Islamic State is payback for the Crusades. Last summer President Obama initiated airstrikes on the Islamic State; a group he had referred to as the ‘JV Team’ of terrorists, a remark which will go down as one of the greater mistakes of his administration. Later he called for airstrikes, promising ‘no boots on the ground’, now he is asking Congress for a new force authorization which may or may not give Obama – or the next president – authority to send troops into the region to fight the Islamic State. As the group expands into Libya, Yemen and threatens Europe, it’s time for ordinary Americans to start thinking about what the country’s response should be. Yes, this will be an election issue in 2016 because the threat will get worse before it gets better. Has anyone told you how the Islamic State differs from Al Qaeda? What are the theological underpinnings of the group and how does its theology appeal to Sunni Tribes in the region? Is this a religious conflict, or tribal? What is Iran’s role in the fight? These aren’t questions for foreign policy experts, but for ordinary Americans who are going to be voting for presidential candidates, as the 2016 race begins in less than one year. Do you know what you need to know? Or, are you ok with going into another conflict, where service men and women are going to die, without asking the important questions; Why? What are the stakes? What is the foreign policy of the United States. What should it be? How do we conduct ourselves in the world? What interests are we willing to use deadly force to protect? How might we have caused this conflict. How do we avoid this happening in the future? What have we learned as a people about these kinds of struggles, since the US first invaded Iraq in 2003. Has our Afghanistan experience taught us anything? You can listen to people scream and yell at each other on cable TV news and talk radio, or we can get down to business and discuss as many parameters of the issue as possible (Editor’s Note: Or at least the parameters I have been able to research so far). The Islamic State is a gathering storm. The current state of affairs in the Middle East is becoming a dangerous threat to the region and Europe directly, maybe the United States directly. The old World War 2 and Cold War foreign policy paradigms won’t work. Those who are ignorant of at least the broad contours of the situation are more easily manipulated in the political process. Take some time and get a little more balanced view of the situation. Sponsored by Depot Star. 

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The Bob Davis Podcast

Podcast 319

Minnesota Caucus 2016. Get the week officially started – after President’s Day – with updates. The Minnesota Caucuses will be held March 1st, which is the closest possible day to the so called ‘first four’ collection of primaries and caucuses that garner so much national media coverage. Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina are the only states that precede Minnesota in 2016. So, the opportunity for Minnesotans to influence the state and national process is just one year away. What are you doing NOW to organize your precinct and prepare for the caucuses? Is the feud between Minnesota Governor Mark Dayton and Senate Majority Tom Bakk real? After Dayton tried to push through very large pay raises for his commissioners, igniting a firestorm of Republican opposition, Bakk surprised everyone by suggesting the Governor slow down, break the raises into parts, and discuss his plans with the legislature. Dayton says Bakk ‘stabbed him in the back’. Is old Crazy Eyes back? Or maybe he never left? Should the people of the state, through their elected representatives, have some say over pay increases for state officials of over thirty five thousand dollars a year, in one case? You betcha! Meanwhile, as to whether or not those state agencies are getting the job done; A few years and about 37 million dollars ago they were going to consolidate the state’s drivers’ license and vehicle registration system. Brought in HP to get the job done. HP has been fired and paid off, and the story is, it was very difficult to work with state employees on this project. So the state IT people have taken over the job and now say it will take longer and cost maybe 93 million dollars, when it’s all said and done. And they wonder why we question raises? Got poor service from Comcast? Forget complaining to the company, complain to the FTC which is considering the Comcast/Time Warner Merger. Some analysts say the company’s poor customer service may be a factor in whether the FTC approves the merger. Lots of hot air about electric cars these days. Now supposedly Apple is building one. No one ever asks where the power is going to come from and how much its going to cost when we’re all driving electric cars. And after NASA falsified weather station reports to make it look like the planet is warming – when it didn’t in 2014 – now they say we could have the worst droughts in one thousand years. Oh yeah, when? We don’t know when, but you know, it’s gonna happen. Is Russia controlling the weather? Or are international agencies interested in creating a world organization to do just that? Oh, Hell no! Sponsored by Ryan Plumbing and Heating of Saint Paul. 

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