Podcast 441

Shopping, Trump, Lies & Liquor. Welcome back from the big Thanksgiving weekend. The weeks starts with the National Retail Federation, AKA The Propaganda Ministry for the Big Box Retailers. If they’re not making up stories about how many people will shop the day after Thanksgiving, they’re blaming lackluster retail numbers on … wait for it … The Internet and specifically Amazon.com. This is the latest nonsense cooked up to convince lawmakers ‘something has to be done’, and that something is regulation of the Internet, so people will continue to shop at obsolete brick and mortar retailers located inside something called ‘The Mall’. Do we have data that shows the Internet is killing the Mall? Not really. Meanwhile ‘Black Friday’ is more and more an example of all that is wrong in America, and provides a great ‘look at the fat Americans fighting over flat screen TV’s’ story often seen in the foreign media. Maybe people aren’t shopping because they don’t believe the fairy tail about our growing economy, or because the new job only pays half what the old job pays, or because there’s a double digit health insurance premium. Yeah, right. We’re going to ‘spend the savings on two dollar gasoline’ at the mall. You know, like a tax cut. Meanwhile, Political Information Lag produced a lot of surprises at the Thanksgiving table as relatives discovered each other were rooting for Trump, or Bernie Sanders. Both candidates are outside the ‘establishment’ Republican and Democrat story line. Everyone HATES Washington and they HATE mainstream media charlatans who lie to them, while they work for candidates like Hillary Clinton. Once real people actually start voting, we’ll see whether anti-establishmentarianism is a ‘thing’, or not. Jeb! shouldn’t hold his breath tho. Meanwhile the City of Edina’s liquor store apparently can’t complete with ‘cut throat’ discount liquor stores (that actually have a responsibility to their stock holders to make money; how quaint.) Thus, the Mayor of Edina wants a liquor store tax, to make up the loss. “It’s a good business, and we’re going to stay in it”. Why are municipalities in the business of selling liquor? Bottom line, if government can’t even make money selling liquor apparently its incompetence knows no bounds. Sponsored by Ryan Plumbing and Heating of Saint Paul and X Government Trucks.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 40:24 — ) | Embed

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS

MItch-Rossow-the-chieftain

Podcast 411 – New Audio Book – The Chieftain 2021

Introducing The Chieftain 2021. I’ve been promoting a change for the Bob Davis Podcasts for a few weeks. The Bob Davis Podcast IT Specialist Mitch Rossow joins Podcast 411 to introduce a brand new fiction story, and a brand new page to serve fiction by Bob Davis. The Chieftain 2021 is a story about an American family embroiled in a national political upheaval in the not to distant future. I’m taking a few risks with this story. So what else is new? This podcast tells you how to help us beta test the audio book delivery system from the Bob Davis Podcast from the Pay Pal process to getting the podcast onto your PC, Mac or smart phone. The first ‘episode’ of the Chieftain 2021 is posted because subsequent episodes have not been written. Oh, they are outlined but I will be writing them in real time, with input from people who have bought and listened to the story. I have come to the conclusion that you can say more, do more, and have more fun writing fiction than dealing with the so called ‘reality’ in the day to day news. The people and situations in this story are fiction, and any resemblance to real people alive or dead is coincidence. Some of the places though, are real. Thanks to Mitch Rossow, my son Andrew Davis, the General Manager of the Bob Davis Podcasts (my mom) for encouraging and helping along the way … and thanks to you in advance for downloading and enjoying The Chieftain 2021. Sponsored by Tara Baklund’s Weight Free Wellness and by Eric and Erum Lucero at Pride of Homes and Luke Team Real Estate. 

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 39:30 — ) | Embed

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS

Podcast 302

Mass Markets and Politics. As the death rattle of the Mass Market echoes through the land, why do politicians, specifically those on one side of the spectrum continue to attempt to appeal to it? In discussing the rhetorical and organizational challenges of the politics recently, it was suggested that the reason some politicians make lurid comments is to ‘appeal to the mass markets’. If you were born at a certain time in the US, you became very familiar with something called ‘The Mass Market’. From Elvis, to the 1960 Nixon/Kennedy Debates, the Beatles on Ed Sullivan, favorite TV shows and songs and the radio stations people listened to, there was a collective experience. Millions had to wait a week for the next episode of their favorite show. You had to go to a big department store to examine consumer goods. It was an era of shared experience; one after another, from Johnny Carson to Star Trek, to All in the Family and Miami Vice. Radio multiplied from AM only to AM and FM, but all still served a mass market and provided a mass experience. First came cable television, which brought scores of nationwide channels into the home, then the VHS machine, the DVD, Netlfix and very recently, on-demand audio and video, You Tube, Google Hang Outs, Vimeo, Netflix, iTunes, Amazon Prime, HBO Go, and more to come.  Now people can have the experience they want, when they want it, how they want it. They can research characters, content and what it said. Now, the experience is between the content provider, the retailer, politician, entertainer or writer and the individual. While we still have shared experiences, we may have it at different times, we may binge listen and view, we may not have the same experience as someone else. Why then, do politicians insist on lining up and yelling at each other, say ridiculous things to get publicity, why do political parties insist on mass promotional orgies called conventions be televised on the ‘networks’, when the era of Mass Specialization is upon us, and growing stronger every day? Are candidates that play to the mass markets making a mistake? What new tools are there and how can they be used to win. 1965 called, and left a message. It’s not coming back. Ever. Sponsored by Ryan Plumbing and Heating. 

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 38:36 — ) | Embed

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS