Podcast 538

Western Minnesota Road Trip. Freestyle talk about my travel in the last last 6 weeks. My reflections on a weekend jaunt to Western Minnesota’s New Ulm and Walnut Grove, tying in the talk about technology threatening jobs in the future. Recent road trips have intensified my interest in the history of the Western United States. There is a lot of significant western history in Minnesota. We often think of historic topics like Indian Wars and Pioneers has happening further west, but one of the bloodiest clashes between settlers and American Indians happened in New Ulm in 1862, when the mostly German townspeople had to barricade the streets of their town to fight off attacks by the Dakota. Further west is Walnut Grove, the home of Laura Ingalls Wilder and the famous ‘Little House On The Prairie’. While the museum in Walnut Grove could use a little bit better curation, some of the artifacts in the museum are interesting, especially grasshoppers or Locusts the size of a man’s hand, which plagued the settlers of Walnut Grove. When you examine items in a museum, it’s easy to think about how old they are. For the people of the time though, it was new technology. It’s fun to flip the script and wonder what our descendants will think of the artifacts of our time in a museum at some point a hundred years from now. Today, supposedly new tech like robotics and autonomous machines and software threatens millions of jobs. Proposed ‘solutions’ to this ‘threat’, like guaranteed minimum incomes and job retraining programs don’t make much sense. When people came west for opportunity, 140 years ago, they didn’t have job retraining programs. They couldn’t have known they’d be plagued by grasshoppers the size of a man’s hand. Yet they came anyway. We need to start thinking about the opportunity new technology provides us in building a new world, and stop being so negative all the time. Sponsored by Karow Contracting and Hydrus Performance.

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Podcast 537-Bob Davis Podcasts Radio Show-39

Podcast 537-Bob Davis Podcasts Radio Show-39. This week’s radio show contains 3 segments of new content for radio listeners and podcast subscribers. While the mission of the radio show is to bring content from the podcasts back to the radio, the political situation this week requires some additional thinking and reworking some of the ideas in Podcast 536. Podcast 537-Bob Davis Podcasts Radio Show-39 takes a look at what’s wrong with our political party system and makes some policy suggestions on the economy as thought starters for listeners and subscribers. These aren’t so much policy advocacy as a method to provoke thought and conversation around the idea that we have to do better. We have to hold our politicians and the political system to a higher standard, because we deserve better. As we progress to the final stages of the worst presidential election cycle in one hundred years the realization comes that no matter who takes the oath of office in January of 2017 the chances anything will change are remote. In fact, our national situation will either muddle along the same lines, or chaos will ensue. Your guess is as good as anyone else’s when it comes to which mainline candidate will produce muddle, or chaos. I’m not even sure which of both negative outcomes I would prefer, if such a thing is something you contemplate. Later in the show, questions about our national political themes. What happened to the America that was strong, not afraid to compete in the world, not afraid of the world, and ready to take risks to achieve. How did we become a nation of depressed, conspiracy theory mavens and people demanding someone ‘help’, ready to attack anyone for their view if it is contrary to their own? What happened to our money? What happened to our leadership? I believe what happened was too much government, expected to do too much, with mediocre ‘leaders’ who go along to get along, so they can keep their cushy jobs. We have to take it back. Taking it back means creating a new political movement in this country that pushes past the crust of the political party and primary systems, designed to keep the establishment in control. They tax us, divide us, scare us and control us, all to the purpose of making sure we’re good boys and girls. Remember, the people are the sovereign in this country, not Washington. Sponsored by X Government Cars and Ryan Plumbing and Heating of Saint Paul.

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Podcast 536

Podcast 536-Midnight Thoughts. Back in the studio after a long road trip. The excitement of travel gives way to scanning the news and wondering what to talk about in this podcast. Hence, Podcast 536-Midnight Thoughts. Midnight Random thoughts perhaps? But. No. Specific observations about the role of podcasting and transcending the nonsense in day to day politics. In fact the more I talk about politics the more I feel physically revolted by it and physically almost unable to talk about it. Why? Because what is going on distracts and obscures. Our politics in the United States no longer enlightens and illuminates. Our politics is no longer a soaring bird, but a slithering ‘thing’ down in the mud and dirt and grime. It’s depressing, boring, frightening and at the same time ridiculous. While I have not lost my passion and interest in what is going on politically, I find more people inexplicably joining tribes committed to convincing those in the opposing tribes with one ridiculous argument after another, spitting out what has been drummed into them hour after hour from social media, 24 hour cable TV news, talk radio and so on. Not wanting to harp on those same themes, all I can say is it is truly Orwellian; like there really is a little man behind a curtain pulling on levers. For me, the antidote to all this is travel; actually witnessing events. When you see it go down ‘for real’, you realize many things you see and hear are designed for video. The protests at the conventions? If you were there you had to go find them because you could hardly tell they were happening. The guy climbing Trump Tower in New York? If you were on Wall Street, or on the subway, or in the Bronx you didn’t even know it was happening. Did it? Did it mean anything? What’s important? I think it’s a the conversation podcasters have with their listener/subscribers one on one, based on the inner thoughts we share. It’s one of the things podcasting can do that radio doesn’t do anymore. Maybe the best thing we can do is provide a venue that helps you have that conversation. The news these days seems more like greek theater and less like, well news. Reporting on events, gathering facts and making observations based on those facts. You all know this, because I talk about it too much. I realized while traveling and while thinking about this podcast tonight that so much of what is happening in 2016, I’ve already done detailed podcasts about. For example, podcasts about the death of the conservative ‘movement’  over the years, and we’re just starting to see people write and talk about it. So, use the search window to listen to those podcasts. Meanwhile, the travel podcasts, the podcasts reporting on breaking local news, the podcasts about deeply felt emotions are the ones that resonate with me and hopefully with you. Finally, all this feels like its leading up to something; some big thing that is epoch changing, and you know, historically pivotal. Something we’ll talk about for decades after. As the rain comes down, it’s fun to be back in the studio and talk it out. Sponsored by Karow Contracting and Hydrus.

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