The Bob Davis Podcasts

Podcast 532

What I think of Election 2016. Getting emails and calls from people political analysts would consider ‘low information voters’ asking what I think and who they should vote for. So in this podcast I am going to tell you. First thing? When you consider the low quality of all reporting on election 2016 everyone is pretty much a low information voter. In 2016 the country is facing decisions on major issues in economics, immigration, trade, foreign policy, military, diplomacy, social issues and more. Almost no one fully understands the contours of these issues well enough to discuss them. Instead what we have are tribes of people who are very emotional about these issues. They know the latest meme. They know all about the latest scandal and the latest ‘story’ evolving concerning who said what about who, and the reaction to it, but when they’re asked to discuss any of the key issues of our time with clarity and depth, as they say in the windy city; “fergitaboutit”. Who do I think should be president in 2017? None of them. Repeat. None of them. If you include the so called independent candidates and the mainline party candidates they’re nothing but placeholders. Someone needs to lay out what the potential outcome of this election will be, regardless of who wins the office. I start – repeat start – to do that in this podcast. I realized about twenty minutes in, this is going to take more than one ‘talk’ podcast (with no editing) to lay out all the possibilities and outcomes. Bottom line? None of the potential outcomes bode well for the future of the United States. We’ve had a series of placeholder presidents, and it looks like we’re about to have another. Meanwhile, the country is getting closer and closer to what I call a ‘clarifying’ event that will wake people up from their media induced hypnosis, and reinvigorate the political process. Maybe. Maybe not. Meanwhile, if you expect to get information from television and radio, and from the standard websites these days, I feel sorry for you. If you guess you’ll find “the truth” on You Tube’s conspiracy channels, and the Drudge Report, guess again. In What I Think of Election 2016 you’ll get my read at the present time, which sets up future podcasts specifically on the issues in the hope of giving listeners to the Bob Davis Podcasts a little more substance and depth than you’ll find anywhere else. Meanwhile, it’s on to the motorcycle rally at Sturgis from here. Sponsored by Hydrus Performance and Brush Studio in the West End, Saint Louis Park.

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Podcast 515-Andrew Davis

Podcast 515-Andrew Davis. At the close of Father’s Day Weekend, a father and son podcast. From our adventures this weekend in talk radio, to late Sunday night recovering a lost iPhone, Andrew and Bob Davis talk about issues to get you current for the week ahead, the first official week of summer. This weekend we filled in for friends on the radio, and talked about our personal feelings that the establishment republicans will take one last run at Donald Trump at the RNC later this summer. Between a tough week last week for the New York Developer, to high negatives in recent polls, as well as reports of a (have to put this in quotes) “RICO civil lawsuit” on the Trump University matter, to his rhetorical and often controversial method of speaking, Trump is giving republicans fits. This weekend we talked about at least five or six republican seats that are vulnerable in this election. Those long term, powerful senators are very concerned about Trump’s high negatives and the potential that they could lose if he proves to be a weak presidential candidate, particularly in their states. An announcement this week that there’s an effort in effect to change the rules to allow delegates to ‘vote their conscience’, might gather steam if Trump continues have problems. This is why using terms like ‘presumptive’ is a bad idea when it comes to either of the front-running republican or democrat candidates. (Editor’s note: The only party that has actually settled on a ticket so far is the Libertarian Party which chose Gary Johnson as its presidential candidate and William Weld as its vice presidential candidate.) One of the things Andrew Davis wanted to talk about was the British vote, for or against exiting the European Union. We then moved on to international trade and trade deals, and what international trade and ‘free trade’ means to the United States, as well as some friendly father and son debate about executive power in these trade deals, and the negative effects they sometimes generate in this father and son Podcast 515-Andrew Davis. Sponsored by Ryan Plumbing and Heating of Saint Paul and Karow Contracting.

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Podcast 587-Easy Talker

Podcast 507

End Of Primary Season. As June begins, the presidential preference primary season for 2016 draws to a close. What are the takeaways from the End Of Primary Season? Maybe some surprises. These days it can be difficult to do political media, since media types are expected to turn their microphones on and flap their lips, endorsing candidates and causes, and joining the partisanship parade on talk radio, cable television, and in the Op-Ed world. Even some reporters can barely conceal their biases. With no one to observe and present facts to the voters to help with decision making, people have either lost their ability to discern fact from conjecture and bloviating (a sort of alchemy in itself) or they just don’t care anymore. Maybe people have already made up their minds to be disappointed with the choices delegates eventually will make at the mainline conventions this summer, or to be excited. Lots of ‘analysts’ trying to explain the ‘Trump phenomenon’. Some of these explanations have become both absurd and comedic, if not outright ridiculous. A ‘resurgence’ of interest in Hitler in Europe (thinly based on sales of books and some ‘polls’ there) suggests the reason Trump is gaining so much support. This serves as underpinning for the ongoing anti-trump tripe that he is a fascist, or his supporters are fascists. Everyone forgets fascism itself was a center left movement in Italy and Germany as a third way between socialism and communism, and that the conditions that predicate fascism as a political movement require the failure of socialism, which looks like Venezuela, not the United States in 2016. Then of course there is the ongoing figurative suicide of talk radio, bloggers and television personalities. In the End Of Primary Season Glenn Beck is pulled off the air as one of his guests suggests armed revolution is the only path left for #nevertrumpers. The Red State Blog has become The Black and Blue Blog as Eric Erickson continues to trip on his shoestrings as he falls down the back steps. And Sean Hannity makes a fool of himself telling the world he is voting for Trump and can say that because he runs an ‘opinion’ show. MSNBC gets attention advertising that with Hugh Hewitt they might get tagged for being to right wing. Then there’s William Kristol – the establishment moderate – laying the groundwork for a challenge to Trump at the Cleveland Convention, up to and including the suggestion of David French as a potential third party presidential candidate. It’s only the beginning; next comes the remonstrations of Trump’s inability to win an electoral victory, which remains to be seen, and of course the suggestions the New York developer is tied into the Mafia. Moderates are trying to secure a disaffected evangelist/moderate/establishment GOP coalition to derail the Trump Train which is described as ‘inevitable’. Meanwhile in the democratic party the fight is only just beginning. Bernie Sanders won’t quit – one wonders why Ted Cruz did, watching the Vermont Senator wreak havoc with the Clinton campaign and the democratic establishment. By the way, there is a third party candidate and his name is Gary Johnson. Think he’ll be in the debates between the mainline party candidates? Despite all of this there is a nagging feeling our politicians are headed in exactly the wrong direction, regardless of party. Sponsored by Hydrus Performance and by Brush Studio in the West End.(Editor’s Note: This podcast suggests Speaker Paul Ryan remains on the sidelines, in terms of endorsing Donald Trump as the republican candidate. This was true at the time this podcast was posted, early in the morning on June 2nd. Ryan endorsed Trump and the story broke later the same day, June 2nd, 2016.)

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