Podcast 306

Political Polarization. This Podcast is live from the backyard, on a warm summer night. This is made possible by the magic of on demand audio. How did politics get so personal? How did Political Polarization become something written and talked about all the time. These days it seems like the media tries to divide Americans by slicing and dicing poll data. What’s the real divider in America today? The Government. What’s the solution? Maybe getting the government out of the people’s lives. Is the solution a third political party? Former Minnesota Governor Jessie Ventura is saddened by the news that the Independence Party has lost major party status in his home state. What about Ventura’s one term as Minnesota’s Governor? How did that work out? Meanwhile, how does one explain the fact that ‘divided’ Americans keep putting up moderate candidates like Mitt Romney, Chris Christie, Jeb Bush, Hillary Clinton and Jim Webb? If American Politics is so polarized, why do moderate candidates consistently end up as favorites? Mitt Romney continues toying with a presidential run, trash talking Clinton and Obama, but offering no solutions or plans of his own. (Editor’s Note: And you wonder why I say Republican arguments so far are nothing by rhetoric.) Is it possible we Americans run a little deeper on the issues than polling data can show? Is it possible people are divided on different issues, yet not necessarily ‘polarized’ when it comes to the leaders they choose? Has the growth of government in our personal lives made everything political? Is it possible the divisions, and frustration and anger might be mitigated if Washington and Saint Paul would just get out of the way? Sponsored by Depotstar. 

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Podcast 296

MYSOTU. What started as a courtesy to Congress by President Washington has morphed into an irritating media spectacle, bordering on – no wait, it has become – obscene. It is time for every American to use whatever media you can, to deliver your own State of The Union Message. Line some chairs up, invite friends over, have the postal worker down the block join you, so you can use him as an example during your speech, make sure everyone wears a suit, add klieg lights and cameras for effect. If you have a teleprompter or two laying around, throw them in as well. (Editor’s Note: I invited congress to join me, but they had other things to do, so my State of The Union Address is delivered from the Broadcast Bunker.) The media machine cannot be without a story, and beheadings are getting old, so the new story line is the President is pugnaciously at least, thumbing his nose at Congress. Somehow this is viewed as new behavior, though he has been doing it all along. The results? President Obama lost the House and then the Senate is a series of historically bad election cycles for The President’s party, yet analysts think somehow, now that Republicans are in charge in Congress, he’ll get different results. Moreover, the President’s restless flying around the country and making speeches, offering candy and popcorn to the masses is now considered something called Populism. If you are a media commentator and you say the word ‘Populist’ and another word like, ‘Electorate’ in the same sentence, people think you’re smart. Populism? What’s that. Nothing, really. Nothing that can be defined as a real political philosophy or ‘policy’ per se. Using the standard definitions, your dog could be a ‘Populist’, and probably a pretty good one. The ‘Populist’ President wants to raise taxes on the rich, give it back to the middle class, if the middle class sops perform tricks and jump through rings of fire to get tax ‘credits’. Thanks! Meanwhile, he wants to increase spending by something like 7 percent, to add to an already massive public debt, the largest ever accrued in one administration in history. But hey, we got a baseball cap and a beer can insulator, right? Republicans? They’re going to fix it all so it works, don’t you know that? What it comes down to is Statist, versus Non Statist, and there are an awful lot of Statists in Washington right now. The good news? The Bob Davis Podcasts SOTU is mercifully short. The post SOTU party awaits. Sponsored by X Government Cars. 

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Podcast 281

Live From The Living Room. There’s no plastic wrap on the furniture, but The Bob Davis Podcasts is live from the living room, updating you on the last few stories of 2014. No, there are no countdown lists, best of’s, worst of’s, rankings or other nonsense to tell you how ‘special’ 2014 was, in its final hours, as we head to the New Year’s this week. Remember all those sale price deals from Black Friday? With the Christmas season over, the returns begin. Retailers now take your return, put it in a box, and send it to an online liquidator, which sells it for pennies on the dollar. While retailers moan and groan about Internet sales, they continue to follow business and customer service models that seem like they’re from the 1980’s, let alone 21st century. Making customers traipse across town to find items they need now, offering discounts only after you send in the rebate, not having items in stock, and of course, not seeming to care when customers find the sweater they paid 150 dollars for on some online liquidator for 20 dollars. Did you watch Sony’s The Interview on You Tube? If you did, or tried to, you discovered the hoops you have to jump through to see it. Now iTunes will feature the ‘controversial’ and critically panned comedy about the assassination on North Korea’s ‘Leader’, Kim Jong Un, and you can rent it for 5.99. Wonder if Sony’s intention all along was to bypass the theaters to be able to release first run films to VOD? Jeb Bush as ‘surged’ to the ‘top’ of all potential Republicans candidates for the GOP presidential nomination in 2016, and here come the articles extolling his so called conservative virtues. Do we really have to ask whether Bush is conservative? Are Republicans going to fall for this trick again? (Editor’s Note: Probably? Yes.) What’s needed is a radical reduction in the scope, size, cost and power of all government. The new technologies want Low Entropy systems, and Government is one of the highest entropy systems known to man. Jeb Bush will not ‘make government work’ any more than Barack Obama did. And speaking of the President; Despite the departing Congress’ effort to remove funding for Obama’s immigration ‘executive memorandum’ on immigration, the White House is spending at least 50 million dollar to hire a thousand federal employees and set them up in a building near Washington to process all the illegals effected by the order. Yep. Don’t use existing bureaus because that might actually make sense. But don’t worry, Bush III will fix that. Finally, MSNBC acknowledged it has a terrible year (because it blows), and the network will begin offering digitally delivered programming, mostly sports. Bob Davis has already predicted the network will go all sports soon. Not only is the retail model ‘so 1999’, so is the model for talk radio, and cable television news services. Sponsored by Depotstar. 

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