Podcast 455

Impeach the Con Con. All hands will be required on deck to win the 2016 election. Caucuses and Primary Elections produce low voter participation. What is the tea party doing? Sending out petitions to impeach President Obama and calling for a constitutional convention to pass a grab bag of wacky amendments. In 2012, only about 7 percent of Iowans participated in precinct caucuses. Sadly, in Minnesota, which depends on caucuses for political volunteers to turn out the vote, turn out in 2012 was in the single digit range. Tea Partiers may be ‘angry’ and ‘frustrated’ with Congressman Tom Emmer and Speaker Kurt Daudt, but are so busy with the Obama Impeachment, they don’t have candidates to oppose either. Meanwhile Democrats are already door knocking and asking for contributions for a surfeit of candidates. Barack Obama leaves office on January 20th, 2017. Then there is a pesky detail that if an impeachment, guilty verdict and removal from office could be accomplished during a presidential election year, Joe Biden would be president of the United States. The constitutional convention idea, pitched several times in the last 60 years, is currently championed by talk show hosts, who apparently think delegates to such a convention would only be Tea Party members from deep red states like Texas and Kansas. Think California, New York, Illinois, Massachusetts and Minnesota would send conservatives? If you wonder why the conservative movement in this country is dead, look no further than this kind of folly. It’s a sad waste of people earnestly concerned about their country’s future. Help turn out the vote? Build an organization with lasting political power? Forget it. Sponsored by X Government Trucks and Ryan Plumbing and Heating.

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Podcast 447

Ted Cruz In Saint Paul. This podcast takes you inside a political event in Saint Paul on a cold winter night. From heading out in Mobile Podcast Command Unit 8, to making coffee in Mobile Podcast Command, parked with the media trucks, to trying to sneak into restricted meetings, interviews with Cruz Minnesota Organizer Mandy Benz, State Representative Cindy Pugh, an unidentified (by her choice) Cruz advance planner, to 2nd District Congressional Candidate and old friend Jason Lewis, put headphones on and follow me. The brand new media story line is that Texas Senator and candidate for the Republican presidential nomination Ted Cruz is running second to Donald Trump and therefore ‘could be the guy’. Two months ago the Senator sent his father, this time he came in person, with reporters clustered around the door he was supposed to walk through, while technicians set up cameras on a riser in the back of the small Harriet Island indoor pavilion. As people filled the room, a giant screen showed campaign videos complete with all your favorite national talk show hosts talking about how great Ted Cruz will be when he becomes president. An introduction from a local preacher, more videos, and finally the main event…Senator Cruz throwing ‘red meat’.  Boy, can he sling it! From rescinding Obama’s executive orders, to ‘utterly destroying ISIS’, this crowd loved it. Cruz’ strategy is to organize and concentrate on winning the Iowa caucuses, and use that momentum to win in enough key Super Tuesday states in the mid south, out west and along the eastern seaboard to gain the momentum to win the nomination, and the presidency. Can he do it? Or is he the new flavor of the month. We’ll know when people start to vote in roughly a month. Sponsored by X Government Trucks and Ryan Plumbing and Heating of Saint Paul. 

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Podcast 445

The Highway Song. As the media cycle repeats on an endless loop, boredom begins to set in. How many more arguments do you want to hear about Donald Trump being Hitler, or Ted Cruz being Ted Cruz, or Hillary Clinton and Benghazi? There is a real world waiting to be experienced. Not the make believe world the media’s twenty four hour a day obsession with American politics seems to be showing us. When there’s a new wrinkle, the Bob Davis Podcasts will break in with an update. Meanwhile this podcast asks, is travel an escape from reality or is travel reality and our lives are an escape from travel? A walk and talk through a ‘warm’ early December evening is designed to stir your memories of travel and your wanderlust. Where have you gone? Where would you like to go? Why? When did you first experience a sense of wonder as you traveled to new places? Was it a road trip with the parents? A first flight to some exotic location in the islands? A ski trip in the mountains? A road trip, with college friends, back in the day? What cities have you visited? Where would you like to visit? New York City? Chicago? New Orleans? San Francisco? Las Vegas? For me its all about the road trip. As I prepare for the big Mobile Podcast Command Winter ’16 trip to Iowa for the caucuses, then onto the mid south, and the eastern seaboard through the North and South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas, my mind turns to the things I see and learn through the screen … the windscreen that is. There’s nothing better for the soul. Sponsored by Ryan Plumbing and Heating of Saint Paul and X Government Trucks. 

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