Podcast 314

Global Warming Hot Air. The ‘Climate Change Community’ thanks Brian Williams for making up stories, stealing coverage from what could be the biggest scandal in scientific history; It appears the US Government has been cooking the books when it comes to temperature data. Actual temperatures posted from weather stations in Paraguay, Northern Canada and Siberia have been altered (gasp) to show higher readings…for years. A midwinter meltdown would ensue, if this story was actually taken up by the news machine, but they’re too busy with Dirty Laundry from Brian Williams right now. Meanwhile billions of dollars are being spent on wind and solar, and electric car subsidies. Not to mention the legislative roadblock ordered up by Obama Crony Warren Buffett on the Keystone pipeline, due to concerns the EPA has over its environmental ‘impact’. Carbon Credits anyone? Hot Air indeed. More bad news for the IRS and for taxpayers. Thousands of taxpayer numbers and social security numbers have been hacked, and have been used by hackers to file early returns. People are discovering the problem when they file their taxes and get the message, “Your return has already been processed”. The actual taxpayer then has to go through the process of ‘proving’ to the IRS that they have been the victim of identity theft. This, with an agency that is so poorly run they don’t answer the phone, or even respond to letters, and sometimes when they do, they get confused. Solution? Give them more money. Oh Hell No! The solution is a new tax system that does away with the byzantine tax code and the poster child for government inefficiency; The Internal Revenue Non Service. Minnesota Governor Mark Dayton has kicked up a firestorm after giving his commissioners huge raises. The head of the unelected Met Council now earns well over one hundred thousand dollars a year. Other commissioners will make as much as $155,000 a year. Dayton says these people need this money to take care of their families. Keep in mind the average Minnesotan earns somewhere around forty eight thousand dollars a year, with no pension. State employees can double dip pensions, and their pension is based on their income. Remember, taxpayers pay their salary and fund their pensions. Governor Dayton catches a break though. It was revealed this week that the average dock worker on the west coast earns $147,000 a year, plus benefits paid by the employer and an eighty thousand dollar a year pension. What’s in your wallet? Sponsored by Baklund R & D.

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Podcast 309

Vaccination Politics. As predicted by The Bob Davis Podcasts, whether to vaccinate or not has become a big political issue in the United States. Senator Rand Paul and potential candidate for the Republican nomination for President in 2016 got into a spat about whether people should be required to vaccinate their children against Measles and Rubella. New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, another potential candidate for the Republican nomination for President stepped on a political land mine when he suggested people ought to have a choice whether to vaccinate their children. Ben Carson, yet another presumptive presidential candidate split hairs in his ‘statement’, and you can be sure several others on all sides of the political spectrum will issue ‘statements’ in the next few days on the subject, as an outbreak of Measles in California captures the media’s attention. Berkeley, California wants a 21 day quarantine for all kids who’s parents refuse to vaccinate (the kids are ecstatic … no school for most of the month! Please don’t vaccinate me mom!) and nothing seems to horrify the left in this country more these days than a refusal to vaccinate. Is it possible people have about had it with government interventions? Federal and State Government intrusions into the personal lives of Americans is starting to become almost comic. They want to make you vaccinate your child so he or she can be healthy enough to what? Eat school lunches that wouldn’t have been fit for the Soviet Gulag? That’s healthy, huh! The perfumed princes and princesses walking through the marble hallways of our Federal Government cathedrals in Washington D.C. and the State Capitols might just be out of step with Americans who have a lot of questions about the long term effects of vaccines. You can call them stupid and try to bamboozle them into certain kinds of behavior, and you can even require certain kinds of behavior, but at some point they’re going to push back. One thing people seem to know, ‘Scientists’ are wrong a lot of the time. Doctors and hospitals will kill you if you’re not careful, and there’s nothing wrong with asking questions and taking control of your own health care, or the health care of your children. If the scolds would leave people alone once in a while, they might just make the right decision. What is it about liberty that so frightens the statist? Plus, stories about the General Manager of the Bob Davis Podcasts, getting the flu, Mexican Coke, Coffee (the cure for all that is wrong), and more in a longer podcast. (Editor’s Note: People keep saying things to me like, ‘My run on the treadmill in the morning takes exactly 45 minutes. I would like a 45 minute Podcast’. Ok. Here it is.). And an appearance from MPR Bob at the close. Sponsored by Ryan Plumbing and Heating of Saint Paul and Depotstar.

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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.

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