Podcast 505 – The Bob Davis Podcasts Radio Show-28

The Bob Davis Podcasts Radio Show-28. All eyes shift to the Democrats and California for once, as Bernie Sanders challenges Hillary Clinton in the Golden State. If Sanders wins Cali, there’s going to be some soul searching among democrat super-delegates. It might mean the ambitious former Secretary of State will face a challenge from yet another progressive who is doing a better job exciting the Democrat base. The last progressive who excited the Democratic base? Barack Obama. Democrats, do you think Bernie Sanders the logical successor to President Obama? I think many would answer yes. Meanwhile on the Republican side there’s suddenly a lot of talk about ‘Unity’. Unity behind what? What does Donald Trump stand for? What does the Republican Party stand for? Sadly, it seems like Republicans want to ‘unify’ for no other reason than winning. While winning in itself certainly has its benefits, if that’s the only goal what happened to all that talk about ‘principled conservatives’? What pools of Republican votes are left? What’s left of the old so called Reagan Coalition? Is the conservative movement, and by default Republican party dead if Trump wins the nomination, or especially if he wins the nomination? And of course it’s Memorial Day weekend. Some people think of it is as a ‘holiday’, which it isn’t. It also isn’t a day to celebrate those serving or ‘veterans’. It’s a day specifically set aside since 1868 to honor those who gave their lives in service to the United States of America in war. We do not say, ‘Happy Memorial Day’, as there will be many silently thinking about those who will not be enjoying this summer weather in the upper midwest. In Podcast 505, The Bob Davis Podcasts Radio Show-28, we condense all the podcasts from the week, and add some original content in each of the four segments. Live from the basement studio at The Bob Davis Podcasts Broadcast Bunker, while we do laundry. Sponsored by Hydrus Performance.

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Podcast 504

Choices. A companion to the ‘slipping into summer’ podcast for the political junkies. Choices. The Choices we make, politically, As the primary season draws to a close, Memorial Day Weekend is a good place to take stock of what has happened in this tumultuous and unpredictable 2016 Presidential Preference Primary and Caucus season. In Podcast 503 there was some discussion of an uneasy feeling seeing FB posts from politicos about the weekend’s conventions and promotions of party unity. This gets explored a lot more deeply in Podcast 504; Choices. Republican presidential preference primary and caucus voters have settled on Donald J. Trump as their choice for nominee of the republican party. While it remains to be seen whether Trump actually gets to the RNC with enough delegates to clinch the nomination, or whether some other fate befalls the New York Developer and Realty Television Star, it’s significant that republican and so called ‘conservative’ voters have settled on three major pools of thought. The ‘Trumpist’ pool which seems to be about winning the argument, the evangelist and self-described ‘constitutionalist’ pool represented by the Cruz supporters and the establishment pool, which is about the status quo. There’s one other pool, but it’s really a puddle; The Libertarian pool which is the only group that actually wants to reduce the size, scope and power of government. On the democrat side, is an establishment political operator who can only be described as a Statist (with a capital S) and a self described Democratic Socialist, really a socialist and also a STATIST. So, voters have settled on a political insider who is also a statist, a socialist and a populist statist, with second choices that include politicians who claim to be ‘conservative’ but are also going to make sure ‘The Government’ operates more efficiently. Sigh. What are the takeaways? These are the people the voters – who have been exhorted to get involved – have chosen. Of these three or four, one will be President of The United States. In November the voters will choose a president, a congress and a third of the US Senate, as well as a slew of statewide and state legislative and local officers across the country. What will it mean? What will happen? The media keeps trying to tell us, but we cannot know the future. We’re just going to have to wait and see. Takeaways for political junkies on Memorial Day Weekend. Sponsored by Brush Studio, in the West End, Saint Louis Park.

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Podcast 487

Confessions of a Delegate. As commentators, political junkies, your next door neighbor and just about everyone speculates about the number of delegates garnered by candidates in the 2016 primary race, I thought it was time to actually talk to one of the delegates to a past convention to get an idea of what it’s like. Thus, Confessions of a Delegate. Mark Johnson was a republican activist supporting Texas Congressman Ron Paul for president in 2012. Johnson was part of the storied Minnesota Delegation, one of five state delegations pledged to support Paul. We’ve all seen the shots on TV from the convention floor. What was it really like to be on the floor at the convention? What was it like to experience the power of the establishment first hand, a republican establishment bound and determined not to allow the Texas Representative a chance to speak to the convention or have his name entered into nomination from the floor. What did the establishment do? They changed the rules before the convention (the now famous rule 40b) and prevented a so called ‘minority report’ on the rules committee from being entered into consideration and voted on, making sure Minority Report author Morton Blackwell’s bus didn’t make it to the convention in time for the vote. The establishment also disqualified the Maine delegation and replaced them with Romney supporters. Why is this important. This fight is nothing compared to what could happen if none of the candidates reach Cleveland with enough delegates pledged to them to achieve a nomination on the first ballot, an outcome which appears more and more likely, an outcome all three remaining candidacies appear to be preparing for. Now ‘retired for the time being’ Johnson talks about his experience and has some advice for the delegates elected to their conventions in 2016. Sponsored by X Government Cars and Pride of Homes and Luke Team Real Estate. (Editor’s note; At one point I refer to what happens when delegates get to ‘Tampa’, since we were talking about Tampa and 2012. I meant to say Cleveland, where the GOP convention will be held in 2016.)

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