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National Review's Radio Free California Podcast

News & Politics Podcasts

A show about the perilous state of the Golden State—and what that means for you, wherever you live. California is the hothouse lab of the Left, the nation-state creating the statist policies, art, and lifestyles of the future – and generating the political dollars to make them a reality in a community near you. Hosts Will Swaim (California Policy Center) and David Bahnsen (The Bahnsen Group, Fox Business News commentator, conservative activist) beam this weekly show internationally, from mostly undisclosed pirate-radio platforms west of the Sierra Nevada. [Intro music graciously provided by Los Angeles-based Metalachi, the metal/mariachi soundtrack of the near-future. Find them at Metalachi.com.]

A show about the perilous state of the Golden State—and what that means for you, wherever you live. California is the hothouse lab of the Left, the nation-state creating the statist policies, art, and lifestyles of the future – and generating the political dollars to make them a reality in a community near you. Hosts Will Swaim (California Policy Center) and David Bahnsen (The Bahnsen Group, Fox Business News commentator, conservative activist) beam this weekly show internationally, from mostly undisclosed pirate-radio platforms west of the Sierra Nevada. [Intro music graciously provided by Los Angeles-based Metalachi, the metal/mariachi soundtrack of the near-future. Find them at Metalachi.com.]

Location:

United States

Description:

A show about the perilous state of the Golden State—and what that means for you, wherever you live. California is the hothouse lab of the Left, the nation-state creating the statist policies, art, and lifestyles of the future – and generating the political dollars to make them a reality in a community near you. Hosts Will Swaim (California Policy Center) and David Bahnsen (The Bahnsen Group, Fox Business News commentator, conservative activist) beam this weekly show internationally, from mostly undisclosed pirate-radio platforms west of the Sierra Nevada. [Intro music graciously provided by Los Angeles-based Metalachi, the metal/mariachi soundtrack of the near-future. Find them at Metalachi.com.]

Twitter:

@NRPodcasts

Language:

English

Contact:

212-679-7330

Episodes

Episode 157: Shocking, Not Shocking

1/27/2021
Governor Gavin Newsom eases COVID restrictions as the recall effort gathers strength, but he’ll have a tough time persuading his allies in the state’s teachers union that it’s safe to reopen schools. Kiss frontman Gene Simmons leaves California for income-tax-free Washington, John Sutter was a very bad man, Kevin Faulconer’s bungled effort to move left, and Henry “Hank” Aaron is an American hero. Bonus: Will and David go deep on one powerful police union’s readiness to smear its political...

Duration:01:07:46

Episode 156: So Close to Newsom, So Far from God

1/21/2021
Gavin Newsom adds “failed vaccine rollout” to his catalogue of failures. Monarchical power saves ex-congressman Duncan Hunter. Census data reveals California’s population growth is slowest since 1900. David and Will consider new state laws, the precarious state of free speech, and Bridget Mason, the freed slave who remains a California hero.

Duration:01:09:26

Episode 155: The Clampdown

1/13/2021
David and Will consider California reactions to the pro-Trump mayhem at the U.S. Capitol, including Trump-free Facebook and Twitter, the electronic shutdown of a nonpartisan policy conference in Sacramento, new legislation to recreate a California Patriot Act, and the California Democratic Party’s attempt to label the Recall Newsom campaign a “California coup.”

Duration:01:05:34

Episode 154: The Madness of Crowds

1/8/2021
David and Will discuss the relationship between this week’s events in Washington, D.C., and California’s ongoing dysfunction. How do people of good faith talk to one another?

Duration:01:06:16

Episode 153: Not the Book of Revelation, but a Remarkable Facsimile!

12/29/2020
David and Will review pandemics, wildfires, utility regulation, school lockdowns, the fall and rise of Kamala Harris, Father Junipero Serra, San Francisco, blackouts, Gavin Newsom, Kobe Bryant, George Floyd, porn-star licensing, on-and-off plastic bag bans, Elon Musk, Oakland mayor Libby Schaaf, John Wayne, John Sutter, Walter “Big Train” Johnson, the Book of Exoduses, and much (much) more.

Duration:01:29:02

Episode 152: Riding Shotgun with the Pope

12/23/2020
State treasurer Fiona Ma wagers California cash in Pope Francis's misguided "inclusive capitalism" initiative; Sacramento's youngest assemblyman says the state's struggling business community needs a muzzle; Governor Newsom appoints Secretary of State Alex Padilla to fill Kamala Harris's U.S. Senate seat; and the growing multi-billion-dollar scandal inside California's unemployment department.

Duration:01:11:03

Episode 151: Eric Swalwell’s Hidden Dragon

12/16/2020
The entire time he was blasting Trump on Russian involvement in U.S. politics, NorCal congressman and House Intelligence Committee member Eric Swalwell knew he had spy problems of his own. In other news, David and Will discuss the departures for Texas of Oracle and Hewlett Packard, how climate activists are pushing California cities into the utility business, Netflix’s love letter to Hollywood radicals in “Mank,” USC football, and more.

Duration:00:51:20

Episode 150: The Sesquicentennial Edition!

12/8/2020
Welcome to episode 150 which, like each of its 149 forebears, considers the madness of California. This week, the masklessness of lockdown enthusiasts continues, entrepreneurs Elon Musk and Joe Lonsdale move to Texas, the path of destruction that led Xavier Becerra into the Biden administration, and Gavin Newsom’s golden opportunity to name replacements for state attorney general, secretary of state, and U.S. Senate. Bonus: Mark Zuckerberg’s role in the Biden victory.

Duration:01:00:40

Episode 149: Mea Culpa

12/2/2020
David and Will discuss the now-regular cycle of watching public officials who vote for COVID lockdowns quickly violate them, and then apologize for their great sin. What Janet Yellen didn’t learn while living in the Bay Area. The San Francisco Chronicle hopes Joe Biden will weigh in on California’s stupid lawsuits against oil companies. Bonus: Let us now praise Pacific Legal Foundation for its defense of Central Valley farmers vs. the State of California.

Duration:00:55:15

Episode 148: The Book of Exoduses

11/25/2020
Never mind the flood of entrepreneurs leaving California for safer states, the Golden State’s political class is still bullish on failed policies. The Biden team wants to Make America California Again. Bonus: Listener letters!

Duration:01:15:54

Episode 147: And Now for a Break in the Unrelenting Propaganda

11/17/2020
The Los Angeles Times turns over its letters page to Trump supporters for a single day. Governor Gavin Newsom locks down 95 percent of California under threat of COVID — but still finds time to celebrate with a lobbyist at French Laundry. Bonus: David and Will discuss waterboarding Will.

Duration:00:55:18

Episode 146: California Is the Specter Haunting America

11/11/2020
What’s with the Biden team’s bottomless affection for policies tested — failed — in California? Who will Gavin Newsom name to fill the Senate vacuum created by Kamala Harris’s rapid rise? Why do California’s political elites hurt the working class they say they love so much?

Duration:01:01:01

Episode 145: This Just In: We’re Not All Nuts and Berries

11/6/2020
Ballots are still being counted, but the data emerging from Tuesday’s California voting offer a fascinating possibility: Californians are conservatives who think they’re Democrats. Bonus: Two California members of Assembly persuade a state judge to limit Gavin Newsom’s constitution-busting emergency orders.

Duration:00:59:36

Episode 144: Mask Between Bites, Please

10/28/2020
Gavin Newsom rolls out new rules for the holiday table and quietly approves fracking even as he denounces it. Kamala Harris laughs off questions about her socialist inclinations while undermining faith in democratic institutions. Why the LA Dodgers pulled their third baseman just moments before they won the World Series. What to make of Facebook’s friendliness with authoritarian governments. News Flash: We're not pleased with a California Assembly bill to limit the power of police unions.

Duration:01:24:34

Episode 143: California’s Thrill Kill Kult

10/21/2020
California’s political class continues its war on Californians, but nowhere is the fighting so lopsided as San Francisco. Gavin Newsom battles a virus only he can see. And we answer this question: When Kamala Harris tells a lie and there’s no honest media to check it, does it become true?

Duration:01:20:59

Episode 142: Check Your Brahmin Privilege

10/14/2020
Progressives open a new front in the identity politics war, demanding that Kamala Harris fight Indian caste prejudice in California. David and Will fact-check Harris on her Lincoln references. Special Bonus: The final Radio Free California assessment of state ballot propositions.

Duration:00:49:03

Episode 141: California Achieves Stone-Age Governance

10/7/2020
Wildfires have achieved what government could not, burning through California at a rate unseen since prehistory. Gavin Newsom appoints the first openly gay man to the state Supreme Court. Kamala Harris relabels “free” college tuition for black audiences. Disney’s Bob Iger bails on the governor’s business-reopening commission. Xavier Becerra wins and San Franciscans lose in the court battle over housing. Trump’s bizarre intervention in the federal COVID bailout, and California’s likely abuse...

Duration:01:20:50

Episode 140: Another Atlas Shrugs

10/2/2020
David and Will process investor Jeffrey Gundlach’s threat to exit California, the state’s multiple appearances in the first presidential debate, and Governor Newsom’s latest foray into corporate-board diversity and slave reparations.

Duration:01:05:32

Episode 139: Mental Exercises, Tackle Dummies, and Practicing against Air

9/24/2020
David and Will discuss how state regulators and fretful college administrators destroyed the college football season in California. Governor Newsom’s latest executive order won’t stop wildfires but will slowly strangle the economy. Kamala Harris inflames water anxiety during a campaign cameo in Flint, Mich. Elon Musk thumps UC Berkeley professor Robert Reich.

Duration:01:07:10

Episode 138: Trousers Fully Engulfed

9/16/2020
David and Will discuss the reigning narrative that California’s wildfire catastrophe are the result of climate change. In other news: Daily Wire leaving LA, and USC’s latest defeat in the woke wars.

Duration:01:07:34

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