Is This Any Way to Treat a Loyal Customer?

I have been a Dr. Laura Schlessinger fan for decades, listening to her radio program and reading many of her books, and interacting with her program's social media. She read at least one essay I posted on my blog on her radio program, approvingly. It was in her defense from attacks directed her way. She's read letters I've written to her on her program.

Her program, which airs live on SiriusXM, is also sold as a paid subscription podcast. I subscribe to that podcast, because I want to be able to listen to every moment of the program; the implication is that the podcast is going to be the program that aired, minus the breaks.

Unfortunately, too often, it isn't.

Sometimes, an hour or all three from weeks or months ago will be uploaded instead of that day's live program. Some other times, the 48-minute long hour will have one segment repeat back-to-back, meaning we are hearing the same 12 minutes we just heard 12 minutes ago. And since the hour isn't extended, that means we are missing 12 minutes of that hour.

This is NOT when she plans to be off and they run "Best of." Or when old calls are dopped into her "live" program to give her a break or make up for a lack of callers (all talk programs are getting fewer callers). This is the person handling the podcast (which isn't her) botching the podcast. Now, we all make mistakes. But a botched podcast can be fixed. And it should be.

Dr. Laura says she reads all her e-mails (just not all on the air). I wonder if that's true, or if she only reads the ones her staff allows her to read? I know she interacts with comments on the program's official Facebook but does NOT interact with the program's Twitter account.

It became clear that Tuesday [not Monday, as I originally wrote], July 19, 2022 podcast's third hour (at least), wasn't (or, substantially wasn't) what aired on the SiriusXM program. There were several ways to know:

• Some people catch parts of the program on SiriusXM, then later listen to the podcast, and some podcast listeners discuss the program with people who listen live. Differences become apparent. "Did you hear the call about....?" Well, no, because it wasn't included in the podcast. Something else must have been, instead.
  
  
• Some close, avid listeners of the podcast recognize old calls from past editions of the program.
  
  
• Dr. Laura reads an "Email of the Day" and that also gets posted on the official program website. The "Email of the Day" read during that podcast hour is NOT a recently posted Email of the Day, and her Facebook posted the Email of the Day for Tuesday (see below) and it wasn't one heard by podcast listeners. 

In addition:

• That hour was labeled on the website as "Jasmine's 7-year-old daughter is holding back her emotions." However, there was no such call during that podcast hour.
  
  
• Dr. Laura does a live promo for her "Marriage 101" course. That was something she was doing promos for months ago. She's currently doing live promos for her book about surviving "Shark Attacks" on land, and indeed, later in the hour there was also one of those.
  
  
• Dr. Laura mentions that she's going to tell story after a break, then never tells the story.

The first one of those three is an indication that the wrong file got uploaded for podcast listeners. The second and third are indications that whatever was uploaded was "spliced together," at least partially from one or more previous programs. The third almost certainly isn't a matter of Dr. Laura forgetting to tell the story. Using old calls isn't the problem here, if they were used during the live program. The problem is that we podcast subscribers aren't getting the program that aired that day.

So what are paying podcast subscribers to do, if they want what aired that day instead of retreads from weeks or months ago?

Well, they can try the customer service tied to the podcast subscription. What if we think Dr. Laura needs to be aware of this recurring problem? We can write her an e-mail about it, and hope she sees it. I tried alerting her through the program's Facebook. This was posted there:



That was precisely the Email of the Day podcast listeners DID NOT get to hear her read. None of her podcast listeners (as of this writing, anyway), got to hear that.

So I was the first to comment:


For that, I was quicky banned from the program's official Facebook (and that comment removed), despite being a longtime "Top Contributor" who behaved respectfully and expressed my appreciation for the program there.

Now here's the question I have, other than "Will that hour of the podcast ever get fixed?":

Was it staff that banned me (I wonder if Dr. Laura even knows how to ban, as she is self-admittedly not that technical), and is Dr. Laura being informed of when her podcast is getting botched, or is that being deliberately kept from her? If she doesn't care, or doesn't want customers talking about it because she doesn't want to discourage people from signing up, that's one thing. If her staff is hiding important information from her, shame on them.

I'd really like to know which it is.

As things are right now, I'm considering ending my subscription, as this isn't the way customers should be treated, and if podcast subscribers aren't going to get what they paid for (especially given there are still ads included, just not the ones during breaks), they shouldn't keep paying. No, my one subscription isn't a big deal, ...but if you lose me, surely you're losing many others.

I'd be happy to do a positive update to this post. If someone needs to reach me, they can contact me through my Facebook or my Twitter.

Do the right thing, indeed.

National Divorce - What Are The Options?

There seems to be increasing talk about a "national divorce" or "civil war" or "secession" lately, and it is something I've thought about for years. 

The Founding Fathers envisioned a nation in which the average person didn't have to think much about the President, Congress, the Supreme Court, or various federal agencies. The Federal government was to be limited, with the states having powers to govern in diverse ways from each other. People referred to "the United States" in the plural. If things were still like that, we wouldn't be talking about a national divorce, civil war, or secession. But things aren't like that. The Federal government has grown enormously and usurped many powers, and people are trying to use that force to coerce everyone else into doing whatever it is they want.

When I mentioned what the Founding Fathers envisioned, any Leftist reading this thought "I don't give a s--- what the Founding Fathers envisioned. They kept people enslaved." This is part of our problem. Yes, slavery as it was in the USA was a terrible evil, and I'm thankful it's long gone.

Flawed as they were, the Founding Fathers created the best system of governance fallen people could. It is one the main reasons the USA quickly rose to be a world superpower.

Now we're at a point in history in which we have a bitterly divided nation again. It's not cleanly delineated into "North and South." Instead, it is between Deep Blue States (particularly, the large cities within them) and Deep Red States. The divisions involve things like elective abortion, private gun possession, immigration and border control, identity politics, religious freedom, the Electoral College, the structure of the Senate, and more.

What are the options? Let's examine each of them.

1. Peaceful Surrender - One side simply gives up. 

2. Violent Oppression - One side violently enforces its will on the whole country.

3. Wild Pendulum Swings - One side gets what it wants, but when the other side is back in power per elections, the pendulum will swing wildly to their side, over and over. An example: Elective abortion being legal nationwide with no restrictions for several years, then being severely restricted nationwide for several years, then repeat the cycle. These wild swings could be every two, four, or eight years, depending.

4. Constant Struggles - Kind of like what we have now, only growing more intense. Court battles, legislation, media campaigns; demonstrations, acts of vandalism, rioting, and terror; corporations picking sides; more and more of the "average person" having to spend their day thinking about national policy and what they can do to try to tip things their way, where they can work, where they can spend their money, etc.

5. Compromise - The two sides make some grand compromises to largely eliminate the contentious culture.

6. Violent Separation - Some states decide to leave and the rest of the states try to stop them. This was attempted with what is commonly known as the Civil War.

7. Peaceful Separation - Some states decide to leave and the rest of the states don't try to stop them.

8. Two Or More Sub-Unions - Rather than full secession, states are allowed to form sub-Federal unions that act almost like a new federal government, with the Federal government still retaining all states.

Number 1 would be the best, if it was the Left surrendering. Either way, it isn't going to happen.

Number 2 is what some on the Left are publicly saying is happening right now, because SCOTUS... is allowing states to determine abortion laws in their states rather than SCOTUS imposing it on everyone. We are not living in the same realities. Many on the Left want to violently oppress everyone else. It's a terrible thought, but if it happens it would be better if the Right won. Except that the Right favors federalism, so... the Right wouldn't do this.

Number 3 is a terrible way to live and will result in more corruption of elections and less confidence in elections.

Number 4 is also a terrible way to live, but it is encouraged by those who make money off it: politicians, lawyers, lobbyists, political scientists, campaign managers, activist organizations, media, etc.

Number 5 is something people profiting off of Number 4 won't allow, and a "compromise" won't work on many things.

Number 6 would be terrible, but could be better than aptly numbered Number 2.

Number 7 could be great, right behind "Number 1 with the Left being the side to surrender." However, it would be extremely complicated to pull off, and again, plenty of people are profiting off of Number 4 and will resist this.

Number 8, at first glance, looks like it could be the second-best choice behind "Number 1 with the Left being the side to surrender," but it probably wouldn't work out, because it would essentially add yet another layer of government (no doubt requiring major Constitutional Amendments) and there would still be irreconcilable differences at the federal level.

Do I want to see a breakup of the United States? No. But what are the alternatives?

The Left wants to do away with the Electoral College, two Senators per state, and the Second Amendment. There are also many other irreconcilable differences federalism won't alleviate. The Left doesn't want federalism anyway. There's no compromise on these. What's the compromise on the Electoral College? Any "compromise" will shift more power from the states with lower population. How can there be compromise on the Senate? By making PR and DC states? No thanks!

What can we do right now? Here's one possibility.

I Thank God I Was Born in the U.S.A.

People risk and lose their lives trying to get here. People lie, cheat, and steal to get here and stay here. Me, I was blessed to be born here, making me a citizen simply by surviving Roe v. Wade.

So many people sacrificed and fought and worked to create and build and preserve this nation, from the explorers who made the journeys across the Atlantic and had to turn around and make the journey back, to the pilgrims and others who colonized here, to the revolutionaries who broke away from the monarchistic mother country and later set up the greatest Constitution in history, to the settlers who ventured west, to people who insisted that human beings should not be treated as property, to the people who went around the world to defeat Naziism and Soviet Communism.

I thank God they did. I thank God my ancestors dared to come here.

I thank God I can choose my job, choose where to live, choose what to buy (when government hasn't shut down businesses for simply operating normally), choose my doctor, choose what to drive, choose to have as many children as I can, and openly worship Jesus Christ, pray, and study the Bible.

Our nation is not perfect, but it is the best place in the world, and it does have the ingredients for further greatness. We must now implement the recipe to preserve and further that which is good and discard or change that which isn't. We must fight to make the government work to protect our rights instead of infringing on them. We must work hard to raise the subsequent generations with the morals, values, and priorities that produce good citizens and aid in limiting government.

Our way of life is under attack – from enemies both foreign and domestic.

One way we can fight them is to declare our independence, and continue declaring it - our independence from: being governed by those not operating under our Constitution; the failed promises of politicians; the failed and restrictive programs of the federal and state governments; the tyranny of the minority; the activist judiciary; socialist labor unions; academics who hate America; media with a Leftist bias or that degrade our culture; churches that have become lukewarm; family and "friends" who are sociopaths, malignant narcissists, unrepentant evildoers, or enabling cowards.

Pray. Study the Bible, the Constitution, and history. Go to a healthy, well-balanced church. Get informed. Tell others. Vote at the ballot and with your dollar. Stand between evildoers and the innocent. Civilly disobey unjust laws, rulings, or orders.

Happy Independence Day and God Bless America!