The Bill Walton Show

"Commuting to office work is obsolete. It is now infinitely easier, cheaper, and faster to do what the 19th century could not do, move information, and with it office work to where the people are, the tools to do so are already here. The telephone two-way video, electronic mail, the fax machine, the personal computer, and so on."  Peter Drucker (1989) In 2020, over 30 years later, futurist and man...

In 1974, with annual inflation raging over 12%, President Gerald Ford introduced WIN ("whip inflation now") buttons telling Americans: "To help increase food and lower prices, grow more and waste less. To help save scarce fuel in the energy crisis, drive less, heat less." In other words, the responsibility to fix inflation fell to ordinary Americans. It didn't work - because they didn't cause it i...

The world has suffered and continues to suffer catastrophic economic and social damage from the Covid-19 pandemic of 2020 - but not from the virus itself .   Rather we're in the midst of a continuing global crisis created by governments' policy responses to the pandemic.  Trillions of dollars of Federal "relief" spending Financed by the Federal Reserve massively increasing the money supply And the...

To put it mildly, the expected massive Republican Red Wave in the recent 2022 midterm elections didn't materialize.  Even though 75% of Americans believe the country is on the wrong track, the election gave us status quo. Virtually every Governor, Senator and House incumbent won reelection. Trump states elected Republican Senators and Biden states elected Democrats. And despite House Republicans g...

In this episode I'm joined by Bion Bartning, the founder of FAIR , the Foundation Against Intolerance and Racism. An entrepreneur and investor, Bion also co-founded eos Products , a personal care brand best known today for its iconic egg-shaped lip balm.  Bion launched FAIR to address head-on the tribalism, identity culture and politics of division that are pitting Americans one against the other....

Recently The Wall Street Journal published an op-ed by my guest on this episode, Yale freshman Sahar Tartak. Titled "My High School's 'Antiracist' Agitprop" , she described how illiberal her supposedly liberal high school had become, and the ways she and other students were "berated, bullied and insulted" for voicing dissent towards the school's race essentialist policies and programs. The story g...

In this episode I'm talking again with Myron Ebell, Director of the Competitive Enterprise Institute's Center for Energy and Environment, one of our most effective advocates for Free Market Environmentalism. Myron led the successful decade-long fight to defeat cap-and-trade legislation and led the effort to convince President Trump to withdraw from the Paris climate treaty. The list of those in th...

"There is more respect to be won in the opinion of this world by a resolute and courageous liquidation of unsound positions than by the most stubborn pursuit of extravagant or unpromising objectives." George F. Kennan, 1966 Americans may admire the valiant resistance of the Ukrainians to the Russian invasion and be proud that we have been able to support their defense. Yet now we have to ask: how...

In the 20 months that Joe Biden has been President, his decisions and rhetoric have made the world ever more combustible. Events in Ukraine has reached a flash point. Still, the Biden Administration refuses to negotiate with Russia's Vladimir Putin. The chance of a wider war between NATO and Russia grows ever more likely, a war that would immediately draw in the United States under NATO's Article...

This episode took a couple of twisting turns to complete. A few weeks back, I emailed my friend Brandon Weichert, a very smart geopolitical strategist and publisher of the Weichert Report, to ask if he could come on my show to talk about Ukraine, Putin and the possibilities of a nuclear war. He emailed back that "well, perhaps we could do the recording later this week or next weekend because I've...

Election process isn't a sexy topic, but if we want to preserve our democratic election system, and keep our Republic, election integrity is essential.   Election Integrity means ensuring the legal right of all Americans to vote in a free and fair election:   without concerns that their political voice would be diminished by individual or institutional fraud,   physical or verbal intimidation,   v...

"These are the cold, hard facts: Russia, the country cornering the European energy market, is profiting from its war against Ukraine, while the West's adversaries gain economic and global dominance. U.S. Warhawks and like-minded ideologues of the European Union (EU) have enabled a war that grinds on, destroying Ukraine, while its leadership poses artistically for Vogue magazine."   "And now, in th...

In the decade since Barrack Obama remarked that "it would be so much easier to be the President of China," the Chinese Communist Party has been working hard to make that job even easier. How?  One way is to impose a social credit system that monitors, rewards, and punishes people according to how closely their behavior conforms to the Party's diktats.  "The social credit system is an important com...

The genius of the founders who gave us the United States Constitution was that they sought to provide a system of government to guard against the concentration of power by an elite few. Their clear-eyed understanding of human nature was that unchecked power almost always and everywhere has been the source of tyranny throughout history. But for more than a century in America, the Constitution, as d...

This episode is set in our mountainside house in Rappahannock County, Virginia for a wide ranging conversation with my friend, the always engaging and provocative Matt Schlapp, leader and Chairman of CPAC. We cover a lot of ground, with some of the highlights being: Why we believe we're in the human flourishing business. Why the "diversity, equity and inclusion" mantra is a false God. How CPAC is...

The Supreme Court's most momentous decision was not the 5-to-4 vote to overturn Roe v. Wade. That simply sent the issue back to the states to decide. Rather it was the blockbuster decision to rein in the Environmental Protection Agency from claiming powers that Congress did not grant. When Congress passed the Clean Air Act it authorized the EPA to impose the "best system of emission reduction" for...

As we can all recall, when Donald Trump took office in January 2017, he didn't exactly come equipped with the detailed plans and the 1,000s of people necessary to bring about his agenda. Essentially, he had to start from scratch. That was part of his appeal. That he did accomplish so much was a testament to the strength of his mission - Make America Great Again - and the power of his personal lead...

We've all been appalled by yet another school shooting, this time in Uvalde, Texas. We want these tragedies to stop. We want to do something.  Of course the cries to "do something" almost always means doing something about guns. Yet, the gun bill just signed into law by President Biden is unlikely to prevent future school shootings. There's a lot of evidence to show why it won't work, especially w...

From the moment President Joe Biden's administration took office, the world has grown a more dangerous place, and the pace is accelerating.  There's a long list of national security worries that didn't used to be of concern to everyday Americans, but now are, or should be. Russia, Ukraine and the prospects of a nuclear war. China's mounting threat to envelop Taiwan, a world leader and supplier of...

In this episode, my friend John Tamny interviews me about legendary Wall Street leader and Blackstone founder Stephen Schwarzman's book What It Takes: Lessons in the Pursuit of Excelle nce. There are many fascinating insights and lessons in Steve's book which we can all benefit from.  A few highlights: Steve Schwarzman started Blackstone with a unique strategic plan.  There's a tremendous lesson i...

Have you ever thought about what your life would be like if you were denied access to a bank account or a credit card or access to any kind of digital payment system? Well, it's happening and it's happening to an increasing number of people and organizations. Cancel culture has come to banking. PayPal, major credit card networks and banks have already stopped processing payments for organizations...

Russian's war on Ukraine, and China's aim to take over Taiwan. Joining me is one the wisest national security experts around, Dr Stephen Bryen. With 50 years of experience in foreign relations and national security, he's seen it all. Called the Yoda of the arms trade, he was the Pentagon's top cop, the man whose job it was to ensure that sensitive technology would be kept from enemies, potential e...

The Federal Retirement Thrift Investment Board is once again planning to allow federal employees' to invest their retirement savings into companies controlled by the Chinese Communist Party. The FRTIB has decided to ignore directives by both President Trump - and President Biden - as well as strong opposition on Capitol Hill, to open a 'Mutual Fund Window' in June which would make available to Thr...

Is this right and lawful? Well, we now have a test case to find out.   In a first-of-its-kind First Amendment lawsuit against the federal government, attorneys Jenin Younes and John Vecchione of the New Civil Liberties Alliance, argue that the government acted wrongfully when it "directed social media platforms, including Twitter, to censor alleged "misinformation" about COVID-19." Both Jenin and...

Author John Tamny joins me on this episode for a freewheeling back and forth about some of today's big concerns. John, a free market fundamentalist and original thinker, almost always has a contrarian take on things. John's books include Who Needs the Fed, When Politicians Panicked, Popular Economics and The End of Work. Some of the questions we get into: Elon Musk's plans for Twitter Why credit's...