Former Gov. George Allen Joins The Show

Ah, the refrains of Buck Owens means it's time for us to catch up with Governor George Allen. joins us every Friday here on News Radio, WRVA. In kind, sir, can I wish you happy football season with exhibition preseason games going this weekend? Yes, it's good. I'm getting to my favorite time of the year, which is football season, and obviously all the political campaigns kicking into gear as well. I don't follow it as closely as I did growing up where, you know, preseason games really, really mattered, and who made the team and who doesn't make the team and all the intrigue and so forth. But it's still great, even if it's a preseason game. You follow individual players who are on different teams just to see how much they got to play. And a lot of them are players that you just hope make... the team by being the backup quarterback or the backup running back or special teams player. So to me, maybe it's just the way I was raised. This is really an important time of year and it's kind of your rhythm of life. rekindled. Oh, 100%. And for those that don't know, Governor Allen has a brother who is a general manager in the National Football League and his father, of course, legendary Hall of Fame coach as well. So he comes from football family. I was thinking about you last night. I watched the first episode of Hard Knocks and had coach McDonald or the world champion Seattle Seahawks and his young son was at the football practice and he was sitting in his office looking at... dad dad down on the field, and then his mom took him out there, and it just made me think of the Allen boys. Oh, that's interesting. I didn't see that, but, you know, my memories, of course, was when my father would fortunately take me to training camp, first with the Bears. when I was in elementary and middle school and then in high school went to the Rams practices and so forth. By the time I was in college, I wouldn't go to that many training camp things because I'd have to get through my own training camp in college. But I was talking with Gary when the week you're off that I remember he was eight years old and Doug Atkins and Bill George and all these guys chewed tobacco. And Doug Atkins said, go out for my scat this vehicle and get him his beeching nut chewing tobacco. And, you know, as a kid you're chewing. gum all the time and they gave me a chaw of this beech nut which was at first really sweet and they said you don't need to spit and with it and then it started burning and i came as close to throwing up as possible and you got to a drinking fountain but it it it um i didn't try it again for five years you know when i just know what to do chew tobacco but um the the thing about the training camps is so hard and you get to know the players

And I think the most difficult thing I remember as a kid and I still think of it is who gets cut. Right. And you like certain players. And then they just don't make the team. I said, gosh, that's got to be the hardest thing to do because they work so diligently sweating and all the exertion and effort. And they don't make the team and they get cut. And it's... To me, that was all the hardest because as a kid, you'd get to like some of these players. You know, you'd admire them and, you know, gosh, you got cut. Now, these days, the rosters being so much bigger than they were when they were 40-man squads. Right. You know, some of these guys who get cut, they'll get picked up and their practice squads are really big. now. So there's more opportunity, but still it's pretty limited. And there's other football leagues, you know, whatever they call the U.S. Football League and so forth. But still, it's an exciting time. The coaches love training camp. The players hate it. It's the same thing at baseball. In baseball, the last week of spring training, I would stay out of the clubhouse. Because I knew there were guys that were going to get set down, cut, and released. I didn't want to be around there. Hey, I wanted to ask you about something. There is a Scarborough research in sports. That's how they figure out how many people pay attention to watch and our fans, and that's how they kind of use that research. They have a research study that they threw out here, and it talks about... Who is this, Rich? Scarborough Research is the organization. So they have the politics of sports fans. I wanted to see what you thought about this. The most hardcore left-wing Democratic sports fans follow the WNBA, the most hardcore conservative sports fans watch. PGA, PGA, college football, and NASCAR. I'm a fan of all three. Does that really tell you how I vote? It doesn't tell you how you vote. It will give you an idea. And actually, you know, I've said many times, if the people who go to NASCAR races, rodeos. and country music concerts. If those are the people voting, Republicans, conservatives would win with 90% of the vote. And the WNBA, that Scarborough and other research, you know, they'll look at everything from the WNBA to the NFL and hockey and all the rest in college football. The WNBA has the most liberal left bands. That's why I think they're having a hard time trying to figure out this trans issue. for them because their fans are very, very liberal. And the interesting is, is how much do people vote? You know, which sports fans, not only their ideological index, sort of, you know, conservative versus liberal or Republican versus Democrat, but how much, how, what's their propensity of voting? And the people who follow men's golf.

vote the most. And women's golf. Those are the golf fans vote the most. College football is very conservative. Actually, college football is more conservative than the NHL. And you generally see that college fans, regardless of the sports, say it's basketball, say college basketball fans compared to NBA fans are more conservative for whatever reason. But the NASCAR race there in Richmond, I'd always love going to the race there. The Sawyer's family owned it in those days. And it was at the height of NASCAR. It just was fantastic. The fans were great. People fired up. And it's just a great experience. Brooke and I went to a race a few years ago. And it was great fun. It didn't have the crowds they had back in the 90s and earlier. But it's still a... great watching the pit crews work and it's just a great, great experience. And it's great for the economy as well. Oh, 100%. 100%. And it's interesting. So you look at this. PRCA rodeo, pro bull riders, which I'm a big fan of. Yeah, rodeo is great. And then you go to, by the way, you go to a rodeo, you go to a NASCAR event, a NASCAR race. They're very patriotic. And they have a prayer. And I'm not saying you have to have a prayer or not. You know me. I'm a Jeffersonian on it. But the fact that they have that patriotism. And a prayer before the event. Events is, you know, you have a fairly conservative crowd. But go ahead. But see, in NASCAR, they're more likely to vote than less likely to vote. Pro rodeo, bull riding, they're less likely to vote. Now, if anybody's wondering, if you were a fan of the PGA college football, NHL. National Football League, high school sports indie racing car, college basketball or major league baseball, you will lean to be more Republican as a sports fan. If you're fan of Major League Baseball, it's about 75-25 conservative to liberal. Horse racing tends to be more of a liberal, have a liberal following. Well, it's kind of in the middle. Horse racing's in the middle. Right, towards the middle. And like we said, the WNB far over the left. NBA, a little bit more over to the left, but below those that would vote. So I think you're right. If you could just get the net, if you could just hardest the NASCAR fans to come out there, then maybe we won't have these Democratic Socialists of America winning. Yeah, I agree. No, honestly, if you had, if everyone who goes to rodeos or NASCAR races voted. Republicans would do very, very well. And, you know, you look at sports generally, and the WNBA is an outlier in it, but the great thing about sports, and this is why it ends up being such a controversy with men and women's sports, is that the great thing about sports, it's what I always say, you've heard me get speeches rich, the meritocracy of sports with everyone.

Regardless of their race, their religion, their ethnicity, where they're from, they're all playing on a level playing field with equal opportunities. And if you have women's sports, it's for women. If it's a men's sport, it's for men. And to some extent, people hate politics being brought into it. And in fact, these surveys... of their fans is when the NFL was was a lot started allowing kneeling during the national anthem and so forth they were the commissioner was insulting a majority of their fans by allowing players to be kneeling or having messages on their on their jerseys or shoes and so forth. And so you need to, you know, you need to know your customers and your band base. And you should not be insulting them. Now, doing that kind of stuff for the WNBA and women's soccer and, you know, these more liberal sports, yeah, fine. Your fans probably think this is perfectly fine. If you're doing this with football fans, NASCAR fans, rodeo, college football, and so forth, NHL, you're insulting a majority of your potential customers and your existing fans. And so the sport of football, though, is such a great, great sport. And it's, you know, you just look at the ratings every year. And the passion. Well, the passion, the pace of the game is perfect for commercial breaks and all of that. And the top viewed and listened to events every year are football games, mostly NFL, but also college football. And then people live. like live events that you don't know the outcome. There's upsets every now and then that adds to it. And it's just such a great sport. But, you know, the leaders of it, just for the business aspect of it, beyond the patriotism and you shouldn't be consulting people by kneeling during the National Anthem. But you're also insulting and offending your potential fan base. 100%. This is interesting politically, but it's also an interesting analysis just for marketing. Absolutely. Sir, thank you very much. Oh, by the way, the Reagan movie came out, The Break of War, I think is what it's called. Is this a Reykovich? Yes, yes. So either I'm going to come over there to see it with you and take you, or you have to go see it. We have to talk about it coming up. Yeah, that sounds great. Well, enjoy the race. You're going to the NASCAR race. We're going to the Superdame and I are going to the NASCAR race and we'll be festooned in red, white, and blue and celebrate America.

That's great. And I hope Danny Hamlin wins from Chesterfield County. He runs good on that track. We used to do fundraisers at that track, which is great fun. If you ever get a change to do it, you understand how do you go into a curve and come in high. That's my wife right there. Sir, that's my wife just driving on 95. It helps you learn how to take the turns and keep your... Keep your good mileage and save your brakes and tires. But any rate, enjoy the race, and hopefully Denny Hamlin will win or Chase Elliott or Josh Bari Weiss. Those are the ones who I'm for. Sir, thank you very much. My best of your wife, I'll talk to you next week. All right. Thank you. All right. Take care. Governor George Allen joining us here on news radio, WRVA. Yeah, I'm going to get in trouble now complaining about the way she drives. Today's program is brought to you in part by our friends at Pearson's signature dealerships. Maybe all this racing talk, all this car talk has got you in the mood and you're thinking, you know what? Time for me to do it. Love this car, starting to break down, getting 100,000 miles. Time to do something different. Gotcha. I got you coverage. So I'm going to tell you where to start right now. It's Pearson Signature dealerships. Go to buy Pearson.com. Find out about that Pearson promise and schedule a test drive. Whether you're looking at the West End, Pearson Chrysler, Jeep Dodge, Pearson Mazda. Genesis Richmond or Pearson Hyundai near Woodlake, there's Pearson Honda and Holstreet. They're all right there. Every one of their vehicles is on ByPierston.com. You can look at the entire selection of new, previously on vehicles, and find the one that you want to take for a test drive. And then you know when you walk in, you've already got it in your pocket. They've doubled the engine and transmission warranty. Boom, just like that. Go to Buypearson.com. That's bypearson.com. The online home for Pearson's signature dealerships.