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This is America's Cooking Network with Kevin Gordon.
Lulab Bars. Thanks for tuning in. We are in the Schumers shutdown. Apparently the folks on the other side of the aisle, the Democrats, just can't seem to get rid of this whole spending binge that they're in. That they just have to spend our money. They have to confiscate more of our wealth and then run government programs are inefficient and fun things that aren't for US citizens.
But I don't want to go off in a tangent on that.
But there's some things that are going on that may
affect the Department of Transportation and other things. I do want to say that the thing that irritates me the most about our government, among other things, is the fact that year after year after year, there are different studies that are done, whether it's the Office of Management and Budget, whether it's the Government Accountability Office, whether there's Inspector General's reports, whether it's a situation where Rand Paul, Senator from Kentucky
comes up what he calls the Festivus Report right around oh right after Thanksgiving before Christmas, and it goes line item by line item certain waste fraud and abuse in the federal government. We also had at the beginning of the year the Doge Group, the Department of Government Efficiency, which everybody on the left wanted to trash and everybody wanted to say that this was so evil and cruel
and whatever. But when they dug in and saw some of the waste fraud and abuse which everybody has claimed, and you can go through that, You can go through the different It doesn't take you long to look it up. But what everybody has said, from Bill Clinton when he was president, to Joe Biden when he was in the Senate, to Barack Obama when he became president, all these people are on record talking about the well, Bill Clinton, the era of big government is over, talking about waste fraud
and abuse that needs to be cut out. All these unnecessary programs, and yet not one of them has ever done anything about it until Donald Trump came into office in his second term, and you would have thought that the entire economy was going to collapse, that the world was going to come to an end, simply because trying to do some government efficiency. And I have a little more thoughts on this when we get into this next story.
But the mere fact that they.
Have all of these agencies that say this is something that weighs for aden abuse, this can be cut out, this could be cut and they.
Never do it.
It infuriates me to the point where, you know, if it was their own money, if it was coming out of their pocket that they had and took away from their salary, you better believe that they would eliminate it. But because it's coming out of our pockets, because they don't see it, because they're not affected by it, it's going to continue. So anyway, here's what the Department of
Transportation shutdown plan means. Now, they came up with this Department well, this shutdown plan, knowing that there was an impasse as far as the budget was concerned. Now you know, we're still talking about the finalizing the budget from the Biden years. We aren't even talking about the first budget because the fiscal year for the United States like September thirtieth,
and then the new year begins October first. So the budget going into the first Trump budget, which begins well, actually began on the first that hasn't even been voted on. The budget from the prior year, from the October of twenty twenty four that funds the government through September thirtieth to twenty five.
Has never been voted on and approved.
That is how weird our Congress is and how backed up they are and inefficient as far as the as far as the Congress is concerned, actually getting work done
on behalf of the American people unbelievable. The Department of Transportation put together this plan in terms of knowing that there was going to be a government shutdown, knowing that there's certain funds that are cut off, certain appropriations that aren't going to be used, and during this shutdown, and oh, by the way, when you hear the whining and complaining about these various government workers that are not going to
be receiving a paycheck and so on, know this little tidbit. Okay, first of all, them knowing this, I'm sure day one, they're out there filing for unemployment, which they are entitled to. So they will be collecting unemployment when they come back, and when the government is funded the pay they will be paid retroactively back to that date that they were furloughed,
which means that basically this is a freebie. They're going to get paid, it's just going to be delayed, but they are going to be collecting unemployment all during that period of time. So the unemployment is basically just icing on the cake. And they know this, but that's not going to stop them from whining and complaining about.
Well, I'm without a paycheck, I don't have money. You know, what am I going to do to feed my family? Yet? Right? I mean as if we're going to believe that. So anyway, just so you.
Know that they are going to get back paid retroactively to the day that the government ran out of money and they were load. But in the meantime, they're going to be collecting unemployment, so they're getting, you know, basically
a bonus for being furloughed. All right, So, anyway, what's going on as far as the Department of Transportation trucking operations are set to roll on even if Washington grinds to a halt, or even when According to the Department of Transportations shut Down Plan that protects safety functions and Highway Trust Fund programs, the Department's plan really was released on September thirtieth, shows that the highways and truck agencies
are among the least effected in a lapse of annual appropriations. Federal law requires agencies to continue work necessary to protect life and property, and many Department of Transportation programs are insulated because they draw funding from the Highway Trust Fund and the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. Now let me go off on a tangent of one of my pet peeves.
Again. I've told you.
Before that I was involved with a group that we were trying to that we're not trying to, but that we successfully stopped tolling on a companion bridge here in the Greater Cincinnati, Northern Kentucky area. We have a bridge here that carries not only one, not two, but three major interstates through the Cincinnati area. I seventy four, I
seventy five, and I seventy one. One bridge, okay, covers three separate interstate highways where there should actually be probably three bridges, but anyway, they can congest this all over one bridge. For the longest time, they tried to build a companion bridge down there. They actually had funding years and years ago, but the City of Cincinnati couldn't figure out where that was going to go and figure out their plans and so on, so.
They put it off, put it off, put it off.
Then suddenly they decided back in twenty thirteen, hey, we got a brilliant idea. We can go ahead and do this, but we're going to toll the bridge. And we here in northern Kentucky, a group of us said hell no, hell no, hell no, And anyway we.
Got it stopped.
But in the process of me doing some of the work and digging into the details, I found out some of the stuff about the Highway Trust Fund, finding out that all the money that we paid that you guys pay that in the trucking industry, all the excise taxes on the on the on the trucks, on the trailers, on the tires, all the money that we're paying as far as federal federal gas tax for gas and then diesel taxes that you guys pay as far as the trucks are concerned, all that money goes into a fund.
Thirty three percent of that money is spent on non highway issues. Number One, we are we are we, You and I are subsidizing that Northeast Corridor. The train, the Amtrak train that Joe Biden used to when he was in the Senate used to ride every night, paying like you know, four bucks, and so we would normally cost him fifteen bucks. But it's subsidized by us, so that Northeast Corridor can run. Okay, we also are funding highway
or hight hiking trails and biking trails. Now again not opposed to that, but if it's a if they're going to toll a highway and say it's a user pays, then where's the user paying the high hiking trails and biking trails? And as I said before, can't they charge like maybe a one percent tax on all the equipment, the bikes, the boots, the stuff, everything having to do with that and fund those and not take that out
of the Highway Trust Fund. So, knowing that thirty three percent of our Highway Trust Fund is already wasted on non highway issues, that infuriated me and was one of my talking points and talking about why we shouldn't be tolling the Brent Sprid's Bridge, so on and so forth.
But anyway, that's off on a tangent. Pick this up.
I'm Kevin Gordon, America's truck and Network seven hundred WLW.
This if the Racing Repard on America's Trucking Network on seven hundred WLW.
Looking ahead to the racing weekend and the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs Round of twelve. It's a Bank of America Rovo four hundred Sunday at three pm. Kyle Larson is the defending champ. The Exfinity Series Playoffs Round of twelve continues also at Charlotte Road Course with the Blue Cross North Carolina two fifty on Saturday at five pm.
Green Flag.
The NASCAR Crafts and Truck Series Playoffs Round of eight also runs at Charlotte Roval on Friday afternoon at three thirty pm, and Formula One holds the Singapore Grand Prix on Sunday.
This is the Raething Report on America's Trucking Network on seven hundred WLW.
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I'm Kevin Gordon, America's Trucking Network seven hundred WLW. We were talking about or I was talking about the Department and Transportation shut down, their policy and what they're planning on doing, and I went off on a tangent when I got to the point where it said that that many DOT programs are insulated because they draw funding from
the Highway Trust Fund. And again, the Highway Trust Fund is the money that is collected through all of the excise taxes that you pay on all the equipment trucks, trailers, et cetera, tires, the gasoline tax, and the diesel tax of federal diesel tax on every gallon of diesel that you pump, every gallon of gas that we pump. All
the money goes into that pot. And as I mentioned, a group of us fighting tolls on the Brent Spenz Bridge or the bridge that was going to the Companion Bridge, learning that thirty three percent of the money already in that fund is being spent on non highway items. When I read this, this is another another piece to that puzzle of why when they say we don't have enough money in the Highway Trust Fund in order to do
the infrastructure to repair the roads. You know, when they throw these taxes on us, they always say, oh, well, we're going to put this tax on gasoline to fund the repairs. Now, going back to the beginning of the interstate highway system, ninety percent of that money that came up for that was paid for by the federal government because they realized the importance of commerce going across the
country and being able to move goods and services. Not only did that do that, But then that opened up the ability for people to travel go on vacation, travel down to Florida from Michigan or from wherever that normally would take a couple of days or three days by the old highway systems. Now you can do that almost well a day if you want to drive fourteen hours or something.
But still it's a hell of a lot closer.
The amount of freight that can be moved from one end of the country to the other is very quick.
And the fact that.
We are now able to get certain items that were never available in terms of fresh food, either vegetables or seafood into the center part of the country. So they
realized how important this was for the commerce. But let's not forget that the original proposal of the Highway Trust the highway system in the first place, was during the Cold War to be able to move troops from one end of the country to the other within a matter of a day, as opposed to three weeks what it talked took before the interstate highway system was put into place. So part of this highway system should be funded out of the defense budget, in my opinion, because this is
an important component of moving troops. So again they put the Highway Trust Fund, put all this money in there, and then now they're wasting thirty three percent of it. But now we've got all of these government bureaucrats that are taking money out of this for their paychecks. Shouldn't that be part of the normal taxes that we pay? Does the EPA where do they get their funding? They
get their funding from the taxpayers. There's not a separate fund that people pay into in the term of a lotion tax or an air tax or something like that. Where's the Department of Defense that comes out of the normal budget.
Why isn't the.
Department of Transportation come out of the normal budget? Because they want to make sure they wanted to pretend that they're being more efficient, and they say, oh, we got this pile of money over here, why don't we build these agencies here and pull that money out of there and fund it through that. No wonder they don't have enough money for interstate highway repairs and so on. So that's one of my pet peeves, and I didn't realize
it until I was looking at this particular story. Anyway, getting back to the story, trucking oversight remains intact Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, which regulates the trucking industry. All one thousand and eighty four employees remain on the job. And again, when I'm talking about the number of jobs here, that's one thousand and eighty four people that are being paid for out of the Highway Trust Fund. And now, in the terms of government efficiency, are all of these
people necessary or all these people? Can somebody look at that and say, all right, do they have enough people to do this? And people that are dead weight or jobs that are redundant or whatever, can we eliminate that? Hell no, we've got this money coming from the taxpayers. We don't care about efficiency. But again the plan says FMCSA positions are primarily funded by authorized contract contract Authority
and paid out of the Highway Trust Fund. The agency also collects fees under the licensing and insurance function, the Drug and Alcohol Clearinghouse, so on and so forth. Also, they've got a pot of money coming from the back in the day. Let me see, during the funding from the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, which basically was just a green energy, green news steel program that they did, but there were some things in there, for the highways and construction and that, but a lot of it was
more of these Green New Deal programs. So anyway, part of this is funded out of that. During the lapse FMCSA's obligation limitations follow the IIJA, the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act highway programs fully protected.
The Federal Highway.
Administration will continue normal operations with all twenty two hundred and sixty eight employees. So again, are all those employees necessary? Is anybody looking at that? Protecting the tax payer money, protecting the money that we put in there through these gasoline tax and diesel taxes to make sure that the are spending our money efficiently. So anyway, no furloughs are expected. The Department of Department of Transportation said the agency has
enough liquidating cash to support several months of reimbursement. Has Mad inspections continue with some cuts. The oversight of hazardous material shipments will continue despite staff reductions. Pipeline and has met material safety Administration expects one hundred and ninety of the five hundred and seventy nine employees to be furloughed, with three employees. Now they are talking about that in
the federal government. Remember when dose came in and they said, we want to eliminate certain employees, and they said, well, okay, overall, in order to reduce the federal workforce, what we're going to do is we're going to offer everybody, everybody across the board, nine months worth of.
Pay if you agree to leave the job.
And so if you want to retire, if you want to quit or whatever, you got nine months of paid time off and you have to accept that. They had to accept that contract by September thirtieth, and I think I saw somewhere where one hundred and ten thousand federal employees have taken advantage of that. So that workforce will be reduced by one hundred and one hundred and ten
thousand workers. So again that's a way of you know, people leaving the job and then basically not having the replace And it'll be interesting to see if people don't even miss those jobs in the first place. But a lot of these positions that they're talking about in here, some of the furloughs will actually be people that have actually resigned. Vehicle safety standards work uninterrupted. Maritime operations continue with reduced staff. Other transportation modes face deeper cuts, while
trucking in highway programs are largely shielded. Other parts of the Department of Transportation faith further strained. Now this, I don't understand the Federal Aviation Administration projects more than eleven thousand furloughs. Though air traffic controllers remain on duty without pay, Why aren't they protected of all of the different organizations, all the other elements of the federal government that get paid, and that there's a subsidy for them, that they are
essential workers. Air traffic controllers aren't considered essential paid people, but they're still expected to show up even though they're not going to get paid unblue And I wonder how that's gonna work out in terms of do they get to collect unemployment because they're not receiving a paycheck or are they just going to get that retroactive money later on? You know some of the stuff when we when I dig into this stuff and see how inefficient our federal
government is, it just absolutely appalls me. I'm Kevin Gordon, America's Trucking Network seven hundred WLW News Traffic and Weather News Radio seven hundred WLW, Cincinnati.
The FDA has just approved a generic version of the abortion pill with your twelve thirty report, I'm Travis Laird breaking now. The drug is mifepristone, the most commonly used for medication abortions. It is the second generic version to reach the market. The announcement comes just weeks after Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Junior said the drug safety would
be reviewed. A study from the Ethics and Public Public Policy Center, a conservative think tank cited by the administration, claimed eleven percent of women had serious adverse reactions, but that research was not peer reviewed. The FDA's own data shows the rate is just one half of one percent.
A spokesperson for the department says, by law, the FDA must approve a generic drug if it is similar to the brand name drug.
That's ABC's Michelle Franzen. The move prompted fierce backlash. Senator Josh Hawley called it shocking. Anti abortion groups said it was reckless and unconscionable.
Another lovely night, partly cloudy conditions, temperatures dropping into the upper fifties, and the tomorrol cloud's decrease a little bit. We'll get back to a mostly sunny sky. And it's also a warmer day with a high of eighty four. We'll see the same forecast for Saturday and Sunday. It's Monday night next week that rain will return and bring back some cooler air. That's the forecast. I'm nine First Warning Meteorologist Jennifer.
Ketchbar sixty degrees in Cincinnati right now.
Now.
The City of Cincinnati has announced how it will spend the next round of Railway Trust money for twenty twenty seven. Officials expect fifty eight million dollars, two million more than last year. The biggest chair, twenty two million, is set aside for street repaving. Other projects include the Fleet Garage and the Dunham Recreation Center. Mayor Pirraval says it costs a million dollars to pave a single mile of road, but he says crews have patched more than forty three
thousand potholes so far this year. The city is also looking at cameras on city vehicles to flag new potholes.
And the Queen.
City Book Bank has opened its two hundred and fiftieth Little Free Library the New Boxes in Avondale. Hosted by former libraryan Connie Harris, the initiative provides free books to more than four thousand elementary students in twenty Cincinnati schools giving each child ten new books every year. Organizers say the little free libraries help students build reading habits and help neighborhoods connect. Our next update is with Lee Mallin
at one o'clock Breaking News Anytime. I'm Travis Lair News Radio seven hundred WLW HI.
I'm Stephanie Quell and I'm Tom Quell. You're co founders of the Jack Quell Foundation.
We lost our son Jack in twenty twenty one to fentanyl poisoning, which.
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Here's your trucking forecast for the tri State and for the rest of the country. Through the overnight, mostly cloudy with a low fifty nine, mostly sunny, Friday with a high eighty four, Mostly clear Friday night with a low sixty Saturday, sunshine, high eighty four. Sunday, sunny, and a high again of eighty four degrees for the rest.
Of the country.
Record high temps possible across the northern Plains, upper Mississippi Valley and Great Lakes. Below average temperatures to stretch from the West Coast into the Great Basin and Northern Rockies, and heavy rains and isolated flooding along the east coast of Florida and from the northern Sierra into the Northern Rockies.
Seven hundred WLW. I'm Kevin Gordon. This is America struck a network.
Last week, the Department of Transportation Seawn Duffy had a press conference and they were discussing has declared a national emergency over states handling of commercial driver's license for non citizens, ordering immediate changes that could affect thousands of drivers and
potentially reshape hiring practices across the trucking industry. You may recall back on I think it was September twenty fourth, we covered on the show fmcsa data show surge in roadside inspections where we talked about the number of trucks been pulled over and.
Put out a service.
This is as a result of the enforcement action that was required by the Department of Transportation back in let's see, it was in May the twentieth that Sean Duffy put out this new guidance. In the headline at the time was US Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy signs order announcing new guidelines to enforce that English only proficiency. And then that was supposed to go into effect on what was it,
June the twenty fifth. Now you may recall too that on August the twelfth that heart Hard Gender Singe, the one that the guy down in illegal Alien Driver's License CDL license from California made that illegal U turn down in Texas Florida that killed three family members, and all of a sudden, this focus went on these illegal aliens and the driver's licenses. Now, this again is something that was announced back in May. The enforcement action began June
twenty fifth. This hard gender singh was pulled over in July in New Mexican Co. Pulled over for speeding, was issued a ticket. They couldn't communicate with him. The bodycam footage of that showed he couldn't speak English, which meant that he probably couldn't understand roadside road signs, and the officers just let him go. And then less than a month later he kills three people in Florida. And so this is something that when the problem comes about.
When a problem is announced.
Wouldn't you think that people would immediately jump on it and say we need to change it. It was announced in May, the enforcement date became June, July August, and we still have these states that are a non compliance.
It amazes me, and.
Especially the spoon fed regurgitators in the mainstream media, how they tend to ignore these things. I watched the press conference, and I watched it a couple of times. The press conference last week when Sean Duffy was announcing this. They took some questions afterwards, and the main focus was, what do you suppose that with these people maybe losing their licenses and put out of service, will this affect the supply chain?
What the hell difference does that make?
What you're concerned about a little bit of inconvenience as opposed to somebody driving an eighty thousand pound vehicle that can't drive it, doesn't know the safety features, can't read road signs, and could and has not passed the necessary requirements to travel that truck. Do you not care about your kids? Do you not care about your friends? Do
you not care about your families? You governors that continue allow to have your DMVs go ahead and do this are not concerned about making sure that your highways are safe. This was a topic earlier or actually last night, Dan Carroll on w Here on WLW a guest on his program, and we were talking about this because one of the topics that came up is and when we discussed it on his show about how some of these driver's licenses
have the phrase no name given. Now, we talked about this and one of the things that needs to be looked at is that how is this being done, because the stories were that these issues, these driver's license were issued that had no name on us. He just said under the you know, the normal name and said no name given. But looking into it, some of these people
only have one name. And I don't understand that because if you look at you know, whenever you look at some of these shakes and these people in the Middle East, they all have names. They all have a first name and a last name. I can't believe that some of these people would come over here and only have one name. What do they share or adele or something like that.
I mean, there's got to be a name. I mean, you know, even in the Arab countries you have like, for instance, my name's Kevin Gordon, right, So if I don't have a last name, and the city that I live in is Wilder, Kentucky, so it would the normal would be Kevin Ben Wilder, which means that I'm Kevin from Wilder. So they always have some sort of a name like that or it's bet something. So how this
is possible is incredible. But the focus of Sean Duffy's press conference last week was the fact that well, let's just get.
Into the story.
Department of Transportation Secretary Shawan Duffy announced September the twenty sixth that a Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration audit uncovered systematic failures in how multiple states issue non domiciled CDLs and commercial Learners permits to foreign nationals living in the United States.
What the new rules require.
Now technically these and one of the things was that these people were being issued driver's licenses even though their work permits had expired. And in one instance that he pointed out, this person's work authorization ended four years ago. So how is this person even still in the country if they're not even supposed to be here.
It's just absolutely amazing.
As of September twenty sixth, an FMCSA interim final rule imposes strict requirements. States issuing these licenses must now verify the applicant documents through the Department of Homeland Securities Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlement system. Keep non domiciled application documents for at least two years match non domiciled CDL CLP expiration dates with US Immigration Form I ninety four ninety.
Four A expiration dates.
In other words, make sure that they can cross references with their papers as to whether or not they are supposed to actually be in here and.
Have a work permit.
Downgrade non domiciled CDLs and colps if drivers become ineligible now, he pointed out during his press conference the fact that if you are a Mexican citizen or a Canadian citizen, you can get a CDL license in Mexico and in Canada, which allows you to drive in the United States. But if you're non domiciled, you cannot be issued a permit. You cannot be issued a driver's license only if you are here legally, only if you are a citizen, and
can you be actually enrolled and get a CDL license. Now, this whole deal of this English language proficiency, we talked about this, and we talked about this a couple of times. We talked about this when we were at the truck show down in Louisville in March. We talked about this with Louis Pugh a couple of weeks later on, and we've talked about this off and on that the fact that some of the I mean, it's the FMCSA requirements.
In twenty sixteen, during the latter part or the final days of the Obama administration, they stopped enforcing those.
Now I don't know why the.
Next Department of Transportation secretary didn't pick up on that and start enforcing it. But this had been going on and then on through the Biden administration where they you know, they just started issuing these driver's license without And we had the case last a couple of weeks ago too, where six people had been indicted for falsifying all the documents, the training records, whether they had actually taken a course, whether they passed the safety or whether they could actually
pass the road test. So they falsified these documents and allowed these people to have these CDLs. I mean, how any hell do you sleep at night knowing that you have permitted somebody who's not qu Qui for driving such a vehicle going down the highway and possibly killing people.
Unbelievable.
So anyway, I will post this on Facebook because the requirements and what was going on as far as this concern. We'll cover a little bit more of this, but some of the details I'll put this on Facebook. We'll cover the rest of this coming up. I'm Kevin Gordon, America's truck in Network seven hundred WLW.
You know what your customers are saying.
You know, we were talking about this story DOTS emergency CDL ruling what that means for the trucking industry, and as I mentioned during the press conference, these people were asking, is this going to affect the trucking industry? Is it going to affect the supply chain? And this goes into a topic that we've had on this program before and a topic that was discussed at the Mid America Trucking Show down in Louisville, where you hear in the press
all the time that there is a driver shortage. I think I think the number being floated around a couple of years ago was that there were something I forget what the number was, eighteen thousand or maybe sixty thousand. I don't know what the number was off the top of my head, but we were short that many drivers. And then when I made that comment to somebody at the truck show, they said, that's crazy. There are plenty of drivers there. As a matter of fact, we have
too many drivers out there. And this has been a narrative. I don't know where it began, but we talked. When you listen to some of the stuff being discussed by Chris Spear, president of American Trucking Associations. He talks about that there's not a driver shortage. He talks about that there's a problem with qualified drivers. He talks about the fact that you know, we need to because the age of some of the drivers, that there needs to be
other drivers coming up through the pipeline. That there should be more trade show or trade schools that are started, and the trucking schools began, you know, to train more people and try to attract more people to the business. But as far as a driver shortage, no, there is not, and so there is not a need to try to gin the system or to screw the system up by throwing people in there unqualified. This is, in my opinion, a criminal offense. The fact that you know, what is it,
I don't know. There's got to be some sort of involuntary manslaughter on the person that issued the driver's license if this person is involved in an accident, because you know, if you falsified their data, if you've falsified whether or not they passed the course, you're just as liable as the person driving that car. In my opinion. So anyway, when he put this out there. He's talking about the
states that face the most scrutiny. California faces the harshest consequence because, you know, anything that the Trump administration says, all of a sudden it's bad. You know, people can talk about a particular topic for years, and then all of a sudden, once Trump talks about it, all of a sudden, everything that they've said, they ignore and go in.
The opposite direction.
California ignores everything coming from the White House, everything coming from the administration, including this mandate about clamping down on illegal and English language proficiency, experience or proficiency before you get a driver's license. California faces the harshest consequence. FMCSA auditors found twenty five percent of California's non domiciled CDLs in violation of federal rules, Duffy called the most egregious licensing situations.
Of any states.
California has over sixty thousand non domiciled CDLs in total. That means that there are fifteen thousand people that have driver's license that are unqualified and should not be behind the wheel of a class eight a semi truck eighty thousand pound truck going down the highway fifteen thousand people. Those are potential, Those are accidents waiting to happen and are preventable. Secretary gave California thirty days to comply or face a loss of one hundred and sixty million in
federal highway funds. California must immediately pause issuance of non domiciled CDLs, identify all unexpired non domiciled CDLs that failed to comply with FMCSA regulations, revoke all non compliant non domiciled CDLs, and reissue those that comply with the new federal requirements. Duffy also pointed out that Colorado, Pennsylvania, South Dakota, Texas unbelievable, and Washington for also for licensing failures. I just it boggles my mind that I have to repeat this.
The fact that somebody would even allow some I mean, there are This is like handing a gun to somebody that doesn't even know what end of the barrel the bullet comes out of a loaded gun, and to say, I'll go ahead, you know, go out.
And play with it. It's there.
It's an accident waiting to happen. And how the like I said, how these people sleep at night? I have no clue. Let's take a quick look at oil and gas prices, because you know, with the interruptions and the preemptions of this preempt in the show, gas prices.
Have really been coming down.
In oil prices, West Texas Intermedia crude currently is a sixty and sixty dollars and sixty eight cents a barrel, That is down a dollar nineteen from yesterday, or one point nine percent. Brent crude currently is sixty four dollars and fifteen cents a barrel, that is down a dollar eighteen or one point eighth percent, almost two percent there just since January of the twentieth when Donald Trump came into office. West Texas Intermediate crewed is down sixteen dollars
and twenty one cents. Brent crude is down fifteen dollars and seventy five cents. That means that West Texas Intermediate cru is down twenty one percent. Brent crude is down twenty percent. And for the life of me, I keep asking the question and I keep getting the answer back that well, there are different grades. We're in the summer months, that the summer blend of gasoline is different and it costs a little bit higher in order to refine that.
But I go back to in twenty twenty, when we are energy independent for the first time since nineteen forty nine, oil prices were down in the fifty dollars range.
We're very close to that now.
Gas back in this back in twenty twenty, was it two to twenty six a gallon?
Diesel was a two thirty nine a gallon. Right now, as.
Of today, gas prices across the board national average three dollars and sixteen cents. We are ninety cents higher than that. I don't understand why gasoline isn't about ten percent or at least maybe fifteen. If oil prices are down twenty one percent and twenty percent, respectively, I don't understand why
gasoline prices aren't down a little bit lower. Imagine if gasoline prices again match the and you know when you see oil prices go up all of a sudden, gasoline prices go up or around a holiday, and they call it supply and demand. Yeah, I understand that. You know, when you have a big demand and you have lower supplies, the price is going to go up. But oil now
is down at a four month low. If oil prices, if gasoline prices were to follow that and be about fifteen percent less gasoline right now, I'd be about two sixty a gallon. Diesel would be abround three fourteen as opposed to three sixteen and three seventy, respectively. And the reason that these gasoline prices are down OPEC is pumping
out more oil that their production numbers are up. The International and the Energy Information Agency is talking about the possibility of an oil glut, even though that's being argued by some that it's not happening, but the fact that the oil supply is going and going well, gasoline prices should be following that.
Well, folks, we're up against clock here.
Time for us to step out the door, have a great weekend, stay home, stay tuned for Red Eye Radio at the top of the hour. I'm Kevin Gordon, America's struck A Network seven hundred WLW