Thursday 1/30/25 | Headlines, Goodnews, Discussion

Welcome to the party, pal. The Michael Duke Show. The greed and the entitlement. is astounding to me what more could you want from a low budget radio program this is a dumpster fire that was just bs it is time to get a new perspective We know just what you need, and we've got just the cure. Open wide and prepare for a steaming hot cup of freedom. I just don't fathom it.

The Michael Dukes Show, streaming live across the world. Live around the world on the Internet at MichaelDukesShow.com and across the great state of Alaska on this, your favorite radio station and or FM translator. Hello, my friends. Good morning. Burr. Chili burr. Oh, yeah, that's right. I've grown a bit of a thin skin now. It's a little cold. Zero degrees.

on top of the world down here in beautiful homer alaska and i'm sure colder across other parts of the state but uh it is what we're getting used to the weather we're getting used to it welcome back to the program and thanks for coming in and joining us It is the Michael Duke show where we talk about all the things that you care about or at least should care about.

each and every day here on the big radio program. Thank you for, thanks for, thanks for being, thanks for being part of it. 10 below up in the Mat-Su near my old homestead up there. And I'm sure it's cold as we've got that snap going on around the state. The weirdest weather we've ever seen. Well, I mean, probably for some of you not, but it's a lot. It's a lot of weird weather going on for sure.

All right. Well, we are. It's just you and me today. Just you and me. We're going to we're going to dive into it and. Talk about some of the stories that are going on around the state. And there's some that, quite honestly, you just won't believe. The tone deafness of some of the folks. uh around here is pretty astonishing uh we're going to talk about things that are happening excuse me at the state level and uh

And also potentially at the national level. I know I don't usually cover national politics, but there's. Boy, there's so much going on. I mean, there's just so much. At some point, you got to be like, can you believe it? Can you believe that? That's some amazing stuff. So we'll be talking about that. We're going to try and fit in some good news. We got some news about space. All kinds of stuff, man. It's going to be good. I'm looking forward to it. So we're going to...

So we're going to kind of crack in on all those. And I think, well, I mean, I don't know. It seems like a lot of times folks, especially in the early morning, are just not. They're not as interested in calling in and sharing thoughts with us and doing everything else. But we'll do our best. We will do our best. We might even... Turn on the phones here in just a little bit to see where you guys are at and what's on your mind these days as well.

So we'll let you know when we turn the phone lines on if you want to participate. We're also working on some good guests for next week. Still trying to get Rod Pyle back on the program. Rod Pyle, of course. He is an author, a writer. He is a consultant on various History Channel shows, worked for JPL and NASA. Um, and we're going to try and bring him back on to talk about space and more because I don't know if you know this, but I'm a bit of a geek and I love, I love the, uh, I love the, the.

the space stuff to know where we're going. And so we will try and have a conversation hopefully next week with Rod Pyle. Also going to be talking about food security next week. and anything else. We'll pull it all together. We'll pull it all together and have another whiz-bang show for you coming up next week as well. All right. Some of the stories we're going to be covering today, but talking about that tone deafness, the Alaska Compensation Board has recommended some more pay raises.

for government workers. We're going to talk about that. The Matsu. Now may be on the hook. This is what we were talking about the other day, where, you know, you get just a taste of that federal gravy, you get just a taste of it, and then you have to pick up the bill. And remember, a lot of times we hear things like, oh, well, we need this program. We really need this program. And it's so important. And it's all good. And, you know, it's not going to cost us a thing.

Don't worry, it'll be fine. Won't cost us a thing. And then, of course, a few short years later, sometimes as short as a year, maybe two, sometimes maybe as long as eight or nine or ten, all of a sudden... The the the the funding dries up and you're left on the hook for it because we couldn't possibly cut it now because there's so many people dependent on it and we can't cut it now. So we've got.

So we're going to talk about that going on in the Mat-Su. So you folks out in the Mat-Su, you best listen up because this could cost you some money. We're going to talk a little bit about education. And... how that's important for, you know, the competition, because now we're hearing about how competition is not really good for education. We don't need competition. We've already got enough competition amongst ourselves.

And then one of the president's new executive orders that deals with education and school choice. Oh, what else? That DOT is now addressing the safety concerns along the Seward Highway. Some details on that. Do you like potato chips? Do you like potato? You might not like these ones. We'll talk about the new Lays recall. I suppose I should group this story here with the other school stories because I'm still going over the commentary from KPB school district superintendent Clayton Holland.

who's talking about the spending in the Matsu and all the things they're going to have to cut because nobody will pay them what they need to. So we'll talk about that as well. And I think that's all the stories that I've got for this morning. So we're going to get started on that and we'll get going on. How about that? First and foremost. I wanted to talk a little bit about this crash. It's been all over the news since late yesterday.

into this morning and this is that crash that happened at reagan international airport in washington it i mean it's a tragedy a commuter jet carrying 60 passengers and four crew members, struck an Army Blackhawk helicopter in midair on approach to Reagan International Airport.

um and it looks like um it looks like all hands were lost everybody all all they have not found a single survivor as of this point and it's uh you know it's a tragedy So it's I just again, I guess I know it doesn't do much, but thoughts and prayers out to the families.

But I do also want to put things in perspective, the number of flights and airlines and planes that are flying around, not just at Reagan, but at most busy airports and around there. Air travel, although you do get the occasional tragedy like this one, is still one of the...

safest methods of transportation out there on a per capita basis so you know don't be afraid but this does beg some questions as to what exactly happened Some of the commentary that I've heard and read since yesterday has indicated that there may be some there may be some. Looks that need to be taken at air traffic control there because they, you know, that's it's a tightly regulated quarter. Reagan International has got it's one of the busiest airports in the country.

And it has got some very narrow approach lanes and corridors that lead in and out of it. And so there's a lot of questions about whether or not... Air traffic control was on top of things when they were handling these kind of stuff. So we'll figure it out. We'll see what that's all about.

uh as it comes down but i just did want to mention that as one of the top stories going on around the country right now it seems to be pretty much all anybody's talking about not much we can do now other than pick up And learn from it, I guess, is the bottom line. Learning from the mistakes that we've made in the past is the way to go forward. So we'll see where it goes from there.

Well, you know that Phil Lison and Art Mathias are names you probably know. These are the guys that were putting forward the... Ranked Choice Voting Ballot Initiative. And the Alaska Office, APOC, the Alaska Public Offices Commission. has gotten in the fray. We know that Scott Kendall and company over there at Alaskan Alaskans for better elections were doing their best to try and shut eyes on and company down and that they were continually reporting.

and filing complaints against the ballot initiative with the APOC committee. And it looks like they're going to... They're going to come out victorious according to an order issued Monday. The ballot petition group is going to be facing 100. And $50,000 in new fines on the heels of a previous fine that totaled $90,000. So we're talking about a quarter of a million bucks, essentially. Almost two hundred and fifty thousand dollars in fines for the rank choice voting ballot proponents. Now.

Again, a little bit of lawfare. And I've had my dealings with APOC in the past. When I ran for public office in Fairbanks and was on the borough assembly, there's a lot of reporting requirements. A lot of reporting requirements when you run for office. You've got to dot your T's and cross your I's. I remember I had to pay like a $150 fine or $200 fine because I didn't.

I can't remember what the report it was some report that had to be filed like after the fact or something like that. And I didn't do it. And it was I mean, it was it was. uh and the potential fine was over a thousand bucks and they're like okay pay us 150 bucks and we'll leave you alone and i'm like good okay get here take it and got away from it the uh but this is this is significant

quarter of a million dollars. They were fined more than $94,000 last January after the Public Offices Commission found that they had illegally funneled their spending through a tax-exempt church and failed to report their donations. That time the fines were levied against Art Mathias, who had given the repeal campaign about $90,000.

and against Philip Izon, who's from Wasilla. Izon declined to any answer questions, and Matthias was not immediately available to comment after the APOC put out their... put out their latest report. Even after the backers were fined last year in order to comply with the law, they failed to do so according to the order issued this week by the commission. APOC as members are appointed by the governors.

Matthias and some of the campaign groups had appealed the commission's initial fines to the Superior Court, which upheld much of the order last year. And Mathias then appealed to the Supreme Court in August, and the Supreme Court in Alaska has yet to rule on that appeal. We'll see what... We'll see what happens. We'll see what happens. But $250,000 in fines.

And again, there's no mention by this is an article from Iris Samuels over at the ADN. I always want to give attribution when I can. There's no mention of the... of the complainants and the law and some of these complaints have been rejected by APOC, but many others have been taken up. And it's, you know, Kendall's made it a full-time job to go after these people.

for daring to uh for tearing to go after ranked choice voting so we'll see we'll we'll see where it goes from here but uh i will say tell you one thing this definitely could put a kibosh on future ballot initiatives from Alaskans. If they're fearful of having to come out of pocket with that kind of money, $250,000. To help put on a citizens initiative. Well, that could that could that could put a real damper on people's enthusiasm to try and participate in government in that way. And again, it.

But the thing is convoluted. I mean, I'm not the sharpest guy, but I'm not dumb. And even I couldn't figure out exactly what I was supposed to do when I was running for office and putting all that stuff on. And I got hit with a fine. How many times? Is that happening for others out there as well? And will that prevent people from wanting to, I don't know, run for office, file a petition, do a ballot initiative?

Well, what is that going to do, especially if you've got people out there like Scott Kendall and company who are watching, who've got their full time job is to pick through everything that you're doing, especially if you're doing it. on your own time and on a shoestring and you're just trying to you're just trying to make a difference and they've got full-time people out there watching your every move ready to report any slip up and you know and make it stick

All right, we are coming up on the break. We're going to be back in just a moment. Don't go anywhere. The Michael Duke Show, Common Sense, Liberty-based, Free Thinking Radio will return. Right after this. Broadcasting live through a series of tubes. Allowing all of these entities to provide streaming stuff going on the internet. Well, it's kind of hard to explain. Sorry. Streaming live every weekday morning on Facebook Live and MichaelDukesShow.com. All right. Good morning. Good morning.

Let me scroll backwards here, see what you guys are talking about. Live around the world. 14 below in the hook. You can have all that. Like I said, it was zero here this morning, and I was like, ooh, I got a little bit of a chill. Of course, I... I'm in an unheated room, so that's probably part of my problem as well, being in the unheated room. All right. Scrolling through, scrolling through. Oh, Harold. Harold.

Always socialize the kiddos at every opportunity. Public schools rock. Don't let your kids sit at home all day and call it homeschool. Well, my kids weren't sitting all day. They were working. They were doing things. They were, you know. Jerrica says she can't wait for the food security segment. Nice. Okay. All right. going through it here uh recall what recall laid yeah lays i know

Good morning, good morning, good morning. This is the first commercial airline crash in the U.S. since February of 2009. Yeah.

No, like I said, it's making headlines. It's all they've been talking about for the whole news cycle. Even Coast to Coast AM last night, they started out with a whole discussion on the story and everything else, which, you know, that's... kind of unusual for some of the coast-to-coast stuff but it's it's everywhere so we'll see there's also a question of whether or not the nods were part of the problem

nods or night vision goggles that because the the Blackhawk was on a training mission so they were training and some have I don't know if it was confirmed or just speculated that they were flying The pilots were using nods to get practice in for nighttime, no lights kind of stuff. Fat Ray says, was the F-35 crash at Ileson covered? Yeah, we talked about it a little bit yesterday, but there's really nothing to tell other than the pilot ejected right after takeoff. Some kind of problem.

in the jet and uh he walked away and the plane was a total loss but uh that was pretty much the coverage of the story that we had yesterday um Harold said they fined him $25 for being a day late. Yep, I know, I know. I was, I want to say I was, like I said, it could have been $1,000, but it ended up being like $150 or $200. It's kind of crazy. What the what? Why? Oh, why? Does that keep happening? Let me fix this. I've got to fix something here. Let me fix this here. And...

This one right here. Oh, no. No, I don't want to do that. Done. Yeah, no, right there. Okay. Done. All right. Sorry. Just... Wow, what's going on there? What's happening? Got a problem up there at Fairbanks with the way things are being done. The way things are being done. All right, we're going to get started here. Ooh, look at that ding. I like that ding. Let's get to it, shall we?

all right we are ready to go uh we're going to continue here in just a second please like and share like and follow subscribe ring the bell and uh do all that kind of stuff Do you ever wonder what tyranny looks like, says Bill? This is the start of what tyranny looks like. Yikes. All right. Yeah, if you don't send your... We'll get to this here in just a second. Here we go.

The Michael Duke Show. Not your daddy. Wait, sorry. Not your daddy? Ooh, not your daddy's talk radio. Whew. I was scared for a second. Thought we were going down. Here's Michael Dukes and the show. Okay, welcome back to the program. Thanks for being part of it and coming on board and joining us. We are ready to go. So we were just talking, they were asking about, you know, the crash out there. The other thing that it could have been, this is again, there's a lot of speculation going on.

You know, there's a lot of speculation going on. But the other thing that since the Blackhawk was on the Blackhawk that crashed into the American airliner commuter jet. Since it was on a training mission, there was speculation as to whether or not that night vision devices, the nods that sometimes the pilots wear were part of the problem. Because... They create a limited field of vision.

And they create a depth perception problem, especially when you're transitioning between light and dark. And there's a lot of lights on the runway. And so there was some speculation there as to what we're going to maybe we'll find out. Maybe we won't. The bottom line. is, as somebody pointed out in the chat room, this is the first commercial airliner crash in 16 years. 15, 16 years. I mean, it's been a while. It's been a hot minute.

So, again, still the safest way to travel. Just want to throw that out there and let you know that you're still okay to jump in there and do that. A lot of comments in the chat room about APOC from the Phil Izon, Art Mathias story. Ron Gillum says getting rid of APOC will save the state somewhere around one and a half million dollars per year. And like I said, if it's just going to be part of a lawfare program where the other side has got full time attorneys.

you know, perpetrating that lawfare against other citizens and basically having a chilling effect on public participation in the process, then maybe we don't need APOC after all. Maybe that's not a... Maybe that's not a problem or shouldn't be, I guess, in the way that that that that goes through.

Well, the Seward Highway, I moved from one dangerous road to another, although this one's much further north from where I'm at right now. The Seward Highway is rated as one of the most dangerous roads in the state. And now there have officially been two fatal crashes on the Seward Highway this month. That head-on collision that happened on Monday.

that killed two and injured three, and the collision involving the tractor trailer that left one dead and two injured back in the early part of January. Now, it's not all doom and gloom. because the crashes along the Seward Highway have actually been significantly down, 40% since 2006, according to the Department of Transportation. And that's the road traveling the Turnagin arm, though it still poses a threat to drivers. According to a study from 2022, a safety corridor audit.

the alaska department of transportation there were nine fatal crashes within the seward highway traffic safety corridor between 2018 and 2022. And they recommend that they got some recommendations. They say that the weather along the highway, especially along the arm. I was always told that when you're traveling up and down the Seward Highway between, you know, Sterling and Anchorage, that the areas to pay attention to were right about mile 90.

through mile 115. That was where they said those are the worst parts of the road. And when you look back, this last one was at mile 89. I think this head-on collision was at mile 89. But they said Weather along the highway, particularly on the Turnagin arm, is often unpredictable. It has a tendency to basically get its own weather systems in there. It can change quickly as you go from one side of the arm to the other.

They estimate about 10,000 vehicles pass through the Seward Highway Safety Corridor daily and being narrow and undivided and not really having many places to pull out. It's a problem. You add to that the potential for landslides and avalanches, and it could be kind of a spooky road. DOT is urging drivers to stay vigilant and adhere to the speed limit when traveling the highway no matter the weather.

I don't understand people who just race through there. I've made enough trips back and forth over this last year between the Anchorage area and Homer that... I just don't understand people who are going a gazillion miles an hour in such a hurry to get stopped at the next bunch of cars. I just never understood that.

It's not a section of road that you want to rush through. You take your time. If the difference is five minutes at the other end of your journey, maybe you should just slow down a little bit and then see where you go from there. All right. Oh, and I guess the other piece of good news is at least I think we're out of the most the danger zone danger zone is in December. Most fatal crashes.

And those resulting in serious injuries on the Seward Highway occur in December, which makes sense. You know, it makes sense. So be cautious. Be careful. But, I mean, there's really nothing to do in the meanwhile. They are, you know, they're continuing to work on that road and they'll continue to work on that road for the next 20 years. But they will, you know, the worst parts are the parts that are beyond. on the construction at this point. Well, if you like a Lay's potato chips,

I've got some bad news for you. Lay's potato chips. Now, this is, again, it just goes to show you that you... peasants who like plain potato chips. You're peasants. You're dead to me. It'll be barbecue or nothing. Or it'll be something or nothing. It'll be sour cream and onion or nothing. You who like plain old Lay's Classic potato chips, there may be a problem. Federal regulators have now updated a recall of Lay's Classic potato chips.

to the highest risk level the chips were first recalled in 2024 um and the problem apparently is an allergy uh thing uh there's an undeclared milk ingredient in the chips posing a risk of serious or life-threatening allergic reactions I mean, I've never heard of any kind of milk product being used. I can understand it in sour cream and onions because there's some kind of powdered milk-based whatever. But no, this is just plain classic potato chips.

Apparently there's an undeclared milk ingredient. The Food and Drug Administration upgraded the recall on Monday as a class one, which is the most severe risk level, according to several reports. The recall only includes about 6,300 bags of Lays Class, the big ones, 13 ounces. So one of the bigger bags, not the little snack packs or the ones you get at the convenience store. But no, this is the big 13-ounce bags, only 6,300 of them.

And they were distributed in Oregon and Washington. So they may have made their way up here. And you could start buying them back in November 3rd. So it's a thing. But I guess it's only... I don't know. Again, is it only if you're lactose intolerant or is it there's an undeclared milk? The way this is worded is so weird because. an undeclared milk ingredient poses a risk of serious or life-threatening allergic reaction only if you're allergic to milk

Or is it just in general, like I love milk and ice cream, but if I eat one of these chips, I could have an allergic reaction. I don't know. It won't really affect me because I don't eat plain potato chips. I mean, if I'm going to be bad, I'm going to be. bad i'm gonna eat you know i'm gonna eat the spicy potato chips or the salt and vinegar the puckery you know potato chips i'm not gonna eat plain old i mean that's

Oh, that's just plebeian. Oh, you just, you poor thing. But if you've got a 13-ounce bag of Lays, you may want to, you have a milk allergy. Although, my God, what is it? six or seven bucks now for a bag a large bag of potatoes in the store the other day and maybe i'm just in sticker shock maybe that's part of my problem is that i'm just still kind of in sticker shock living at the end of the road giving what you know taking what they will give

us or allow us to have. But when I'm walking up and down the aisles and a single And I'm not talking about the family size bag, but I'm talking about just a single regular large bag of potato chips is six or seven dollars just for plain old potato chips. I don't know. Maybe I wouldn't throw it out. Maybe I'd eat a few and see. Do I have an allergic reaction? But again, they're plain. Why would you? All right. I'm sorry. I'm not here to judge your lifestyle choices.

If you want to eat plain potato chips, that's just fine. You're probably a lot of fun at parties. All right? I'm just saying that. If you eat plain potato chips, you are probably a lot of fun. at uh at parties uh all right uh let's see where we at well i guess we're coming up on the break aren't we because i wanted to i wanted to move back in again to now that the that the pause

on federal grant funding has been reversed, or at least in part reversed, there's still more commentary. People are still reeling. Even though it's been reversed, people are still upset about it. And I'm still upset about the fact that people just can't see a potential way forward without all that federal booty. Right?

without lying sideways in the federal trough. They just can't see a way forward. And again, there's been some more commentary reported, this time in the Peninsula Clarion, talking about some of this stuff. And just some of the comments are just shocking to me. I mean, we're Alaskans. We're rugged individualists, right? We could do it on our own. I mean, that's how I viewed Alaska. Apparently, that's not how everybody views Alaska.

A lot of people apparently view Alaska as, please, mommy, could I have another cookie, please? I promise, I promise. That's, I mean, that's how they, that's apparently how they view it around here. All right, we're going to continue here in just a moment. I think I'll turn the phone lines on an hour or two.

I got some other things to talk about. We're still going to talk about that pay raise. We're going to talk about the Kenai Peninsula Borough School District. And again, this is all part and parcel of the same thing. It really is. It's the same kind of thing from the federal funding whiners, you know. No, I just, please mommy, I need some more. That's going on across the state on every level. All right, we got to go. The Michael Duke Show. Common Sense, Liberty Base, Freethicket Radio.

If you missed the show, you can listen to it on your time with Duke's On Demand. Oh, and it's free. Like America used to be. Streaming live every weekly morning on Facebook Live and MichaelDukesShow.com. Okay, I need to do some math real quick here. This is over here. I need to come down here. So one, two. three and a half four and a half five so what is this right here sorry i'm doing math bad i'm doing math is hard math is hard uh 91.

those three is okay so that should be that should be fine okay all right doing it let's do it let's do it all right let me put uh Wow. Wow. Okay. Sorry. I got a lot of things on my brain. I got a lot of things going on on my brain this morning. So let me kill a few things here and bring this down here. Okay. I'm dragging, I'm dragging, I'm dragging. The screen is scrolling. It's so slow.

Before I get to your comments and your calls. All right. There we go. Nope. Yep. Nope. Bring it over here. Yep. There we go. Look at that. Did it to it. Do it to it. Okay. Got it. Let me go back up here and see what you guys have been talking about. Why am I not surprised, says Anthony? Those nasty thin chips have secret milk? Get you some ridges, chips hippies. I know, right? I mean, if you're going to eat red dye number 33 and whatever they put on them to cause them to stay good, I mean, yeah.

I don't know. stupid drivers along the road are also unpredictable as well says ron i've had people pass me on blind corners with double yellow lines numerous times that's when i just pull over If they're doing that, I just pull over to the side and let anybody who wants to go by me. I want to get as much room between me and those mora. If it's five minutes, I'll take the five-minute hit.

I'll just pull over if I can, or I'll slow way down if I can't pull over, if there's no place to pay over. Yeah. uh willie says apoc i'm gonna start this we're gonna talk about this later apoc sucks find me eighteen thousand dollars couldn't do the paperwork with gci internet out there and they wouldn't let me do paper copies instead of internet from a village with no internet They finally dropped it to $500. Corrupt. Let's see.

All right, I would like to see a list of stuff that's banned in Europe for food use compared to what they have here, said Richie. It is an interesting comparison, Richie. There's been some comparisons, and you can see. We put a lot of stuff in our food that they don't allow in Europe. I'm not saying that I'm in favor of the nanny state, but I got questions as to, like, why? Why? Why?

Was it Richie that asked the question earlier? Somebody was asking about K-Pen. Is there new programming? They heard Bongino on K-Pen. Yes, yes, you're hearing Glenn Beck and Bongino. on KPN or on KGTL rather, uh, across the state. So new programming. There you go. So there's been a program change. I have the radio on most of the day and notice now that Dan Bongino show is on regularly. Dan Bongino, Glenn Beck as well, plus Coast to Coast AM, plus full weekend programming. I've been a busy boy.

I've been a busy boy. Lots of stuff going on. Okay. I wonder if they soak them in milk before frying. That might be it. Maybe it is the milky. goodness that's out there um good morning good morning good morning let's see Still scrolling through here. Real world problems, MD, says Kevin, I think on the potato chip recall. Let's see.

Well, the ASAP system shutters 30% of your Alaska payroll. That's the problem, Harold. Why is 30% of the payroll in the state dependent on Uncle Sugar's teat? That's the question. The invaders from California and the loons from the Pacific Northwest do not have the qualities you described, Michael. They are the govern me harder, daddy. People. That's true. Govern me harder, Daddy. I need to get a t-shirt that says that. Govern me harder, Daddy. All right.

Here we go. The Michael Duke Show. Common sense, liberty-based, free-thinking radio. Public enema number one. Oh, wait, sorry. Uh, enemy. Public enemy number one, which makes more sense. On the other hand, he's a little bit of a pain in the, uh, Michael Duke show. What are you trying to say? What are you trying to say? Anyway, just talking about I need to get this t-shirt made.

When I was talking about all the qualities that we're looking for in Alaska and all the people who are whining, Fat Ray over on YouTube, who's watching this morning, says the invaders from California. That was nice. And the loons from the Pacific Northwest do not have the qualities you describe, Michael, that rugged individualism and that we'll do it ourselves. He says they are the govern me harder, daddy people.

I need a t-shirt that says, govern me harder. I mean, that is, oh man, that is some, got some good stuff right there. Good stuff. All right, let's go over to, where's the rest of my stories? I got stories on top of stories on top of stories here. So let's just chat about that. the govern me harder and the, and the whole cost of, because again, somebody, Harold in the chat room was just talking about how, well, they shut down the payment system and they shut down the grants. And that's.

It shutters 30% of your Alaskan payroll. Exactly. That's the problem. When you are so dependent on... Well, any government, but the federal government, when you're so dependent on the federal government for every aspect and it touches and goes and touches every part of your economy. You know you're going to have a problem because you can't have a group or an organization that is so unbelievably undependable in fiscal matters.

Having them so, you know, having them so woven into the very fabric of your society and into every aspect of your lives is not going to end well. The Peninsula Clarion had an article that they've since updated after the pause. on the disbursement of federal grants and loans after it was rescinded on Wednesday, they said even after it stopped, they're still reeling on it. Now, I think there's a reason.

Why? I mean, one, because it was so shocking to many people. But two, it's been one of the few things that the news media could actually latch on to because Trump was moving so fast. Again, kudos to the guy. You know that I'm not a huge fan of some of his policies and the way he does things, but I got to tell you, 10 days, 12 days in office now, and the guy has...

I mean, he is moving so fast that the news cycle, the news media, and his opponents can't even keep up with what's going on. I mean, it's like the whole Columbia thing. Before the news media could even get ginned up about it, you know, two hours later, it's crisis averted. It's all over. They couldn't even get up on it. He's just like moving from one thing to the... I mean, somebody said the other day it's like shock and awe, and that's kind of what it is.

And as far as strategies goes in dealing with, you know, your opponents and the news cycle, it's kind of brilliant. I got to say, it's kind of brilliant. Again, grudging respect to... to him or whoever's helping write his playbook. But this whole thing with killing the loans and the grant program, not killing it, but to suspend it for a period of time. And they admitted it was only for a period of time long enough to be able to understand where the monies were going.

But see, now, finally, the news media got something it could sink their teeth into and everybody could could rally behind one thing that they really hated. But again, the most troubling aspect of this is that. Everybody in the state of Alaska, well, not everybody, but a lot of people in the state of Alaska, the sky is falling.

The sky is, I mean, they said it at the beginning. This was not a permanent close. It wasn't a long, I think they, I don't remember if they put a time, I think they said a week or 10 days, I think is the initial timeframe that they talked about. And quite honestly, I didn't read the actual order, but they said it was for a limited amount of time. Whether that was a week or a month, I don't know for sure. But they...

said it was for a limited amount of time. But people acted like you had killed their favorite puppy, that that was it. This is the end of the world. People will immediately leave the state because they shut down the grant program for... five and a half minutes or whatever it was but some of the other comments uh it just It's amazing. Soldotna City manager Janet Bauer on Wednesday after the order was rescinded. So this is after they reversed it.

Said Soldotna is still waiting for more information. When the announcement came Monday night, she said it was a whirlwind as the city worked to understand which projects might be affected and who in the wider community might be affected as well. And they said.

almost everyone so when everyone is affected by something like that when every level you know you got too much going on you get too much government in there if that's what's going on In a joint statement issued Tuesday by the Alaska Council of School Administrators and the Association of Alaska School Boards,

They said that the abrupt freeze exacerbates existing uncertainty surrounding federal funding for education. There's that certainty question again. That's I mean, that is one of their main talking points is the certainty. Right. That's why they want the BSA increase for the certainty. The problem is, is that there is no there is no certainty in the state of Alaska. We don't have a stable.

revenue base we don't have a stable tax base it is variable one year oil revenues could be high production could be high production could be low prices could be low earnings from the fund could be high, earnings from the fund could be low. We just don't know. There is no certainty around that. And so trying to create a certainty around a variable funding mechanism. is a recipe for disaster, unless you do what we've been talking about for years on this program.

And you change the funding, you change the budgeting process so that the budgeting process is not based on a single year's income. But you take a page from the old permanent fund dividend formula and you make it so that the funding every year is based on a five-year rolling average of the previous five years worth of funding. So if you get highs and lows.

You know, it evens it out. And you know that this is what you're going to have. But it doesn't really matter because they're going to spend whatever they're going to spend anyway. They don't care. I mean, these are the same group of people. Not all of them. Some of them are the same, but not all of them. This is the same group of people that spent $14, $15 billion from savings.

Instead of having any kind of fiscal discipline to say, whoa, wait a second, maybe we shouldn't pull $2 or $3 billion from savings this year. They're just like, yep, we got it. Go ahead and spend it. It'll be fine. Don't worry about it. It'll be fine. Just go ahead and spend it. Right? This whole thing is, again, if you have to depend on, you know. A government big enough to provide you everything is a government that's big enough to take everything away. If we have become so dependent.

on the federal government in this state and we have we're a dependency state there's no two ways about it we're a welfare state of the of the u.s government and we're becoming more of a welfare dependency state on the state government at every level But when this kind of stuff happens, you just got to go, well, that's just, but I mean, the hits keep on coming. The hits keep on coming.

The Kenai Peninsula Borough School District and David Boyle, who was on the program earlier this week, he called in the program earlier this week, alluded to this. The superintendent, Clayton Holland, was in front of the legislature. And he put testimony up there saying basically that, you know, that $680 increase you were talking about last year, not going to cut it. Not enough.

Not enough. He said the KPB is facing a $17 million deficit. It only has $300,000 in their fund balance. That's less than one day of operation. David said that that's not true. Either he did the math wrong or they lied on their CAFR report or whatever they're doing. But, you know, we're going to issue a hiring freeze, massive cuts program, staffing, school closures.

Look, this is not a scare tactic for us, he said. But of course it is. I mean, it's part of the theater that is this process. The chief operations officer in the Fairbanks North Star Borough. said his district faces a $31 million deficit this year. Wait, wait, wait. I thought it was only 17. Is Melissa in the chat room? I saw Melissa earlier. Is Melissa still in the chat room? The school board president, Melissa? Melissa Burnett, are you out there? $31 million?

I thought it was only 16. Which number is right here? But again, it all comes back to... Education is going to be the hot topic this year and they're going to want to add a half a billion dollars to the spending every year. I mean, once they lock this in, we'll never talk about it again. Well, I mean, we will talk about it, but they'll never want to come back to it again. Anything else beyond this will be extra. There won't be any cuts. It will all be extra.

Because if you think that one-time funding is going to go away once they get that new BSA lock-in, oh, baby, you are mistaken. You are mistaken. All right, we got to go. We got to go. We'll be back. The Michael Dukes Show, Common Sense. Liberty Bay's Free Thinking Radio, hour two dead ahead. The pay raises. For the legislators. Part two. It's dead ahead.

Somebody just sent me a mock-up of a Govern Me Harder Daddy t-shirt. I feel like it should be Uncle Sam pulling my hair from behind. You know what I mean? That's what I should... Long hair, Uncle Sam. Covered me harder, Daddy. Is that disturbing or is it just me? Melissa says she's here. All right.

melissa says okay so it's melissa says 31 million if the governor's budget doesn't include the one-time funding uh she said it's only 16 million because we're assuming 680 from the state and 58 million from the borough okay all right okay i mean i guess that may

Boy, I really wish they'd work on kind of leveling these numbers out and making them so that they all made sense in that regard. 90 days. Thank you, guys, for straightening me out. 90 days. It wasn't a week. It wasn't a month. It was 90 days. All right, let's go back up here.

i'm going i'm scrolling backwards here what are we talking about we need we need a topic or a guest i'm talking about what i want to talk about harold if you don't want to listen to it you don't have to stick around my friend i mean you don't have to be here you know feel free to click the little x in the corner if you don't i mean if you're not happy with what we're talking about i'm enjoying myself they found an edible bag of those chips in the pyramids i heard

Potato chips must have artificial flavors and colors, says Mr. Dukes. You're damn right they better. Damn right they better. Jerrica says she can make me a t-shirt. I got my press in the mail the other day. Oh, man. I'm scrolling through here. um too much of the government law um too much government everywhere lack of education and single parent homes got to help more government govern me harder daddy um

People have the right to block anyone. 90 days. Catastrophic, says Lisa or Gary, whichever one it is. Lisa and Gary. Catastrophic. It's catastrophic. That, I mean, because that's what they were talking about. You know, yeah. Oh man, it's going to be so bad. If we don't get our grant funding, we don't get our, if we don't get our free sugar, we'll riot. If we don't get our free sugar, poppies and children will be living together on the streets at 50 below.

I don't have a problem with a top-down review, says Tani. I absolutely don't want $15 million sent to Gaza for condoms. Well, then you'd be totally outraged to learn that it was $50 million, not 15, 50. Million dollars. If the government teat dries up and you're in danger of dying of starvation, you're part of the problem. I'll say the quiet part out loud. This is 100% true.

100% true. Yeah. And then the worst part with those condoms is, right, they were using them as explosive deliveries. They'd fill them with helium and they'd... put explosives on the bottom of them and drop them, float and float them into the city where they landed in the highways and schoolyards and residences and parks and everything else. Okay. Cut it, freeze it, then explain to me why, like I'm five about how, you know, explain to me like I'm five.

how what it effectively how what explain to me like i'm five how a company gets to run millions and billions into the negative and not get shut down How does government sit here and tell me all the virtues of capitalism while simultaneously being 100% antithetical to it? I don't think the government's telling you all the virtues of capitalism. Most of them want to tell you the virtues of...

How putting them in control will make a lot more sense. Yeah, pay raises for the legislature. How not to read the room. Don't raise my pay says Rob. That just encourages people to take the legislative job and quit their regular job. Take the same amount of money and just pay it in the first five months of the year. Did you see the new attack ad on Nick Begich? I did. I mean, he's been in office for less than a month. They've already gotten the negative attack ads are already out there.

Um, uh, let's see. Trump attempts. Yeah. Yeah. The condom story was a put up for propaganda. Okay. Cite your sources. Cause I saw it in four different outlets, including international outlets with pictures. Okay. Cite your sources. I mean, wow. That's nutty. All right. How come there's no homelessness and starvation in rural Alaska? Because they ship everybody to the other cities. That's why. That's why. Note to self.

buddy. Put that thing back in its holster. We haven't gone anywhere. I don't understand. Check out the Michael Dukes show.com for information on how to get access to the podcast. Welcome to the party, pal. The Michael Duke Show. The greed and the entitlement is astounding to me. What more could you want from a low-budget radio program? This is a dumpster fire. That was just BS.

It is time to get a new perspective. We know just what you need and we've got just the cure. Open wide and prepare for a steaming hot cup of freedom. I just don't. The Michael Dukes Show, streaming live across the world. Live around the world on the internet at michaeldukeshow.com and across the state of Alaska. On this, your favorite radio station and or.

fm translator hello my friends welcome back to the program hour two of the big radio show i'm gonna go ahead and open up the phone lines for hour two because why because i can I guess that's just that's a good reason. And I'd love to hear from you on whatever stories that you guys want to whatever stories you guys want to sound off on. So if you got a pen and paper.

or a pencil, or you want to type it into your phone and save it for later, you can do that as well. Are you ready? Are you ready? Are you ready to copy? I'll wait. I'll wait. Just find that pen. I know it's down in the bottom of your purse. There you go. Okay, you got it? You ready? 319-527-3864. 319-527-3864. I know it's not an Alaskan number, but I couldn't get the call. There's reasons for that. 319-527-3864. Feel free to...

Dial us up here in hour two and talk about whatever you want to talk about. We'd love to do it. Okay. A couple stories that we have here. The president.

signed an executive order that deals with school choice. We'll talk about that. We'll also talk about the pushback from educators and those in the education industry about how... competition doesn't raise the bar um and more we were just talking about the kpbsd and how they were saying that they just we just don't have any more we just don't we can't do it We can't do it without you, Uncle Sugar. Please give us more. And, of course, the big story. The big story.

The big story today is the failure to read the room. And this seems to be a common, I don't know if it's something in the water down in Juneau, something in the air. But they seem to really have a problem trying to read the room down in Juneau. It's like, can you tell what's going on? The compensation board. The the state state officers compensation commission is the official title. Has now recommended.

Now, of course, we'll remember their last recommendation was increasing the lawmakers pay by 67 percent. OK. When. I mean, we're in a fiscal, we have fiscal crises already, but, you know, let's go ahead and raise it. So not only do we have that problem, they have now made a recommendation that the governor... Cabinet members and legislators receive automatic pay raises every odd numbered year moving forward. So. That would nothing else. Iris Samuel reports over at the at the ADN.

The proposal comes two years after the same panel recommended steep compensation boosts, including a 20% increase for the governor and 67% increase for legislators. Alaska law requires that the Compensation Commission issue pay guidance. And again, the odd thing about this is that these recommendations go into effect automatically. They have the effect of law. So this now three member panel was five. Now it's three. This three member panel issues a recommendation.

And it becomes law automatically unless the legislature passes a bill disapproving it. Which is the most... Bass-ackwards thing I could possibly think would. I mean, just, you know, we're going to automatically, you know, and what it does is it protects the legislators from having to take a vote on whether or not they want to give themselves a pay raise. I mean, even Congress, OK, they at least have the chutzpah, the cojones enough to vote for their own pay raises and then live with that vote.

Here it just, no, I'm not going to, I'm neither for nor against it. And it goes into effect automatically. Now, maybe this won't happen. Senate President Gary Stevens said that he is not in favor of the automatic adjustments. He's quoted here saying, I don't like the idea of having an automatic increase because our budget is so tenuous. We just don't know what's going to happen. Andy Josephson, an Anchorage Democrat, said he thought he was already well compensated.

This whole thing, and this is really weird because the whole committee, which if you recall. Governor Dunleavy back in 2023 fired everybody that was on the committee. It was a five-member commission. They... They put forward a recommendation for a pay raise for the governor, but not for the lawmakers. So the governor fired everybody, appointed five new members, and they put forward that 67 percent.

pay raise. Now, since then, three of the commissioners have resigned and the governor only replaced one of them. So you've got three members of the panel. Jomo Stewart. who's the at fedco the fairbanks economic development corporation president nice guy but a government guy big government spending never saw a government dollar he didn't like to spend

Larry Ledoux, the former education commissioner and Republican, former Republican representative Lynn Gaddis. Now, I don't know if it should be former Republican representative or Republican former representative. The order of those words might matter, but at this point, why, Lynn? What is, why? She comes from the Matsu, and I always considered her to be fairly conservative, fiscally conservative. Although she and I have had our differences over the years on different points of policy, but why?

So the recommendations, if they stick, could basically render the panel's future meetings and purpose moot. It wouldn't matter at that point because it's automatically going in. I mean, this is. This again, did you not read the room to see what was going on? Did you not read the report that said one point five billion dollar deficit? Did we miss all that?

Okay, we got to go over. I got a phone call. So first of all, I forgot to set it up to automatically put them on hold. So I just put the caller on hold. And now let's go over to them and see what they have to say. I'll take them off hold. Good morning, caller. Who's this? from this is the bunny lady happy valley good morning well good morning there how are you lady freezing thank you it's negative seven here

But I just wanted to say, give a shout out. That wonderful thing on last Tuesday, that thing they had in Anchor Point, you know, give us your tired, your poor, your huddled masses, yearning to be warm. Well, it was wonderful. I went there. They gave me a sleeping bag, which, believe me, was really needed. And I'm glad you put it on the radio.

And by the way, cojones, you don't hear that often enough, do you? Nice choice of words. Brass ones, cojones, testicular reaction. What do you want? I'm trying to find something that's... That's polite and plausible. I always thought that had rather an oomph to it. Don't you? I think it does. I think that does have some oomph to it. Absolutely. Absolutely. Well, I'm glad you... Yeah, the world needs more oomph. I'm glad you... But it's negative seven here in Happy Valley. My cabin's up...

to 24 degrees. It's going to be a good day. All right. Well, good. We'll throw another log on the fire and stay warm today. Appreciate you calling in. Thank you for being part of it today. Be well. All right. Thank you so much. She's talking about the Community Connect event that went on in Homer, Anchor Point, Kenai Soldotna, up all the way into Fairbanks.

Lots of good folks were served in that. So I'm glad that that went off well. And I'm happy to help purvey that information to you folks out there. We're trying to, again, we're part of the community. We're trying to be part of the community and trying to let folks know about what's going on out there and how they can help and be helped. That's what it's all about. 319-527-3864. 319-527-3864. If you want to sound off, we'd love to hear what you guys have to say on today's program.

But I'm just again. I'm sorry. We kind of derailed there for a second. I'm going to come back to this pay raise. I mean, I guess I'm heartened to see that that even those who are kind of on the big spending side of the equation, Gary Stevens and Andy Josephson, again, quoted in this article.

uh that they're not in favor of it i mean maybe they're finally getting the maybe they're finally getting it i mean i guess they got their 67 pay raise that gary i mean gary stevens was he was hot to trot on that he was going to veto They were going to vote against that 20 percent because when the commission originally proposed, again, just a raise for the governor. And no raise for anybody else. And my understanding, talking to people.

who were intimate with the details down in Juneau, is that Gary Stevens was PO'd. He was a little miffed about what was happening. uh, over that. And, uh, he was gonna, he was, they were gonna put a bill together to, to disapprove it. And that's when the governor fired everybody and appointed a bunch of people who apparently were like-minded and, uh, put it all together.

But again, they got their 67 percent pay raise. How much more do we need? Rob Myers in the chat room. Senator Rob Myers, I guess I should say. He his comment was, don't raise my pay. That just encourages people to take the legislative job and quit their regular job.

Which, I mean, what we really need is more citizen legislators who have a job to go back to. First, because it puts a fire under their butt to get out of Juneau so they can go back to work. And secondly, it keeps them connected to the rest of the economy. You would hope many of them would be working in private industry. At least it keeps them connected to the economy in that way.

So he says, don't raise my pay. That encourages people to take the legislative job and quit their regular job. Take the same amount of money and just pay it in the first five months of the year. That would make sense. I mean, you're going to be that's when you're going to be spending most of your time working as a legislator. So take that pay in the first part, because that's when you're probably not working your regular job. So your income is a lot lower. Right. You're you're you're on hiatus.

So that makes sense. I can see that. I could see that happening. Anyway, again, just the fact that these people cannot read the room and the tea leaves and what's going on is astonishing. Um, more stories of govern me harder daddy. I, I can't tell you that, that just, I'm getting t-shirts made for sure. Um,

And we were talking about this early in hour one where, I mean, here's how it works. Do I have enough time? I don't have enough time. I got 20 seconds. All right. We're going to come back and we're going to talk about what's going on in the Matsu. and how they're about to be saddled with another additional million dollars in spending that they probably weren't expecting, but they should have been. You should have seen this coming.

Because there's no such thing, my friends, as free money. It just, it doesn't exist. Well, we want this program. We won't have to pay for it. It'll be fine. Don't worry about it. Yeah, but what happens when they stop paying for it? Oh, that's a good question. We'll be back with more. The Michael Duke Show. Common Sense. Liberty Bay's Free Thinking Radio.

Listened to by more staffers in Juno than any other show. Because their bosses told them to. And after what they just heard, oh man, they're gonna be best. You're a bad, bad man. The Michael Duke Show. All right. Donna says, which year does the pay raise take effect? The proposed pay raise would take effect in 27. So that would be the new one. If this stands, the new pay raise would take effect in 27, according to the news article. Yeah, apparently.

Only they, the legislature, cannot raise the pay. Melissa says, personal opinion, legislators should be paid the same as the average income of their constituents. School board should be voluntary without pay. Parents should make up the school board. I'm not saying that that's.

Not a good idea. Why would someone who makes six figures want to become a legislator unless it's to protect their income? If you want to know the ones who want to make a difference for our future generations, look at their voting records. Yeah, absolutely. Let's see. Scrolling backwards now. Scrolling backwards. Everyone focuses on legislators getting a pay raise, but it also includes boards and commissioners where honorariums are paid. I thought it was just cabinet level.

because it's a, it's a, it's officers. It's not, it's the officers compensation board. I believe Frank, and maybe I'm wrong. Maybe Donna could correct me or somebody else, but I believe that it is the governor. cabinet-level commissioners and the legislature. I don't think it's rank-and-file commissions and honorariums, but maybe I'm wrong. Don't forget that supplemental budget they try to hide in the shadow, said Willie. Oh, man. That's just a oof. Yeah.

Who's paying for all that? Let's see. It's weird when I'm reading backwards because I'm reading comments to... comments that have already been i should scroll up to the top to where i was before we went to break because this is one of those things um uh where is it Where is it? Where is it? Wow. Okay, here we go. It's funny watching people that supported an administration that couldn't balance a checkbook and did literally nothing for four years now all up in arms demanding action.

Yeah. Let's see. Bethel just spent millions on a new homeless shelter, nonprofit. Yes, the villages illegally banish people to Bethel, Anchorage, and Fairbanks. I mean, I know that that happens because I have talked with people who have said that this is what happens. They don't, you know, they can't do it. They send them into town.

Frosty Pumpkins here in the canyon. Minus four below. Minus four below in the canyon. Which canyon is that, Willie? Where is Paul Harvey when you need him? I know, right? It used to be my favorite time of day listening to Paul Harvey. Frank said, I never said that rural Alaskan has no issues. I said they don't have a homelessness and starvation problem.

I didn't think that you did say that they didn't have no issues, but your question was, why don't they, why, how come there is no homelessness and starvation in rural Alaska? It's because there's no homelessness specifically because they're shipping people through there. those hearings on education yesterday how did it go willie i didn't even bother to listen because these folks have made up their mind and i'm busy um

Kevin said, I was today old when I heard there might be an attempt at another pay raise. Alaska legislators' pay raise are determined by the state. These recommendations automatically take effect. So you just learned about it through my reporting of it, Kevin? You hadn't even heard about it yet? That's great. That's great. All right. Here we go. The Michael Duke Show. Common Sense. Liberty-based. Free-thinking radio.

like share subscribe ring the bell do all that stuff let's go here we go public enema number one Oh wait, sorry. Enemy. Public enemy number one. Which makes more sense. On the other hand, he's a little bit of a pain in the Michael Duke show. Alright. Let's continue ahead here. Phone lines are open for your discussion. Do you want to talk about anything? We've been talking about stuff all over the place here. 319-527-3864. 319-527-3864 if you would like to.

If you'd like to sound off, I'd love to hear what you guys have to say. We are ready. We are ready. to jump in and talk about whatever you want to talk about. People are talking about the pay raises in the chat room, and they are a little frustrated. They're a little frustrated with what's going on.

And Kevin McCabe, in fact, just said, Kevin McCabe, Representative Kevin McCabe, said, I was today years old when I learned that it might be another pay raise attempt. He didn't even know about it until I just reported it. Wow. Maybe somebody should put forward a bill, Kevin. Andy Josephson says he's all in. Andy Josephson said he gets paid enough. He doesn't need more.

That's what he said. It's a quote right out of the news story. So feel free to go ahead and put that bill together to disapprove the automatic pay raise and see if you can get him to sign up on it. Will you? They don't even know what's going on. It's it just don't even know what's going on. Wow. Absolutely. Wow. All right. Well, here's the sad story. And this.

is a story oft repeated from many years ago. Once upon a time, there was a government program. A government program that some people wanted and some people didn't. Those that wanted it said... Oh, this would be great. Look, all this free money and we get what we want. Those who didn't said, but wait. What happens if they stop paying for it? And those that wanted the program said, don't worry, it will always be there. Then one day, it stopped. This is where we're at, right?

This is I mean, this is what's going on. It's a story as old as government and as old as time. Oh, we really need this program. Yeah, but that program costs so much money. Oh, don't worry about it. We don't have to pay for it. It's free money.

I mean, I had a chief of staff of one of the mayors of Fairbanks tell me that one time when I was speaking against a speaking against a bill and there was a break in the conversation and, you know, potty break or whatever. And he came out to me and he goes, but you don't understand. man, this is free money. And I'm like, but somebody's paying for that. And he's like, well, but if we don't get that money, somebody else will take it.

OK, they probably need it more. Nobody really wants the program you're talking about. We really don't need it. But you just want to get it because it's free money. The problem is, is that they start these programs that. don't really in some cases, not in all cases, but in some cases don't really have a constituency to serve.

Right. They start a program. They start an office. They start a thing that will help people with X, Y or Z. And in some cases, the people don't there's not like a huge demand for it. And they assure you. that it won't cost the local folks a thing. Then the program gets started and then a constituency develops. They're starting to serve, you know, a certain amount of people. And then one day down the road.

Uncle Sugar says no more. They change their mind. The regs change. There's an administration change. Something else changes. And all of a sudden, Timmy is not getting his money from the federal government. That's what's going on. Right. And now you've got a conundrum. Because now the local folks, the local government, state, borough, city, now they're on the hook.

For this money. We saw this happen during the whole Medicaid thing, right? Where they're like, oh, we're going to expand all available options of Medicaid and it'll be fine. Don't worry, the federal government's reimbursing us, except for three years later. Now they weren't reimbursing us for everything. And it slowly ratcheted back where they were paying for a bigger share. And then every year they'd pay a little less and they'd pay a little less. But guess what? Now we're on the hook. Now.

Well, you can't cut the program. Now people are dependent on it. We'll just have to pay for it ourselves. This is the slippery slope. This is the hook that is these government programs. Once you create a constituency, oh, you can't stop. You can't stop. The Matsu borough must now cover half the cost of its local bus service by July or lose the program entirely due to a change in federal transportation funding rules.

for the region rules changed rules changed the current program runs out at the end of june when the federal rules push the region into a new population-based funding category They require state or local officials to cover half the cost of public transit. Bus service in the Mat-Su, including commuter shuttles to Anchorage, an on-demand door-to-door program is operated by Meadow Lakes-based nonprofit Valley Transit and funded almost entirely by federal transportation grants.

But, you say, people pay to ride the bus. Rider fees make up less than 1% of the program's current 3 million. $3 million budget. Okay. So what is that? 3 million, 10% would be 300,000. 1% would be 30,000. $30,000 in rider fees. It says less than 1%. Let's just give them to them at $30,000. $30,000 in rider fees. Well, they must have, you know, 30, what? That's got to be 25 or 30,000 people riding. No.

Users pay $7 one way, $10 per day, or $120 a month to ride to and from Anchorage. On-demand rides start at $3. Even if they were all on-demand rides at $3, that's only 10,000 rides a year. I mean, 10,000 rides a year. For people, uh, what? The borough currently contributes no money to the bus system. Starting in July, it will have to cover it. It will cost about a million dollars for them to pay half of that cost, apparently.

Eliminating the bus service in the Mat-Su, according to Amy Bouchatz, who writes for the Mat-New Sentinel. Eliminating bus service in the Mat-Su would leave hundreds of residents without rides to and from work in Anchorage and hundreds more without transportation to essential services within the borough. Look, this isn't downtown L.A. or some kind of condensed urban area. The Matsu is like one of the most spread out cities that you've seen.

Right. Even Fairbanks is more condensed in its downtown area than the Matsu or Palmer is. I mean, it's it's spread out everywhere. So they want a million bucks to... Keep this rider service going. They said the bus provides about 33,000 rides to and from Anchorage each year and another 29,000 to locations throughout Matsu via the on-demand service. Which, that math doesn't work out. I mean, maybe it's me. Maybe, you know, you're asking me to do math live on the air, and maybe I'm wrong.

But it says it costs $3 million, right? It says it costs $3 million and that rider fees make up less than 1% of the program. Well, $3 million, 10% of 3 million is 300,000. 1% is 10% of 10%. So that's $30,000. Am I wrong? Am I, am I wrong? Tell me I'm wrong. $30,000. That's what 1% of, that's what 1% of 3 million is. $30,000. So when you tell me that you only bring in about $30,000 of budget for a $3 million budget,

And yet you go on to tell me that the bus provides rides for 33,000 people to and from Anchorage and 29,000 people around the Mat-Su. Well, the on-demand rides start at three bucks. The 29,000 times three. that ought to be a hundred thousand bucks. And the 33,000 times seven, well, that ought to be another 200 something thousand bucks. I mean, you should be at $300,000 should be making, if you're making people pay.

Or are you not making people, something, it just don't add up. I'm sorry. Math is hard. Maybe it's me. Maybe it's me. Maybe it's the new, maybe they're using the new math. for this one but they're say they're servicing 60 000 people a year and even at three bucks a piece that's 180 000 i can do that math in my head Anyway, the Burrow's going to be on the hook for this. You know what I say? Just let it go. Let it go. Let it go. Just...

You know, a million dollars to serve. I have so many questions on this. But again, this is just another example of this being part of the problem where you create a program. That was all going to be paid for by Uncle Sam. And then one day the rug gets yoinked out from underneath of you. And here you sit.

Let's go over to the phones. We got one more phone call before we go to break. Good morning, Terry. How are you this morning? I'm good. Calling from Wasilla. I was on the transportation advisory board. Okay. When all of the garbage was being talked about for public transportation, and they were wanting to extend it, like, out to... past houston sutton that way and they'd hired some um organization to do a study of the study of the study and i was

Adam, no, we do not need to increase the transportation situation. Americans are too independent. They want their own vehicles. If you live that far out, it's your responsibility to find a way into town or to Anchorage or whatever to take care of your situation. Anyway. Then one of these ladies that was doing the study of study of study said, well, public transportation, the lot down by the hospital and the one at Searwood Meridian, they're packed full every day.

And we know, you know, there's a lot of writers. And they'll say, wait a minute. I live by the parking lot at Seward Meridian. And I said, if there's 15 cars parked in there a day, that's a lot of cars. And most of them are homeless vehicles that are just taking advantage of the parking lot. Anyway, it was just... insane what they were wanting and I you know we don't have to be everything to everybody no this is an absolute no and I got the vote put off but They were just hell-bent to get

More money, more transportation, and now here we are. Yeah, to expand it. In the hole for a million dollars. Right, to expand it to more and more areas. I agree with you, Terry. Look, if you choose to live in an area like the Mat-Su, which is beautiful. Don't get me wrong. Beautiful. This is my second favorite place to live in the state was the Mat-Su. It was a beautiful area, everything else. But if you choose to live out there, again, it is one of the most spread out places I've ever been.

as far as it goes if you choose to live out there you have to plan for having your own transportation you have to you can't You can't depend on public transit out there, especially if you work in Anchorage. How, I mean, how does that work? So, I mean, I would hope that the Matsuburo would look at this and go, no, sorry. Either that or the system itself, the transit system, is going to have to up its rates, you know, and I don't know if they could even afford it on that.

But yeah, this is what happens is you get some get some out of town expert with a briefcase who comes in, sits in front of a committee like the one you were on and says, here's what you really need to do. You need to make this more like. I don't know, fill in the blank, Portland, Seattle, Los Angeles, someplace where there's dense urban, and you need to expand outwards to help more people. No. Yep. No. Yep.

And that was my point. And, you know, the steady of the steady of steady people just were bound to determine this is what we needed. And now here we are. Back for a million bucks. Yep. Well, it's all that free money, don't you know, Terry? It's not free in the end, is it? Yep. That's it. All right. No. I appreciate you calling in. Thanks for giving us the intel on that. Thank you so much for listening. 319-527-3864. We're going to take a quick break. And when we come back.

We will have more, including a story from space and more. I'm sure I've got something else here that we can talk about. Oh, the president's executive order on school choice. I forgot about that. Yeah, we got to get to that, too. I want to get to that today. All right, we'll be back. The Michael Duke Show. Common Sense, Liberty Bay's Free Thinking Radio. Running on 100% pure beard power. Oh, also some coffee. We dip our beard in coffee. Ha, nice beard. The Michael Duke Show.

Okay, fine. Where were we? Oh, we were over here. That's where we were. We were over here. I was moving some stuff around. I was doing some stuff. Stuffing things, Lori. Stuffing things. You guys, if you know. If you know, you know. If you know, you know. My quote of the day, if you know, you know. All right, let me pull. look at that okay all right um let me go back over here to the chat room rick who's in the valley says screw that people find your own way it is part of the problem

Yep, that's part of the problem. I will point out that many times that free money has a time limit. It's a known upfront, although not always disclosed, that the money is a bridge intended to allow the state or the muni to get the program started.

It's up to them to figure out how to keep it funded or kill it. The political class sees dollar signs and ignores those little, oh, by the way, clauses. Right. It's the asterisk at the end of the clause. Well, we're not on the hook on this forever. You know that, right? We're going to give you this money up front and then it's on you. Oh, we need this free program. It's free. Yeah.

It's kind of crazy. Ron Gillum says the KPBSD gave the bus company a 10-year contract. These people have come to expect the yearly raises even when there is no money. Yeah, Tawny says, Michael, this change in the bus system is based on population changes. We have known this was coming for years. And that's the thing. You know? You're a Republican, aren't you, Harold? Harold says this show needs an optimistic pill. Commentary is always on the dark side of the issue. So Republican.

I thought you were a Republican. I'm a libertarian, but I mean, I guess it doesn't, you know, I guess it doesn't matter. I mean, I guess it doesn't matter. It seems like Anchorage has listened to those people who study the study, the study, the study, as it's becoming more like Seattle every day. Yeah. Yep, exactly.

Exactamundo. All right. Well, I'm caught up on the comments. That's the first time today I've been caught up on all the comments. So thank you so much. I guess I missed this one from Anthony. I used to have a negative view of Medicare, Medicaid in general until I got old. I've got prescriptions that if I didn't have the insurance would cost me $980 for a 30-day supply out of pocket. Sure, it's a government expenditure, but it speaks to the state of our national health care that you can...

look someone in the eye and charge almost a thousand bucks a month for their health. Street drugs are literally cheaper than the real ones. I know I've got family members that if I had to pay completely out of pocket and not use my insurance, thank goodness I have insurance. it would be $1,200 a month just in medications. That's crazy. That's crazy. Kevin says, here's the bill from last session rejecting the Compensation Commission's report.

I can't follow the link and I don't have time to read it right now, but I will later. But I mean, are somebody putting together a bill right now to reject the commission's report? I'm asking for a friend. I'm asking for a friend, Kevin. Is somebody else putting out a bill that will reject the current report?

Yeah, because Willie says, and this is some of the other hooks and strings that you don't see. This is the invisible strings that you don't see. Hey, accept a federal grant for an electric bus. You have to replace it with another. Work for you or not, it has to be replaced with another electric bus.

Did you see the thing about in Boston where they got those electric buses and they had five brand new electric buses and one of them, the lithium battery exploded and it burned all five? They hadn't even been put into service yet. Burned all five of them up. I mean, all five of them hadn't even hit the road yet. Hadn't had a single nickel drop through the fare box. All five of them burned up. Oh, man. Lithium. What are you going to do? Um, all right.

Kevin says, unknown if there's a bill to disapprove the pay raise thing. Not much talk about that report at all yet. I will if no one else does. Well, thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much. All right. One final segment. We're going to get into the President Trump's executive order and we're going to talk about.

the, the competition. And I'm going to try and get to this space story because I want to get to the space story. I've been wanting, been all boarding. So we'll get to that as well. Here we go. It is the fastest two hours in radio. Free radio. The Michael Duke Show. Common sense, liberty-based, free-thinking radio. Let's do this thing, shall we? Here we go.

The Michael Duke Show. Seriously humorous with a pinch of intellect. Pinch of intellect. Sorry. That is humorous. Here's Michael Dukes. Well... That was uncalled for. All right, let's go over here and talk about the breaking news. President Trump has signed a new executive order yesterday aimed at expanding school choice for American families.

must read alaska is reporting on this uh there's also an article in the adn if you want to go look at it uh it comes in response to ongoing concerns about k-12 education in the u.s 70% of eighth graders are below proficiency in reading, 72% below proficiency in math. And if those numbers weren't bad enough, we, Alaska... are at the bottom of the heap. What, 47th, 48th, 49th? I think we made it all the way up to 46th in math. So we jumped up a space or two to math. But we're out of 51.

the States and DC 51. We are 46, 48th and 49th on all the different metrics. So we're not, you know, it's crazy. Um, The new executive order establishes a framework to support state-based K-12 educational choice programs and increase competition within the education sector. The governor was effusive. President Donald Trump is serious about improving educational outcomes for American children. Fantastic.

So the key provisions in the executive order guidance for the state within 60 days, Secretary of Education will issue guidance on how states can use federal funds. To support educational choice initiatives, ensuring the public funding follows students to their preferred schools. Backpack funding. Discretionary grant program. The Department of Ed will prioritize education freedom in its discretionary grant program.

Departments of Labor and Ed will evaluate and recommend ways to leverage grants to expand education options for families and teachers. There's support for low-income families. They'll explore ways to use block grants, including child care and development block grants, to help working families afford private, charter, or faith-based schooling options.

Military families. The Department of Defense will review mechanisms to allow military-connected families to use federal education funds for school choice. And then finally, options for Native American students. The Secretary of the Interior will examine how BIE. which is the Bureau of Indian Education, school funding can be redirected to provide greater education choice for Native American families, including access to private and charter schools. This is fantastic. This is fantastic.

This is awesome. Supporters. of the executive order argue that the expanding school choice is critical to addressing long-standing disparities in our education qualities. They emphasize that increasing competition... will drive innovation and improve educational outcomes for students across the country. And this has been one of the biggest arguments for school choice anywhere.

Now, before I get to the phone, and I do have a phone call on the hold, I'll get to you here in just a second. Let me go over to the counterpoint. It's an opinion piece in the ADN from R. Brett Sterling. who was a teacher and principal in Alaska for 21 years before retiring in 2022. R. Brett Sterling. He writes, and here's the headline. Alaska education competition does not quote-unquote raise the bar.

He said the governor claims competition between schools and school districts will raise the bar. That statement ignores reality. Districts are already in competition with each other. Rather than raising the bar, competition has quite the opposite effect. as a former superintendent should know the reality or no he says as dunleavy a former superintendent should know the reality

The governor's argument is based on two false assumptions. First, he assumes parents are shopping for the best opportunities for their children. Second, he assumes schools will raise the bar by increasing expectations to attract more students. He says this is not how the system. And this is where...

This is where his moral superiority shines through. A majority of parents don't shop for the most rigorous or challenging educational options. Like groceries, parents shop for the most convenient and least expensive option. They go to Walmart. Wow. Wow. The dramatic increase in students enrolled in correspondence program is not example of parents seeking the best opportunity. They're seeking the convenient, easy option.

Oh, my God, the condescension in that state. First of all, I'm sure there are some parents who are looking for the most convenient. and easiest option i'm sure there are but to lump everybody who's chosen homeschool homeschooling is not easy if you do it and you do it right homeschooling is not easy Homeschooling requires work on the parents' part more than if they did just ship the kid off to school. But, you know, it's just the... Wow. Talk about looking down your nose at everybody.

they're just seeking the most convenient and easy option. That's all they're doing when they enroll them in correspondence programs. He goes on to say, here in Delta Junction, the local high school has lost 34% of its enrollment since 2020. 34%. Most have transferred to our district's Alaska homeschool, which now boasts more high school students than the physical school.

They don't worry about being late to school or being ineligible. Many finish courses in hours instead of semesters and finish high school in three years or less. This is not because the education is better. I... Wow. Hey, hey, I think your bias is showing there, buddy. Brett, you may want to check your slip there, buddy, because I think your bias is showing. There's no evidence that correspondence schools offer better education. This guy, well, he was a teacher and principal for 21 years.

I got shoes older than this guy, but I mean, it doesn't matter. I mean, you know, the whole, I mean, just the condescension. Many finished, that was what got me. Many finish courses in hours instead of semesters and finish high school in three years or less. My son finished his schoolwork in two hours a day, three hours a day, maybe on a heavy day.

Why? Because he didn't have to wait for 30 other kids in the class and for the teacher to come and pick, and he could go at his own pace. And he did well. He did real well. My daughters have done the same thing. This is madness. All right, I got to get to the phone before we run out of time. Randy's on the phone. Randy, what's on your mind? Oh, hello there, Michael. I was going to call about some other subject, but since there's so little time, I'll just comment and say that...

Homeschooling is a great option, but I personally am glad that I went to regular school it seems more fun you know to see all the other kids and everything and there was a brief time when we went overseas and we hadn't been enrolled in the school that was available there where there was kind of homeschool us a little bit, and, you know, that was no fun, in my opinion. I mean, you know, I can't even hardly remember what all we did, but just a little bit of stuff. But I prefer being in a...

Fun school with other kids is kind of fun. Anyway, that's all I could say. Well, I mean, it all depends on what's going on and, of course, the advancement in technology and everything else. I'm sorry, Randy. I said it all depends on what's going on, and it depends on the advancement in technology. I mean, today you can do a lot of things you couldn't do before with homeschooling, but even before.

homeschooling was a great way to get. And you didn't have to work at the pace of the slowest students in the class. So if you needed time, you could take it. If not, you could do it at your own pace. But what got me, I guess, more than anything, Randy, was the condescension in this guy's whole thing that every parent is.

only looking for the easy way out. I don't think I want to meet this guy's kids. You know what I mean? I just don't think because out of the mouth speaks the heart. And maybe that's what he was looking for. Maybe he was looking for an easy way out. I just not sure at this point. All right. Well, thank you, Randy. I appreciate it. We are out of time. Tomorrow is. Firearms Friday. Your chance to sound off at issues of a 2A nature. We'll be back tomorrow. Be kind. Love one another. Live well.

we'll see you we'll see you we'll see you tomorrow have a great day my friends well thanks for coming in and joining us brian says what does it say about the government schools if a student can finish the coursework in a couple of hours maybe the government schools should step up their game Yeah, I mean, the ultimate pupil to teacher ratio is one to one. That's why homeschooling works, in my opinion.

Anthony says, sure, it's not as good homeschooling. That's why my kids finished high school with college credits already built up. This idiot is the same wacky tobacco folks crying for BSAs.

and more funding for a decrepit education system i'm not i don't think it's decrepit i think it's broken i think it's broken that's what it is anyway yeah i mean just this guy's arrogance was sheesh all right we gotta go he's in delta too of all places out there in the rural area wonder what this community thinks all right we gotta go be kind love one another live well we'll see you tomorrow have a great day Radio Skin. And now we are slimy lizard internet people. It's the Michael Duke Show.