Tuesday 6/17/25 | Keithley's Weekly Top 3 | Story's Life Coaching

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The Michael Dukes Show, streaming live across the world. Live around the world on the Internet at MichaelDukesShow.com and across the state of Alaska on this, your favorite radio station and or FM translator. Hello, my friends. Welcome to Tuesday. Beautiful.

Beautiful, a little cloudy, a little foggy this morning, but it's going to burn off. Yesterday started out the same way, but it turned out to be gorgeous. It's going to be a nice summer overall. I saw that Juneau is getting a heat warning, 80 degrees in Juneau. Oh, 89 in Fairbanks over the weekend. I'm OK. I mean, global warming. Bring it on. It'll be fine. It'll be great. It's awesome. All right. We are getting ready to jump into it for Tuesday.

And of course, today is the day that we talk about the weekly top three with lots of good truths and lots of good discussions today. A lot of talk about oil and gas today as well. And that should be interesting. Keithley from Alaskans for Sustainable Budgets joins us here in just a hot second for that. He's waiting in the wings right now. In hour two, I've got a recap of some thoughts, plus some other stories, including big shakeups in the... journalistic landscape.

I don't know if you saw this. Big moves, big changes. Some of the names that you recognize are moving around or leaving. And not sure exactly what that means overall, but we'll give you some thoughts on that. at the end of the show this morning, who's going to come in for our weekly life coaching lesson.

And and positivity uplift, which sometimes on Tuesdays we need by the end of the show, because I'm either all ramped up about something or, you know, we've gotten way too much truth, way too much truth for Truth Tuesdays. All right. Well, let's get to it. Joining me this morning is my brother from another mother. Apparently, we're coordinating wardrobes this morning. I see. We're both. I don't know. Is it May Day? Is it May Day? What's going on? I don't know.

Well, you know, I'm trying to wear... colors that brighten things up i didn't realize i i didn't see the memo but i must have my i must have absorbed the memo somehow yeah you intuited it it was right there i mean it's a great minds think alike or something brad keithley for those of you who don't know what we're talking We're both wearing bright red shirts today, so it was just one of those things. Brad Keithley, Alaskans for Sustainable Budgets. The weekly top three kicks things off here.

um uh lots of stuff to uh to to go over and talk about today how you doing brad i'm doing great michael i'm doing great um I'm in Anchorage for a few weeks, and the cool weather here, at least, is making me happy. Cool, non-humid weather. Yeah, no, I get it for sure. All right, well, let's...

Let's tackle this. Oil prices. You know, we know that next year there's a predicted $1.5 billion budget, and that was based off some higher oils. And then oil started to tank, and it looked like it was going to slide down into the 50s.

And then, of course, Israel and Iran got into the little thing. And so now it's, man, I feel like I'm on a roller coaster. This is like an e-ticket ride at Disneyland. What is, you know, where are oil prices going? What does it mean for us? Well, this is the second. This is the segment that I'm absolutely going to get wrong because predicting oil prices is a fool's errand. Right. And I'm not really trying to predict the precise price. That would truly be a fool's errand.

But I think it's useful to talk about some fundamentals that we see in the oil markets that are useful to remind ourselves of when these roller coasters get going. And the fundamentals are the fundamental is prices set by supply and demand. We always have to keep that in mind. that that it we can have all these things going on in the world we could have all the all of the you know

bombs going off or we can have all of the, you know, tariffs that are out there in the world. That was, that was the story last week before this started, uh, going out that going on out there, but it's fundamental supply and demand. And the fundamental supply side of this is that Saudi has increased production over the last few months.

They've increased, they've raised the OPEC ceiling over the last few months. Additional supply has come onto the market. And that additional supply has softened price. because demand hasn't moved much that additional supply has softened price in a way that got us down into the 60s what's going on with with Israel-Iran is what always goes on when you have something like this in the Middle East. It's concern about supply. Is there going to be some activity that disrupts supply?

in a way that sends us back to 1973 the saudi oil embargo or 1979 the iran revolution that that seriously disrupts supply in a way that that that forces price price up And what I think we're seeing is that for all of the attacks that are going on, for all of the damage that's going on... supply really isn't being impacted. Israel seems to have gone out of its way not to attack Iran's export capabilities. They've attacked energy inside Iran.

But it's domestic energy. It's internal energy focused that Israel has attacked. They've not attacked Iran's export pipelines or Iran's export terminals. And Iran, for all of the bluster and all of the things that it says, has not disrupted shipping in the Arabian Gulf. which is which if it did would would have extreme impacts on supply but it hasn't done that um and so what i think we're seeing is the market going okay there's risk here

And we're continuing to assess the risk that this will ramp up in some way. But I think the market is sort of being capped off. by the realization that there's not been supply disruptions to this point. There was an FT article, Financial Times article, that I think was very insightful on this point.

And it has a paragraph that I think is useful to read and keep in mind. The interplay of geopolitical uncertainty, oil prices, and macroeconomics is really straightforward, as some useful research from the European Central Bank published in... 2023 indicates. It points out that Brent crude prices leapt by 5% in the immediate aftermath of 9-11 as investors priced in the chance of war in the Middle East disrupting supplies.

But they were down 25%, but oil prices were down 25% within 14 days of 9-11 as fears that a slowing global economy would weaken oil demand came to the fore. In the two weeks following Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, rent prices rose by 30%. But they were back at their pre-invasion level eight weeks later. So I think the lesson we take from this or the lesson that the market takes from this is when there's an event that is in a major supply region or in a major demand region.

When there is an event that could theoretically put supplier demand at risk, the market's going to react and it's going to jump. And it's going to jump either one way or the other. in response to that event. But as the smoke clears, to use a probably inappropriate metaphor, but as the smoke clears, and you begin to see whether there is actual damage to supply or damage to demand, the market sort of readjusts. And we're seeing that to some degree.

in the markets. I pulled up the markets this morning and the December 25 or the midpoint 2020 or midpoint fiscal year 26. which is the way we think about it in Alaska. The midpoint fiscal year 26 oil price right now, as of this moment, futures price is $71. The midpoint FY27, the year after that, is $68. So I think you see the market sort of still hiked up as a result of these concerns about whether there's going to be a disruption to supply.

but not overly spiked, not convinced there's going to be a long-term disruption to supply. And I think you've also seen it sort of coming off the highs that spike to. shortly after the beginning of the Iraq-Israeli attack on Iraq. So we're in for a continued roller coaster. Yesterday, the big news was... that there were ships on fire in the Arabian Gulf. And all of a sudden, you know, oh, my God, there's been an attack. We're going to start seeing these attacks on shipping in the Gulf.

And as a consequence, there's going to be disruption of supply. Well, as the day wore on, it turned out that what had happened is two ships had collided. There wasn't an attack. And while the collision may have been a result of navigational disruption due to the war. It didn't look like it was persisting. That navigational disruption was going to persist in a way that was going to put shipping generally at risk. So you're going to see these spikes during a day.

or maybe even during a week. But long-term, it's supply and demand. And long-term, OPEC has increased supply. which is what led to the softening of price into the 60s and some people talking about going into the 50s. OPEC has increased supply. They haven't backed off that as a result of this. And so I think you're going to see if there's no additional activity as a result of the war that results in damage to supply, I think you're going to see prices continue to soften.

back to the level, toward the levels that we were at before the war started as time goes on.

What does this mean for Alaska? I mean, and when you say see the prices soften again, Trump's vision and goal was oil in the mid to low 50s. And of course, we weren't there yet. I think we. Before the war spiked, it was down to, what, 64 or something like that. So we weren't quite there yet. But what does it mean for Alaska? I think it means that, unfortunately.

That the spring, unfortunately, from a revenue standpoint, unfortunately, from a budgetary standpoint, I'm always reminded by friends that it means different things on the gasoline side. But unfortunately, from the budgetary side, I think we're going to see prices come back down into the 60s, unless there's some serious supply disruption, long-term supply disruption.

that starts occurring as a result of the war. I think we're going to see prices starting to come back down where they were before, which sort of reflected the supply-demand, the pre-war supply-demand balance.

And if the war is not resulting in a significant supply disruption, I think we're going to see it come back down into that range that it was, which is in the 60s. And the market is going to sit there waiting for OPEC to see if OPEC continues to... continues to raise the levels what what opec what what what is is going on with opec is as a reason during covid opec brought its caps uh down significantly restricted supply significantly in an effort to as covid destroyed demand in in an effort to

balanced supply demand at a price point that was in the 70s. And so OPEC brought the caps down. What we've been seeing over the last few months is OPEC bringing the caps back up, essentially to pre-COVID levels. And they aren't finished doing that yet. They've sort of brought it up part of the way, but they haven't finished doing that. So I think what we'll see is prices come back down if there's no long-term supply disruption coming out of the war. I think we'll see prices.

come back into the 60s, sort of settle back into the 60s, and they'll sort of sit there waiting on what OPEC's going to do next in terms of continuing to lift the caps back to pre-COVID levels. So the short answer is I think we're going to continue to see budget softness in Alaska. So no quick fix to our budget woes for next year with that deficit because we'll probably be back. here within a few weeks if this conflict doesn't escalate or attack any of the supply lines or anything else.

All right. Interesting stuff. Brad Keithley, Alaskans for Sustainable Budgets. This was actually one of the things that I was wondering about as this attack came out. I was thinking, huh.

What does this do to oil prices? I mean, that sounds a little cruel, but I'm just like, huh, what does this do to oil prices in Alaska? That's how Alaskans think, isn't it? I mean, yeah. Ooh, war. Ooh. I was just wondering. I mean, you know, worried about... world war three maybe but yeah it was really what was going on with our oil prices uh all right uh back with more brad keith lee alaskans for sustainable budgets the weekly top three continues right after this don't go anywhere

Running on 100% pure beard power. Oh, also some coffee. We dip our beard in coffee. Ha, nice beard. The Michael Duke Show. Okay, we're in the break. We're ready to go. Anthony wins the internet this morning. He says, this looks like a before and after photo of beard growing ointment or something. That was great. That was great. It's a side-by-side. Before and after. Before and after. It was a great thing.

Or it's the much younger version. The much younger version, yeah. Don't let the white hair fool you. I'm only 42. All right, let's see.

uh i thought that was a great explanation because i've been wondering about this and uh you know i know that things are cyclical and and i know that after um I know that after the Russia attack that oil prices stabilized, you know, in a fairly short period of time. But I thought that was that's an interesting take on how all that go, how all that is going to lay out again.

This is just another one of those things where there was, you know, maybe there was a hopeful sigh of relief in Juno, and then they realized that maybe it's not going to save all that they're going to do. We're going to have to do something about this. Yeah, it really... It added a lot of confusion, and I think that confusion is still there to the governor's veto or the line item veto of education on K-12 spending.

citing the state's fiscal outlook, depressed fiscal outlook or lower fiscal outlook, and then coming out with the revised revenue forecast that dropped prices down even further than they had been in the spring revenue forecast. And then the next day, or maybe it was later that same day, Israel, Iran starts and prices spike. And so you have all those, you have a lot of comments out there of, you know, keyboard warriors that say, oh my God, you know.

Governor vetoes, but now prices are way up into the 70s and we have all this extra revenue over what the spring forecast. How could he have done that? Like Netanyahu called Dunleavy and said, by the way, your oil prices are going to spike, so don't veto anything because we're about to strike Iran. I mean, you know, come on. It's ridiculous.

But even if you'd known that, even if you'd known that, looking at, I mean, you've got to understand supply disruptions and you've got to focus on supply disruptions. And I will say. that Israel and Iran, Israel in its precision of targeting, and Iran in its response have sort of gone out of their way not to hit supply. I mean, Israel has hit internal domestic supply sources, energy supply sources for Iran, both on the gas side and the electric side, certainly, and somewhat on the oil side.

uh but israel's gone out of his way not to attack the export facilities and iran's still continuing to export and ships are picking it up and taking it out and it just keeps keeps on going so as long as that happens as you saw after 9-11, as you saw after Ukraine, after you saw after a lot of these things, as long as that happens and the market sort of sorts out well.

Maybe we aren't going to have supply disruptions here. You'll see the market respond in a fairly short period of time. It doesn't take the market long to absorb that information and then to incorporate it into prices.

Well, again, like I said, I hear something like this and all I remember is that old bumper sticker that said, you know, God, please grant us another pipeline. We promise not to piss this one away. It's like we're constantly waiting to be saved by some kind of world event.

that changes everything instead of changing our own behavior. That's the, that's the, you know, that's, that's the key here. Yeah. And the other thing, Michael, I mean, I'm reminded of a discussion we had last week or the week before. We Alaskans put ourselves in this position by predicating our budget on the futures market of the moment, right?

You know, we predicate spending, we predicate revenue and then spending on whatever the futures market is telling us. And as we've talked about on the show before, what we should be doing. is predicating revenues on historic, on an average of historic prices, just like we do on the PFD and just like we do on the POMV draw. We ought to be looking at what we've had in the past.

Chris asks, wouldn't export facilities become a higher priority for targeting as the war escalates? Yeah, it's possible, but... Anyway, it's an interesting discussion. We're about to jump back into it here, get with the program. Please like and share, like and follow. Subscribe, ring the bell, do all that stuff. Here we go. The Michael Duke Show, Common Sense Radio.

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. Yes, yes I am, proudly. Good morning and welcome back to the program. The Michael Luke Show continues. It is Tuesday, which means it's Truth Tuesdays, the weekly top three from Brad Keithley from Alaskans for Sustainable Budgets. continue on with our discussions number two Brad says he's not going to hold his breath

on the conclusions from the education task force. I mean, gasp. I'm shocked when you look at the makeup of the task force. What are they going to discover? Brad, give us your thoughts here. So one of the pieces of the education bill that passed over the governor's veto, I mean, we've got a lot of vetoes going on here. We've got a lot of bills going on, but we'll recall that there was an education bill.

that set the $700 BSA increase that the governor then line item vetoed in the budget. But the fundamental House bill that set that passed, then was vetoed by the governor, then passed over veto. uh and enacted over the veto um and so that that bill still sits out there as the law and one of the one of the provisions of that that we that we mostly talked about the increase in the bsa in that bill one of the provisions of that set up a task force

an education task force composed of legislators, uh, to go in and look at the K through 12 system in a task on a task force approach. Um, uh, and identify places where, you know, sort of in some ways, the fundamental truths of the education system. Does it need more funding? Where does it need more funding? Does it need reform?

policy reform where does it need policy reform now the task force has has a credibility issue right off the get-go because of the members uh you've got some very pro education members that are in the majority on the task force, and limited minority membership. There's six members, two from the majority in the Senate, two from the majority in the House. As you would expect, the House Education Chairman of both bodies are on the task force and very pro-education members.

from other committees or on the task force for the majority. It's Mike Kronk from the Senate, from the minority, and Jason Ruffridge from the House. So you can sort of guess where... where the conclusions are going to be. And so there's a credibility issue with the task force right off the beginning. But here's something that I think the task force actually could.

could raise awareness on and include in its conclusions and oddly enough the idea for that came from an opinion piece by a couple of members of the uh well, the chairman and a member of each of the Anchorage Daily News, Anchorage and Fairbanks school boards. He wrote an opinion piece that appeared in the ADN and the Fairbanks News Minor and elsewhere. The headline in the ADN is Governor Dunleavy's education veto shows a leadership crisis.

And Alaska's urgent need for a fiscal plan. And it's the last part of that, Alaska's urgent need for a fiscal plan that I think is important. Actually, the editorial that they wrote doesn't. go on to describe what they really mean by that it gets mentioned again only in the last paragraph of the of the op-ed but it but it but it it it triggered in my mind

Something that the education task force can do, and that is frame the education issue as a sub-issue of the overall fiscal issue the state is facing. I don't think you're ever going to get resolution on the K-12 issue. I don't think you're ever going to get resolution on any issue that involves any long-term resolution on any issue that involves the budget, involves spending.

Until you have a fiscal plan in place, as long as we're floating along, you know, dependent on what the futures market says about oil, dependent upon what the permanent fund corporation. investment policy is with respect to the permanent fund. As long as you're floating along with sort of a very unstable fiscal plan. I think you're always going to have unstable policy and unstable spending on the other side of the ledger. Those that depend upon the revenue side.

for, for spending to fund spending are always going to be at have, have uncertainty as long as there's uncertainty on the, on the revenue side. So I think, I think it would be very helpful in, I guess I'm really. appealing to to cronk and roughage to make this point during the uh during the deliberations of the body i think it would be very helpful if the education task force said look

One of the fundamentals that we've got to resolve before you can resolve education is to resolve the state's fiscal situation one way or another. You've got to lay down a solid base. on the fiscal side, on the revenue side, before we really will get resolution to what's going on over on the spending side, K-12 or any other. category of spending you want to address. We've got to get a stable base resolved on the revenue side.

And I'm not arguing for increasing revenues or lowering revenues or any of that. You've got to get a solid base on the revenue side. And I think part of that is you've got to go look at oil taxes. I think oil taxes are below the constitutional requirement of maximum contribution. And I think you've got to go look at oil taxes. I think you've got to go look at what the Permanent Fund Corporation is doing in terms of its investment policy. I think we're leaving $700 million.

maybe a billion dollars on the table, annual revenue in terms of revenue from the investment policies that the permanent fund corporation is pursuing.

I'm not suggesting that we have the education task force undertake to write a new oil tax code or to direct the... redirect the permanent fund corporation in a way that improves its investment policy but i but i am saying that i think it would be highly useful for the education task force to say that one of the foundations of getting K-12 or any spending policy right is getting a very stable fiscal revenue side.

in place. And I think that would be of service coming from this task force. Now, do I think they'll do it? Do I think the task force will make that a highlight? Probably not. Right. They'll want to highlight other things. But I think if Kronk and Ruffridge are there to contribute anything. I think it ought to be that sort of fundamental concept that we've got to get a fiscal plan, a solid fiscal plan in place before we really.

can't address any of these issues on the spending side that people want to address.

No, and I think that this has been the problem. Again, this is the, you know, the foundation of any home or pyramid or structure or whatever needs to be strong. And that's the problem is that our financial.

our financial foundation is all over the place we have no long-term plan or you know every outlook is only till next year or maybe the year after if it's forward looking at all there is no tenure there is no tenure plan there is no long-term you know a plan on any of this stuff and so yeah is is it surprising that we run around like our hair's on fire every every session to some new crisis um no

Because they can't decide. And again, this all goes back in my mind to, you know, we have a serious spending problem. Now, can we cut our way to to the solution? Probably not logistically. It would have to be some kind of step-down approach. But, you know, the bottom line is until we acknowledge that. We're not going to fix it. Whether we replace it with new revenues or whether we cut to it, until we even acknowledge it, it's not going to happen. Yeah.

And certainly we would get pushback from other members of the Education Committee Task Force on that issue. They would say, no, we have a revenue problem. My point here is what Alaska has done through various steps, focusing on the futures market being one of them, the oil futures market being one of them, is we have a very... roller coaster, a very unsolid, a very unstable fiscal base.

And as a consequence of that, and as we discussed in the show a few weeks ago, as a consequence of that, when you have these spikes in revenue, you get spikes in spending. you get new programs you get new capital projects underway you create new expectations you create new constituencies that sort of that sort of don't go away

When we go down the other side of the roller coaster and revenue sort of melts away, you've still got all of these programs. You've still got all this expectations of capital spending. You've still got all of these constituencies that are still out there. that got built up during the peak periods. Um, and, um, and, and, you know, and they continue pressing, even though revenue is melting away, I sort of, regardless of.

And it's hard to say this because I know people come with their own preconceived notions about what the solution is. But sort of regardless of whether it's a spending problem or a revenue problem, we just need to have a solid base, a solid base of revenue.

and have a base that doesn't go on this roller coaster when oil futures prices or oil prices do what they do. We need to have a structure that... takes any excess revenue over the base and puts it into some sort of stabilization fund to have it to have it there to to to balance things out when current revenues go away because oil prices prices go down until we have that sort of solid base and see what that see what that baseline is uh and then build

spending off that baseline. Until we have that, we're going to continue to have this debate and we're going to continue to have, you know. People say, oh, we need more spending or we need less spending or we need this or we need that. We need to be like more like a normal state in the sense of having a baseline of.

a regular predictable solid uh baseline of revenue and start from there and then see what spending fits within that baseline And I think the K-12 task force, I think any task force that's focused on the spending side would do the state a service. by saying, yes, we need to have that sort of solid base. One of the fundamentals of being able to figure out what to do on the spending side, whether we have too much, not enough, whatever.

One of the things we need to do on the spending side to have the spending side under control is to have an expectation of a solid base on the revenue side. Well, we know how much they pay attention to task force, right? I mean, the Fiscal Policy Working Group task force. I mean, you know, they...

You know, they did a lot of work, spent a whole summer that they can't get back, and yet they pretty much ignored everything that came out of that. So maybe we can just ignore whatever comes out of this group. I don't know. It's... It would be nice to see an actual, you know, commentary that says, hey, we need to have a fiscal plan and have somebody actually follow up with it. That's been part of the problem is that, you know, it's just it's never been followed up on.

Afterwards, we've probably gone through a dozen of these different, you know, working groups or task forces or special committees or whatever, and they just never follow through on it. Why? Because it's easier to do what you've always done.

And that's, you know, until, of course, until, of course, the piggy bank runs dry. And then then what do you do? Final thoughts here, Brad, on this. Well, we do have the Fiscal Policy Working Group. Jesse Keel was on that. Jesse Keel is on this task force. I hope.

would be that he would bring the learning from the fiscal policy working group over to the task force and talk about the need for that solid baseline. Whether Jesse's going to do that is probably not in the art of the possible. But I do think Cronk and Ruffridge. I think that's what they can be. If they can be additive about anything, they can be additive about talking about. needing to have a solid fiscal base before we really can have a solid discussion about education policy or anything else.

Brad Keithley, Alaskans for Sustainable Budgets, the weekly top three. We're ready to jump into this and go on to number three. Please don't go anywhere. We're going to be right back. We'll continue. We're going to talk about Japan and Jarrah and AKLNG. And what does it mean? What does it mean? Double rainbow. We'll be back with more. Right after this, The Michael Duke Show. Common Sense, Liberty-based, free-thinking 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 weekday morning on Facebook Live and MichaelDukesShow.com. Well, you'll be happy to know, Brad, that Mike Cronk is in the chat room and said, Brad, that is exactly what I told every single superintendent that came into my office and asked us to help, or if they could help.

I told them to help us implement a fiscal plan. I mean, I hope it happens. I, you know, again, cautiously optimistic that maybe something will come out of this. But again. Two members of the minority versus the rest of them, and looking at the rest of the makeup, they're all very much pro spend, spend, spend. I don't know how much horsepower they're going to have in that room when it's all said and done.

Well, senators start every meeting and every meeting with that statement. And at some point it will be enough that people can't ignore you about it. I do think. I do think that it could be very helpful to continue to remind this task force or any task force of the need for a solid, predictable baseline. that doesn't get spiked when oil prices go up. There's a way of taking that excess money and putting it into a stabilization fund as opposed to creating more constituencies by...

by spending it. I think there's a lot of helpfulness that can be used by reminding this task force and others that we need that as a baseline before we really can have useful discussions on spending policy. yeah i mean that's the thing i mean like i was trying to say earlier until we acknowledge that there's a problem we're just going to keep doing what we're doing And that's what we've been running through for the last 35 years is just, you know, oh, there's no problem.

you know, hey, we're $3 billion underwater. No big deal. We'll just take it out of our savings account and it'll be fine next year. And then it wasn't fine the next year. And it wasn't fine the next year. And every year it was $3 billion, $4 billion that they draw from CBR until there was no more money. And then they just, again, it's a classic game of avoidance of dealing with the issue.

that you're spending more money than you are taking in, period, full stop, end of sentence. And they just, they don't want to even acknowledge that that's part of the problem. Yeah. And not acknowledging, I mean, and both Republicans and Democrats do it. I mean, we had a price spike. We had a price spike, what, two or three years ago. when the Republicans were in charge of the legislature and we had Republican co-chairs and they spent it. They spent it on a capital budget, but they spent it.

And and it's and we so we've created expectations. We've created constituencies. We've created a sense of, hey, they got theirs. Where's mine? We just. We do all sorts of bad things to ourselves when we run this roller coaster, when we run our state fiscal policy on this roller coaster of forward-looking. uh oil prices um and and and spending every cent we have

And creating expectations, we're going to continue to be able to spend those cents when we hit the downside. Well, it's like I said, one of the things that we need to change is the way we budget. I mean, that was one of number four in the charter of changes is, you know, we need to start looking at an average instead of predicting what's going to happen next year. We need to look back and say, what have we got in the last five or six years, the last 10 years? What is our average? Okay.

then that's what we're going to budget on, and we should go from there. But we need a governor that has the fortitude to actually do that, right? I mean, that's the problem. I mean, we're laughing, but that's the problem.

Oh, yeah. Dunleavy's just been such a, from a fiscal standpoint, Dunleavy's just been such a disappointment. I mean, this year's budget, this year's budget is a classic. in terms of in terms of his proposed but his proposed budget was a classic in terms of showing how bad it can be you know the 10-year forecast showed yeah we have enough revenue and enough savings to get us through a couple years and then it's just one big red line

from there on out. And as governor, I'm just going to throw it out there that way. I'm not going to try to propose any solutions to it. That's just the way I'm going to ride here. And that's, you know... what did we elect the guy to do? We didn't elect the guy to do that. We elected him to actually come up with proposed solutions to it.

No, it's definitely frustrating. And in all honesty, of doing this for 25 years, all I can say is it's been the most frustrating thing because this has been the one thing that I have been pointing to. for 25 years, that you can't continue to spend more than you take in and expect it's going to work out okay. math doesn't work that way right we can't work with negative integers on a math on a on a budget basis and unfortunately

You know, they all just, oh, it's fine. Why are you so, why are you so down? Why are you so negative? Oh, it'll be great. It'll be fine. And yet here we are. Like you said, the big red line. That's why we all wore the red shirts today. The big red line, right? That's what it came down to. And then you have things like Israel, Iraq, right? Or Israel, Iran. And people say, oh, well, see, we're going to be bailed out again. Look at those prices spike and sort of forget.

That they come back down and that OPEC is on a drive to take control of the market again at a lower price point. It's just, it is frustrating to be on this roller coaster. It is. We've been up. All right. Brad Keithley, Alaskans for Sustainable Budgets. Like, share, subscribe, ring the bell. Let's do it. 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.

All right, we're continuing now. Brad Keithley, Alaskans for Sustainable Budgets, the weekly top three. We're saved, Brad. We're saved. They're going to build an AKLNG. You heard him say it. The president said we're going to do it. We're saved. Of course, you and I, who've been following this issue, you for a lot more than I have, but I've been following this issue, know that this is, again, one of those pie crust promises, easily made, easily broken, right?

And yet we continue to hear about all these deals. Now, Japan may have gone maybe a little more solid on the record. I don't know. Tell us about this decision from Jarrah and who Jarrah is and give us the give us the rundown here. So Jarrah is the biggest Japanese LNG purchaser.

uh there there are a number of japanese lng purchasers jera is the one that purchases sort of a consortium that purchases for the electric utilities uh in japan and is the biggest purchaser of Japanese LNG or imports of LNG into Japan. A couple of weeks ago, or maybe last week, we talked about the thing that surprised me the most or the thing that happened.

The thing that was most important about the governor's sustainability conference, energy sustainability conference, was the thing that didn't happen. And the thing that didn't happen was this big signing party. that I think people had looked toward when you had the members of the Trump administration up here. I think there was a hope and by some an expectation.

that there was going to be a big signing party where the japanese koreans and taiwanese came in and signed you know binding letters of intent or maybe even even uh even even not binding letters of intent but at least letters of intent at the sustainability conference uh around lng there had been a lot of a lot of discussion about you know there was going to be a summit an lng summit in alaska in the early weeks of june

uh timed with the governor's sustainability conference we were going to have members of the administration up here of the trump administration up here to you know represent the administration we were going to have representatives of japan and korea and others up here we were going to have a big signing party and i think that what we talked about last week was the biggest news out of the sustainability conference was the thing that didn't happen

which is that we didn't have that signing party. Well, I didn't know at the time, but turns out there was going to be a signing party, but it didn't involve AKL and G. This past week, there was an announcement by Jarrah and others and a big signing party that Secretary...

that the Secretary of Interior and the Secretary of Energy, Chris Wright, were at. It was a signing party that involved Jarrah, the big Japanese purchaser. making a big shift, announcing a big shift in supply sources from Australia to the U.S. and in a significant commitment by Jera to U.S. supplies as it rebazzed. to use its terms rebalanced its supply from australian focused to more u.s focused big signing party down in houston attended by a number of people with jara signing four agreements

four LNG supply agreements with four suppliers, all of which are located in the U.S. Gulf Coast. No Alaska at all. Not even a piece of it out of the four, not even a piece of the four agreements is Alaska oriented. And so I think, you know, coupled with the non-event. at the sustainability conference, coupling that with the event that occurred with the signing party down in Houston involving Jarrah, I think we've got to see the writing on the wall.

about the Alaska LNG project. If you can't, I mean, how Jarrah pitched this was, look, we are realigning or rebalancing. our supply portfolio from australian focused australia focused to us to an increased us focus we are signing agreements significant agreements for offtake agreements with U.S. suppliers, these four U.S. suppliers. We are focusing on the U.S. We are improving our trade relations with the U.S. We have the Secretary of Interior.

And the Secretary of Energy down at the signing party talking about how important it is and how great it is to have this U.S. focus. And for Alaska not even to have a piece of that. is very telling. If you can't, when JIRA is rebalancing, intentionally rebalancing from Australia to the U.S. And it's signing agreements to implement that rebalancing. If Alaska, and Jara is the largest LNG purchaser, Japanese LNG purchaser, if Alaska can't even get a piece of that.

Can't even get a piece of the market for the largest LNG, for the largest Japanese LNG purchaser. I don't know. I really don't know what hope there is. for saying that you're going to be able to bring this project together. So the signing party down in Houston hasn't gotten a lot of press up here or any press up here. But by gosh, you know, when I saw that, the headlines of it, that is probably more significant news for Alaska LNG.

then any piece of news, including the fact that Glenn Farns had entered into contracts, is probably the most significant news for Alaska LNG in the past six months, certainly, and possibly the past year. Right. And it's not the news you would want it to be. No, because logistically, again, it's a straight shot from Alaska. All this other stuff is coming from the Gulf Coast of Texas, which means it has to come through the canal or around the horn or wherever they're bringing it.

And so you would think it would, oh, it's a straight shot from Alaska. You'd think it would be easy, even if it's a, and those are all non-binding agreements, right? Those are all head of agreement. No, there's two of them that are binding. Two of them are binding. And we're talking about, I mean, this is like 5 million tons.

per year i mean this is this is a significant amount even if they had just said oh we'll break off a million tons per year for alaska i mean it would have been something but i think everybody's looking at this and going no not gonna

not, not going to happen. I just, that's how I read it at this point. Yeah. It, it, it, I mean, Jared, Jared isn't saying this and it, and it doesn't. It's not all of Jarrah's demand, but this is a shift of 20% of Jarrah's demand from Australia to Alaska. The U.S. goes from 10% up to 30% as a result of these agreements.

And Jera wants to, I mean, they're making the point that we want to rebalance because we want supply diversity. And you've also got, I mean, so they're keeping Australia as a part of it. They've got the Middle East as a part of it, a big part of it. And now they're saying we've got the U.S. as a big part of it. So at some point, I mean, Jared is going to say, look, we've filled the U.S. quota. We filled in this portfolio of diversity.

We've filled what we want out of the U.S. with these agreements. We've rebalanced to get what we want out of the U.S. in these agreements. There isn't anything left or anything significant. left in their in their demand. And if you don't, if you're not, I mean, if this is the largest LNG purchaser in Japan and they don't have anything left for Alaska, how the heck are you ever going to bring this off?

Yeah. So I, it is, it is major. It is just, just like the biggest news out of the, out of the sustainability conference was, you know, the event that didn't happen. The biggest event for Alaska LNG is the event that did happen that nobody's talking about in Alaska because it didn't happen up here. Right. Didn't happen up here and it didn't mention us and nobody's inferring the...

the context of that. And that's part of the problem here is that we've got to, you know, this, this does not paint a rosy picture of the AK LNG project when it's all said and done. Uh, Brad, 60 seconds here. Final thoughts.

well michael uh oil prices are up but oil prices are going to come back down alaska lng isn't going to save us we've got to talk about fiscal policy uh as part of the as part of the education task force we've got to put this all in the proper context of we can only spend what we have Yeah, we've got to. And we've got to acknowledge that there is an issue. And until we address that.

We're just going to be like those, you know, we're just going to continue on blithely with business as usual because that's the course of least resistance at this point. It's just continuing on as we've been doing. But we know that that's not going to work out for us in the end. Brad Keithley, Alaskans for sustainable budgets. You can find him on Facebook, on Twitter, and at ak4sb.com. Go argue with him on Twitter. He loves that. He needs more of that in his life. Brad, thank you so much.

Michael, as always, thanks for having me. Folks, we've got more coming up. Hour two, dead ahead, The Michael Duke Show. Yeah, I mean, as much as people... as much as people want and dream and i mean i was on the lng bandwagon for many years Until I really started getting into it and looking at, again, the economics and the different reports and talking with you over the years. And, you know, I just like, I would love to have it.

But we've got to be realistic. We've got to make plans. We've got to base it on the worst-case scenario, and the worst-case scenario is it's not going to come through. That's not only the worst case scenario, it's also the most realistic. Right, the most likely scenario. Yeah, exactly. And, you know, every once in a while you sort of spike and say, okay, we are the closest. We are the closest to Japan.

And it would be, you know, you would have a savings in terms of time. You would have a savings in terms of money. You would have a savings or you would have benefits in terms of security because you wouldn't have to either go through the canal or go around the horn. And so, yeah, we do have an advantage there. But to have that in successive weeks. to have that not acknowledged basically by the absence of a signing party during the Alaska Sustainability Conference. And then...

Well, looks like we lost Brad for a second there. All right. Well, we're going to continue here. Don't go anywhere. The Michael Duke Show, Common Sense, Liberty-based, free-thinking radio. We'll see if we can bring Brad back up on the screen here in just a second, get his final thoughts as we as we looks like we got a whole bump here. So let me take a quick break and we'll be right back. Gravy? Oh, hey. Oh, hey. How are you?

Boy, I don't know what happened, but all of a sudden, Brad was talking, and then he just disappeared. Everything else was connected, but I think StreamYard crashed. I don't know what happened. Anyway, Brad, you were giving us your final thoughts, and I know you've been filler bustering for the last two and a half minutes. I've been reading the chat room. I've been doing your role of reading the chat room.

We had some great ideas. Brian said, talk about music. So I talked about music for a couple of nice, nice. Yeah, no, that was one of those things where it was just like, yeah, you were talking and then everything blank. I mean, my internet didn't drop. I'm still on the internet everywhere. But I think the StreamYard app that we use to broadcast had a hiccup on my end or something. Yeah, just don't talk biscuits.

Just don't talk biscuits. What's the deal with biscuits? Oh, Harold is always talking about it. It's more interesting to talk about biscuits than it is to listen to what we've got. But he's here every day to complain about how boring. this show is and how wrong we all are and he wants to tell us all about it so it's uh we just won't talk about biscuits so that'll be it

Well, Brad, last minute, so I'll give you the final. You've had a lot of say, but I didn't hear it. So any final thoughts before we go for the rest of the show? No, Michael, I think I covered it all in the minutes. So much good stuff. So much good stuff. I'm going to have to go back and watch it. Go back and listen to the podcast. If you want to pick up anything, go back and listen to the podcast. The worst part is that that's not going to be on the podcast.

It'll only be on the replays on YouTube and Facebook. So I might have to go peel it out and put it into the podcast. People can hear me go, bye, Brad. left hanging i'm only here to leave you hanging brad you did you did great buddy you did great i don't know i don't don't i said i i told him you usually call me when one of these things happens and tells me what to do with it but you didn't even call no well because i thought it was

going to come right back i mean i thought it was like you know i had to actually i had to close that browser window and restart it so anyway uh hashtag engineer problems all right brad thank you so much for coming on board my friend it's good to see you Michael, as always, thanks for having me. All right. We'll see you later. Wow. Okay. Well, Brad's a trooper. He took care of me on that one. Here we go. The Michael Duke Show, Common Sense Radio.

Oh, buddy, put that thing back in its holster. We haven't gone anywhere. I don't understand. Check out themichaeldukesshow.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 fathom it.

The Michael Dukes Show, streaming live across the world. Live around the world on the internet at MichaelDukesShow.com and across the state of Alaska on this, your favorite radio station and or FM translator. Hello, my friends, and good morning to you. on this tuesday edition of the show you don't know what happened during the break but it was

It was hysterical. We were just talking, finishing things up with Brad, and boom, I went away. My connection to our conferencing software just crashed or something. I still had internet. It was just all of a sudden there was, it was Brad all alone on the stage talking to the chat room and he was a trooper about it. So I appreciate him.

Appreciate him jumping into that and doing that. It's always awkward when the host just disappears arbitrarily. I mean, you know, so it's just one of those things. But we just finished up with Brad Keithley from Alaskans for Sustainable Budgets. It's always an interesting discussion, you know, and I know some people get mad about all the things that Brad talks about. But I think if we don't have the discussions and offer points and counter.

points then uh you know you know it'll be something that'll it will get something else that'll be forced down our throats if we don't uh if we don't deal with that so Anyway, it was a good discussion with Brad Keithley. And if you missed it, you can go back and listen to it either on the podcast, which is available wherever podcasts are found, or, of course, on the replay on Facebook.

have to go back and watch the facebook replay to see what brad said because i couldn't hear it didn't and none of that went on the podcast so it uh it's good stuff All right. Hour two of the big radio show today. We've got Chris Story coming up at the end of the show.

to give us our weekly life coaching lesson and to give us a little bit of positivity. Although today wasn't too bad. Today I thought was some good discussions about... you know, about some of the serious issues and some of the main problems that we're still dealing with here in the state of Alaska, which, number one, I'll get to here in just a minute. and continue to discuss. But overall, this is, you know, this I thought was a very solid discussion.

on the impact of the Israel is Iran thing and AKLNG and the education discussion, which is going to be... You know, like I said, this is going to be an interesting session. I mean, we said that about last session, and I think we probably said that about the session before. But let's just say that each one is going to be. More interesting than the last at this point. Let's let's get to that. But first things first on Wednesday.

At a Wednesday at eight at seven o'clock at eight o'clock, we're going to be joined by Nick Begich. Congressman Nick Begich will be joining us. I just got confirmation yesterday from his coordinator, Rick Whitbick, and we're going to be... talking with Congressman Nick here about all the stuff, Big Beautiful Bill, and I'm sure many other things that will come about here and where he sees things going for Alaska.

uh here in the future and we'll talk with him a little bit about our favorite subject which of course is uh is arithmetic uh you know how's that working out for him in the congress when he's got a bunch of people out there that just are determined that they're going to spend everything that they can. So we'll have that conversation tomorrow with Congressman Nick Begich. We're also going to be talking with David Yoragi probably maybe tomorrow or Thursday.

about some things happening down in the KPB with the borough and flooding and groundwater issues and some other things. It'll be an interesting discussion. I was fascinated when I first started talking to him about it, and we're going to get the full rundown from him on that this week, tomorrow or Thursday. And there was one other thing I suppose I could have pulled my calendar up and because I, you know, get to that point where I can't remember everything. Too many things happening.

Oh, we were going to be interviewing Bernadette on Thursday, but that's been moved because she's got another commitment. So we're going to be talking with Bernadette Wilson in just a couple weeks as well on that. As well. Oh, and of course, a big thing today is that I would like to wish my daughter a happy birthday. Today is my daughter's birthday. So very exciting. For my second oldest daughter, who is now, well, I got to do the math on that. She's 27, 28, 28 today.

Wow. That's that's that's time flies when you're having fun. Time flies. So happy birthday, Maggie, out there as well.

um all right so a couple stories that i want to get into but i want to recap some of the things that we were just talking about with brad uh because i i just don't think i mean i was just gonna say i was just gonna say something you know trite like well we really need to hit this topic hard because it's important and then i realized That's been my life for 25 years. We've been hitting a couple of these topics really hard for 20 to 25 years.

But two of the topics that Brad brought up were intertwined, and that was, of course, this discussion on this education committee. Now, I don't really have high hopes. for this education committee. Even with the two minority members on there, Justin Ruffridge out of the Kenai here, he has said that he pretty much fully supports education. And to me, that's almost code for whatever they want they'll get. Now, he didn't say that. That's just kind of my interpretation of it.

And the second member is from up in the interior near Fairbanks, and that's Mike Kronk. And Mike was actually in the chat room this morning and said that he that he agreed with Brad and that he had been telling people. And I can't go back and see the comment anymore because I had to refresh, but that he agreed and he's been telling people that we need a fiscal plan, which is great. But at the same time, again, I'm.

And Mike, this is no secret to Mike, I'm a little disappointed that he voted for the increase in the BSA rather than just a one time funding piece, because, again, we've we just don't know what's happening. Um, you know, we just don't know what's happening, uh, with our, with our finances moving forward and we shouldn't commit to something in perpetuity. If we don't know where our finances are, this all comes back to, this all comes back to one thing.

We don't have a long-term fiscal plan in this state. David just said, breaking news, Michael. The education task force has determined that more money will improve K-12 education. I mean, right. I mean, right. That's what's going to come out of here. I can guarantee you that coming out of this meeting will be some kind of thing about.

how we are underfunding, that our children are starving, that we're failing, that it's unconstitutional. It doesn't matter that we're spending more than almost anybody else in the nation on a per student basis. The thing that's going to fix it is more money. Right? Because that's all we've heard. That's all we've heard.

That's why we're failing. That's why we're 51 out of 53 jurisdictions. That's why we're down in the bottom on everything for educational standards and scholastic achievement and everything. It's all because we've been...

starving our kids that's weird that was the language we're not failing we're starving right that's been the the thing but this all i the whole school thing i mean it's it's really a separate issue Because even if we have a full on fiscal plan, if they just want more money out of our fiscal plan. That's not going to solve the issue. So there's a whole other thing going on with education and et cetera, et cetera. And we can get into that. But the...

the bottom line and what i really came out of this and this goes back to that opinion piece that brad was referencing that was written by our very own melissa burnett who's a who's a friend of the show president of the Fairbanks School Board, Tim Duran from the Fairbanks School Board, Carl Jacobs, who's the president of the Anchorage School Board, and Kelly Lessons.

who is a treasurer on the Anchorage School Board. So four school board members wrote this opinion piece. And the headline reads, Governor Dunleavy's education veto shows a leadership crisis. And Alaska's urgent need for a fiscal plan. Now, I wish they'd spent a little bit more time in this opinion piece on the need for a fiscal plan, because although it's in the headline, it really doesn't get into it at the very last.

paragraph, it says, it's past time for Alaskans leaders to develop a sustainable long-term fiscal plan that wholly funds public education. That's it. That's the whole mention of a fiscal plan. There needs to be more. There needs to be more on what that fiscal plan looks like. What does it mean that we're not always out there fighting it back and forth? And I would argue that we need a closer look at what...

what these school boards and school districts have been doing with a lot of the money that they've received already. Again, we're spending more than almost any other state in the nation on a per capita basis. It's right up there in the top. I mean, we're top three, top four of the whole nation, and yet we continue to do poorly on the achievement. We're in the bottom.

And so it's not necessarily just a money issue. The states are beating us all the time. Mississippi is the latest one that's been doing some changes in how they do schooling. And they've seen some tremendous leaps. They moved up, I think, 12 or 13 places. And they spend a fraction of what we spend. So it's not always about money. It's how you do it and what you do with the money. So, I mean, that's something that, again, that's a whole nother show.

of just that discussion on what are we doing wrong. But the bottom line is we need to come up, we need to figure out in this state how we're going to do things moving forward. Because as of right now, millions of dollars and hundreds of thousands of man hours wasted fighting over the scraps that are left in the yard we're again we're facing huge deficits One and a half billion dollars this coming year. Maybe there'll be a little less. Maybe the.

Maybe the war in Israel and between Israel and Iran will push those those oil prices up a little bit more and maybe it'll peel a little bit of that off. But you're not going to make up a billion and a half dollars over that. And we're going to have to tackle this. In January. We have to have a fiscal plan. And we just don't.

I mean, we had a we put together a fiscal policy working group, which was another task force. Speaking of task forces that had some good ideas. But how many of those ideas got implemented? How many? Let me guess. It starts with a Z and ends with a ERO. All right. I mean, zero of those ideas got even hardly entertained.

Ben Carpenter was the yeoman trying to get some of these things across the line. And I felt for the guy, it felt like he must have been beating his head against the wall and could get nothing past after they spent a big chunk of the summer. Two years previous, trying to put all these things in, nobody wanted to talk about it. And again, the Senate's answer to that question of what is your fiscal plan? Gary Stevens proudly points to, oh, well.

75-25, that's our fiscal plan. And how long did that last? One year? Because this year it's what, 82-18? 83-17, that's the fiscal plan for this year? Because they took more of the PFD? Because they have no plan!

He said the quiet part out loud. He called it 7525. But what he should have just said is the PFD. That's our plan. Taking the PFD. Because this next year. You know, you just got a thousand dollar PFD this year, which adjusted for inflation is the lowest PFD ever distributed. Next year. which when they're facing a deficit that is at least two, maybe three times as large as the one we were facing this year, what do you think is going to happen to that remaining 17% of your PFD?

Uh, I just, I just don't bet on the F come baby. So how, how did that 75, 25 again, it wasn't really 75, 25. His answer was the PFD. That's our fiscal plan. But of course, that means that this coming year is the last year of their fiscal plan. The PFD will be gone, and then there are no readily available pots of money to draw from.

No other monies that they can just as a majority swing, swing, swing a majority vote on any of those things, because the last one is the CBR that requires, you know, cooperation with the minority because it's a three quarter vote. So this is the last, the gravy train's almost over pal. That's, that's where we're at right now. Anyway. All right. Well, let's, um,

We're going to take a break, and when we come back, we'll talk about some of the headlines that are going on around here, and we'll be back. Don't go anywhere. The Michael Duke Show, Comedy Sense, Liberty-based, free-thinking radio. We return in just a moment. 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.

Okay, I'm reading through the chat, through the comments right there. Frank says, you know, what are the school board's fiscal plan? Where is the school board's fiscal plan? In Fairbanks is what he's talking about. Melissa. says we just approved ours two weeks ago too much to type here but we do have one frank says for how many years out and melissa says five which wasn't enough i wanted 10 to 15 but we got five

I mean, at least you got five, I guess. And are they betting on a continuous increase, Melissa? Are they betting on a continuous increase or are they looking at a five years of austerity? Because that's what they need to be looking at. They need to be looking at five years of austerity. They also need to take into account that five years of declining enrollment and everything else. You know?

Wow. Michael really wants to give an arm and a leg. I mean, not literally an arm and a leg, but something else. He said, we tackle the billion-dollar deficit by selling a kidney and blood plasma from each resident of the state. That's dedication. I'm giving my state the kidney. Giving my kidney for the good of the state. Oh, man. says the quiet part out loud, taxes are inevitable. And I mean, at this point, I mean, I came to that conclusion about five years ago.

That at this point, and based on the trajectory that we were on, that taxes, they're inevitable in the state. Because nobody's willing to admit. That we've got a problem and address the root cause of it. So at that point, it's an inevitability. That's what we're going to be facing. Okay. I'm sorry. I'm getting, uh, I'm getting messages here. Oh, okay. My mom's my, well, my mom, my wife is sending me the video. She just sent me as the words, my mom in the front of it. Um,

She's sending me cute dog videos. That's it. She's sending me cute dog videos. We love it. All right. I mean, she's listening, but. She's trying to bring me back on track, you know. Kim also said, it's so sad to see the demise of our state when it didn't have to happen. Isn't that how hindsight works all the time? I mean, you're talking about foresight, Chris or Kim, but I mean, isn't that how it always works?

I was so sad to see the demise of our state when it didn't have to happen, when we couldn't. And, you know, we're like Chicken Little out here crying that the sky is falling and everybody's like, no, no, it's fine with the big props, you know, holding the shaky sky up. Let's see. The legislature and the governors and the state courts have been creating this scenario for years, said David. Yeah, it's 100% true as well. Now I'm scrolling backwards a little bit here to see where we're at.

Michael is also a little bit negative this morning, Michael. Bottom line, we have no hope in the near future. Buckle up for the ride. It's going to be a rough one. I mean, it's been rough so far. But yeah, you wait over the next three or four years with all these deficits that we have right now. Yeah, it's going to be an interesting, interesting, interesting ride, to say the least.

And like I said before, you know, it's one thing to grab your bucket of popcorn and watch the train plummet off the bridge while you're standing on the sidelines eating your popcorn. It's a whole nother thing to be in the second car. as the train plummets off the bridge into the ravine. And that's where we're at right now. You know, we've been on the outside telling them to slow down, pull on the brakes. It's going to be bad. Don't do it. And now, boom.

Now we're stuck in train car number two, watching over the engineer's shoulder as they ride into the chasm. All right. Chasm. Chasm. Chasm. Well, how do you say it? That's the thing. The Michael Duke Show, Common Sense, Liberty Base, Free Thinking Radio. Let's continue on here. We've got one more segment before Chris. Don't forget tomorrow, Nick Baggage will be joining us and more. I was early. The Michael Duke Show. Seriously humorous with a pinch of intellect. Pinch of intellect. Sorry.

That is humorous. Here's Michael Dukes. Okay. Welcome back to the old radio broadcast for this Tuesday edition. Oh, it's so good. You guys ready? Some interesting things are happening. Excuse me.

Wow. My cough button was not there long enough. Some interesting things happening here in the state from a journalistic standpoint. It was just announced late yesterday, and Suzanne Downing over at Must Read has got this piece. And I think I got to feel like Suzanne must be feeling a little smug. a little prescient on this because there's been a big shakeup down in Juneau. They are seeing a shift in their, in their landscape, as she says down there.

As two well-known reporters headed new directions, one is stepping away from the newsroom completely, apparently for a break of some kind. And the other is. taking a whole new path and going independent. So it starts off with Sean McGuire, who we quote quite frequently on this show. Sean is the veteran reporter down at the Capitol for the ADN, the Anchorage Daily News. And he has he announced his departure and is is off.

off into the weeds he said he has no plans at the moment but intends to quote unquote explore new opportunities so he's not moving to another paper or doing anything else he's just you know he's just on the way out Now, Suzanne does mention that many who left the ADN have ended up in political jobs for Democrats, which, I mean, I guess is a possibility. It would be a little disappointing, but, you know, it's a possibility.

In his announcement, he added a link where people could apply for his job. So if anybody out there dreams of going to Juneau and covering all the legislative politics, here's your opportunity. to go to work for the ADN and to be this whole thing. But she also points out that the Daily News has had some real problems. After they unionized, the workers unionized at the ADN, the editorial staff under the News Guild, and they were...

saying that the reason that they unionized was because they were saying that better wages would keep people in the newsroom. But they've had a continuous decline. Just people have been leaving a steadily a steady outflow from the ADN ever since then, which, again, just proves a point that I made probably 10 or 15 years ago that you could slowly see that the demise of regular print media was. was it was on the horizon i guess we'll just say it was on the horizon um so mark sean mcguire is out

And who knows where he's going to end up, whether he's going to stay in journalists or if he's going to become an advocate or a PR person or who knows. Meanwhile, on the other side of Juno.

Mark Sabatini, who has been with the Juno Empire for a coon's age, has pulled the plug. Today is his last day at the Juno Empire. But he, on the other hand, is going fully independent. In fact, that's what it's called. It's called the Juno Independent. It's a new online publication. And he apparently has some financial backing already. He's got it all set up and he's ready to go. This apparently has been in the works for a while. And this, of course, is...

The Juno Empire has had some struggles over the last few years. It recently changed ownership. It was purchased by the Sound Publishing. which is the same entity that owns the Kenai Peninsula Clarion down here. And they've had some real problems, though, with the Juno Empire. It now only prints actual newspapers twice a week, and it's printed out of state. They don't even print it in state. And they ship it up.

And it's undergoing what Suzanne Downing describes as financial restructuring. And they are already said that they're not going to replace Sabatini, which. kind of weird Juno empire in Juno won't have somebody to cover Juno capital politics. You know, kind of interesting to say. The Juno Empire is instead going to be managed from the Kenai Peninsula Clarion's offices here. They're going to manage it from... Oh, this is going to be... He's been working at the Empire for...

Uh, let's see, started in the nineties, left for a little bit and then returned. Um, and he's been serving as both the reporter and its editor while they have been dealing with this last little bit and now has decided to go full independent. Um, although, you know, independent is kind of a loaded word when it comes to, um, some of the things that happen out there. Like, I would not say.

As much as I like must read, um, must read. I would not say it's independent, probably in the word that you're thinking. I'm saying it's independent of any newsroom or newspaper, but it does have a bias, just like the Alaska Current, Matt Buxton's thing has a bias. The Midnight Sun blog, the Alaska landmine, Nat Herz's Northern Journal. They all have they all have a bias. They're independent only in terms of.

Not being part of the legacy, a legacy news outlet like a newspaper or something like that. Oh, the Alaska Beacon. That's another big one. I mean, the Alaska Beacon, that's all funded by. you know, the progressive, big progressive entities behind the Alaska Beacon. But as long as you know that going in and you read it and you realize you're going to get a certain slant on it, then, you know, you're good to go. You should understand that.

But this is what's happening. You're seeing all these things transition to more independent, non-mainstream news outlets. And that's, I think, a good thing. Not only does it give you a variety of choices in what type of news media you can get, but it also allows you to, you know... There doesn't have to be a vein of, not a vein, a veneer. There's not even a veneer of we're trying to be non-biased, right?

I mean, for the Alaska Beacon, you know where they're coming from. It's a liberally funded, liberally supported news outlet. Must Read is a conservative news outlet. You know, the Alaska landmine is weird. It's both conservative and liberal at times. So I don't know. I wouldn't say it's libertarian. I would just say it's weird.

But again, I think it's good because it gives us a good, you know, at least people won't look at it and go, oh, they're completely unbiased. They know, at least you know about it. So I guess.

Interesting news. I don't know if it's good news overall, but it's interesting news for sure. And we'll have to see where it goes from here. Yeah, that same company owns the Juno Empire, the Peninsula Clarion, and the Homer News. So we'll have to see. We'll see how that we'll have to see how that works here in the long run. What was the other story that I wanted to get to here before how much time we got? Oh, we don't have enough time to get into this.

I want to talk a little bit about this. Maybe we should spend a little bit of tomorrow's morning show in the first hour talking about. um, the, uh, Chewbacca report, right? The department of, uh, uh, division of elections report. And one of the things that Ben and I briefly touched on, but didn't really get into, which is the The PFD voter registration. And how the PFDAVD, which is the automatic voter registrar, AVR, PFDAVR, I guess is what they call it.

which is the PFD automatic voter registration law, has created a lot of headaches for the state of Alaska, for the Division of Elections specifically, and is something that needs to be... repealed and turned around. And there's a lot of reasons for it. But we will, you know, we need to... It's something we need to discuss at a much deeper level than the time that I have left right now to get into that.

Maybe tomorrow we'll pick this up and do it. But again, we've got Nick Begich coming up in hour two. So maybe we'll pick this up in hour one tomorrow. It'll be something. I'll give you something to look forward to. Something to look forward to. We hope you like it. All right, we got more coming up. Don't go anywhere. Chris Story is up next. The man from Homer. We'll continue. Don't go anywhere. The Michael Duke Show. Common Sense, Liberty-based, free-thinking radio. We 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 weekly morning on Facebook Live and MichaelDukesShow.com. Michael says it's unfortunate that it is very hard to find only news anymore. Most articles are opinion pieces with nitpicked parts to fill the narrative. It's true. I mean, you know, it's true.

But that's what you're finding. You know, you're finding that in what so-called mainstream news media outlets, right? It's more opinion than anything else. A lot of times or lazy journalism. in the terms of lazy journalism, in the terms of, you know, just rewriting a press release, you know, half the time.

I got a frog in my throat this morning. Half the time, I think they take press releases from the various outlets and they just drop them into chat GPT and rewrite them and then post them as a news article. I mean, I'm sure they don't do that, but I mean, you know, that's what it seems like. And there's, you know, very rarely, especially from the conservative viewpoint, do you see any point counterpoint? It's it's very frustrating to to watch this stuff happen.

But it is what it is. Let me see if I can get Chris on. I don't know if he was going to log in or call in this morning, but I'll give him a call and see if I can get it. Of course. of course it's not gonna work here let's try this again we'll try it again we'll try it one more time we'll see if we if we're calling him or if uh he wants to do it through his system there we go

Try it one more time. Morning, Michael. Good morning. I wasn't sure if you were going to try and log in through the video thing or not. Oh, shoot. I totally forgot that. Is your phone working? Yeah, my phone's working. I mean, we're working. It's connected. Yeah, we can do it. That's fine. It's all good. Yeah, totally forgot. You gave me one week away and I totally forgot about the new methodology.

Yeah. What was my name again? Yeah. So Mother Dukes. Mother Dukes. Mother. Wait. Yeah. You're not the only one that calls me mother around here. Anyway, what's what's our topic today, Mr. Story?

Well, when six is nine. When six is 69, dude. All right. When six is nine. How about this? So with your immature mind, how about when nine is six? When nine is six. Okay. man i should have counted on that you guys have no idea chris the phone calls that chris and i have had we will never be able to play on the air Uh, so, uh, that's right, baby, whatever happens. Uh, so how was your time away, my friend? Give us, uh, give us the rundown here.

It was historically and culturally rich. It was really wonderful to be in Boston, surrounded by the history and the founding of the very almost epicenter of our birth. of the country, you know, the Boston Tea Party and being in Paul Revere's house and walking the Freedom Trail. It was just, it was incredible, really incredible. It was an unexpected gift.

Did you get a chance to walk the Freedom Trail, the Paul Revere's Freedom Trail? Yes. I got a horse, rented a horse. They have an app for that now. Got on a horse. Are you serious? Did you really get on a horse? No, don't be so gullible. It's almost 8 o'clock in the morning. Well, I don't know. I've never done the Freedom Trail. That would be cool, though. That's what I'm saying. You know, they've got an app for, you know, ride shares, the car. You can rent your car in Turo.

Why not a horse? What a great idea. Anybody on this call, you get to be part of it on the ground floor. Just send Michael and I each $10,000. It gives a whole new definition to the term rideshare.

Um, when you're, you've got an app for horses, although, I mean, it would be cool to kind of, uh, you know, trot along and take the same route that he did. I've, I've heard about the freedom trail, but I've never, but I've never, uh, you know, never thought that I would, but it would be something to be cool to see.

You know, walking through the footsteps, going by the church and going by the different things. It would be kind of a cool thing. We did a ghost graveyard and ghost tour, and that was really interesting and a lot of history. You know, they're very theatrical and those kinds of tours, but at the same time shared a lot of.

a lot of pertinent and interesting history that we wouldn't have learned just walking by the graveyard or going into one during the daytime because they close it down after 4 p.m. and only the guided tours have access to them. It was really... really fascinating. So it was an unexpected gift. Like I said, we're going to Maine for my nephew's wedding.

and just thought we'd better route a couple days through Boston and just be there immersed in that culture for a couple days. And it was fantastic. We got to see the No Kings, yes, Queens parade. It was just, that was culturally significant. I bet it was. Very similar to the tea party. There was some tea bagging. It was different than I expected. Very different. The No Kings, Yes Queen. So it must have been, was it? No Kings, Yes Queen. Yeah, it was a pride thing.

You must have been, were you, did you have to staple your eyebrows up or down to keep them from rising or what, you know, what's going on there? My eyes still hurt from rolling. Exactly. Exactly. All right. Chris Story is our guest. We're about to jump into it here when nine is six. We're going to, because I know I had tried hard not to laugh on that. You know how that is. We're going to continue here. The Michael Duke show, common sense, liberty based, free thinking radio. If you haven't.

I don't know why you haven't, but will you like and share the show? Will you like and follow the show page? Will you do all that stuff? Please? Here we go. The Michael Duke Show. Proudly splitting the left versus right dichotomy. Yeah, I had to look that word up too. I don't think it means what he thinks it means. There he is though, that guy, Michael Dukes, the one with the show.

Okay, welcome back. The Michael Duke Show, Common Sense, Liberty-based, free-thinking radio. I just was reading a text as we were coming back on here. And I got to say thank you. Your show is the closest thing to a true Alaska podcast I've seen. Podcasts are the way many people get their info. So I appreciate that. And we do podcast the show. So it is a true podcast. So thank you so much. Another guy who has a podcast, of course.

that is almost as good as mine, is Chris Story, the man from Homer. You can find him at ilovehomeralaska.com. He's got a show that he does every week on Tuesdays and Thursdays here on my radio stations. That include the Millionaire Minute, some real estate advice, some life coaching, all kinds of fun stuff. Of course, he's also a realtor and potter and an author as well. But everything that he does, all the hats that he wears.

You can find him at ilovehomeralaska.com. Chris Story joins us this morning. Hello, my friend. Michael, thank you for having me back. I missed you last week, but it's great to be back. Yeah, it was good. I tried to fill in for you, Chris. I did. I asked the people. I said, should I try and do a Chris story type, you know, a little bit of motivational? positivity and they said yes and i i mean i i flubbed it along i mean it was it was

It was painful. But, you know, so we're glad you're back. We're glad you're back to help us with this for sure. Today, Chris is going to talk about how when nine is six. And I don't know what that means. So I'll turn the floor over to the guru of positivity here on the Southern Peninsula. Well, you know.

I start every day off in my library. I've got a whole morning routine that really works well for me. It doesn't really matter what it is other than to say it works well for me. And everybody's kind of got their own routine. And I highly encourage everybody to develop one. If you don't have one, if your idea of a routine is get up at the last minute and race through your morning and kind of.

just let the day run you, I'd suggest doing something different. But my routine, whether I'm here at home or on the road, is always to begin every morning with a certain number of rituals to include. prayer and gratitude and reading and reading with a delicious cup of coffee. And I got a new book while I was traveling and it was about mental models. And I'm like, this is fascinating and not life.

altering or shattering from like, it's just a different perspective on creating mental models and adopting mental models that have already been almost like shorthand.

or how to think about something or how to the framework around an idea and one of the like blueprints for ideas right yeah yeah and and one of them was this it was just a small little cartoon on a page and it shows two people so just imagine two people standing facing each other maybe they're five or six feet apart and printed on the floor in front of each of them is a number

And the person on the right says it's a nine. The person on the left says, no, no, it's a six. Which is right? Which person is correct? From their perspective, it's the same number. it looks like a nine and the other person it looks like a six and imagine that with every single issue or person you see or meet or have in your life there's

two perspectives, two viewpoints. One time when I was about 18, I started writing a book. I called it a collection of thoughts and teapots. And I really wanted to, I really thought about these profound ideas and I would have a quote and then a picture. of a pot I had made. This was my whole, this is my dream, my authorial dream and beginning of all this writing business would be a collection of pots and teapots. And one of the quotes, and I still have the little book here today, and it says,

We're all looking at the same shadow from different sides of the barn. And it's the same kind of idea, I guess, is that the perspective changes from where you're standing. What are you looking at? And really what we're talking about. is empathy. Empathy is being able to see something through the other person's eyes or walking in their footsteps. Charlie Munger, half of the founding partners of the book, Birchard Hathaway, said, I don't allow myself an opinion on anything.

until I know the other person's argument better than they do. That is the ultimate in empathy. Stephen Covey borrowed that same kind of mental model when he said the goal of life is to seek first to understand. then be understood. This is empathy and action. But I'm telling you, if you just can imagine these two people standing face to face, looking at the same exact number from two different perspectives.

The vantage point is the definition of meaning to that person. And if we can understand that and then, you know, sort of deploy it in our own life, I think we'll find a deeper meaning in every relationship and everything we do. I think this is interesting because I often on the program talk about, you know, there's a reality and then there's a perception. And for many folks, perception is reality, right? How they perceive something informs everything, whether it's true.

True or not. And this this can fold back into what you're talking about here. If you can if you can wrap your brain around how they're perceiving something, you can help. in some ways, you know, change that perception or bring something about. But what you're talking about, Chris,

requires a lot of work. I mean, we can look at a country right now where people don't want to put themselves in other people's shoes. They'll scream at you all day long that that is a six by God. It's a six no matter what you do. And they don't they don't want to have you're talking about having empathy. If we had empathy for other people's positions and that's not sympathy.

That's not I mean, it is understanding of other people's position. We wouldn't have the polarization that we have in this country today. I don't think I mean, we've been encouraged. to ignore other viewpoints instead of trying to consider them all in making a rational decision. I can still empathize with somebody's point who completely disagrees with me. But we've been encouraged to go off of that path.

Agreed, 100%. And imagine, well, Jim Rohn said something that was, I think, really profound and very simple, but his whole philosophy was very simple, and thus it will stand the test of high. And he said, that which is easy to do. is easy not to do. And I think it comes back to Charlie Munger's point about not allowing himself to form an opinion. How genius is that? Because we all arrive, and I'm guilty of this as anybody, at an opinion very quickly. Oh.

you're wrong, that's wrong, this is right, I know, blah, blah, blah, but I have an opinion. almost instantly i have to pull myself back and so that's easy to do but it's also easy not to do and imagine if we took charlie munger's words which again just to reiterate he said i don't allow myself an opinion on anything Until or unless I understand the other person's argument better than they do, meaning he's done research, he's given.

consideration he's done actual you know thinking critical thinking about something in advance of even allowing himself to form an opinion let alone sharing it let alone tweeting it the second he sees something how many times have people retweeted something and then only learned later oh you mean that was that was fake oh that was a that was a that was a mock story oh man oh man we are living in an instant

world where not only can you share your opinion instantly, you better have one. You better understand the Israel Gaza situation. Really, I mean, even though it's thousands of years of history, you better have an opinion right now without doing deep research and critical thinking. You haven't read six books on the topic. You haven't visited the region, but yet you better have an opinion right now.

And not only have that opinion, you're duty bound to share it and try to find a cool meme to really represent something that you have an opinion on instantly, even though you maybe haven't done. the research you don't know the other person's argument as well as they do. Right. No, I mean, you're 100% right. I mean, people will push you. I mean, if you tell somebody, well, I don't know, I'm undecided. Again, it's back to that attack, attack, attack. If you don't agree with me.

Then even if you're undecided, even if you're not on the other side, then you're again. I mean, again, you're talking about developing a mindset that is is very useful. I think is something that I try to do in my daily life, but at the same time is almost antithetical to the common practice of the public at large.

My new coin for 2025 says on the reverse side, live with purpose, seek wisdom and knowledge. And take back that word wisdom for just a second. What is wisdom? Was Socrates wise? Was he wise? Was he a wise man? He still lives today as one of the greatest philosophers in human history. All he did was ask questions. The Socratic method is merely to ask questions to the point where he was faced with...

Stop asking questions. Stop what you're doing or drink Amalek. And he chose to drink. He chose to die versus abandoning his methodology of living and seeking wisdom. He lives on in infamy just simply for having sought wisdom by asking questions. Didn't portend to know everything, but asked enough questions to distill down to.

as close to truth as he could get and inspired legions of people to do likewise, even to the extent that he was offered a choice of die or stop asking questions and he chose to die. It's a fascinating, that in and of itself is a fascinating conundrum. Would you rather die or just stop asking questions?

I'm always, I've always been curious about everything. It's, it's one of the things. Do you remember the last, just this pandemic we just went through, you weren't allowed to ask questions. In other words, when I say you weren't allowed.

You were scoffed at. Yeah. To be a conspiracy theorist. Oh, you were punished. Sometimes you weren't just. Yeah. Sometimes that you were you weren't just punished. Sometimes you were fired. You were castigated. You were pursued. There was threats of governmental. Legal action, if you didn't, you know, I mean, it wasn't just you were chastised. I mean, in some cases, people, their lives were ruined because they dared to question a single narrative. I mean, when did that become a problem here?

When the other party said it will forevermore be nine, it's not six. Your eyes deceive you. You do not see a six. Instead of having the conversation, and I read, and I'm sure you did too, I read. Robert F. Kennedy's book and all kinds of books on during that whole time period, trying to understand what I was looking at.

and created an intermediate, you know, or an interim radio program five days a week, just asking questions of people that were in authority. What do we know? How do we get to these conclusions? And yet again, coming back to Charlie Munger's point. Immediately, I'd already arrived at several opinions, and I actually, as I look back on it, was asking questions in order to seek out the answers I already thought I had.

So I'm not suggesting I have this figured out. I like another quote from Jim Rohn is he goes. Listen to what I say closely, carefully, but don't watch me too closely. I'm still figuring this out. It's like we're all in this position together. We can share our opinions instantly. Until I got forced off of Facebook, I was the same way.

putting pages out there all the time. We're not really getting a lot of critical thinking of some of the political things I was sharing on social media. So it's just a way of life we have to consider now. Is it a six or is it a nine? Change perspective, take a look, and then make an opinion after you've educated yourself. Final thoughts, Chris Story. Was that it? Or you got one final word of wisdom, one nugget for us. Drop it here on the way out.

Well, what you're probably thinking is, Chris, how can you possibly relate this to your brand new book, The Millionaire Code, Unlocking the Lasting Principles of Wealth, now found available at ilovehomeralaska.com forward slash books. Can I find a way to link that all together?

I don't think so, Michael. I really don't. I believe you're just going to have to go check it out for yourself. You're just going to have to check it out. There is no correlation, but it's still good stuff. All right. Chris Story. I love Homer. That was brilliant, by the way. Brilliant. I love Homer. That's right. I love Homer, Alaska.com is where you go to find Chris and everything else that he's got going on. Chris story. Thank you, my friend for coming on board.

My pleasure. Thank you, Michael. All right, folks. Tomorrow, Nick Begich will be joining us. The Michael Duke Show. Common Sense. Liberty-based. Free thinking radio. Have a great day. All right. Well, my friends, I think that does it for me today. Got lots of stuff to do. So we'll be back again tomorrow with more great stuff. especially Nick Begich. Thanks for coming in. We will see you manana. Have a great day.

We've shed our terrestrial radio skin, and now we are slimy lizard internet people. It's the Michael Duke Show.