Barn Talk - Why Corporate Giants Own Farming

Episode Date: January 25, 2026

Welcome back to Barn Talk! In this episode, Sawyer and Tork bring you a rundown of the week’s hottest topics—from farming market updates and surviving winter storms, to Trump’s bold moves at Davos and eye-opening government fraud in Minnesota. The guys also break down the new food pyramid and share their own experiences with nutrition and whole foods. You’ll get honest opinions, relatable insights, and plenty of laughs as they explore college football’s latest underdog story, and wrap up with a discussion on faith and being a better man, inspired by Pastor Joby Martin. Tune in for straight talk, practical advice, and a dose of barn wisdom on everything happening in ag, politics, and everyday life! SUBSCRIBE TO THE PODCAST ➱ https://bit.ly/3a7r3nR   SUBSCRIBE TO THIS’LL DO FARM ➱ https://bit.ly/2X8g45c   LISTEN ON: SPOTIFY ➱ https://open.spotify.com/show/3icVr4KWq4eUDl7Oy60YMY  APPLE ➱ https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/barn-talk/id1574395049 Follow Behind The Scenes👇🏻 ● This’ll Do Farm Instagram ➱ https://bit.ly/30KPBNk   ● Barn Talk TikTok ➱ https://bit.ly/3qciekS   ● Sawyer’s Instagram  ➱ https://bit.ly/3BtX0n4   ● Tork’s Instagram ➱ https://bit.ly/3LGZJxS    00:00 "Help Barn Talk Grow" 09:38 Trump, Hype, and Staying On-Track 12:28 Greenland, NATO, and U.S. Defense 18:39 "China, Venezuela, and Monroe Doctrine" 23:09 Minnesota Programs Shut Amid Fraud 27:36 ICE Controversy and Fraud Claims 37:20 "Red Meat and Weight Goals" 41:55 Farmer Frustration Over USDA Report 44:06 "Challenges in American Agriculture" 49:24 Corporate Control Over Farming 55:21 "Sports, Gambling, and Underdogs" 01:00:08 "Pastor Joby Martin's Impact" 01:06:42 "Grateful Perspective on Life" ------------------------------- ⚠NO FINANCIAL ADVICE / DISCLAIMER⚠  The Information discussed and shared on Barn Talk is provided for educational, informational, and entertainment purposes only, without any express or implied warranty of any kind, including warranties of accuracy, completeness, or success for any particular purpose. The Information contained in or provided from or through this podcast is not intended to be and does not constitute financial advice, investment advice, trading advice, or any other advice. The Information on this podcast and provided from or through our content is general in nature and is not specific to you, the user or anyone else. You should not make any decision, financial, investment, trading or otherwise, based on any of the information presented on this podcast without undertaking independent due diligence and consultation with a professional, professional broker or financial advisory. Understand that you are using any and all Information available on or through this website at your own risk. RISK STATEMENT– The trading of Bitcoins, alternative cryptocurrencies, NFTs, individual stocks, etc. has potential rewards, and it also has potential risks involved. Trading may not be suitable for all people. Anyone wishing to invest should seek his or her own independent financial or professional advice. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

All of the food we eat and much of the clothing we wear comes from plants and animals that are raised on farms. Farms are different in type, in size, and even in name. Welcome to Barn Talk. What happens at the barn stays in the barn, but not today. We're going to let it all out for you guys. Today is going to be a hot topics episode. Barn Talk, hot topics, a lot to talk about going on in the country, in the world. And we're going to give you guys our thoughts and opinions on all of it. but before we get into it, you guys know the drill. If you get any value from the show,

share it out with the people that you know. The more that you guys do that, the more that this show grows, the more we can have more guests come to the barn and have great conversations with us, the more impact we can have on people. We really want to do some awesome things in the year of 2026 here at Barn Talk.

And with you guys getting the word out, it really does help us out a lot. And it's kind of the ticket to admission to watch or listen to the show. You can get value in a number of different ways. If you laughed, if you're related to us on something, if you learn something. Even if you cry.

Even if you cry, that's some, hey, yeah, we strike a nerve with you that good. That's value. So all we ask is you just share it. Another thing you can do to help us out here at Barn Talk is leave a review on Spotify or Apple. The more that you guys do that, the more credible you make our show,

which in turn helps us get more guests to come to the barn and make some great episodes. So, and we also just love hearing your guys' overall thoughts about the show. So leave those reviews. It takes you five seconds, and we really do appreciate it, and it does help us out a lot. So, yeah, thanks for everything that you guys have done. This is going to be a great year for Barn Talk,

and I'm excited to get into the topics today. But how are you doing, King, doing. Good. If you hear this, if you're listening to this, it means you made it through the huge winter storm. that everybody is predicting. And we're kind of on the last, we're kind of on the last nice day. The wind changed, picking up out of the west,

out of the northwest. It's going to be cold. Damn, is it going to be cold? And I don't like the wind. And one of my barns is just about empty. We're supposed to ship out the last couple loads of pigs on Sunday night. Not looking forward to that. And me and the LP guy are going to get to be best friends

because I'm going to be heating that sucker during this cold snap. but that's all part of it. And I wanted to say, kudos to all of you because we threw a shout out about the speaking engagement that we're doing here in a few weeks. And sorry to say, Texas yesterday, it's full up, which is good. I appreciate that. Thank you to each and every one of you. And I would just say that's something that we are going to do more of in 26. We are going to get out on the road and probably do some in-person stuff.

we're slowly coming out of our shell. So we're home bodies. We're home bodies, but we're trying to venture out and see the world a little bit. So we're going to... Sawyer's trying. I mean, look at him. He's actually wearing a...

You're wearing a nice shirt today. I tried today. I put on a flannel because I said, you know, people are probably sick and tired of seeing me in a black or white t-shirt. So... I thought that was all you had.

I keep it simple. I keep it simple. But today I just felt like, you know what? Flannel season. January's a biotch. You know, January is one of those months that

I feel like January has become the new norm of it's almost worse than December when it comes to the cold and the snow and the wind and the ice. You get your worst storms in January. Seems like it. Which kind of sucks. But hey, we're going to make it through. Hopefully we're not supposed to get a lot of snow so we don't have too much work to do. But that wind, man, that wind will kill you.

It's depressing. It's kind of like the grain market. Yeah. Look at that. Yep. Uh, here is. Don't ruin it by saying it was a good tie-in because you do that. Dad will do a good tie-in.

Every day. He's like, did you like that tie-in? I'm like, now you ruined it. It's not much of a tie-in now. Yeah. But I'll give you, that was a good tie-in. All right, thanks. Way to build me up.

Let them know about the markets. Today's market update. Uh, corn 422 and the basis is crap. I mean, well, I guess it's not. It's just, it's bad number. locally 405 or 414 in Cedar Rapids. Beans for March 1063, November 1077. You can get 1023 on this side of the river or 1070 on the other side of the river.

Bean meals, $295 a ton. Wheat market, $5.05. 507. Hogs. So all your livestock, that's the bright spot because these guys, you got cheap inputs. I mean relatively cheap on the corn side if you're feeding cattle or hogs. And February hogs, 8750, but July 108. And February cattle, 233.

And feeder cattle, $3.63. Crude oil, $60. The oil market is kind of like the corn market and the fact that it just doesn't do much, no matter what happens in the world. Bitcoin $88. This number, so gold is 4867, but the silver market I think hit 90 bucks.

8667 was last time I looked. Can you believe silver is $100 or basically, I mean, 90 bucks an ounce? When I was a kid, it was like $14 an ounce forever, so I don't know. You got any? I'm not telling you. You'll hit me with a shovel and try to steal it.

Gold Rush. Yep. There you go. Silver rush. Interest rates, 30-year 4.8 and the 10-year 4.2. That's kind of the hot and fast. I didn't get too into it. I should have gotten the cotton. I should have gotten the cotton price because we're going to talk a little bit about commodities. But that is the market update today, courtesy of our good friends at Contera Ag. They were just down. Some of you might have seen they were just down at FarmCon. They didn't offer to take me with them. But good friend of mine, former customer, in my hog billing days, the Horace boys, they were down there, and they won the Contera cooler. So hopefully they'll invite me down to have a cold beverage out of that, said cooler.

And I don't know, where's ours? I was just going to say, what are we, chop liver? I guess we're not borrowing any money. Anyway, good folks there at Contera, if you want a second opinion about your farm financials and your needs for operating, call those guys, conteraag.com.

that is the market update. I like it. Nice and easy, quick and fast. Didn't last long. It's all good. It's all good. It's what we like. So what do you want to talk about? Well, I think we should really talk about Trump going to Davos and him rolling up in his heli and just letting the Europeans know what he thinks about this whole Greenland deal. I mean, he really did put the hammer down, didn't he? He went like 80. It was like 80 minutes. And I would say he pretty much went. Well, give him the play by play. I mean, literally, they're supposed to all fly into some air base, right?

Or some landing strip. They fly into the airport. So this is at Davos is in Switzerland. And they, you know, a lot of these guys, most big CEOs have a private jet. or if you're a public official, you know, they got some form of a private jet. I'm pretty sure that Trump landed Air Force One somewhere else,

and then he took Marine One, the helicopter from wherever that was, to Davos. And it looked to me like he landed it. He landed it right, like right there. There was nobody around, but I don't think that it's not like it's a government thing. There isn't going to be anybody there to greet you. But anyway, he came in and Marine One and went to Dobb, you know, walked in. Yeah, to the world economic form.

Yeah. Which nobody likes the world economic form. I mean, most people don't. Well, no. They seem like they're, it seems like the elitists of the elite that are telling us how the world should go when they have no fucking idea what it's like walking in our shoes at all. But supposedly they're the ones that are going to make the decisions on our behalf or push agendas on our behalf. So, like, who was the head of it for a long time? Soros.

George Soros. Yep. Klaus Schwab. Yep. Nobody likes those guys. Everybody thinks they're crooked mofos that want America to fall. I mean, the amount of stories you hear about George Soros and that guy is insane. But anyway, go ahead.

I'll just give you kudos that you remember Klaus Schwab because he's got, he looks like, he literally looks like Baltimore. Yeah. I mean, it's like the emperor and Darth Vader. Those guys are like, I just think about them being evil characters. Well, like a few years ago, they were the ones that coined the phrase like that you were going to own nothing and you were going to like it. Like they were talking about the New World Order and all that. And that really got people fired up. And so Trump went in there and he spent the first, I don't know, 20 minutes basically.

it was just like a hype speech about the United States and everything we've done and and how good it's going. And I will be the first to say that, you know, I can only take small, small amounts of Trump at a time because if he could stay on track, it would be tolerable. But man, as soon as he goes off script, you don't know what, you just don't know what he's going to say. It's amazing. You know, the amount of people that I've met, there's a lot of high drive people that are successful that you meet. But when it comes to, like, forming complete thoughts

and being, like, on track with how they bring things in a discussion, there's some people that don't do that. Trump's not one of those people a lot of time. Like, you'll listen to him. And yeah, he gets there eventually. but man, sometimes he goes on rambling. He just rambles sometimes. Yeah, I think I always say that I like it a lot better when Marco Rubio talks.

I think the best cabinet member that Trump has, excuse me, the best cabinet member that Trump has for being able to articulate. Articulate their ideas. Concise. Who am I going to say? Got a guess? Rubio. Yeah, Rubio, but Scott Besson.

Okay. Scott Besson, he's like a low-key savage. He's always, like, he's always very concise and very to the point about what he says, and he does a really good job. But anyway, Trump rambled a lot. And so he rar-wrought about, you know, what the U.S. is doing. But then he pretty much put Europe on notice and said, you know, we've been paying the bill since 1945, and we haven't gotten a whole lot out of this deal,

but you guys have. And in return, we haven't asked for a lot. And people are jumping all over that because when it came to the Operation Iraqi Freedom, I think pretty much every NATO country donated troops into that deal. So, I mean, you can argue about that. But his point was that the United States hasn't really asked for much. And the Greenland deal is they want that because they believe it's key to the defense of North America and Europe going forward if a war should break out between Russia or China

and the rest of NATO. And basically that if you don't... He said he's not going to try to take Greenland militarily, but if they don't play ball, that basically the United States will remember that. And he said that Europe knows that the United States has their back, but the United States doesn't know if NATO has our back. In other words, they know that if something happens

and Russia goes into Poland or wherever, the United States will be there. The United States military will be there. But Trump's question was if the Chinese came after the United States, States. Would NATO be there for the United States? I don't know. And then he jumped all over Canada because, you know, Canada signed a free trade deal with the Chinese, and he said to Mark Carney that you should probably be more careful about what you say when you give these speeches, because if it wasn't for the United States, Canada, there wouldn't be a Canada or something like,

you know, just, I mean, it's just rhetoric. And it's a little bit. It's a little bit funny because... Well, why do you think he wants Greenland? Why do you think Trump wants Greenland? Well, I think the reason he wants Greenland is because the United States has been working on a much bigger version of what the Israelis call the Iron Dome that they shot down those...

You know, they shot down a lot of missiles. I think the United States has a technology to shoot down intercommental ballistic missiles, and they probably have something like that installed somewhere, in Alaska. It would not surprise me. But Greenland is the perfect place to deploy something like that. And I think Trump... You think Trump knows there's going to be a war?

Well, yeah. So this, you know, I'm not a, I'm not trying to be a fearmonger or anything like that. And I don't know for sure why, but I get the feeling that Trump is convinced. Like, I think Trump is convinced there will be a war. Now, I don't think that he's convinced that it will happen during his administration, but I think he feels like it's inevitable. And the reason that I think that is because there is a sense of urgency, both among the Chinese and the Russians, that if they don't act now,

they are going to lose the opportunity to be relevant in the world. And the reason I say that is because, and I've said this before, their demographics are so bad that, and think about Russia. Trump spoke about this with the Ukraine war. Last month, approximately, there was 30,000 soldiers that died. The month before it was 28,000, the month before it was 26,000. and you could go on and on. The amount of young people that have been killed in that war

from two countries that do not have good demographics and rushes are terrible. They're not as bad as China's, but they're very bad. That's going to be a problem because at some point, your manufacturing ability diminishes because you have more people over the age of 50 than under, and that's where China is, and I think that's where China is, and I think that's basically where Russia is.

Anyway, all that to say, if you're the Chinese and you want to get Taiwan back, you're going to have to do it sooner than later. You're going to lose the ability to field an army to do that. And the Russians have always had the goal of getting back to Eastern Europe where they used to control all those satellite companies or countries because that's the only place where there's any terrain that you can actually defend your border.

because the border now of Russia between Russia and Ukraine, Russia and Poland, Russia and all those countries, is basically just flat, barren plains that is very difficult to defend. And that's always been Russia, that's been Putin's goal since he took power was bring Russia back to its former greatness. That's been China's goal for a long time

is to reunify Taiwan. And I think they're going to lose that ability and Trump believes that at some point there's going to be a war. Yeah, I mean, make sense to me. You know, you always see China, like China has been trying to buy farmland in the United States

and they're investing in Africa. I think China realizes the only way that they stay relevant, the only way they keep China going is they're going to have to take ground in other places. They're going to have to take territory in other places. They're going to have to win the AI race. That's one big factor.

win the AI rates against America and win that war. But then they also are realizing they're investing in other places because they realize they have to. They absolutely have to. Yeah. And it's just crazy. I think, I mean, Trump, that's the one thing you got to like about him, man. He's got balls. You know, he is not, he is not a pus when it comes to putting the hammer down and saying what he thinks needs to happen. And you got to, you sometimes, you hate it, but sometimes you got to love it. It's a lot better than Biden. Sleepy Joe, in my opinion. I'd rather have a president that's 10 toes down that's going to make shit happen and put the hammer down and let the world know that I'm the president of the United States and this is the way it's

going to be. And you can get on the train or get ran over. Whether you like it or not, that's, I like a powerful leader, not a passive leader. So, yeah, don't forget, I mean, part of the reason, I think part of the reason that what happened in Venezuela happened is because China made a huge investment. Shouldn't say investment. They loan Venezuela a pile of money. And in return, they did not want that money back. They wanted exports.

They wanted oil is what they wanted out of Venezuela. And I guarantee you they're not going to get that oil for free now. And that was calculated by the Trump administration. And what they're really trying to do in the North American continent and South America is they are going back to, and I said this before, the Monroe Doctrine, they want to limit the presence of any foreign country, China, mostly China and Russia, from having influence in Central America, South America, and even here. And the other thing is Cuba has been a thorn in America's ass ever since the Bay of Pigs. during the Kennedy administration. And the next, I think there'll be regime change in Cuba because I think they're going to choke them out

is what they're getting most of their oil, most of their energy from Venezuela. That's probably on the skids. Trump didn't talk about that at Davos, but that's just, I just think that's going to happen. All that's say, do you think we'll get Greenland? Do you think they'll do it? Or do you think they won't?

I think they'll drag their feet but I think at some point the United States, if they have the intelligence that is pointing them to something that they know for sure there's a credible threat and a reason why they would need to deploy defensive measures to Greenland,

I think NATO, I think the Europeans will fold and let that happen because it'll be in the interest of their mutual defense. So I don't know how long it'll take. And I don't know whether it's a deal that we buy Greenland. We don't have the money to buy, we don't have the money to buy milk at the grocery store. Just print it, baby.

Well, I know that's the, he did sit. Now here is an interesting statistic and this, this ties into our next kind of, our next topic. He said that what's going on in Minnesota, he said there's roughly $19 billion that has been a fraud from Minnesota from the federal government. And he said that that is just one example of what's going on all over the United States. And he said that if the U.S. government was able to get rid of 50% of the fraud, 50%, not 75%, not all, 50% of the fraud, we would have a balanced budget. He believes that there is that much fraud and abuse within the federal government. I believe it. I mean, I absolutely believe it. I guarantee you there's more scandals and

shit like that. Minnesota daycares are just the, they're just the scratch of the surface. There's so much more there. There's so many more. That thing is so big. There's so many, there's so many holes. There's so many low-key things probably happen. And we have, have no idea because nobody's looking for that stuff. But Nick Shirley is, so who knows, maybe he'll discover more. Let's talk about that before we talk about the next thing on the list. Sounds good. We'll go back to that.

Because I didn't realize this until today, so I was trying to read up on this. So to give you some idea of how flagrant the fraud was, and I didn't think, think about it this way, but everybody knows about the daycare the daycare deal and then the transportation companies that

were, that Nick Shirley has shown now that were set up to like minibus. Well, I've heard it's not, it's daycare's transportation but also translators. All these people that had to go to the doctor, they had to have a translator. Oh,

sure. So every single one of them had to bring an English, somebody that can speak Somalian in English. And they were getting paid. Every single one of them. So that's three, that's three different programs there. What has come to light is there were 14 programs, 14 programs that the Minnesota Department of Health and Human Services were funding. And when this all started, Tim Walts and his government said,

that these were of vital importance and that people, if you shut this down, people would die. Well, what happened once the fraud started to come to the surface and these videos started getting out? Tim Walts is the one he shut down all 14 of those programs for 90 days. Now then, you've got to ask yourself the question. if these 14 programs, the three that we spoke of here, and I don't know what the rest of them are, if these programs were so vital, how could you shut those down for 90 days? And that's what he did. So that tells me that you're basically admitting the fraud.

And I couldn't understand how this worked as far as how they got the money. you have to go all the way back to COVID. During COVID, the U.S. government granted Minnesota these waivers. And up until that time, any bill that was submitted to Medicare and Medicaid from an individual, it came to the state and then the state had to submit that to the federal government and they had to approve it. And I'm oversimplifying this, I know,

but it's the best way I can explain it. In 2021, the federal government granted Minnesota a waiver that just said, you can administrate all these programs and then you just submit us a bill for the total amount of money you pay out. And the idea of it was that the state level could be much more efficient than the federal level

and they could react much sooner to needs on the ground. And this was like an experiment. And then as soon as they got that waiver, the Minnesota legislature and the Minnesota governor's office dismantled every financial check whatever you want to call it like safeguard

as far as anybody looking over the transactions there were no audits there was no accountability and the reason was because they didn't want any because that's how this started they built the U.S. government

they took the money and they gave it to these people and then part of the deal was those people donated a large chunk of that money back to the Democratic Party and local candidates to help keep them in power and strengthen their position so they could vote to spend more money. It's just a big circle, but that's how it started. Crock of fucking shit. And the thing is, this isn't the only state where that's been done.

And there's other ways of doing it too, obviously. There is so much fraud out there that I think, when it's all said done. I don't know what that number could do. Let's just not paying taxes. Well, there's a lot of people that'd like to do that. Gosh, it's insane. That is insane.

Well, when you make it all, you know, you have a good way of just making things make sense, you know, just simplifying it down. Makes sense. And it seems like that could very well happen. And, yeah, because, you know, you talk to anybody from Minnesota, well, not everybody,

but you talk to most people from Minnesota. they're out on Tim Walts. They've been out for a while. How the hell he's still around? Nobody knows. But he hopefully is going to be out of the, he's going to get kicked to the curb here pretty soon. And one more thing.

I think the whole, the protests over the ICE agents. So that whole thing started because so many of these businesses that were billing Medicare and Medicaid in Minnesota were Somali-owned businesses. and that got ice involved because of the number of illegals and all of that fraud brought them in. And now then the Minnesota governor or the Minnesota government, all they want to do is stir that pot

and all the media coverage is on ice because they do not want... I honestly think... They're shredding files. Yeah. Shred and files. I think the best thing that the government could do would be to just pull them out.

Pull all the ice out and just stop and then turn around and say, okay, we're not going to do, we're going to do no deportion, we're not going to do anything. We're coming for you guys and focus 100% of their resources on forensic accountants

and running down this money. Because when that happens, I guarantee you those protests are going to go away because these politicians are going to be running for their life and when you get that cleaned up, then go back.

back and go after all the illegal immigration and all that shit that's going on. But I think that's what they should do is pull out. And one more thing that I thought was very interesting that I saw today, a guy was going through an intersection in a suburb of Minnesota, of Minneapolis, and there were people on all four corners protesting. And I mean, they were pretty peaceful. they weren't, and nobody was paying any attention to them. I mean, the cars were just going through, and he slowed down and he panned across that entire crowd. They were all elderly people.

Like, basically almost all of them were elderly people. And then he pulled out and he brought up a map, a block and a half. So where this was was where there was like a big strip mall, where there was Home Depot and like bed back, beyond all that and then there's like a restaurant and a gas station on the other corner so it was an area where a lot of traffic a block and a half away there's a senior living retirement center and he said this is happening all over up there he said what's happened is these groups like the no more kings group or whatever the hell it's called they're going to these retirement homes

and they're recruiting people retired people because they have the time to do it and he thinks they're paying them. So they're launching an investigation into this. Like they're paying people to come out and protest. Like they're so pissed when they're just like, yeah, hell, it gets me out of here, you know, I can only pay so many more hands of hearts. Yeah. And they're out there protesting. Or they're threatening to throttle back funding or help or aid for the nursing home. Who knows? Anyway, they could be painting. They could be painting them as evil as saying, this nursing home isn't going to last. So if you guys don't get out there and make a difference. Yeah, I mean, there is so much BS going.

It's crazy. Just crazy. It is crazy. Well, let's switch gears a little bit and go back to our roots. Yep. Let's talk about the new food pyramid. So I think the new food pyramid is great. I think it's common sense.

Whole food diet makes sense to me. The old food pyramid, I think everybody can kind of agree. It's a little ass backwards. Yep. And we look at the people that we have in this country today, a lot of people are unhealthy. A lot of carbs, a lot of processed food. Eating cereal in the morning probably isn't a good idea anymore. We've kind of learned that.

But pretty much the core message of this new food pyramid is prioritize whole nutrient dense, real foods, high quality proteins, red meat, healthy fats, dairy, cheese, whole milk. fruits, vegetables, whole grains, trying to slash ultra-processed junk, added sugars, and seed oils. And, yeah, right. I think that makes sense to me. That seems like it's,

that's common sense. That's kind of, we've kind of all realized that sugar, seed oils, processed foods, aren't good for us. Uh, and grains and carbs. A lot of times the grains and carbs, the breads, the cereals,

the, all that, stuff has the most shit in it. And I don't know about you, but when I eat, like when I eat toast and if it's not real sourdough, gosh, I feel sluggish after eating toast. Like I could have,

I could have eggs, like turkey bacon or bacon or sausage. And then I think it's the toast. That toast, I'll have like peanut butter toast or peanut butter toast or butter toast. I always feel sluggish after eating. that and I regret, why did I even eat it? Why did I even eat that shit? But if I have real sourdough, I don't feel nothing. I don't feel bad. But it's just that, I think all that grain, all those grains,

if you're buying it from a grocery, just sometimes look at the ingredients on a pack of bread. It's terrible. Yeah, I, well, sourdough, that's why sourdough is making such a huge, like, everybody in their dog is making sourdough. But my doctor told me that toast will make your blood sugar just spike. But he said, like, if you take a slice of regular toast and you put butter on it, the butter actually helps smooth. Your blood sugar is still going to go up, but it's going to go up slower and then taper off slower so you don't get that big where you just feel like crap.

But ideally, you'd be better off not having it. I mean, what it comes down to is shop around the outside of the grocery store. Yeah. That's what it comes down. If you notice a grocery store, the way it's laid out, all of the whole foods are around the outside. Because you go down, you got the fruits, the vegetables, you go up and you got the canned whole vegetables, then you got the meat department, then you got the dairy department, and then you come back around. And then all the box crap and bread and everything else, that's in the middle.

Yeah. Just. Well, and that's the thing. A lot of people, you know, especially when it's tough times, I mean, the middle of the grocery store tends to be cheaper. you know, you're, uh, what, what was that? What's that box? Hamburger helper? Hamburger helper.

I mean, hey, I love a good hamburger helper back of the day. I'd eat that like a mofo, but I'm sure that shit ain't great. No, it's not. It's hard to, it's hard to eat healthy. But another thing is, uh, they, they up the protein recommendation. They bumped it to 1.2 to 1.6 grams per, per pound of body weight. Yeah. So, you know, usually people say one gram per pound of body weight.

think a lot, a big reason for that is, I think, so protein will, will make you feel fuller. It's the biggest, it's the best macronutrient for making you feel full. When you eat, like, if you eat a full 16 ounce steak or you eat a full, uh, uh, pound of ground beef, try, try eating that or like, I've heard somebody say, try eating a grass fed like 90, or a lean ground beef, a 93, 7 ground beef. eat a pound of that and see how hungry you are after that. Because it just makes you feel so full. And I think that will ultimately help people eat less junk. Because when you eat McDonald's, now take the con, when you eat McDonald's,

how full do you feel? I mean, three hours later, you're like, well, the density of the food is not there. When you eat McDonald's, you eat something fast food, you don't stay super full for very long because it's not very dense. but when you eat real food, real protein, or like a real steak, a chop, a chicken breast, ground beef, just makes you feel fuller. And I think if people up their protein intake, hopefully they're thinking people will eat less because they'll feel fuller and stimulates muscle, helps with muscle growth, helps with keeping muscle on. So I think that's probably why they emphasize protein as much as they do. The sliding scale of fast food is if you eat Chinese, you'll be hungry in like two hours.

Like that, I mean, that's crazy. You eat a bowl of Chinese. The worst stuff, you walk out, you drive away an hour later, you're hungry. The worst part about Chinese is it just makes you kind of feel like shit. I don't even think it's like, yeah, you feel hungry, but you also feel like shit. High sodium, high sugar, white rice. Oh, yeah. And then McDonald's in there.

And then I don't know what would be the closest, you know. But yeah, the other thing that we all need to keep in mind is those recommendations for protein, what do you say? They recommend 1.6 now? 1.2 to 1.6. Yeah. Those protein recommendations are, that's how much protein you're supposed to eat per pound of what your ideal body weight is, not per pound of what your actual is.

So in other words, for me, I should eat 1.4 grams times 180 pounds, not the 205 pounds that I am. Yeah. Yeah, for sure. And that's where I run into problems. Yeah. So. Yeah, it's wherever you want to end up on your target weight if you want to lose weight, gain weight, maintain weight. For me right now, I want to kind of maintain or kind of cut a little bit.

So I'm not trying to eat 225 grams or it'd be even more than that. now if you go off this, but I'm trying to bump it down a little bit. But ultimately, I think it's good for ag because, yeah, there is a push for red meat, protein, real food, real meats. And I think it's going to be good for agriculture and just the promotion of the meat industry because I think for a long time, people have been bashing red meat. They've been saying it's not good. They've been telling us that butter's not good.

They've been telling us dairy's not good for us. But I think culture's really started to shift, and you're seeing that in the food pyramid, which is great. And just firsthand experience, I feel best when I'm eating real food. Real food, I'm not perfect. I get McDicks every once in a while if I'm in a pinch, you know, especially harvest or anything like that. 80-20, I think that's the rule to live by. If you can eat, if you can eat pretty damn good 80% of the time and still enjoy yourself 20% of the time and have some of that shitty food, I think that's a good, that's a good balance. How many people, though, do you feel like, well, actually, that how much, how much weight does those recommendations actually have?

Because do you feel like people that are entrenched in their, in their viewpoints that meat is bad, are going to look at the food pyramid and go, oh, I was wrong. Meat is good. Uh, no, but I think the everyday, I think what it makes the biggest difference is the everyday consumer that might have been like, you know, I shouldn't eat as much, meat because I'm not supposed to. Yeah. I love meat, but I'm not going to eat as much. Maybe this helps them go, you know what? I might eat a little bit more meat.

It's actually not too bad after all. You're never going to change the vegans, unless the militant vegans, unless they go through being a vegan and realize that it's not for them, it doesn't work for their body, and they got to switch things. That's the only way they're going to come to the light of meat. but I think what the biggest impact this has and the best impact this has is on the everyday American that's kind of on the fence of maybe making better choices for themselves, realizing, hey, meat ain't that bad, dairy ain't that bad, you know, butter ain't that bad, you know.

So that's the biggest difference. And I think it's going to be good for us. And I'm seeing a bunch of, on TikTok and on social media, you've been seeing people talk about it. I think both sides are acknowledging that getting rid of processed food and sugar and all that has been great. But the side of not so pro this food pyramid is they just caution people with the protein bump and, you know, not getting enough fiber and maybe prioritizing animal protein. So, well, the one thing about it is, you know, it'll work itself out because the, the militant vegan problem will take care of itself, especially the more protesting that goes on because the militant vegans, they just get weaker every day.

And so when they have to protest and then you get all the people that are eating meat, I mean, they're eventually going to be like, they're just not going to have enough energy. So they'll finally give it up. They put these canines in there for a reason. We've got to just eat them. There you go. We've got to eat the meat. There you go.

I think it's God-given. I think you're right. I think you're supposed to eat meat. Yep. 30%. So, I'm down with it. Anyway,

let's talk about USDA numbers. So you were, you were pretty down in the dumps. When was that? Was that late last week? Yeah, it was last week. Late last week, dad were sitting and dad gets a, he gets a notification from his phone.

And his, his, his, uh, text message ringer is, who's texting me? Peter Griffin from Family Guy, which I think is so funny. But you got a notification. It was from Cats. From Cats.

From Cats. Telling us the new numbers and the report. And so tell them a little bit about your experience because I'm sure you're not alone and feeling the way that you feel. No. You know, it's funny, you should always, you should always have varying opinions that you listen, voices that you listen to that you don't necessarily agree with. because it helps you, you know, figure out the BS from real. And I failed on that because all of us farmers, we all talked to each other and we all believe the same thing.

And yeah, my good friend John from Katz Green, I was sitting in there and we were talking about the report because I was trying to figure out, you know, I got bills to pay and mouths to feed. And I got grain left to move that I didn't have sold. And my master plan was that I had bought, I had bought March futures. And because I thought that the report was going to come out. And very, very conservatively, we were going to cut, we were going to cut the yield by two bushel.

And, you know, plenty of people were like, oh, they're going to have to cut it by four because USDA is so wrong and all of that. And as you all know, instead of cutting it at all, they added a half. half bushel back in 186 and a half. But then, if that wasn't enough, just to kick you right square in the nuts, they just went out and found a million acres of corn that they didn't know it was out there. And it just, I mean, it just pretty much crushed everybody's hope of a spring rally in the corn market.

and we're as you can see the prices I gave you today. I mean, we were 420, we were 425 various times going into that report, you know, the weeks leading up to it. And you got a cash bid now, a 405 at your local feeder. And some people around here like even $3.99, something like that. And there's just, there's just a lot of corn out there. And exports have been great. And the other thing that everybody is like questioning is all of these unknowns,

all these unknowns buying corn besides China. So exports are great. Ethanol use has been great. But USDA, they threw a wet blanket on everybody with all this extra corn and all this extra acres. So now then you're sitting here and the bean market. isn't any good, and the wheat market ain't any good, and the cotton market ain't any good. The problem we have is really a perfect storm where the people that are farming at the fringes of corn country that maybe used to plant all wheat and didn't plant corn, or planted cotton,

or planted a strict 50-50 rotation with soybeans, they're planting corn, and then they're planting corn on corn. And it doesn't really matter because we got too much of everything. I don't know. It is a really tough spot in American agriculture. And you look at your inputs going into next year and people are talking like,

oh, you need to figure out how to cut it. hundred dollars out of your cost of your cost of producing well i don't know cut i don't know if cutting a hundred dollars out is going to get you to getting is going to get you to profit or not so it's a it's kind of a shit sandwich is all it is and how's it tastes it tastes pretty shitty too thanks for that thanks for that um and i don't know you know we can sit here in debate whether USDA's right or wrong. A lot of people think they're wrong, but by the time

that all works through the system, it'll be next fall before you know whether it was right or not. Now then we're trading this thing on ethanol demand, on exports, and is it a little dry in South America?

I don't know. And South America is going to just keep, they're going to keep going. There was a news story two weeks ago in Brazil and Argentina. There had been this pack that they put together to save the rainforest. And there was a moratorium on clearing more land. And that, everybody said to piss on it. They left it. That's done. And they're going to, they're going right back to clearing out more land. They're going to increase the number of acres that

they have to plant, a ton of money getting spent in Brazil on infrastructure to get that product to the coast and be able to export it. And in the world, I don't know. Until we've got to get to the point where we can get commodities, multiple commodities that have a little bit of profit in them to take the pressure off of corn. Because we're growing corn places now that we never used to. And You know, people are like, oh, this is the fringe. Well, it's not the fringe when you do it for five, six, seven years. Now then it's the corn belt. So, yeah, I mean, what do you think the solution is?

Do you think it's just we need? Do you genuinely feel like we need farmers to go out of business? Like, does, because it's like, you feel like more and more farmers are going out of business every year. They definitely are. But yet we still are throwing out the numbers we're throwing out. And it's like... Because somebody's going to farm that. Yeah.

Tony Reed, last week I saw he talked about that... I don't know, he heard this from somebody or he saw somebody's video down in the Delta and they were just... They weren't going to plant... There was acres. They weren't going to plant. Like, they just weren't going to plant a crop

because it's not profitable. And his point was he farms in Illinois and he's like, it doesn't matter. He's like, it doesn't matter. He goes, do you know anybody? that anybody that even though it looks like you're going to lose money, they're not going to plant their farm this year? Hell no, because every grain farmer, at least in the Midwest,

they all think somebody else is going to not get the rain or they're going to get flooded out, or somebody's going to buy a pile and the exports are going to save us, or Central South America's crops are going to fail. We're all just these, we are fatal optimist. Yeah, pure optimist. To where, oh, somebody's going to get screwed and we're going to be okay. So they're going to plant it no matter what.

So all these acres, if a farm fails, if a farmer fails, somebody's going to rent that ground, and they're going to farm it because they're smarter than that guy. They're going to do it. And, you know, it's like, oh, low-cost producer. Well, okay, given your input cost today, if you're a big farmer, the idea is, oh, you can buy your inputs cheaper. Yep, probably can. how much cheaper? Because if you are in today's costs and corn's below $4,

I don't know. I don't know if you can get your cost of production to that or not, especially if you're rent and ground. So it's all going to get farmed. But you know what scares me more than anything else? I honestly think this is where we're headed to. I think it's going to get real bad. And then you're going to get these companies like Syngenta

that are vertically integrated, you're going to get farm management companies that are hooked up with ADM or whoever that is lined up with end users and they're going to come to these farmers and they're going to say, we'll guarantee you X, we'll finance you.

You're going to use 100% our chemical program, our seed program. You're going to buy the tractors through our lease, program and we're going to pay you to farm and we're going to guarantee you this much. And there are plenty of stupid fuckers out there, pardon my French, that they will line up for that all day because they'll get a seed corn trip to Hawaii in the summer or in the winter and they'll go golfing in the summer and they'll kill themselves running that big and they'll get to run big ass equipment brand new and roll it. And that's all they care about.

there's there's enough people to do that you think contract growing will come into the grain farming sector well i think if it can if it can it will because if you're getting if everything remains the same the economics don't work the only way the economics work is if it's subsidized now if there is a crop failure i mean i said this when the war started in ukraine i thought that wheat prices would just go crazy because I'm like Russia and Ukraine that area

is one of the biggest wheat producing parts of the world I'm like it's screwed they're not they're not gonna all that's going off the market and it's never coming back hasn't even affected it wheat's five bucks

somehow they're still exporting somehow they're still producing I don't know or else world demand is dropped I don't know what it is but so you can never say never, but there are people out there that if they're backed into a corner, so there's some people that if they're backed into a corner, they will accept,

they'll accept that because it's the only way they're going to stay farm it. Then there's a whole other group of these guys that are farming a shitload acres, and they're all about it because they think they can manage the people and manage the inputs through this deal to where they're going to ink out X number dollars an acre, they can sub everything out, they'll hire all the labor,

and they'll just manage it from St. Croix. And they think that that's... So I don't know. I mean, I'm sorry to be negative, but for me, for me, the only way that I grain farming in five years for us, the only way that it is viable is if we have all the debt paid for and we're making a shitload of money off of something else, whether that be the hog business or whether that be, you know, I don't know what I do. You know, if I start a

coaching, if I start a coaching channel, run the other way. But, you know, heck, I don't know, if somebody wants to pay me enough money, I'll coach them. Yeah. I just verbally abuse your ass all day long and tell you to get your fat ass out and start running, whatever. But you'll be the Midwest Goggins. Yeah. I would love to do that. I'd get me a little motor, one of them little motorized mopeds and just follow people around and go, you worthless. Yeah. But I don't know. I mean, the only way we're going to be doing it is if we're debt-free and making enough money doing something else that we can afford to form. Yeah. It's true. Now, that said, that said, I think the bright spot in this is animal.

agriculture. I think that you're going to have cheap commodity prices and demand worldwide for red meat is better than it's been. And because of disease pressure and all of the cows that we lost, it's going to be very slow to build back. So the people that are in animal agriculture are going to have some very profitable times. And those guys, when they make money with cattle and hogs, you know what they like to do, go buy more farm ground. And they'll, and they'll do good. I think they'll do good. But your straight cash grain farmers, you're going to be grasping at straws,

and you're going to take any handout you can get because otherwise you're going to be screwed. How's that for... Well, let's go to something more positive. Sorry. Let's talk about Indiana football, baby. I mean, I'm an Iowa fan, but man, was it fucking cool to see Indiana go 16 and O

and win the Natty? And there's nobody better to represent Indiana football than Fernando Mendoza. I mean, he's a little bit on the spectrum, but I mean, I don't know if he is or not. He seems like it, but he is a class act. You can't not root for that guy. I mean, that fucking run into the end zone on fourth down. If anybody watched, if anybody watched that national championship game or saw that play, gosh, I literally watched it and I said, what a fucking stud.

I was like, what a stud. Him just jumping over into the end zone and getting smoked in the back by that guy on fourth down. to, and that was ballsy. After nearly being stopped at what the four yard line. I don't know. That was ballsy of them to do that. But I think it was the right move. Obviously, it was the right move.

And man, I you know, I was, everybody hates on college football now because the NIL and the kids aren't as passionate and you can't build a program. And I understand that, you know, and I think sports betting and gambling, I don't know how much that's playing

into sports today. A lot of people they think it's playing more into it than what you think, which is unfortunate. But this, you know, for I grew up an NFL football fan, and the reason I did was because I always loved that there was a playoff. Any team on any given Sunday could win, and it was the same way going to the Super Bowl. I mean, look at the Giants knocking off the Patriots in their undefeated season. You know, they didn't end up going undefeated because the Giants came in there

as an underdog and won the whole fucking thing, and you can get hot in the right time and end up winning it. And my problem with college football growing up was, before the playoff, it was just the one in the two seed. The BCS National Championship was one and two seed. It was always Alabama or was always Ohio State, or it was always the same freaking teams every year. And I was like, what do we, this isn't even fun

because my team has no chance ever to go win the national championship. Then they did the 14th playoff. And then I was like, all right, this is a little bit better. Now we're in the full-fledged playoff of college football, and I love it. Because here you had the number one seed, Indiana, which they deserved it. They built that team because of the new age of college football that were in. That would have never happened in the old way of college football. So that's a story in itself.

Then you have a 10-seed Miami go and get to the national championship. That was awesome. That's what now I'm like, I like watching college football now because of that one reason. Any given team can win. And that's what football is about, you know? And you're giving these teams chances to actually go win it, which I think's great. But I think this is one of the best sports stories ever.

I mean, it just is. You got to love the coach. You got to love Fernando Mendoza. I mean, he's the man on campus. They're singing a damn Abba song about him, you know, and grown-ass men are singing the song. You just can't hate the guy. You can't hate the program and you got to give them their flowers. And it was

it was awesome to see them win and it's good for the Big Ten and good for the Midwest. I think they're going to be a powerhouse for the foreseeable future. And it gives me hope for my Hawkeyes. Yeah, and the Hawkeye tie-in and somebody will correct me if I'm wrong.

But I feel like the closest game that they played all year was the Hawkeyes. Probably. I think they, didn't Iowa lose by three points? I think it was 9 to 13. I think they won 9 to 13 or 9 to 14. I can't remember. I mean, if you're a Hawkeye fan,

you'll grasp whatever you can. So I think that was their closest loss. We had a lot of close games this year, but we had a lot of close games this year. If we would have pulled some of them out, we might have maybe got in or at least gone to a really good bowl game. But what I mean by it gives me hope

from the Hawkeyes is I think any, Hawkeyes have kind of been that Big 10 B-tier team where you got the, the A tier of Ohio State, Penn State. Now you got Oregon in there. And USC, I don't know if they're... We've always been best of the rest. Yeah, we're like, we're right there.

We're right there on making it to go to the A. Also, Michigan's an A. You know, we're right there to go get into the A tier, but we keep, we just always can't win the big game to be considered an A tier program in the Big Ten. But Indiana rose from like the C tier of the Big Ten all the way to the A tier. So just... It just gives you hope that, like, hey, any team can build a program now with the right pieces and the right coach and the right staff.

Shit, you can put together a team, which that makes it exciting. That makes it exciting. So, yeah, I think it was a good day for college football. It was a great American sports story that I think most people can get behind. And, yeah, I'm glad Carson Beck, the quarterback from Miami didn't win because he's kind of a douche. Yeah, ESPN. ESPN got a bunch of, they got some really good free publicity by showing his girlfriend. Yeah.

She's a, she's an adult film star. So ESPN had to sneak her in on the, in the crowd. They keep doing that every game he was in the playoffs. And Mendoza's brother just signed. He's transferring to Georgia Tech, which probably a good idea. I don't think there's probably any hard feelings there. But if you're the brother, you're like, I got to get out of this shadow. Well, yeah, I just think, yeah, your brother, he, he,

you're never going to top that legacy. I mean, he just did the ultimate, he did the trifecta, Heisman Trophy, 16 and 0 National Championship. You're not going to beat that. I mean, you're just not. Go make your own legacy somewhere else. But anyway, somebody I've been starting to listen to

and read and think, and dad has to, and I think if you're a young guy out there, if you're just a man out there, and you are a Christian or you are faith-based or spiritual some capacitor, or you want to become more of a Christian or you're just trying to find your way a little bit. There is a new guy up and coming.

His name's Pastor Joby Martin. I don't know if you guys have ever listened to him. He has never spoken to me. I've never had somebody online or been a pastor that's ever spoken to me more than he has. And the reason is he is like a real southern masculine man from Georgia that just teaches the Bible and kind of teaches how to be a man of God in a real authentic way

that doesn't strip your masculinity and have your nuts be left at the door when you walk into the church. And he just does it in such a good way that he has a series called, what is it, act like men. Well, it's something else. There's something more to it. But anyway, he's got a series. If you look up Jobi Martin, 1122 church.

Yeah, 1122 church down in 1122. down in Jackson, Vental, Florida. He's got this series, something to do with start acting like men again or some shit like that. You look that up. Watch some of his content. I bought his book and I'm reading it.

And man, it has been really, really good. And I just encourage anybody out there to start getting into it. And if you've never had somebody that you feel like can speak to you and you're a man and you're masculine and you just don't feel like you can ever have somebody in Christianity speech.

I think this guy really can. I think he really can. I would absolutely love to have him on the podcast. I think he's got a long runway here. I think he can really make a name for himself and make a big difference. And he's up and coming, but he is fantastic. I'll say like if you are,

if you're a guy out there that you'd like to start like a small group or a men's group, just get that series, just start watching it. They're usually about an hour. Each one of his sermons is about an hour, about 50 minutes. And I have a Friday morning men's group. Obviously, they're a lot of older guys, but his message resonates really, really well. it's just so relatable. And I would say, and this, I'm not saying this to be, don't take it the wrong way, but like the way he delivers the message of the gospel, I equate it back to the way like Paul gave that message originally to all these churches, like when you talk about Corinthians and because he was, he,

is relatable to all those people. And the way he delivers the gospel is, I mean, it is just no no fluff, very direct. So some people might be a little bit, you know, I'm sure there's people

that probably don't like his delivery, but I haven't met any of those people yet. I feel like if you like this show and you, if you like this show and how we talk and how we keep it real, you would like Joby Martin and how he keeps it real on how he preaches the gospel. And he's also very good at cracking some jokes that are relatable and just making it enjoy.

I mean, it's just enjoyable to listen to. I mean, it really, it truly is. And it will really make you think. It really will make you think about your own decisions and about how you view your decisions and how they affect others. Well, and it, I mean, it teaches you how to be a better man. I mean, ultimately, that's the, that's the, because his whole thesis is the world is messed up because men aren't acting like men anymore. Right.

But nobody's teaching how, teaching us how to act like men. You know, a lot of cultures, it's like bestowed upon you that you transition from a boy to a man. And there's like a, there's a ritual. There's something that happens where it's like, you do this, you're now a man. And it's bestowed upon you. In our culture today, there isn't any of that. And his whole thing is there's a lot of boys that like to claim that they're men, but they act like boys still.

And then we call them dudes. He says we call them dudes. And so the series is called Stand Firm and Act Like Men. And the book is called That Same Thing. So I just wanted to say that because I've started to read it and I've started to get into it more starting this year. and I just think it could help a lot of people out. And if you're a young guy or just a guy out there looking for something that can speak to you on the face side of things, I recommend it.

A hundred percent recommend it. I don't think you'll be disappointed. So anyway. I agree. You get all the words out? I think we did pretty good from our low spot to here. So once again, you know what? It's really up to you because so much of what we talk about on here,

you really set the tone for your world and your little corner of the world. So, you know, you just do what you can to make your part of the world the best it can be. And that will help everybody. You know, this is the thing, too, that I'm trying to remind myself a lot now in 2026. You know how many little things Americans take for granted every single day that we live like, We live like kings. 100 years, the fact that you're able to take a hot shower every night, that was a luxury back 200 years ago.

Oh, even 100 years ago. That was a luxury. 100 years ago, I mean, a hot shower every night. We take that for granted every day you do it. But you, that's, that was a luxury. That's a luxury. A warm bed at night, clothes, a house, food, water, a garage to park your truck in, to have a truck.

Heated and cooled seats. Yeah, I mean, life is pretty freaking good. And it's hard when you're living as an American and that's all you know. It's hard to wrap your head around on how blessed we all are. And yeah, that we all have problems. And yeah, it seems a little doom and gloom sometimes. But sometimes I think you just got to center yourself and be like, I'm living pretty good.

I'm living pretty good right now. So just remind yourself of that. And that's what I'm trying to do more in this year is just, it ain't all that bad. there's problems, but our problems pale in comparison. 1,000%. So that's going to wrap it up, guys.

We love you. We appreciate you. If you got any value from the show, please do share it out with the people that you know. Leave a review on Spotify or Apple. Subscribe to our YouTube channel if you want to watch us and see more of our content. Have a hell of a week, and we'll see you back here next week for another episode.