Barn Talk - Would You Sell Your Farm For $26 Million?

Episode Date: October 11, 2026

Corn is over $5 and beans are near $13, and a lot of farmers still won't make any more money than they did at $4.50 corn. Every time the grain price goes up, something takes it back, and the front half of this Hot Topics episode is about what's doing the taking. Diesel is $6.13 in Iowa. One Illinois farmer spent $1,000 filling a single semi. Anhydrous is close to $1,000 a ton, up 25% from a year ago. Refineries over there are putting out about 60% of the diesel they did before the Iran war, so more oil doesn't mean cheaper diesel. The White House is letting dyed diesel run on the road for the rest of the year with the federal tax deferred, about $640 million of relief by USDA's count. Deferred, not forgiven. Then the bigger point. Farming spent decades specializing, and that bill is coming due. We don't think 10,000 acres is big enough to win on scale anymore, and at that size you're a CEO, not a farmer. For everybody else the answer is diversity: livestock back on the ground, manure in place of high priced nitrogen, shared equipment. And China cut tariffs on corn, wheat, meat and dairy but kept 10% on soybeans, so bean marketing is about politics now, with Brazil getting better every year. Also in this one: 17,000 fewer cattle through the packing plants in one week, why immigration reform keeps dying with no middle left in politics, a Kentucky family turning down $26 million for 900 acres, 70 to 80 trucks showing up to pull a sick neighbor's beets, and a 2,598 pound pumpkin. Maybe that's why we don't just grow corn and soybeans on every acre. Maybe we need to diversify. What's taking the $5 back on your operation this fall? Drop it in the comments and we read them. JOIN THE BARN TALK NEWSLETTER & GET LIVE EVENT ACCESS: We're on a mission to get 10,000 subscribers, and once we do, we're hosting a live event at the barn! Sign up to get exclusive access to tickets and details.👇🏻 Help us get there: https://www.joinbarntalk.com THIS EPISODE IS BROUGHT TO YOU BY: ● Conterra Ag ➱ https://www.conterraag.com ● AcreEdge Soil NXT ➱ https://www.acreedge.com TIMESTAMPS: 00:00 Hot Topics before the pigs get chored 02:35 Why Tork came in fiery this morning 05:25 Tearing out Grandpa's 1970s hog barns 08:16 Market Update presented by Conterra Ag 10:30 $5 corn that pays no better than $4.50 11:28 The red diesel order and $640 million 14:46 Presented by AcreEdge Soil NXT 15:25 Diesel hauls everything you buy 18:43 We've hit the end of specialization 19:27 10,000 acres doesn't catch it anymore 21:43 Put livestock back on the land 23:02 No money behind you? Don't start in grain 23:34 The answer to high priced nitrogen 26:04 Red diesel vs green diesel, explained 29:31 Deferred, not forgiven. Who pays? 31:31 17,000 fewer cattle processed in a week 33:54 Why ag needs immigration reform 36:32 The death of the middle in politics 41:56 Packing plants were always the starter job 44:50 The post World War II order is ending 51:43 Why we want Peter Zeihan at the barn 52:55 China cut tariffs on everything but beans 54:05 Bean marketing is about politics now 57:27 Why Brazil worries every young farmer 1:00:20 100 year old locks and dams 1:02:44 Data centers are coming for farmland 1:04:40 $26 million for 900 acres, and they said no 1:08:59 Why Tork says they get built anyway 1:10:39 Great Grandpa would call me an idiot 1:15:56 Take the principles, not the assets 1:16:34 The good: College GameDay in Iowa City 1:17:52 70 to 80 trucks show up for Bill Cotton 1:18:41 The 2,598 pound pumpkin 1:23:09 Big plans for 2027 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 👇🏻 ● Barn Talk Instagram ➱ https://www.instagram.com/barntalkshow ● Barn Talk TikTok ➱ https://bit.ly/3qciekS ● Sawyer's Instagram ➱ https://bit.ly/3BtX0n4 ● Tork's Instagram ➱ https://bit.ly/3LGZJxS ● Sawyer's X ➱ https://x.com/SawyerWhisler ● Tork's X ➱ https://x.com/TorkWhisler ------------------------------- ⚠NO FINANCIAL ADVICE / DISCLAIMER⚠ Barn Talk is for educational, informational, and entertainment purposes only, with no warranty of accuracy or completeness. Nothing here is financial, investment, or trading advice, and none of it is specific to you. Do your own due diligence and consult a licensed professional before making any financial decision. Trading stocks, crypto, and NFTs carries real risk and is not suitable for everyone. You use this information at your own risk. #ConterraAg #Landus #EP221 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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free of charge. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with Eye Gaming, Ontario. 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 host-only show.

We are in the midst of craziness. Harvests here. We're doing a major project on the farm at the same time. pigs got to get chored. So we're just fitting this in with the time that we have. We're shooting this early this morning before all the chaos starts. It's going to be a good one. Before we get into it, though,

all that we ask is you guys share the show with the people that you know if you get any value. That is the number one way that you can help us out here at Barn Talk. We cannot grow this show without you guys. We don't run paid ads to promote the show in any regard. We just rely on word of mouth and organic growth. you guys so thank you so much for those of you that do that another thing you can help us out with at barn talk is leaving a review on spotify or apple uh the more reviews pile up the more credible you make our show which in turn allows us to have great guests come to the show come to southeast

iwa and have amazing conversations with us last thing you can do to help us out here at barn talk is just go sign up for our weekly newsletter that we're putting out it's at join barn talk dot com uh we're just basically talking about everything going on in rural America and give you guys our perspective on it. It's completely free. And we have a goal right now with that. When we get to 10,000 newsletter, subscribers, we're going to throw a party here. We're going to throw a live event right here on the farm close to the barn and hand out bushlights, have some music, have some speakers, have some food trucks. I don't know what Torque's going to do, but it'll be a blast. Square dance. Torque's going to square dance.

there you go. He's going to, we're going to throw torque at a target. It's going to be awesome. We should have a dodge ball. Tournament. Tournament.

That would be awesome. Except, I don't want to be responsible for all the hamstrings that get pulled by or later aged farmers. Or head shots. Well,

it's a rubber ball. It'll hurt. That waffle look. How are you doing this morning? I mean, you came in a little fiery this morning. Oh, gosh. Why are you a little,

Why are you a little fiery? Nothing goes. We were supposed to start this a half hour ago, and I went to update the market update, and the DTN website was down for Katz Grain. And so I had the bid sheet from yesterday, because they sent out a bid sheet last night by email because it wasn't working, but I thought it would be up and going this morning. And I jacked around.

I thought, well, I can just go some other website somewhere, has all. this stuff and I couldn't get I couldn't get what I was looking for and so then I'm like screw it so I just did everything else and I have the cash bids but I don't have a lot of the other stuff and went to print it and this morning my printer just decided oh today it'd be a good day to do printer maintenance so it just sat there and chatter to itself for 10 minutes while I was being impatient waiting and yeah I don't know and this is only my first cup of coffee. because I made the coffee and then I got started doing something else. And I should have just poured whiskey right in here and just started the day outright.

You're not you when you need coffee. You're not you when you're not caffeinated. I tell you what, it's a doozy. And I got to go get some government juice to pour in the off-road dump truck we have because it's low on death. And the only thing I have on my farm that takes death is my big skid loader. and so you buy a little two and a half gallon jug of it, and it'll run for a month on that.

But this thing takes a little higher quantity, so I don't know, I got to call FS and see if they'll bring me a toad or something to fill the damn thing with. You just love death, don't you? Well, I just think it's funny. There's a guy from somewhere here in Iowa, and he was put on his TikTok that, you know, you put nitrogen in your tractor to save the planet,

but you put nitrogen on your farm on your land to grow corn and you're a monster. So I don't know, it's kind of weird. I think we should get rid of it. I don't think it does a damn thing other than costs a lot of money. And, yeah. But hey, at least we don't have, at least we can run off-road diesel. So for all the guys that, you know, have been running off-road diesel for the last, however many years, now you're legal.

so that's awesome. Coming down the pipe. We're going to talk about that anyway. Yeah, we will. We will. Well, I hope you're going to get better as the progresses. You're going to brighten my... Sometimes you just got a bitch.

I know, you do. That's right. You got to let it out. You got to get your words out. Yeah, you do. So... Yeah, we've got some interesting projects going on right now. So I don't know if we've mentioned this,

but we're tearing out the old hog barns that my grandpa built back in the 70s. he all the concrete is just left and so we got a 10 foot pit we got a three foot pit and two four foot two four foot two four foot two four foot fits um and so we have got one done all the way second one is what three quarters of the way done everything but the floor everything but the floor and then the third one we haven't started on yet but been running the dump you've been running the dump truck basically all week yeah them down and it's a fun machine but yeah now you got to figure out we got to figure out the whole of death called 60 68 loads I think we're piling all the concrete down by the

creek we're either going to grind it or use it for shipwrap along the creek and yeah it's one of those things you know it's pretty cool when you first start you're like oh this is awesome I've never driven one of these and then by day three you're like I never want to drive one of these again. So kudos to the guys that get it done every day because, man, it is amazing. I will say this. I always thought it was curious to me how much money a haul truck costs. You know, it's a six-wheel drive cat.

I think it's a 725 C2 or something like that. Maybe I'm not getting the number right. But, man, it will go through. the amount of stuff that it'll go through and not get stuck is pretty impressive. And I did stick it. I stuck it deep on a hillside. And we pushed it out with a D6. But I couldn't believe how well it just crawled out of there.

It was just crazy. So I understand now why those trucks cost what they cost. Because to engineer something to haul that much weight and articulate and not break, the amount of flex, yeah, kudos to Caterpillar, because I don't know how you, I don't really know how you do something like that, but they do. They do.

They figure it out. Smarter than us. I'm putting it on the list, you know, people say that I'm not telling anybody when I win the lottery, but there'll be signs. I think that'd be a sign. I mean, I don't know what I would haul with it, but.

I thought we were going to turn into a grain cart. I think that would be cool to put a, just put a grain, put a grain cart hopper on that chassis and just make it into your grain cart. People would drive by thinking we were crazy. Well, we are a little bit, but I mean, why not? Make it enjoyable. Seats very comfortable. The buddy seat, not so much, but anyway. Yeah. Well, you got the hot and fast.

Yeah, so this is the abbreviated market update this morning. I apologize for anybody that's waiting on pins and needles for some of the other numbers, but you shouldn't be waiting on my numbers anyway. So corn for December, 502, July of next year, 529, and the best local bid I found was 565, and I think that's only good until the end of this week. Local, there's a few other guys that are right around that 560 spot. Beans for November, 1298, July, 27, 1339.

On this side of the river, ADM, and Burlington had 1250, and if you want to go across to Quincy, 1275, you know, it's a risk whether you'll get back or not, but it's okay. I don't know about the rest. I don't even have a hog bid for you, but crude oil 9227. The 30-year treasury is at 5.66, the 10 years at 5.28. I wouldn't think it'd be good for the new housing market, but it seems to be holding up. Bitcoin, 82,000, gold 4148, silver 5382, and Elon, Tesla, $377.81. Stock market hasn't had a good week.

I haven't been following it too close, but as I check it, it's been down a lot. A lot of angst out there. There is. In the world. That market update is brought to you courtesy of our good friends from Conteer. Ag if you guys need a second opinion on your numbers or you are looking for some hunting ground or some farm ground. Give those guys a call.

Really great people. Love working with them. You can go to contaraag.com and they'll get you taken care of. Today is going to be our hot topics. So we got three or four hot topics that we want to touch on. We haven't done one of these in a while. There's a lot of good stuff going on in the world that we want to touch on. and the first one that we're going to touch on is, well, $5 corn.

Hey, we got $5 corn, but that doesn't pay very much right now because there ain't going on in the world. And also, we're going to touch on the whole diesel, red diesel fix. So corn's over $5, beans are 13, and a lot of guys aren't going to make any money, any more money than they did at $450. because every time the grain price goes up, something takes it back. A farmer in Illinois told a reporter this week he just spent $1,000 filling up one semi, one fill up. Diesel 613 in Iowa, and hydras is almost $1,000 a ton, up 25% from a year ago. And the reason diesel is still ugly, even though oil's coming back, is the Iran War.

The crude is flowing again, but the refineries over there are only still putting out 60% of the diesel. they were before the war. More oil doesn't mean cheaper diesel. So Sunday, Washington, D.C. pulled the one lever it could pull fast. The White House said that for the rest of this year, you can run dyed diesel and on-road trucks and defer the federal tax on it.

No interest, no penalties, and they're looking at whether to wipe out repayment altogether. USDA says that's about $640 million. of relief across the whole harvest. And here's the part we know that most people don't. A week ago, we had supper with two guys from Iowa corn. And the crazy thing is they told us that the growers association had just been in Washington, D.C., pushing exactly that.

And here we are this week, and it's happening. So pretty cool. And that's, you know, I think that's kind of power of a group like that. I mean, you don't know what they're advocating for, but sometimes, I mean, they're watching your back you know they're trying to they're trying to make sure that they can give you relief and help you so um i i i think that that's pretty crazy that was just that was something that i thought about when we were writing this out line up is he literally said that last week so pretty cool um but yeah what's what do you what do you think uh pick your uh it's it's a it's a mess out there i mean

uh input costs I mean, your diesel is, what, 25% higher than what it was, maybe 30%. I don't know what the math is going from 420 to 620. I mean, it's a third hider. Anhydrous is up 25%. Yeah, I mean, we're not to the point of putting on anhydrous yet, so we'll see what it does, but it's probably only going to go higher. And I think the whole Iran thing, it's just another example.

it just shines the spotlight on the fact that we're moving to a time in history where we have got to onshore more of our critical infrastructure. There hasn't been a new diesel refinery built since the mid-70s, I think. California built one, but they say that, but literally it's like the size. of this barn. It's like a, it doesn't amount to nothing. The only one of any size, I think the last one was built in the 70s. And so, you know, availability of oil doesn't really, it doesn't mean anything unless you can refine it. And we don't have enough refining capacity in the United States. And then the second thing you've got is world demand is going to be there. So does all that diesel

stay in the United States or do you sell it on the world market? And my guess is that if you're a refiner, you're going to go where the most money is. And all of that adds up to expense for the American farmer, but also the American consumer because... And trucker. Well, it's all going to trickle to the consumer because, hey, thanks for sticking with us. If you're like us right now, you're living in the combine and watching that yield monitor and every bush, rolling across that screen bounces back to your fertility program. Here's the thing, though. It's not just what you put out there.

It's what your crop actually gets to use. Acre Edge Soil NXT is a soil applied product that activates soil biology, speeds up nutrient cycling, and improves uptake. So the fertility you've already invested in doesn't just sit there. You paid for the fertilizer, help your crop get more of it out of the ground. Learn more about soil NXT and the full line of acres. AcreEdge products at acreedge.com. Now, let's get back to it.

Everything that comes to you via Amazon gets hauled in a truck that probably runs on diesel. Well, those sprinter vans are usually diesels. But it all gets hauled to the warehouse on a truck that runs on diesel. It all gets hauled from the factory. All the right, I mean, everything in this country, for the most part, runs on truck. There is a lot of rail. but even Union Pacific, I mean, they're buying diesel probably cheaper than anybody, but those locomotives are diesel electric locomotives.

So I think we're just at the beginning. And it's not going to get fixed overnight, and there's going to be a lot of pain between here and there. And to tie that back the American farmer, I don't know what you do. I mean, you're going to get squeezed. The price of your commodity is probably going to come up. On the corn side, the bean side seems to be somewhat in question

because everybody's wondering what the Chinese are going to do, whether they're going to buy the other half of beans that they promised they were going to. Although their memory of the conversation is not quite the same as the Trump administration, so I don't know. But Trumpy came out the other day and said that they were going to buy. a whole pile of American ag products. But it looks like the early yield numbers in Iowa that the beans are pretty good.

And the river is not discounting these beans. One of the biggest concerns was it was so wet that when you drove around, the tops of your beans literally were looking black because of all the fungus growing from all the water. and the beans and the pods at the top are discolored, but it doesn't seem to hurt the integrity of the bean. It's just a visual thing,

and so they haven't been discounting them at the river terminal. So that's a good thing, but bean yields have been better than what people thought they were going to be. Corn, about 10% less. But I don't know. it's like every time we run through this scenario, I don't think that the price of the commodity is going to come up enough to make up for how you're getting squeezed.

So your profitability. Well, and eventually that price is going to come down, you know. And I mean, diesel will come down too, but the rest of the inputs have seemed to rise year after year no matter what. So it's like this game of grain farming just becomes harder and harder. just it's i don't i don't know i think agricultural i was talking to i was talking to somebody oh i was actually talking to john haskell yesterday and we were just talking about how he asked me you know with all the people you've had on the show like you guys talk to a lot of people a lot of people out

where you're at but also a lot of people kind of in my world what what is your like biggest takeaways and or what is like the biggest things you've learned and it's like i feel like we've we've specialized in agriculture we we went through a time of specialization and it was really good when you were first specials we were first like focusing on and specializing it was really really good now we are on the tail end of specialization in agriculture where you've just built your operation to do one thing and now you are beholding to this it's all caught up yeah it's all caught up to us and so in my opinion unless you want to be a big bTO grain farmer and you are going for scale and you are going for you are going to try to farm 10,000 20,000 30,000 acres plus i don't think 10,000

catches it anymore no i don't think the economics i don't think the economics are that good on 10,000 acres well i mean unless you're paid if it's paid Paid foreground. But I'm just saying if you're trying to get to the scale that you can leverage everything as far as your input and get the rock bottom price and all that, I think that has already moved past that. I mean, there's a fair number of people

that are right in that between 7,500 and 12,000 acres that they're farming. And you talk to those guys, they're not really bragging any. Yeah. And so, I mean, I think it all goes back to what do you want to do? Like, what do you want to do? Because I think that's the, that's kind of the quandary is, okay, you want to farm.

But if you're going to farm at that scale, you're not farming. You are, you're the manager. You're a CEO. Yeah, you're running the business. You probably have, you're probably meeting with your finance guys. your HR person. You're running the crew. You're running the harvest crew.

Anything that breaks? Well, but anything that breaks, it's on you to go. I mean, you're not you having to go physically fix it, but to get the logistical nightmare figured out of who's in what field and making, I think all you're probably doing is putting out fires

the entire day. That's what you're doing. So it begs the question. I mean, is that what you want to do? And for some guys, it's worth it and they want to do it. But I think there's a realization going along that it's not, it's, I mean, the pressure just keeps building because the margin

keeps getting hammered. So to your point, I think what, well, you didn't even let me finish my point. Oh, we'll finish your point. I was going to say, I just think diversified operations are, we've reached the tail end of specialization, and if you're not going to be these BTO grain farmers and want to scale, the logical conclusion in my head is, you have to find a way to run a diversified operation with livestock or some other element that you can bring to your farm, whether that be ag tourism or social media or an off-farm business. I think integrating livestock back on the land, even here in Iowa, Nebraska, whatever, running them on cornstalks, custom grazing, all those things. I think that needs to be a bigger

conversation that we have for the guys that don't want to be BTO grain farmers because it's going to help your margins, going to help your fertility. If you're running cattle on your corn stocks potentially, you know, your input costs could go down. I mean, there's, there's a lot of benefits that we've heard and talked to guys on that do it with doing it. But that's just one example, you know, but I think, I think that is how we're going to combat this thing. That's how you're going to have to make it as a farming operation moving forward. Don't specialize in just doing one thing. I mean,

don't specialize into doing grain farming. Don't think that you're going to be a first generation farmer unless you got serious capital backing you and just grain farm and it's going to make you rich. It ain't going to. You're not going to make money grain farming. Or you're going to make some money, but if you're low-cost producer, you can.

Yeah, you can make good money doing it, but we're not doing this all for the experience. So, you know, if I was a first-generation guy and I had no money backing me, I sure as hell wouldn't start with the idea that I was going to grain farm, like I was going to get in grain farming. Yeah. I just wouldn't.

I would get seriously educated on livestock and just thinking outside the box. Yeah. To your point, the answer to high-priced nitrogen, is don't buy high-priced nitrogen. Use manure. Yeah, if you can get it. I mean, if you can get, if, and the hog business,

you know, it's not a very rosy time as far as trying to build buildings and making them pay, but, you know, there's a, the same thing that's happening with land ownership is, is going to happen with a heck of a lot of these, uh, hog buildings. There's a whole group of guys out there that build them that are getting to the point that they're going to retire. They don't want to deal with them and they're going to get sold or they're going to get leased. You know, if you're a young guy and you got somebody that is willing to crop rent you some acres or sweat equity or whatever and you got somebody else that's got a set of hog barns that you can work out of deal with to get the manure and then you can get

somebody else's cattle to graze on those stocks, you can. You can. probably cut out a good chunk of your input cost on the fertilizer side and then that makes you low-cost producer so there are ways but you got to get creative you can't and you're not going to run you're not going to run new equipment and the other thing that i'm i it's kind of a testimony as to why farmers are fiercely independent but i'm surprised there's not more equipment being shared around than what there is. And maybe we'll see more of that because it's not like, it's not like case IH or deer is interested in all about making cheaper versions of

equipment. They only are interested in selling bigger and bigger and bigger. And so I think you're getting to a point where you're going to have to share equipment to make that pencil because you can't. can't make it pencil buying it yourself. So, yeah. It's a lot of quandaries, but yeah, this fall is going to be challenging, but I think it's going to be challenging for the American consumer.

The farmer's not any different than anybody else. I think clear up the line. The farmer, the co-op, all of them are going to be getting pressed because all their expenses are going up. So, yeah, it's going to be tough. What about red diesel? So explain to somebody that's listening that might not know the different types of diesel. What is red diesel?

What's this whole thing that DC's rolling out here? What is that? So basically the diesel that we use on the farm, like the diesel that we put in our tractors and the diesel we put in the skid loaders or that you run, if you've got an irrigation pump and you're running diesel in it, you're using what we call farm diesel or red diesel.

and that does not have any road use tax on it. So when you fill up, like if you fill up your Durhamax at the gas station, that's green diesel. I think it's green everywhere. Maybe it's a different color other places. But that has federal, and maybe it has state too,

dependent on the state, road use tax on it. And at least in Iowa, it's a big deal. Like, I don't know whether they still do this or not, but I know years ago, when a lot of the hogs that got hauled to the packing plants were hauled with, farmers hauled them themselves with gooseneck trailers, it wasn't unusual at all for the DOT to show up at a packing plant and just start pulling samples out of fuel tanks because farmers are notorious for just filling up at the farm barrel to haul their hogs to town. You're not supposed to do that. Obviously, you're supposed to put in green, diet,

diesel and pay the road use tax and so they would they would sample it and then they would find people that so what this does is it basically allows people like if i'm a farmer and i'm hauling my grain with my semi from my farm to ikelbergers i can burn red diesel i can burn farm diesel in that so it's cheaper it's anywhere between uh i think at the bottom end depending on the tax it's what 30 cents cheaper all the way up to maybe it's 75 cents cheaper I guess I don't know if the tax is different state by state but the federal tax whatever that is I think here in Iowa it's maybe you're saving like 40 some cents when it's all said and done the thing that I got out of so first of all I think the way that reads is that only that is only if you're moving agriculture cultural products. So I don't think that means I don't think that means

the bud truck is filling up with farm diesel. And the thing is, I don't think they have access to it. I mean, most commercial like most places you stop on the interstate to get diesel fuel, I don't think they have red farm diesel there.

But for rural America, you have plenty of access to it. So if you're hauling your commodities to town, you can use farm diesel. so you're saving the tax. But I don't know how they're going to recoup that. If you're filling up at the pump,

somebody's got a record of how many gallons you got and all that. And I suppose at some point they can send you a bill and say you owe for this tax. But if you're just filling up in the farm barrel that goes in your combine, your skid load, or your tractors, and you fill up your semi, I don't know how anybody's going to back figure how much tax money you should get. I think that's pretty much. It says it's deferred, not forgiven. Yeah, well,

you state has to go along with it. They can defer it, but it's probably deferred for my lifetime because nobody's going to know how the hell I, how many gallons I use. Yeah, I have a thing in here. Who pays for this? A deferred tax is still a tax. Does this come out of road funding, or is this a, or out of repayment notice next spring?

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with Eye Gaming Ontario. We just go to... Because you just drop the amount of income coming in that's supposed to go to federal road tax. However, like in typical government fashion, like what they did with Social Security, the money that gets paid in on federal gas tax, I don't think it's even kept separate anymore. It used to be kept separate for federal funding of road projects, but I think it all goes in the same pot now, and, you know,

it's not like it's all getting used for roads. it's putting the finger in the dike wherever it goes. But obviously you're dropping that tax revenue. So it's just that much less money the government has coming in. And I guess you could say, you know, it's staying in people's pockets. But there's a day of reckoning coming no matter how you do it. So it does, it probably does help the farmers.

Well, no, it does help the farmers. I mean, it's less money that, like my freight, rate. I have a farmer, a friend of mine that hauls my grain to the elevator. So maybe his, maybe his rate per bushel to haul this fall isn't going to go up as much as it would of if he had to pay that tax. Right. So it'll help some. Yeah. All right. Well, how's that? Clear as mud. I think we beat that, beat that one pretty good. That's pretty good. I'm only on, I'm almost done. I'm I have to get another cup of it. Yeah, how's your coffee?

That's good. Just you drink up. I'll tell them about number two. So, all right. Next topic is the crackdown, hitting packing plants. So,

um, this is close to home for anybody that raises livestock. So over the last couple weeks, immigration enforcement ramped up in Kansas, Texas, and Oklahoma. And a livestock group say it hit the packing plants.

The government says there weren't workplace rates. And the union says, workers got picked up in the surrounding towns and people stopped showing up to work. So it doesn't really matter which version you believe because the results are the same. USDA numbers showed about 17,000 fewer cattle processed in one week compared to the week before. The cattle groups are saying thousands of head got delayed and millions of dollars got lost. DTN says most of the workers were back this week. But think about 17,000 head in a week means that's a.

trucks backed up, that's feed lots holding cattle that they were supposed to ship. That's sales barns sitting in with inventory. You know, and we live in Hog Country next to integrators who supply a lot of plants, pigs. So it works the exact same way on the pig side as it is the cattle side. And I remember when COVID happened, holy cow, like people really have no idea the scale of this monster of their food and the meat industry. but if somebody presses the brake all the way down to the floor,

it screws a lot of shit up really quick. It does. Like the integrators in our place, in our hometown, that have, you know, market millions of pigs a year, they're sending loads to the packing plants every day. There's pigs that need to go to new barn. There's wiener pigs that need to go from the sow unit to barns every day. And there's pigs that need to be loaded on a truck,

fat hogs that need to be loaded on a truck and take into a packing plant every day. And when you have one day of shutting down, let alone a week of shutting down, that causes problems. And, you know, it causes even more problems if you're shut down for even longer. And so that's something that people don't really realize. But this is, I think you can touch on this, but this is why, you know, this is why we need immigration reform. You know, I think we've said this a million times on the podcast. Whether you're a Democrat, you're left, right, you're a moderate, you're in the middle. I think all of us can agree that both sides like to fundraise on this issue, but not get

anything done about it. I think all of us agree, let's not open the border up wide open and do nothing about it, but let's also make it a little easier to become a legal immigrant coming to this country because let's be all let's all be honest industries like the packing business need legal we need immigration we need people willing to do the work and it shouldn't be as hard as it is to become an american u.s. citizen but i'm also not saying that we should just let them let anybody and anybody come into the country either i think there's got to be somewhat of a vetting process but it's just this back-and-forth mouse game that we uh cat and mouse game we like to play in american politics that nobody

actually likes to solve anything. But agriculture needs labor. Construction needs labor. Blue collar trades need labor. Everybody you talk to, labor is a need. And immigration is one of those things that helps us with that. And luckily, we have Mexico right of the south of us that has a really good demographics when it comes to young people. They want to work. They want to live the American dream. And we should we should incentivize that. We should want that, but we just, we can never get off, we can never just get off our high horse either side of the aisle and think with some common sense. Because it's, I know there's a lot of red tape there, but man, if you really boil it down, it's, it's a lot, it could be a lot simpler

than what people, what our politicians like to tell us that, you know, it's not simple. But really, it makes sense to me. If you make it easier to become an immigrant in America, more people would come, more quality people would come. It shouldn't be as hard as it is because if you talk to anybody that's ever gone through the immigration process, they will tell you it's an extremely challenging and long and expensive process. And that should be changed, but I'm also not for anybody just showing up into the country.

So there's got to be a middle ground that we all agree is common sense. There's the problem with the whole thing. I was just sitting here and I, like, that stuck with me. This is an example of what the death of the middle when it comes to politics has done to our country. Because what we have now is we have on the liberal side of things, the Democratic Party has been basically hijacked by far, far left people that they want open borders. And on the right side, you have these extremely hardcore conservatives that they don't want anybody getting into this country unless they pay through the ass to get in here. And neither one allow for any negotiation.

And I think there was a time where the main group of people within the parties were were pragmatic enough that they looked at the middle. And this is a perfect issue that can be solved by the middle. because there is zero reason today with the technology that we have and the ability we have to vet people that if you are a decent human being that is not affiliated with gangs or Truman, drug, whatever, smuggling, and you want to come into this country and work,

I'm pretty sure we can figure out whether or not you are a risk or not a risk. And if you can, why would you make it incredibly difficult and incredibly expensive and tie up a bunch of resources to make that happen? To me, this is a no-brainer. However, it never gets to a vote, and the reason it never gets to vote is because both sides, as we've said so many times, all they want to do is make the other side look like an extremist and look terrible, and when they're in power, they don't want anything to get done. And it just, and we're going to get screwed.

I mean, the thing about it is this is inevitable. It will happen at some point. they will have to get out of their own way and make it work because of everything that we're just talking about when it comes to the economy and how expensive things are. We are not going back to a time where worldwide free trade, the flow of goods back and forth between countries, it will never come back. We are going to have to produce much of the needs. of the American people right here in this country.

And the only way you can do that is to re-industrialize this country. And that means more power, more manufacturing, more labor. And we're a one, what are we, a 1.2 replacement. So for every person here, we're not quite one-to-one, but we're like one of the, we're one of the highest our population growth is higher

than most of the rest of the industrialized world but that means it's just very poor we're not as bad as Japan we're not as bad as China we're not as bad as Europe but we're close and our only hope

it's not like we're just people are like you know more Americans need to work yes more Americans do need to work the work participation rates like 66% or something like that needs to be higher. But even if you max that out, there ain't enough people. The baby boomer generation was the biggest generation ever,

and the generation that replaces it on the youngest side is, I don't know, half. So there's this huge gap that's got to be filled. We got it. Interregation reform will happen. It's just you've got to get these idiots out of the way that are just serving their own political gain. Yes. That's it. Yeah, it's, I, yeah, I don't, I feel like that's not the first time we've It's definitely not, but it's a good reminder, you know, this is an example of a good reminder of why immigration is needed and legal immigration is needed because this is just one industry that really relies heavily on immigrants to get the job done. Yeah, Americans, we need more Americans to work, but not a lot of Americans want to actually, not a lot of, not a lot of generational Americans want to work in a packing plan.

No, absolutely. There's just some jobs out there that, and call it coddling, call it, whatever you want to say. We've lived in this prosperous time in America for hundreds of years now, you know, where. No, the packing industry is one of those industries that has forever been an entry level job. It has always been populated by people that took that job until they could find a better job. That is what it is. I know people, I sold hog billings to some people that grew up, and when they were in high school, when they first got out of high school, they worked at Rath, which is now JBS and Atumwa. And they've said that was, it was full of young, well, they said it was full of young people and felons.

But, you know, they worked there when they were getting their start. Like a lot of those guys were trying to get started farming. It was a damn good paying job, but it definitely wasn't their favorite job. But they worked there until they could get established and get going. That's what it's been. Well, now it is to the point where no high school kid wants to do that. They all want to be investment bankers. They all want to go, you know, we've, you know,

everybody has a grander vision, which is good, but we don't have the people to do those jobs. And food is the basis of our society. I mean, part of the reason we're so productive is because you don't have to get up every day, and the first thing you do is go hunt for food. That's why you're able to do everything else you can do. Because I'm sorry, Missy, but if you had to get up every day and skin a raccoon, and figure out what you were going to make for everybody to eat during the day, you wouldn't have time to go to hot yoga and get a facial and all of that.

So, I mean, there's a reason why it's important to have a reliable food production system. And immigration. And immigration is the fuel for that. Yeah. It was funny when the Iowa Corn Boys from last week came on the show, and we talked about he had the same opinion you've always had where the world's changing. you know it's no longer free free trade he's 100% agreements with that of yeah we got to get away we got to get away it's not coming back uh the way it all went down after world war two and what we

did uh with free trade and all of that that's that's that's gone now we have to we have to change and there's going to be some pain with that change but it's what's necessary and why do you why do you think it's why is that like why do you think that's happening is it is it is it just culture? Is it people not getting along? Is it the opportunity with AI and realizing that this is a chance to shake up the world and become a new

world dominant player? You know, like what, what is it? You know? So, first of all, you know, it's a, it's a quote everybody hears, but I don't think anybody,

like it doesn't register. Like, those that don't know history are doomed to repeat it, we as a society, the world over, the Europeans. Visit BetMGM Casino and check out the newest exclusive. The Price is Right Fortune Pick. BetMGM and Game Sense remind you to play responsibly. 19 plus to wager.

Ontario only. Please play responsibly. If you have questions or concerns about your gambling or someone close to you, please contact Connects Ontario at 1-866-531-2,600, to speak to an advisor, free of charge. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with Eye Gaming, Ontario. The Americans, we have had this idea since, especially since World War II. We think that we are just so damn smart and that we, we can build a better system.

And we are not going to make the mistakes of those who came before us. However, you are making the exact mistakes of people that came before you. The United States is 250 years old. In the history of the world, the known world that we have, there's plenty of people that built societies that lasted a hell of a lot longer than that. And they all fell apart, and we all want to, historians all want to go through and we want to say, oh, this is why that happened and they did this, and this was stupid. and we're like, oh, we're way better than that.

No, we're not. We're horrible people. People are flawed, horribly flawed, and we're self-serving. And the United States, they tried their best. The Brent and Woods, after World War II, they basically said, the United States is going to be the policeman for the world. We're going to build the largest blue water navy the world has ever seen. We're going to police the ocean. we're going to make sure that if you want to buy a load of coal

from wherever and have it shipped to France or you want to take your French cookware and ship it to South America, you're going to be able to do it, you're going to be able to insure it, you're going to be able to ship it, nobody's going to mess with you, and we're going to make sure that the currency isn't jacked up.

Now, we got our own benefit out of that because we made everybody use the dollar, and sometimes we were pretty heavy-handed the way we did it. But it was all this idea that if we can just make people trade with each other, build relationships with each other, that we'll all get along. And it worked for a while, but people are people, and especially, this idea that we've had about the Middle East, about somehow that if we can just win the hearts and minds,

of people in the Middle East that will all be friends. And what they mis-underestimated is there are people there that will kill each other over something their great-great-great-great-6-grandfather did to their family or their tribe or their offshoot of their religion. They do not care. They have very low value for human life.

They have little value for women. women and anybody that doesn't think the way they do, they don't have any value for them. That's not a Western value. You can only run this so long before, no matter what you do, people are going to settle scores. And it's just grown and grown. And then the other thing is, we've ran a deficit. And we've been spending the money that we've spent to try to build this. And we can't afford to spend it anymore.

And the United States, they can say whatever they want, but we're not going to run the size of Navy that we've ran for the last 40 years. There's no freaking way. And an aircraft carrier may become, it may become extinct in the fact that you may not be able to defend a trillion-dollar air. Well, I don't know, not a trillion dollar, but it's expensive aircraft carrier from a drone swarm.

And maybe you can, I don't know, but maybe you can't. And if you can't, you sure as hell better not be spending money making them. I don't know. At the end of the day, it all comes back to, it's not going to keep working the way we are, and people need to accept that. And we have this desire to like cling to the way things have always been

and they're not going to be. and there's going to be pain involved, but it's going to happen. It's just going to happen. I don't know if I answered any question there, but I sure feel better. I think, yeah, you just let it out, let it out, let it out, Tork. Yeah, no, I think you hit on just cultures are different amongst countries. And you can only play that game for so long before people want to settle scores. and I will say this.

I can't remember the other one. There was another one you said too. I said this to you last night, and I'm not going to go off on a tirade about it, but the United States would be well served to watch very closely with what's happening in Europe right now. France, Germany, watch what happens there. Because you are going to see,

I think you're going to see Europe fall apart and you're going to see what the repercussions are for open borders, unfeathered immigration, and political correctness ran amok. And maybe, just maybe, if we watch that and it's going to get worse, maybe people here that have some of these ideas

will look at that and go maybe that's not such a good idea because it's going to be ugly and if we don't change what we're doing here and we don't get this boat turned what's happening in the rest of the world will come here and it's really up to us and our politicians need to wake up

and quit being self-serving and I don't know if they will or not. And the only last thing I'll say is, I am only regurgitating from what I read and what I watch and the ideas that I have kind of come up with as I sit and I meditate on where we are in the world. There's a great guy that grew up in Marshalltown, Iowa, that's written like four books,

and I'd love to have him on the podcast, but if that doesn't happen, you should read at least the first two of his book. and his name's Peter Zion, and it's a shameless plug, but that guy, when I read his first book, it changed my entire worldview, and any of you that know when I go off about China, that viewpoint comes from what I've read from him

and watch him in discussion. And it just makes sense. And it, like, know your history. If you know your history, you can kind of see the patterns that happen and go, yeah he's really good at knowing history but he also is really good at trends and demographics economic trends demographic trends you know what of these what are the decisions these countries

have made in the past that is now catching up with them now and what's that going to mean for them in the future like he's really good at dissecting all of that so so if you're his childhood friend that grew up in marsatown and you've got his number and you can call him say you know what Peter, you need to make a trip down to the barn and have a little power. We'd love to have it. He's like one of our top guests we'd love to have on the show. Absolutely. Definitely one of our one of the ones we want to get for sure. But anyway, speaking of foreign affairs and trade and all of that good stuff. So we touched on a little bit earlier, but China cut tariffs on everything but soybeans. So if you got soybeans standing in the field right now,

you're going to want to listen to this one. So last week, the U.S. and China laid out a plan to cut tariffs on each other, excuse me, and the list covers corn, wheat, meat, and dairy. You know what's not on it? Soybeans. Beans still face an extra 10% tariff going in. The trade truce got extended, but with no new promise to buy beans and no date for when any of these cuts actually happened. the White House has been saying China committed to 25 million tons a year but China's never confirmed that number so the Trump administration is trying to butter us up a little bit the best count somebody just goose you there sorry

sorry it's early let me let me get a drink here the best count anybody's got is their state buyers have bought about 12 million tons so far and here's what that means for a soybean guy. The private crushers in China can't buy from us competitively with that tariff on. So the beans, the only beans moving are the ones the Chinese government decides to buy, which means your bean marketing plan isn't about freight and protein and price anymore. It's about politics.

So, uh, what do you think about all that? I mean, the Chinese, they've got their, I mean, they're our enemy. It's such a crazy I mean we're at war with China And we have been for quite a while and we It's kind of a quiet war Yeah it's a quiet war it is

I mean Everybody talks about you know Russia You know Russia meddling in our elections The Chinese are They are way further down the rabbit hole A messing with the United States Than what Russia is

And they have a way bigger budget to do it China has a lot of problems. They are betting hard on AI to save their ass because they're going to run out of people way before we are. Their demographics are freaking terrible. And they're manufacturing, their only chance is to automate everything. And that's what they're trying to do. And that's why they're building data centers. And that's why they are doubling their electrical capacity what every 10 years, I think. They're building infrastructure for power like, going out of style because to power AI.

But when it comes to American ag, they need us, they need us as an end consumer of products. So ag products that they import because they're very sensitive about the cost of food within their country because they do not want a hungry citizenry in that country because that's one bad things happen. So they're very sensitive of that. So they play that chip back and forth at the United States because they know that we need to export these ag products.

I don't really know where it's going to go but the dollar is getting expensive and as the dollar goes up it makes our products less competitive on the world market. So I mean that's hurting our corn exports

because our corn is expensive compared to our peers. Now, our quality is better, and I think the cost of freight to get it there is better, but that dollar hurts it. So I don't know. I don't know where it goes. They very well could step in here by the end of year and buy everything that they claim they're going to buy. But, you know, we talk year to year, but in the long term, and we touched on it with the corn guys, South America is our number one competitor and

they want to raise more than what they're raising now and it really comes down to what their cost of production is versus ours and our currency versus theirs and I don't know Brazil worries me as a young farmer two decades from now

I think that's going to be a serious problem for both. It doesn't matter if you're talking to corn guys. It doesn't matter if you're talking to hog guys. It doesn't matter if you talk. I mean, packing guys, you talk to anybody when it comes to Brazil. That is a concern. That is a concern on all fronts of agriculture. They are going to be productive.

They are learning all of the methods that we use here in America. I don't know why we're investing down there. Americans are investing, educating, buying land down there. I mean, they're doing it to profit. And labor is plentiful. Labor is plentiful down there. It's not a problem. JBS come into America.

JBS is our nemesis. Yeah. The points that we had in here about China, that was a little off tirade. But yeah, that is any young farmer out there that you're going to be, you're going to be, you know, running the farm in 20 to 25 years, 30 years from now, like, yeah, you need to be watching Brazil. Like, you need, that needs,

to me, that's something I'm tuning into and watching now as a young guy, because that is going to get worse and worse and worse. And you are going, knowing what playing field you're playing on really, really matters when it comes to making decisions in your business or in your industry. And so if everybody in the ag world is saying Brazil's a threat and it's going to get really dice you here in the next decade or two, that is an indicator for me that you better keep your eye on the ball and you better make sure that you're knowing what's going on down there. You know, you got to know what's going on so that you can make better decisions on your own operation and your own business and pivot if you need to pivot or whatever.

There, Brazil's, uh, Brazil's limiting factor that they have to deal with is their cost production because of fertilizer. They don't have any fertilizer production to speak of within the continent. It all is imported. Most of it came from Russia and Africa. So their cost to get fertilizer is more. Their dirt, they are not blessed with the soils that we have in the United States. Their soil is very poor. And they have... Visit BetMGM Casino and check out the newest exclusive. The Price is Right Fortune Pick. BetMGM and GameSense remind you to play responsibly.

19 plus to wager. Ontario only. Please play responsibly. If you have questions or concerns about your gambling or someone close to you, please contact Connects Ontario at 1-866-531-2,600 to speak to an advisor. Free of charge. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with Eye Gaming, Ontario. I have to use a lot of fertilizer to grow that crop.

And their infrastructure is not good. However, they're investing hard in infrastructure. But, I mean, it's not that we can't compete with them, but if we are going to compete with them, we have to, no money has been spent on the lock and dam system, on the Mississippi River or the Missouri River, since they were built, some of those locks are 100 years old maybe, I don't know. If we're going to compete in the world, we need to spend the money here at home to make sure that

getting our products to the shipping port to leave is as efficient as it can be. And that's one thing that I don't understand why we've jacked around as long as we have. But supposedly there's a new steel plant going to be built in southeast Iowa, and the ore, the iron ore that is going to be, that is going to fuel that plant is coming from Minnesota. And so it's going to come down the river. And so now all of a sudden, the Trump administration wants to invest a whole shitload of money in the lock and dam system to update it because it's not economically viable the way they'll have to ship that in barges down the Mississippi, which is good. Hopefully we get it fixed.

but that's not a two-year deal. That's a 10-year deal to get that done. But anyway, I agree with you. South America is definitely going to get more efficient. They're going to get better, and we're going to be dealing with them a long time, which at the end of the day, maybe that's why we don't just grow corn and soybeans

on every acre. Maybe we need to diversify. Yep. Yeah, and I think leveraging technology is an edge of ours as well, because I don't know, I don't know how as accessible technology is in South America as far as, are they up to date with as much as we are, as far as AI usage and, you know, data analytics, understand, you know, efficiencies on that end. I mean, that's, that's where we're getting a lot better in agriculture.

I mean, they're going to have the benefit of the technology is going to get perfected in the United States, and then they're going to be able to buy it. But the amount of compute, the quality of Wi-Fi, all of the last mile stuff, fiber, you know, they're definitely behind. It's just at what point does that catch up. Yeah. Yep.

Okay. Let's move on to our last topic here. And it's one that everybody loves talking about. Everybody loves it. we're talking about data centers. So data centers are coming for the farmland and the farmland is fighting back. So we've touched on this a little bit on previous episodes. And I know everybody hates talking about AI and is sick of talking about data centers and sick of seeing this shit.

But guys, it's relevant, right? I mean, this is irrelevant. This is one of those things that is just not going away. Okay. This is going to be a problem and a hot button. issue that's going to continue to develop as the years progress. So this week, this week it turned into a full on fight and it's happening in farm country, not the suburbs in Pennsylvania. People showed up yesterday asking the governor for a statewide

moratorium, no new data centers, period. In Castleton, North Dakota, a company wants to put on a prime, wants to put on prime farmland that would pull 540 megawatts at peak, which is more power than a lot of small cities use, and the neighbors pack the cafe to say no. The North Dakota legislators got a whole committee on it now holding hearings on water use. Over in Virginia, people are literally chanting, grow tomatoes, not data centers. It's taken over the race for Ag Commissioner down in Texas. And the one that should make every farmer listen and stop and think. Euclair County,

Wisconsin just passed a farmland preservation plan that blocks data centers and utility scale solar on farm ground. Both of them, same rule. And we've said this on the podcast before, but we're going to say it again. The money part is,

earlier this year, a cattle family in Kentucky turned down $26 million for a 900-acre farm from a Fortune 100 company that wanted to build a data center campus. 26 million and they said no. Meanwhile, data center construction is up 46% from a year ago. And home building job openings dropped from almost 300,000 to about 250,000. So the electricians

and the concrete guys and all that are going where the money is and it's not in housing. And it's definitely not in agriculture. We've been saying that for a while. And the president stood up at a rally in Ohio this week and said data centers have to benefit the local communities, which tells you Washington knows this is a problem too. There's even lawsuits in federal court right now asking whether a county is allowed to say no at all. So this whole issue is a hot button one for sure, and there's a lot of, there's a lot of layers in it.

I mean, you have corporate, you have corporations trying to build these things. you have government involvement, you have local communities, and you have farmers, you have the cities that are the local communities that are going to have to deal with the repercussions of having this in their town, you have local politics, and then on the global scale, the whole big reason we're doing this whole AI thing is we are trying to not lose the race against China. And so there is a lot of shit to unpack with this data center thing and that's why it's so important but um you had a really good point about this last night when we're talking you know on um late september uh there was an ai summit at the white house and

i don't know if any of you saw the clips but mark zuckberg was there Elon Musk was there obviously Trump was there anybody a lot of the big big players in AI right now who's the fear monger from Sam Alton? No, the other guy, I guess maybe it's not open AI. It's, uh, is it anthropic? Could be anthropic. He's got a weird, he's like Indian. Uh, I don't know him.

I can't remember his name. I probably seen him. He's the guy that's put out a lot of the, he's kind of been the fear monger out of the whole bunch. Yeah. They were all there, but they put on a summit in September, late September at the White House. And you had an opinion on, yes, it was there to tell the public that we're working on regulating AI and making sure we're not doing this too fast. But the other thing is, what do you think?

The other thing is that there's two sides to this. And I don't think people, I didn't think about it this way, but you know that part of the race in technology is for every jump in technology, you have to have a jump in cybersecurity, because if you don't, these companies that are building cybersecurity of systems for companies and for the government and for whatever, every time there's a move in technology, there has to be a move like they've got to up their game.

And so for every chunk of compute that gets built for AI, part of that computer, gets used for cyber defense. And all of this talk about data centers and, oh, we're not going to have them in my backyard and we're not going to have them here and we're not going to have them here. Honestly, I think that you're just going to get to a point where, and I'm not, I'm not endorsing this. I'm just a realist. this will eventually jump they'll be they'll be an attack they'll be an attack on some

infrastructure from an outside entity using AI and when that happens the United States government they will invoke War Powers Act and they will make data centers a national security priority. And at that point, they're going to put them up and there isn't going to be anything that anybody can do about it because they are in a war with China. And China knows that it, so if China was going to invade Taiwan, they would have already done it. They can't do it. They know they can't do it. The reason they can't do it is because if they were to do that, we would blockade they get almost everything they have imported to them. They don't have enough of anything to do anything.

They rely on imports. They don't have a Navy that can defend their country. You would embargo China and it would be all the coal-fired plants would go dark within about 30 days. They know that. They can't do that. The only way that they're going to win out as their population dwindles is AI. They're going to try to automate their, their factories,

they're going to try to win the AI war. The race. Well, it's a war is what it is. I mean, it just is. We all talk nice about it, and we all talk abstract about it, but the dyes have been cast on this, and I just don't think people realize it yet.

So these data centers are going to get built. Like, they're going to get built. And to the 900 acres, farm that gave up $26 million. If my great-grandfather was sitting here and somebody offered me $900 million, and I didn't take it, I'm pretty sure he would just tell me I'm an idiot. $26 million. Yeah, $26 million.

Yeah, not $900 million. No, for 900 acres. Yeah. $26 million for 900 acres. I mean, I understand. Believe me, I, I mean, obviously, I love this land and everything it represents and all of that, but I'm also a realist. And, you know, at some point, you're like, really? Yeah, I think it's bad.

And I'm, I'm not saying that that's a good thing. I'm not saying that this should just go unchecked. However, when it switches, they'll be an event that will switch it and both sides of the aisle will hop on this thing. And that meeting at the White House was just the first, that was just the first step of showing unity between the government and technology. And the people at the top know what, they know the stakes that they're playing with. And, um, yeah, I think that you were saying was they were forming a united front. Yeah. It wasn't just how are we going to slow the regulate, how are we going to regulate AI so it doesn't

get out of control and it's dangerous. but what is the united front that we're going to approach the American public with moving forward? Like what's the plan on how are we going to get this through the finish line to the American public as a united front? That, I think that's a big piece of it too. Yeah, you couldn't have said it better. I couldn't have said it better myself. I think people, when you don't know anything about, and the thing is like you talk, I'm really, I love talking to my friends about AI.

I love asking young people, what AI are you using? I love picking their brain on it because I want to know how in tune people are with what's going on with it. And man, there's really not. A lot of people aren't in tune with it. They don't want to know anything about it.

Or they just kind of want to put it against, put it on the sideline, put it on a shelf. They don't really want to use it. They don't like it. they don't and i understand that i under i totally understand that but this is because it's it's really important to know what's going on here i think because it is the future it is not something that you can just this cat isn't going back in the bag you know this it's it's out right this it's out it's not going back into the bottle it's it's out and china's trying to win we're competing with them

um so we have to play this game of a i guess do i think there should be more more regulation, 100%, but we also can't win, or we also can't lose the war against China, the race against China, because I truly believe this technology will make, whoever wins the war of AI and has the most powerful AI will be the most, it will become the superpower of the world. Because it has the capability to be smarter the entire human race. I mean, to be able to wield that as a country, as a power, that's powerful. And if we don't win it, we have- Power corrupts an absolute power corrupts absolutely.

So anyway, yeah, and I'm with you too. I'm not, I'm not pro-AI data center without some serious consideration of what it can do to the local people in that community. I think that's really important. It's got to be beneficial to local community. I agree with that. You can't just build this whole thing up and all of the bills from everybody that lives in that town goes way up and the town dies.

We don't want that. That's not good for rural America. That's not good for the people of rural America. So there has to be some way that they find a balance there. If this data center has to go up, what are you going to do for the people that live there? You know, I think that's really important. Visit BetMGM Casino and check out the newest exclusive.

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BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with Eye Gaming Ontario. Important. and you know other thing i think about is is that good for people's health right to be that close to a data center right you know i don't think that i don't know i'm not a health guy i'm not a scientist i don't know about electronic waves and all that shit but is it is it is it good for humans to be that close to something so so technologically you know just all that power and i don't know maybe that's just stupid and I don't know shit and I'm not claiming to know anything but I don't know if I would want to have my house every day living next to a data center right you know I agree so I mean I can

barely control the voices in my head the way it is yeah yeah you'd probably start with all that metal in your body you'd probably just start twitching feeling a feel on a pull and start twitching yeah I don't know hopefully we don't find out yeah well we won't yeah and if you're getting an offer for 20 26 million dollars it's like what John Haskell said when we had a on the show. Your ancestors, it's not just about the assets that they pass down to you if you're a generational farmer. It's the principles.

It's the mindset that taught them, that taught you, right? Take those principles with you for the long run, not the assets because they would want you to take that money and go farm somewhere else. You can take $26 million and go basically farm or ranch anywhere else. It's a no-brainer. Yep. So, I agree. Anyway, what's next? Okay, the good. We're going to end on some good here, because I know that a lot of times we do hot topics,

and sometimes it feels like it's all doom and gloom. There is still some hope out there. First one I want to say is college game day. College game day is a great uniter. College game day came to Iowa City, Iowa for the Ohio State Iowa game. I actually went to that game. It was very disappointed in my Hawkeyes. but it was awesome to just those that program pat macfee was the best thing that ever happened to ESPN

that show has really you know it's just it does a lot of good uh for for college towns it unites people it brings people people together it's trying to spotlight on iowa city iowa and the children's hospital and you know football's just awesome it is i'm glad football's back falls awesome football's back and college game day, I think, is one of the best things happening in football right now, whether it's NFL college, what not. It's just a fun thing to watch, and it's good for any college town that they come to. So, loved watching them, loves tuning into them on Saturdays. It's pretty cool.

In Hillsborough, North Dakota, a farm name Bill Cotton is fighting stage four brain cancer. and his beet harvest was sitting there. Last week, his neighbor showed up with 70 or 80 trucks and a bunch of harvesters and pulled his whole crop out in one day. His brother said, Bill's always the one who shows up for everybody else, so it was neat to see everybody show up for him. Pretty cool story.

Gotta love that when that, and that's a big, that's, if you guys haven't ever checked out Farm Rescue, I know that they've been mentioned on the show before, but they kind of, they're the ones, they're the nonprofit that does that kind of, of stuff for people, which is really, really cool.

It's an awesome charity. It is an awesome charity charity. Kind of a fun one is a guy in Massachusetts just won the fair with a 2,598 pound pumpkin. How much? 2,598 pound pumpkin. How do you even move? How do you move a pumpkin like that? I think you could do it.

you get a bunch of old you get a bunch of all you get a bunch of farm strong big ass forearmed farmers that are have short you know what you say built for high win built for high win got a lot of power and their legs and their glutes and they just all lifted up and put it on a trailer like when those omish move a barn you know for everybody yeah i don't know whether that's like i'm i'm kind of serious i don't know if you because can you put a fork lift under it? Like, could you put forks under it and pick it up without like... puncturing it?

Or do you roll it up? I wouldn't risk it. Do you roll it and get straps under it and then pick it up with the straps? I think you'd probably want to pick it up with straps. I would think you would probably want to hook it on, hook something on to it and pull it up. And then what do you do when you've won? You haul it at home? I'd smash the fucker.

That's what I'd do. I would 100% smash it. How many pies does that make? I bet you that's probably not... Or you could do that. that'd be sweet. You just make a huge batch of pumpkin pies for Thanksgiving and hand them out. That'd be a hell of a way to celebrate.

You should cut it, cut the top of it and dig the guts out and see how many people you could put in it. Let's be honest. It's probably a lot like a show pig. Yeah. If you're, you're not eating a show pig after you show a pig. And I don't know if you want to eat anything that comes from a pumpkin that became that big because God knows. You think there's some nitrates in that pumpkin? Yeah.

They made that thing grow to be that big for somehow. And I don't think it took years and years and years to grow it to be that big. Do you think they injected human growth hormone in the stem? Yeah, they probably gave you some peptides. Peptides. Yeah. Testosterone. Yeah, some TRT.

Nice. Well, that's impressive. Where was that at? That was in Massachusetts. Well, kudos to that guy because or that family because that's a, I wonder who got second. I like you got to wonder whether it was a deal where second place was like 1500 pounds if you ain't first your last baby that's right that's right if you ain't first your last you could put five cougars inside that pumpkin there's a cougar in the car yeah that movie's classic that's pretty awesome yeah anyway so those are some fun touch point highlights I know we're hearing the excavator getting started here on these old hog barns these old hog barns are right behind our barn so that is a queue that we need to probably wrap this puppy up and get going so we can start running the dump truck. Okay. So are you running the dump truck today or are you going to bean harvest? Because

we're going to start beans today. So one of us has got to go mind that and one of us has got to run the dump truck. I think I'll probably go over and do beans. Yeah, I figured. Change the scenery. Change of scenery. What I like about beans is, you know, every year you harvest, you use the grain card every day for weeks or the wagons every day for weeks or the combine every day for weeks and then you put it away and you don't use it for a whole year. So it's just nice when you can start with beans. It's a little slower pace. You can get all your muscle memory back of okay, yep, this trigger does this and da da da da da da. So I kind of just, I like the slower pace of just we're not going right into corn where it's balls to the wall and go go, go, go, go. This is what are you going to do when

the first cart load that you get, David says, I'm sending that straight to the river and it's the trucker that you pissed off last year because you overfilled him. I'm just going to have to deal with it and I'll probably get pissed off, but it is what it is. It'll be all right. I'll just be, I'll be sure to shut it off sooner rather than later this time. And I won't, I'm not going to go off of his hand signals if they're confusing. I'm just going to go off of what I think is right. I'd rather underload him than overload him.

Yeah. It's kind of my philosophy. There you go. It's 90,000 though. 90,000 now. Oh, you can, yeah, they raise the terror. So you can pretty much, if you're not running the big cart, you can just dump the whole thing. All right.

Perfect. Okay. Well, yeah, that's going to wrap up the show, guys. Thank you so much for all your support. We have some really, really big plans for 2027. In the studio, the people that we're bringing on to the team, some things that we want to do in person with you guys. A lot of good things are happening.

It's a big, big credit and kudos to you guys. YouTube right now has been crushing it for Barn Talk. The growth has been absolutely insane. And we just can't say thank you enough because none of it would be possible for another episode. Reaching your audience on Spotify with display ads is easy. Use your existing creative and launch your first campaign in minutes with Spotify Ads Manager.