Bill Meyer Show Podcast - Sponsored by Clouser Drilling www.ClouserDrilling.com - 01-14-25_TUESDAY_6AM

Episode Date: January 14, 2025

Morning news, LA Fires, Smart cities and you, open phones then a talk with Bill Flaig CEO and Co-founder of The American Conservative Values ETF, the fund has dumped Costco for wokeness, Walmart is back in. we talk about why.

The Bill Myers Show podcast is sponsored by Clouser Drilling. They've been leading the way in Southern Oregon well drilling for over 50 years. Find out more about them at clouserdrilling.com. Here's Bill Myers. Good morning and welcome to Pebble in Your Shoe Tuesday. A very frosty 28 degrees. So watch it. There is plenty of freezing fog just about everywhere you're going this morning. And it is slippery walking on the asphalt. So just know it's very deceptive. And, of course, people are still doing 50 miles an hour down Biddle Road. It's kind of interesting that way. That's okay.

They have four-wheel drive vehicles. And so I know that four-wheel drive helps you stop better. I said no traffic expert ever. But let's kind of leave it at that. It's like I'm doing about 30, 35 or so because I can tell it's pretty slippery and that everyone's just kind of blowing by. It's like, okay, fine, fine. Just do that. Just do that.

Yeah, I know. They're saying, hey, you and the PT, you're driving like an old man. Yeah, I know. I know. And my insurance rate reflects it. Cheap. All right. It's 11 minutes after 6, join in at 7.

And see, that's the pebble in my shoe this morning, okay? Because I know the right speed to drive, right? Isn't that the way every driver is? Whatever speed you're going is the proper speed. We know that is the speed that everybody else should be doing. All right. Just have a little bit of fun with you this morning. 770-563-3770-KMED. We've got a lot going on this morning we're going to talk

with uh william flag he's the ceo of a of any of an exchange traded fund it's a you know investment fund and they tend to have a certain point of view because you know how for the longest time in the conservative world we've gotten tired of um of paying for the people who wish to enslave and or tyrannize us the whole woke agenda you know all this kind of stuff and so what uh what bill did is that he opened a place called the american conservative values exchange traded fund and they ended up having an announcement the other day. They ended up divesting from Costco. They ended up divesting from Costco, Allstate Insurance, and they ended up ending its boycott with Walmart.

So in other words, if they had stocks in Costco before, they ended up selling them, the way I understand it. And the same with Allstate, because they're just getting away from these companies that are doubling down on the DEI programs. So we'll have a little talk with him in about 20 minutes. I'm curious to find out how they sit there and they evaluate the various companies, which companies are kind of going up in DEI, like Costco apparently doubling down, and which ones are going in the different direction. So we'll kind of go into that. I think it's an interesting conversation because one of the biggest challenges has been about

where to spend your money. And some companies, it's very difficult to buy around. You know, I get that. Even when it comes time to get the transmitter parts, you know, it's very difficult for me in the broadcast world to not, you know world to not buy around Amazon as an example. You've got to go to Amazon now and then. You've got to do eBay, various other things. And so much of the high-tech bro world is not particularly friendly to anyone who is a little bit to the, you know, to the right of Che Guevara, you know, that kind of thing.

So we'll have a conversation with Bill, Bill Flagg. He's the CEO of this ETF. And we'll kick that around after the 630 News. Also going to talk with Kevin Starrett. And I told him last night, now, I want you to be cheerful. I want you to be cheerful when you come on the show today and talk about what is going on in the state legislature, especially all the gun bills that are there. But we'll get an update from him. Herman Baertschiger, former Josephine County Commissioner, is going to be back in.

We always talk politics and what is going on with the state. He's forgotten more about winning elections than most people have ever learned in their life, really. He's just kind of the way he has old hand at this and uh now it's reported that he may be an incoming county commissioner again because he and andreas black are on the short list to get selected by the current two new county commissioners to fill the seat of the recall john west so we'll have a little talk with him. I guess, you know, it's not like Dick Nixon. You're not going to have Dick Nixon to kick around back in the 1960s when he had lost an election or had left. And now I guess maybe we will still have Herman to kick around.

I don't know. And we're also going to have another interesting open for business. Lisa McLeese Kelly is working with this Network and Action Group, and they're doing really good at exposing locally run businesses, locally owned and operated businesses that are moving on, moving on here and doing some pretty good things. Hey, I wanted to give you a heads up that, you know, after yesterday's conversation about the wildfire map, which got a lot of people all bent out of shape. In fact, I even had a listener stop by.

He was talking to me about some other things and said, hey, I'm one of these people that lives out in the rural areas, and I ended up getting my wildfire map, and I just don't know what I'm going to do. And there was another friend of mine who called who is a pretty well-to-do, pretty well-connected guy. I'm going to leave his name out of it. He tends to kind of keep a low profile here in Southern Oregon.

And he believes that the fix is in and that this is set up, that there's really not much you can do on your appeal, and it's really about just a full takeover of property here in the state of Morgan. That's how he was putting it. It just so happens that State Senator Jeff Golden, who was the main sponsor, along with State Representative Pam Marsh of Senate Bill 732. I think that's the right number. But anyway, he's the reason why you ended up getting those wildfire maps. Of course, the rest of the legislature went along with him, except for most of the Republicans.

But he's having a town hall meeting. Senator Jeff Golden. In fact, here's the news release here. Senator Jeff Golden, who represents most of the Rogue Valley in the Oregon State Senate, will hold his first town hall meeting of 2025 Thursday from 515 to 630 in the Adams Room of the Main Branch Jackson County Library on South Central in Medford. With the 2025 legislative session fully beginning the following Tuesday, Senator Golden will offer a preview of the issues likely to take center stage

and ask Rogue Valley residents to share their views on them. All interested members of the public are welcome. Just so happens that you may be interested in some past legislation that Senator Golden was really, really a big main part of getting in place, and that is the wildfire map. So if you're one of these individuals who, of many, who ended up getting those wildfire map letters over the weekend, you know, the registered letters talking about how the state is essentially going to tell you what to do

from this point forward, or you never asked them to, and they're going to give it to you good and hard. Maybe you want to stop by and go to the Jeff Golden Town Hall. Senator Jeff Golden, I'm sure he'll be quite open to it. And maybe you could just say, Jeff, get rid of this. Get rid of this piece of garbage. A wildfire map that has been formed by students at Oregon State University that doesn't know if you have hardened your individual property, but then just puts a nice big fat rating over everybody that just happens to be there. Because after all, we're looking to reimagine Oregon. Sustainable development.

Climate-friendly, equitable community. That's sort of the unspoken undercurrent of everything which is going on here in Southern Oregon. Speaking of which, we have an example of what is going on with such thought processes right now. Governor Gavin, any twosome-newsome? Yesterday, being talked to by a reporter about Los Angeles 2.0. Have you heard this?

Over the course of the next several years, Los Angeles will be host to the World Cup, and then the Super Bowl, and then the Olympics. With this rebuilding effort needing to take place, is LA going to be ready for all of those global events? My humble position, and it's not just being naively optimistic, that only reinforces the imperative moving quickly, doing it in the spirit of collaboration and cooperation. The President of the United States, Donald Trump, to his credit, was helpful in getting the Olympics to the United States of America to get it down here in LA. We thank him for that. This is an opportunity for him to shine, for this country to shine, for California and

this community to shine. The opportunity with all of that and all that opportunity and that pride and spirit that comes from not just hosting those three iconic games and venues but also the opportunity I think to rebuild at the same time and that's why we're already organizing a Marshall Plan we already have a team of looking and reimagining la 2.0 and we were making sure everyone's included not just the folks on the coast people here that were ravaged by this disaster you just said you're organizing a Marshall Plan for the rebuilding of California. What is that Marshall Plan? For this region, we're just starting to lay out.

I mean, we're still fighting these fires. So we're already talking to city leaders. We're already talking to civic leaders. We're already talking to business leaders and nonprofits. We're talking to labor leaders. We're starting to organize how we can put together a collection of individuals on philanthropy for recovery, how we can organize the region, how we can make sure that we are seeking federal assistance for the Olympics more broadly, but also federal assistance for the recovery

efforts, and how we can galvanize the community with folks that love this community to really develop a mindset so that at scale, we're dealing with the scope of this tragedy and responding to it at scale with efficiency, like the executive order I talked about, time value of delivering projects, addressing building codes, addressing permitting issues, and moving forward to rebuilding and being more resilient. That was a word, Sal, that almost could have been put out by Kamala Harris, rather. Interesting. He talked for about a minute, and I don't think he really said much. But, of course, they're talking about reimagining Los Angeles, kind of like the same way the leftists have talked about reimagining Oregon and our various cities with our climate-friendly, equitable communities.

There's actually a plan out there. They've had it out there. And we have the same sort of things in our various cities. Remember Medford Vision 2040? Same sort of thing. Well, there's something in L.A., the Smart City Plan, officially known as Smart L.A. 2028. And that was published in 2021 by the Los Angeles Information Technology Agency. And they were focusing on prepping the city for the 2028 Summer Olympics by developing a connected and equitable smart city vision. Now, a smart city vision is, in essence, sustainable development, the climate-friendly, equitable community, the 15-minute city.

You will not have a car. You will not own anything. And you'll be happy. This is essentially something that the World Economics Forum would be quite happy with. And it just so happens that the fires come. And the Santa Ana winds were very cooperative with the Klaus Schwab vision and the other various globalists. So, you know, it's the same sort of attack.

As if for some reason, L.A. version 1.0 wasn't any good, right? You know, that kind of thing. And so they want to turn it into a smart city. Now, of course, smart city means that technocratic. Once again, we talked about the climate friendly, equitable community kind of stuff, like what they are ushering in in Medford and the various other cities. This is all part of that plan, apparently. And they want smart cities when I think what the people really want and really what we need are dumb cities that are just efficient and work well with competent people. Competent people who do appear to be in short supply. We can talk about that and other things this morning too on Pebble in Your Shoe Tuesday.

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Get your design suggestion today. Visit WashBautospa.com hi i'm matt stone with stone heating and air and i'm on kmed it is interesting how many of the world improvers like the gavin newsoms or the governor tina kotex and the various other people seem to have a plan just you know sitting there in the background just ready for the next time that there is one of your major cities being destroyed, whether it's Southern Oregon back during Almeda or L.A. right now. Well, we've got the Smart City 2028 plan. It's going to be the Marshall plan. I think it's kind of interesting when the reporter was talking to Newsom.

He said, well, can you give us the details? Well, we're talking about that. No, you already put it out there. You already put it out just a few years ago. It's already out there. You know, they don't want to make it sound as if there was already a solution for the problem that maybe they were half helping to create

or happy to see happening, sort of like 9-11. You remember the people that wanted that project for a new American century, and then there was this amazing Patriot Act that was just sitting in there. And it's like within a day or two of the terrorist attack. And look at this. Hundreds of pages of new government, of a new form of government here. I can't help but think there's a little bit of that going on with L.A. and Oregon and everybody else out here on the West Coast.

Let me go to Casey. Hey, Casey, you want to talk the fire? Go ahead. Good to hear from you. Yeah. You know, if you look down at those satellite photos of the mass destruction, almost every mansion there has a 20,000-gallon swimming pool in the backyard. Now, when ODF protects your house, wildfire around here,

they put up a 1,500-gallon port-a-tank or two of them, a little Honda pump or a Honda pump. It's an air-cooled two-stroke pressure pump. One-inch fire hose, sprinklers on the roof, and down the road they go. And I'll tell you, it would have went a hell of a long way to saving a bunch of houses. That's an interesting take on that. Did they do a bunch of that with all of those swimming pools there? Oh, it should be mandated

that that you build a house that's got a 20 000 gallon swimming pool you got a shunt on it and a pump and then sprinklers on your roof it's ridiculous they're bitching about no water they had 20 000 gallons sitting 30 feet away from their mansion yeah they had water but just in the wrong location right that kind of thing you know uh you can get a pump down at coastal for 800 bucks that'll that'll wet your house down a wet wood, does not burn. Good point. Appreciate the call. Thanks, Casey. Good hearing from you. 7705633, Ron's in Grants Pass. Hello, Ron. How you doing? You want to talk the fire map, right?

Yeah, I got my paperwork yesterday, and I'm telling you, it is a rip and roar going to tear us down because they're going to go after the siding on your house, check it, make sure it's okay, make sure your roads are accessible. What happens if you have a gate up and you don't happen to be home? What are they going to do, tear your gate down? What's going to happen when they say, well, now you're going to have to come up with every three to five years an upgrade because that's when they're going to recheck and redo the system. Yeah, redo the codes there, too. You know, I know that, of course, your current senator, Robinson, is not going to be in favor of what is going on. But you know, Senator Golden is having a town hall Thursday in Medford,

and it might be worth the drive from Grants Pass in your case. Maybe just go talk with him and ask him. I want to suggest one thing, though, that we go into high-speed mode to get either initiative or a referendum going, because that's our only alternative right now, and as much as both houses are controlled by the communists. Point well taken. Thank you for that, Ron. Let me go to the communists. Point well taken. Thank you for that, Ron. Let me go to the horse lady. Hello, Ann. How you doing?

I'm fine. Good morning, Bill. What you thinking? I watched a lot of the interviews of Newsom yesterday, and I think old Slick has a problem. How's that? He's got the wiggles. The wiggles the wiggles like he's got like he's on coke oh or he's uh had too many red bulls i mean this guy is weird as a three dollar bill in those interviews well

you you can imagine though that what what might be going on here annie is that um as smooth and slick as he is and he is incredibly slew uh smooth and slick as he is, and he is incredibly smooth and slick. You know, we all have to agree on that. I think that's one of the reasons he's been able to be governor of that state. That your physicality, after a while, I don't think can keep up with the lie. And you're sitting there and you are lying effortlessly for so long. And yeah, maybe your body language is just going to give it away. What do you think? Bingo.

I think you're absolutely correct. This guy, you can tell he's lying through his teeth and it's all word salad. He sounds just like Kamala. That's what I thought when I heard that little two-minute situation. But, you know, it is amazing how long a smart politician can talk and not say a word. It's beautiful. It's a beautiful thing to observe. I think the fire is going to have a whole lot to do with his future. Yeah, very well could be. I just don't know if he's necessarily going to be bad because they voted him in before.

Let me go to Tom. Hello, Tom. How are you this morning? Welcome. Good morning, Bill. Yeah, you're an admirer of word solids. It's just something. But my pebble, if you will, more like a boulder, is I'm very concerned about the fate and future of Oregon.

We've got a supermajority up there in Salem right now. Yes, we do. If you want to know what could possibly be, well, I think it's more than a possibility. You look at Los Angeles and San Francisco and so forth. They're all run by woke politicians, and we we got all this wokeism up there in Salem. We saw what Kate Brown did with the COVID pandemic, you know, mandates, closed down business, and so forth. And then ended up leaving the climate-friendly equitable community, which Governor Kotick is more than happy to continue to push down. Sure. Oh, yeah. They're using, you know, you got the Jeff Gold and Pam Marsh.

I do believe they're sincere, but I think they're sincere idiots. They're using global warming to bludgeon us into the new world order of 15-minute cities and so forth. And it's also being used to cover up their incompetence. You know, the whole idea of climate change is the excuse for everything having gone wrong in civic engagement and also civic infrastructure that is under their tutelage, that they're in charge of, you know, really. Well, yeah. And, you know, you look at what the Medford City Council did, what you mentioned, the 2040 plan. Well, they were getting all their information from SOCAN. They actually sent a thank you letter to SOCAN because of their very wise advice and tutelage and so forth about how to create the United Nations 15-minute city.

I mean, this is, so what I'm really trying to emphasize to people is that this wokeism, the coming out of Salem and all this correct political stuff is deadly. It's cost lives down in Los Angeles. It will cost lives, and it has cost lives here already in Oregon. So be aware. Be aware. Yeah, be aware. And also, you know, be involved and be vigilant about this. Now, I will once again reiterate that Senator Golden, who, of course, is essentially the origin of the wildfire map that people are getting, the letters that are coming in their mailboxes, and not everybody has received them yet.

But he's having a town hall meeting in Medford, and I think it is well worth your time to head down there and talk with him about it and put some political pressure on him. Well, that's a very good question, Bill. You know, you look what happened down in Los Angeles to the people down there. It's hard to have a great deal of sympathy and one level of sympathy. But the idea that they voted her into office. No, well, I get it.

I get it. But still, Jeff Golden is here. This is an opportunity to talk with him. And I'm hoping that people in Southern Oregon will take advantage of this because he wants to talk about the next legislative session or the session that will be kicking off in in full steam you know next week do you think jeff is capable of listening to anything doesn't seem to be well people need to find out and you know now it's gotten real before everything was etheric way they were talking about it and they were having those other hearings now it's here now it's here and now they're talking about a situation here that um according

to the people that that i know who know a lot about this and i'm hoping to get some more smart people on this to discuss it further that know more about land use planning than i do okay i'm you know talk show host i talk about it a lot i know a little bit about it but it's just a little bit on the on the surface it appears that this so-called appeal of your wild fire map status is almost designed to fail and is that really due process in the land of the free and this is something that is worthy of bringing up to senator golden maybe he can explain himself maybe he can explain it better than the odf and other people will. Okay? So I'm bringing it up. I mean, he wants to talk about the next legislative session, this legislative session. I think that he needs to be talking about the mess that he created in the past legislative sessions. Okay? Good luck. All

right. So thanks for the call. 634. We're going to talk with the ETF guy here in just a few minutes. I'm looking forward to this. And it's not good news for Costco. They ended up dumping the Costco stock. What's going on there? We'll talk with William Flagg, the CEO and co-founder of the American Conservative Values ETF. Honey, we're out of water again. Did you call Clouser Drilling to discuss a replacement

well? Not yet. I just talked to a company who said they'll be... This is the Bill Myers Show on 106.3 KMED. 637. One of the biggest challenges I think we have right now in today's mega corporalopolis world, I don't know that's a word or not we'll just make it up here is how can you actually live your life and do your best not to pay people who hate you and actually go to war with you you know there's been a lot of that in corporate america i wanted to talk with uh with bill flagg he's the ceo and co-founder of the american conservative values etf bill it's great to have you on and you have to be a great with Bill Flagg. He's the CEO and co-founder of the American Conservative Values ETF. Bill,

it's great to have you on, and you have to be a great guy with a name like Bill. You couldn't be a bad guy, all right? Good to have you on. Thank you for having me on the show, Bill. All right. How long has this ETF been in existence, American Conservative Values? Yeah, a little over four years. We actually launched right before the 2020 election, so it was a rough four years initially, but things are looking good. Okay, glad to hear that. What is an exchange-traded fund, for those who don't know? Yes, it's a mutual fund, and I think a lot of us are aware of mutual funds in our 401ks, IRAs, and things like that.

It's usually a basket of stocks in the fund or ETF. The ETF's only difference is you buy it or sell it on the stock exchange just like you would a stock. Okay, very good. Now, when you have an exchange-traded fund, you can have an investing strategy, right? A point of view, I guess, in how you add stocks to the fund. Is that the way that works? Yes, that's correct. An investment objective thesis. All right.

And so you end up looking for conservative, or at least companies that are not openly hostile. I mean, what is the whole purpose? Because, I don't know, I think sometimes corporate America almost hates everything about conservative people, and religious conservative people but i could be wrong it does it does seem that way um yeah so we we kind of look at it as why give you know like you said earlier you know why give money to these companies that are working against our our values so we we try to avoid the ones that are most hostile to conservative values

while still having very competitive performance. Okay, all right. Now, recently you ended up putting out a press release about divesting from Costco. What happened there? Because a lot of people go to Costco. Yes, and Costco, it's a little bit of a lead-in to it. So I'd say one of the woke-ism type of things that corporate America has developed is DEI, diversity and inclusion, and then also net zero climate change type initiatives.

So this is where companies are diversifying, forcing diversification on their workforce and supply chain, rather than just focusing on meritocracy. So as investors, shareholders, we want just the best return. And DEI, in my opinion, is working against that. So in 2024, we started to see companies back away from their DEI programs. Now, were they backing away because of public pressure or that it just wasn't paying off in the bottom line? What do you think? Yeah, I mean, I would say it was pressure from, you know, the advocacy groups,

and I'd like to think some pressure from, you know, my ETF as well. Oh, okay. And what is Costco doing wrong, then? So they are, I would call it doubling down on their DEI initiative. So where we've seen companies like John Deere and Tractor Supply very publicly reduce those programs, becoming more closer to neutral. We've seen companies like Chipotle and Costco kind of reinforce their commitment to DEI.

So they're not even being quiet about it. They are openly saying this is a part of their company. And so this, you think, would actually be a political risk for them moving forward as far as their business, or is it just that you don't want to invest in them? Yeah, well, back to our investment thesis, what we're thinking is companies that play politics, get involved in politics, it's actually detrimental to the company longer term. So it's both. You know, we're avoiding them because, you know, we think these actions are going to

cause price volatility as well as, you know, our values. This is a company that's working against our values. Now, another one that you ended up pulling out of was Allstate Insurance. Was that about the football game announcement after the terror attack, or was there something else going on there? Yeah, well, it's a company. Allstate is, I mean, I guess our options really are to, you know, divest, boycott a company, engage with a company, or monitor them.

So I'd say Allstate was a company that we're monitoring with some concerns. It definitely seems to be, you know, HR seems to be running the company, which, again, you know, goes into that's where these DEI and net zero kind of ideas percolate from. They come from human resources. They don't come from the business line. So, you know, the CEO's speech, you know, I don't think it was handed to him by, you know, the CEO's speech, you know, I don't think it was handed to him by, you know, his human resources people, and it was supposed to, devotee, as opposed to just being part of the political discourse.

All right. Well, you know that character they have, I don't know who the actor is, that plays Mayhem in all the Allstate commercials, the guy who's the Mayhem. I'm surprised that they haven't replaced him with a person of color, but then on the other hand, he is sort of beat up, beat up looking so i guess being a white male is okay still is that the way that works bill i've not seen that perspective before i'm very clever i like it okay all right now the other thing is that walmart was out in the wilderness for a while and american conservatives value ended up bringing it back in. What happened? What have they done to change?

Yes, well, I mean, you know, keep in mind that the performance is important, you know, to what we deliver to our shareholders. So we can't walk away from every major, you know, retailer. So, you know, we already don't own Amazon. We didn't own Walmart, as you said. We don't own Amazon. We didn't own Walmart, as you said. We don't own Target. I think a lot of people understand why you don't own Target if you're talking about American conservative values. Of all of them, I think that's probably the biggest challenge, wouldn't you say, Target?

Yeah. So, well, yes, we were happy to get rid of those. Target, I don't know if it's two years ago or a year and a half ago, that was talking about a huge misstep. But Walmart, you know, initially our concerns with Walmart were they continually were kind of rolling back, you know, firearms and ammunition sales, you know, and overall woke culture. And they are the largest employer in the United States. So it was good to see them kind of as the trend is with companies rolling back their diversity and inclusion program, you know, bringing it closer to neutral, de-emphasizing it. At the same time, so that's a positive development, and at the same time, you know, we see Costco not doing that.

So it was kind of, I guess, a little bit of a reward, a little bit of a tentative step. We're still certainly monitoring Walmart, but they are back in the portfolio. What are companies that people would be surprised to know, in your opinion? Because, I mean, you boycott, you know, in your fund about 30% of the Standard & Poor's 500 index. And so you do this. What kind of companies would people be surprised are really going against people's conservative values? They may not know, may not realize it.

So I'd say almost everybody who owns a large-cap, U.S. large-cap mutual fund or ETF would be surprised that they own a slice of that money is going to Disney, which is, you know, very much when we poll and survey one of the most disliked companies from a value standpoint. A slice of that money is going towards, you know, Google. You know, in the most recent election, they're constantly suppressing conservative voices. The slice of that money is going to Meta, Facebook, which does the same thing. All the old media companies, Nike, Starbucks, I mean, these are some companies that people are surprised to learn

that the fund they own owns these companies. And so you make sure that you don't own companies like that. Which ones are probably some of the most conservative values friendly that maybe people don't know about? People that are rated highly, let's say, within your fund? Yeah, I'd say, unfortunately, in the large cap space, these are the biggest companies. You know, almost even conservatives can't agree on who the safest are. You know, I throw out Home Depot as one that I would say, but I'd say, you know, many, many conservatives don't agree with me. So, I mean, that's an unfortunate state of where we are in corporate America that so many companies are left. That's a hard question to answer.

Might this be changing over time? I mean, are you going to have to go look for conservative values in the Russell 2000, which is all the small companies just trying to get going or not? I'm just kind of curious where you actually look. I think to get an ideologically pure portfolio where it's 20 or 40 companies that we just feel great about, you definitely have to go down to the mid-cap, small-cap space to achieve that. Boy, why is that, though? Why is it that all of a sudden that if you are the biggest of the big, then you are automatic? I mean, you're like a capitalist with a communist ideology backing you, in essence.

I mean, it's kind of odd when you think about this, right? Yeah, I mean, yes, these companies, you know, what they're doing is, you know, anti-capitalist, anti-shareholder value, and yet that's, you know, totally against the point of why these companies exist in the first place, which is to make money for their investors. So, okay, is it because of the political risk, the political risk of most of the politicians in control here? By the way, Bill Flagg is with me. He's the CEO and co-founder of the American Conservative Values ETF, Exchange Traded Fund here.

So is it about political risk? Did they just all decide to get together? I mean, you know, if the dictator is going to be more left-wing, whether it's academia, whether it's most of the governments in the blue states, in the big hive minds, in the big tech world, that sort of thing, we better get with the program? Or is there something deeper in play? I think it's i think it's a a mix of both i mean you know if you look at the uh in the political environment in the last

you know 10 or 15 years say a third of people are liberal a third of people are conservative and the rest are somewhere in the middle the numbers are pretty close to that the conservatives a little higher the liberals a little lower surprisingly but you have the conservative percentage which are by and large quiet, as well as the center and the liberals on the left. You know, they're very active, very vocal out there. So, you know, most companies, they're just trying to, you know, not get yelled at, kind of, you know, go along the get along.

So they've tilted, you know, they've tilted left in that environment, and now the conservatives are speaking up, and they're kind of caught exposed on a lot of these issues. And then there are companies that are just ideologically captive. Yeah, Ben & Jerry's is never going to be on the American conservative values, right? Actually, they're not a separate stock anymore. Didn't they get bought by Unilever or some big company, something like that? Yes. Yes. So there are some companies that are, you know, we would love to kind of make a point of selling them, but Budweiser is owned by a foreign corporation. So yeah, so there are just

these ideologically captive companies that aren't going to change. You know, they may try to lay a little low for the next four years. Zuckerberg's, you know, a young man, for instance. But the companies that were, you know, just trying not to get yelled at, now they're getting yelled at by the right, and they've got a problem. Like, how do they get back to center without losing their liberal customers? Will they gain enough conservative customers? So a lot of corporate America is caught exposed on this issue, and it is a risk for the people investing in these companies.

They have to consider that political risk now, where maybe 15 years ago they didn't. Yeah. What's the value of your fund right now, ACBF? Yeah, I mean, I said sometimes people are like oh you don't you'll run out of companies to uh divest from or boycott yeah and we keep seeing we keep saying i mean all the all-state um costco that just happened a couple of weeks ago since trump's elected so companies will continue to be ideologically captive companies will continue to do um stupid. All right.

How many companies do you invest in right now that you actually think are conservative value companies? Well, I wouldn't say because we own them they possess conservative values. They're just not the worst. Remember, this is that large cap space where almost all companies have tilted left to a certain extent. So you're looking for the cleanest conservative dirty shirts, right? Yes, yes. There's a whole bunch of analogies for the least worst. Yeah. Are there any large cap stocks that are just unabashedly conservative saying, screw you, we're not doing this DEI stuff and we're not going down net zero and all the rest of it? Or are they all? I mean, I'm thinking if there's almost like the black rock uh effect when you have uh such big whales out there in the

in the wall street world that will say you're going to do this or else we're going to you know screw with you you know that kind of thing yes yes so um to answer that question you know not not really i mean i would say it's the, you know, the low end of the companies that will buy is, you know, $4 billion market capitalization. And, you know, DJT, Trump's media stock, has recently kind of crossed that threshold. So that's a company that, you know, is a candidate for us to buy because it has increased in value. But I would point that out as being the most... That's probably the most unabashedly conservative.

But it's right on the line of large cap, mid cap. So certainly of the top 50 companies or the top 100 companies, the top 100 companies are 70% roughly of the S&P 500's weight. None of those are unapologetically conservative. What is your opinion of the stock market this year, Bill? And we are looking at overall values. Values and price-earning ratios are way high, and many of the values are kind of at nosebleed levels in the large-cap world there. Is that something that you think is a risk this year?

Just asking for your personal opinion as we get ready to break. Yeah. I mean, I'd say some of the concerns are valuations. We had a really good year last year. Interest rates is another one. So, I mean, the market, as long as the market keeps pulling back, you know, like it has in the last couple of weeks, it's painful. But I like to see the market go up, you know, two steps up, three steps up, one step back. The consolidation is important.

But I still think the backdrop is very positive. We had this, you know, I'd say the Trump bump here got a little overdone. Yeah. But we've got to see, you know, if he delivers what a lot of the market is hoping he delivers, it will continue to be a good backdrop. Do we have any existential risk in the insurance markets because of, while you look at what's happening in L.A.? Any thoughts on that?

Yeah, I mean, I'd say disasters, generally speaking, are by and large good for insurance companies. They take the hit initially, obviously, but then they can raise their premiums. Yeah, but there's kind of a limit to that at some point too where people just go without i guess that's what i'd be concerned about we'll see yeah i mean well and then the government usually they can leave a market like they did with flood insurance uh you know which is probably the market and the government has to take over so they can also choose not to uh you know maybe they won't cover wildfire anymore in the future. So they've been around for a long time. They know their game.

And I'm not concerned of an existential threat to the insurance market. Okay, I just thought I'd ask at least. All right. Bill Flagg is the CEO and co-founder of American Conservative Values, electronic traded fund, and the stock is actually ACVF. And not giving any financial advice, I just wanted to kick it around here because, like I said, you made some news with that Costco move last week. And is there a website, too, where people can find out more about that? Yes, it's investconservative.com.

All right, very good. Investconservative.com. Bill, a pleasure meeting you, and I look forward to talking to you again in the future. You be well. Take care. Yes, yes. Thank you, Bill pleasure meeting you, and I look forward to talking to you again in the future. You be well. Take care. Yes, yes. Thank you, Bill. Thank you. It is 5 before 7 on KMED 99.3 KBXG. This is the Bill Meyer Show. Very thought-provoking there.