Bill Meyer Show Podcast - Sponsored by Clouser Drilling www.ClouserDrilling.com - 04-22-26_WEDNESDAY_8AM

Episode Date: April 22, 2026

04-22-26_WEDNESDAY_8AM

This hour of the Bill Meyer Show podcast is proudly sponsored by Klausur drilling. They've been leading the way in Southern Oregon well drilling for more than 50 years. Find out more about them at Klausurrilling.com. Now more with Bill Meyer. Warner Reschke. Yes, State House rep. 55 District. How you doing this morning? It's great to have you back, morning.

I'm doing well, Bill. Thanks for having me on. All right. Now, it used to be E Warner. Do you still call yourself E Warner or did you drop the E? entirely. Oh, no, the E is still there, mostly just in print. In print? You know, when I'm having conversation, I'll just introduce myself as Warner or Warner Reschie, but sometimes I'll say E Warner Reschke, but the print version always has the E. Okay. You know, because it does kind of make you stand out for the pack, really, you know? That was one reason. The other reason is

my first name, when I went to work at Tectronics back in the day. I worked at a call center. There were six of us and three of us were named with the same first name. I won't reveal what it is because that's always fun to have. It's a mystery. All I could, all I had to do was just look it up on Wikipedia. It's right there. You do. You do. Exactly. Okay. I will keep your secret secret for now. I always say it stands for energetic, effervescent, exciting, entertaining. Yeah, entertaining Warner Reschke. There we go. I like that. Okay. Anyway, what's on your mind here? Here, now we're past the basic, the session.

We had the short session go by. And it kind of feels like, you know, the same old, same old in which people, I'm talking about people, you know, outside of Salem, kind of looking for signs of real fight and real go-to-the-Met sort of thing. And then afterwards, it's kind of like, you know, ending with a whimper once again. And now we're having to go out and do ballot initiatives. or citizen initiatives rather than stopping anything at its source. What are you thinking about what happened ever since?

Well, you know, there's all sorts of ways to look at session, and when you're down in the super minority in both chambers and don't hold the governor's office, a boring session is usually a good session. Yes. In the sense that not much bad passed. And so I think we did a noble job of being, beating back a lot of stuff, and especially on the gun bill, uh, 41,

house bill 41 45. That was a bill that, uh, was really, really bad that basically implemented measure 114 without letting the courts have a say. And, uh, we were able to get an amendment put on that that basically, uh, just pushed that implementation out to 2028. So the courts could weigh in and could, uh, that process, the lawsuit process could conclude and we'll see where we're at then. Yeah, in other words, the Republicans, you cut a deal, essentially is what you did, right? You had to cut a deal. Well, you can say it's cut a deal.

I don't know what the quid pro quo is. Well, the only reason I'm saying it had to be a deal, just obviously had to be a deal, because there was no reason for Democrats to all of a sudden give a bill to the Republicans that actually helped Republicans in the rural area not be turned into instant felon, with leaving with their firearms. You know, it's a big deal because the Democrats want to make everybody a felon. You know, they can help it. There were quite a few Democrats.

So here's the secret inside of Salem. I don't know if it's the secret inside of Salem. Okay, okay. Well, the secret inside a sane asylum, yes, okay, please. Inside the marble nut house, we call it, is that Democrats will not bring anything to the floor unless they can pass it themselves. Oh, so they didn't think they could pass it in other words. Right. And so they don't think, they didn't think they could, they had people in their caucus that were uncomfortable with what that bill did. It went too far. It was going to cut.

They were getting feedback from, so this is where citizen feedback, whether you're in a red district or a blue district, it doesn't matter. Feedback does matter to politicians, especially at the state level. I can't say for the federal level, but state level, they do feel that pressure. And this was one where enough people spoke up and enough people were rallying that inside Democrat, Senate and House caucus, they were uncomfortable with what was being proposed because they didn't have any good defense. Yeah. Hey, Warner, what do you think?

Yeah. Okay. I'm sorry. Go ahead and complete that. I thought you were finished. Go ahead. No, no. I mean, that's basically just kind of that's basically the process.

So sometimes a deal, quote unquote, will be cut. And I can give you an example of something like that. In this case, I think it was more citizen pushback and Democrats feeling uncomfortable. And so the best path forward was to take a Republican amendment and go with it and help save face for the person who introduced the bill in the first place. All right. Let's shift it then to Senate Bill 1507. What do you think will – what do you think are it's true? chances with the citizenry getting it on the November?

Yeah, I think it's going to be much more difficult. I mean, it sounds, it's not like the gas tax where you can set up shop at every gas pump in Oregon and say, hey, are you opposed to a six cents increase in gas tax? And people say, heck, no, and they sign the ballot initiative. Heck, no. I mean, they're practically flipping off the, you know, you know, everybody, Democrats and Republicans hated it all, right? All right. No. So that was that was the thing is that so this one is pretty wonky. Senate Bill 1507, the disconnect bill, basically removing some of the provisions that the Republicans and the Trump administration passed with HR1, the one big beautiful bill back in July of 2025.

And so fortunately, no tax on tips and no tax on overtime is still the law of the land in Oregon, because those were politically impossible for Democrats to claw back. Now, did the Democrats essentially clawback business breaks? Is that how that worked? That's pretty much it, right? Yeah, they took one of the big, the two big provisions. One was investing in small businesses from outside investors. There was a, what's called qualified service.

stock break or stock policy. And so the wonky part of that is to boil it down is basically you've got an incentive, a tax incentive to invest in Oregon businesses. Democrats didn't think that we could explain that well enough. And it was so few people that are, quote, really affected that they pulled that part back. They also pulled back the part where you can deduct your auto interest on your taxes or take that off. So in every other state

or many other states, if you have auto interest on an American-made vehicle, you can deduct that kind of like a home mortgage interest deduction. In Oregon, you won't be able to do that on your state taxes. And then the third part was bonus depreciation, which again

is wonky. Basically it means it disincentivizes people to invest dollars in businesses in the state compared to other States. All right. Yeah. It is kind of wonky.

It does sound like a walk-w-w-w-wha-vah-vah. You know, for most people. But, you know, that thing about the depreciation, that is a big deal, though. That would be an example of, let's say you have a, all right, you have a business and let's say you're a restaurateur, okay? You have a restaurant, and you need a new stove, right? And the way the Trump administration did it, worked it with a big, beautiful bill, is that you buy that stove.

That stove is $50,000, let's say, you know, a really big commercial kitchen stove. And you could deduct that as an expense that year, right, the whole thing. Is that essentially what that means? That's exactly right. And so the state would not, the county and everybody wouldn't lose their money, it just gets shifted a little bit. Right. And so rather than taking that expense over five years, you can take that expense in year one. And that gives you incentive to like put the money down and then you're going to get it back in taxes because you won't, you know, get to expense that as part of your business all in one year.

And then in year two, you're going to pay full freight the taxes on that. So I just thought it was everybody thinks it's a great idea. But apparently Oregon or Democrats thought that they could get that one, get away with that. So again, when it doesn't hit people directly, it's harder to explain. But for business owners, they were there. My farmers were there in droves as well saying, don't do this. You know, when we purchase farm equipment, now we have to expense it over five years. Oh, yeah.

Now, you want to go out and get a tractor or a combine, what, like a half million dollars kind of thing or more in many cases? Yep. And so now I've got to keep two books because federally I can deduct that all in year one. But in Oregon, I have to deduct it 20% over five years. Okay. So it just becomes a nightmare as far as bookkeeping. And again, people don't quote understand that. business owners live it and it's really frustrating.

Yeah, that could make it a little more difficult to get people all excited and hot and bothered on it. I'm hoping they do, though, because... Oh, I do too. Yeah, because, let's face it, the state of Oregon is not particularly business-friendly, even on its best day when it comes right down to it. Right. I mean, the thing is that initially they started with the one big, beautiful bill was going to cost the state $800 million to the state. It was lost revenue to the state, but that money was never lost.

It stayed in Oregon's economy. It stayed in your pocketbook. Come on. Warner, Warner, Warner, come on. You know, that's not the way that the Democratic majority looks at it. All money belongs to them until they decide how much we get to keep. It's an amazing process. That's exactly right.

That's exactly right. They will not give up one dime if they can keep it because they know how to spend it better than you do. Absolutely. Boy, sure seems to. And what they really like to do is send it into like ODOT grants that turn, you know, Main Streets into ridiculous, you know, pretzel logic kind of deals. But that's a... Another conversation for another time on that one.

Warner Reschke with me, of course, House District 55, parts of Jackson County and a lot of Clameth County, too, for that matter. So, Warner, what are we looking at here as far as farming and water in your district right now? because I just seeing the reports here that they're talking about idling another 10,000 acres of farmland just because of drought and the water issues right now. Yeah, it's not great. The Klamathrout Agency basically had a meeting, and I think the Oregon Water Department had a meeting yesterday about just, Oregon Water Department put out a report basically that said that groundwater has diminished since 1990.

And I thought, well, gee, the whole thing in the basin here started in 2001 with faulty science and the project getting cut off from its complete water supply. And since then, it's been regulated back quite a bit from the full allotment. And I think they're only going to get 50% of what they're legally allotted to have. And so when you don't get surface water, what irrigators do, they go to the ground, right? And so now they're pulling up groundwater and water resources says, gee, over 20 years of that policy, you have less groundwater. Who knew? Right? Let us have the surface waters we're supposed to have, and then we won't be poking holes in the ground and grabbing the groundwater.

And guess what? I bet you the groundwater doesn't diminish anymore. Yeah. I guess my concern here, though, is that is this just, and I know this sounds very conspiracy theory Thursday-esque, okay? Okay, is this just, even though it's Wednesday, isn't this just essentially another way of hopefully, you know, to the elite types, to the Enviral left, just depopulating, depopulating the basin over time? Yeah, I mean, there's been theories galore that they're basically, they want to take the water from the basin and send it to the San Joaquin Valley. I don't know how you're going to do that, but that's I think somebody's dream.

I've also heard. I think that was through Scott Valley, wasn't that they were going to try to do it via Scott Valley? Yes, exactly. Right. So that they were also the other thing was that they were going to, that they only want five to six major ag producers in the basin altogether. so all the small farmers go away, and then the state only has to deal with five to six instead of 500 to 6,000 individual farmers and ranchers, and that way they can make deals, and big business usually will pay the freight because they can afford, you know,

afford new regulation, et cetera. It's, you know. Well, it's kind of like how Walmart is always happy to see the minimum wage go up, right, because they know that the mom and pop any competition. can't do it. Just they can work that. All right. All right. So I'm sorry to hear that. Is there any, is there any solution to that that you're aware of? Because you can't make water appear where it is not existing or falling in the first place. And of course, we blow up every dam that exists to hold any of that water going down there too. It's fine. Yeah, everything's fine.

What could go wrong? Everything's fine. No, it's interesting. If you pull the people in the Klamath Basin, what they want compared to what Salem wants or what often D.C. wants, it's their polar opposite, right? So part of the solution is let us manage our own water, right, instead of you telling us how to manage our own water. Wasn't the state trying to push for that to an extent or not? No, no, and that's how Cliff Benz is trying to do that, right? Isn't that what he's trying to do right now with a bill?

I'm sure he is. Yeah. Sure he is. Yeah, Congressman Bentz, he put out a release the other day about that. I don't have it in front of me. sorry about that. I should have had it. That's all right. I haven't read it yet. So I'm behind there, too.

But, I mean, it's the idea of local control that people who benefit or are hurt by a particular policy are going to make the wise decision for themselves as opposed to some egghead who went to university in another state and now is deciding through some sort of modeling on their computer how water should flow and how much everybody's. should get. Even though this year we have a low snow pack, we've gotten quite a bit of rain. And so that's why dams and lakes and storage is all important because we don't know each year how water is going to come to us and we should try to save every drop that we can. All right, fair enough. E. Warner Reschke with me once again. Hey, Warner, you sent me an interesting chart and this is one of these hidden little

talks. We discuss a lot on the show, the challenges with K-12 education in the state of Oregon, very expensive and unfortunately very poor quality, you know, when you look at the product and what happens and, hey, we're number 48 and we're supposed to be proud. You know, hey, well, we're better than Puerto Rico. Yay. You know, that kind of thing. That being said, though, we're kind of in a, are we in sort of a, I don't know, almost a public school enrollment doom loop from the looks and what's being projected out here for the next few years. Tell us about it. It's a fascinating chart. Right. So enrollment for public schools grew until COVID, basically, or until the lockdowns, right, until remote school only, no kids go to school. And then it had a precipitous drop and it

continues to drop. And projections out to 2031 is it's going to continue to drop. And I think it's driven by two things. One, I think, is that school is, choices are growing, it's becoming easier to homeschool your child because there's such great curriculum. And parents saw what was going on in the classroom, the public education classroom. Boy, they saw that remote learning and what was being taught. They're going like, okay, no, not with my kid. No, not to my kid, right. So I think that's one thing and that's carrying through. And now number two is the population decline. So, you look at the lower end of, you look at birth rates, they're dropping like a rock in Oregon.

So that means fewer kids are coming forward. Even Bill, if 100% of them went to public school, you'd probably still see a drop. Which means that we should be looking then. What you're saying then is that in the next few years, we will likely be seeing a plethora of public schools actually being shut down due to lack of. of students from the sounds of it. Well, yes, exactly. And so I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing, right? You build schools, buildings, because you have population increase.

When you have population decrease in this segment, then it only makes sense that you're going to consolidate and be more efficient with those dollars. And I think it is a symptom of a broader problem, and that is hopelessness in our society. and hopelessness in Oregon particularly. You have high taxes. You have people leaving. You have your parents having a hard time making it work. They become unemployed and have a hard time finding a job.

Everything's so expensive. Do I want to get married and have kids? Yeah, well, to your point, you know, having children, getting married and having children is usually showing that you have faith in the future that you're bringing into a good situation, you know, a child or forming family. So the part that I'm wondering, though, is politically, what this could mean because if you have the Oregon Education Association and the Medford Education Association and all the other education associations translation you know the

hard left wing teachers unions which are very politically powerful I can't help but think they're going to go quietly that they are not going to go quietly into the night there and I'm wondering if if there will be the attack on pulling your kids out of K through 12 because of this what do you see would be some of the reactions to this you look at you Look at that chart I sent you. It was put together, not by myself. It was put together by the legislative policy and research organization at the Oregon legislature at my request. I said, I'd like to know what enrollment's done over the last 10 years.

I'd like to know what spending has done over the last 10 years. I'll put those together. And you'll see that spending, no matter what enrollment does, and spending just continues to climb and climb and climb. And so I took the data from John Horvich, which projected out the job. 2031, a continued drop, and said, what would our spending be at this rate? It's over a billion dollars a year. A billion dollars a year less or more? I'm sorry, I didn't. In total, it'll be a billion dollars. So right now, for 24, 25, we're right around. I'm trying to see what the number is exactly. We're about somewhere between, we're about 10 billion dollars. So it would be a

it'd be a billion dollars more. It's just an insane amount of money to be spending on public education and to be spending more on it than what we compared to the population. You expect that number, expect that spending to drop with enrollment drop, but I have a feeling that's not going to be the case. All right. I'll be curious. Well, there's going to have to be, when push comes to shove, there's going to have to be less if you're not getting the kids.

There's going to be a day of reckoning. And here's an interesting thing. I also did a deep dive with the L-Pro group, the research group in the legislature. Charter schools by Hillsdale College, their student, their teacher to administration ratios 8 to 1. There's eight teachers for every administrator in a Hillsdale charter school. what it is for public education. It's three to two. For every three teachers, there's two administrators. Oh, boy. Yeah, talk about a lot of chiefs, right? A lot of chiefs. So it's a really, you know, it's a really, our system is, I'm going to say it's broken because it's really heavily administrator. It's not student focused. And we're seeing the results of that, not only just in the content, but organizationally how it's set up. Yeah. Is not set up to win.

All right. Well, these are questions that are going to have to be addressed. I think I don't know if it's going to get addressed in the long session next year, but we've got to start. Well, you know how the left talks about it here, Warner. We need to start a conversation. You need to start a conversation on this one, which is usually meaning that we're going to be lectured too, okay? But maybe you could start the conversation. My guarantee you is if Democrats have the governor's office, if Democrats have both chambers of the legislature, that we will spend more tomorrow than we spend today on public education despite the drop in enrollment. God bless Oregon. I'm going to tell you. E. Warner Reschke, we appreciate you being on this morning.

Thanks for the update. We'll have you back, and let's do this more often. Okay? All right. Sounds good. All right. And I guess we can just get in contact if someone's in your district and just go through the regular the House or the House District website on the state, right?

Yeah, yeah. Please visit my campaign and my state website, campaign website is warnerfororegons. Warner for Oregon.com. Warner, pleasure. Thanks for talking, okay? Be well. You bet. It's 835 and change at KMED, 993 KBXG.

By the way, did Senator Brock Smith pop in here? Steve, okay. I hope he did. All right. I think he's going to be here. find out. I'll go, I'll go, he is there. All right. I see his pin. I see his pin through the door. He is here. We'll talk with him after news. Your smile is the key to your health and confidence. Do you know that one out of two adults do not regularly see their dentist due to fear or anxiety?

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getting shot by the resident inside. Medford police responded just before five yesterday morning to the 911 call. They found the suspect. Twenty-two-year-old Justin Moon hate suffering from a gunshot wound to his arm. He was taken to the hospital and treated. No criminal charges announced at this time. At last check, hate is not in the Jackson County Jail. After almost 43 years, Justice finally done. A man extradited from California and charged in the killing of Teresa Peroni is going to prison for at least 10 years. 73-year-old Marcus San Frantello pleaded guilty to first-degree manslaughter in Josephine County Circuit Court. The case dates back to July of 1983, when then 27-year-old Teresa Peroni was reported missing after going to a party in the Selma area. She was last seen with San Frantello, her boyfriend at the time, but there wasn't enough evidence to make a case.

In 2024, Josephine County sheriffs reopened the case and by 2025 with new DM. techniques and witness interviews, they had enough evidence to indict San Frantello. The state wolf report is out. They appear to be eating well. 109 livestock kills in 2025 versus 69 the year before. And Scott's daughter, long-time award-winning editor of the Grants Pass Daily Courier, has officially stepped down. Recently, he wrote a column detailing his 10-month struggle in treatment for aggressive brain cancer. The Daily Courier reports that Scott will spend his remaining good days touring Japan. Bill Meyer, KMED News. This hour of the Bill Myers Show is sponsored by Fontana Roofing.

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Garrisons.com. This is News Talk 1063, KMED. And you're waking up with the Bill Myers Show. Senator David Brock Smith is in studio this morning, and gosh, you're in town at a breakfast. You're rolling around, and you're running for U.S. Senate. How the heck are you, David? I'm good.

Good to see you, Bill. All right. I think the last time I saw you when I was Representative Boyce and I were with you and the Jackson County Commissioners when they were given here your award. Yeah, we had that award. It was like, of course, my wife never lets me forget about that. It came, Mr. Award winner. She uses it like a smear with me. Yeah, you got to sit there again.

I'm glad she does. Hopefully every morning. In all seriousness, though. You know, okay, here it is. You're running for U.S. Senate. And let me tell you, I mean, this would be like a political wet dream of wet dreams to dislodge Merkley from the U.S. Senate, all right? So why are you getting involved in this? What makes you think that you can do this?

And because I thought there were five or six Republicans in here. Now seven Republicans battling in the primary for this one, along with perennial candidate to Joe Ray Perkins. Are you just trying to say Joe Ray? I mean, what? What's going on? No, I'm trying to take back our U.S. Senate seat. I mean, if you think about it, there really hasn't been a challenger that is credible, that has ran against U.S. Senator Merckley since he won against Gordon Smith back in 2008. It's been a long time coming.

It has. And so when you look at my work, I mean, I have, I turned 50 in December. I have spent half my life in public service from city councilor, council president, school board member, chamber of commerce director, and president for eight years, then county commissioner, and then state representative in 17 to 23, and then now sitting in the state Senate in 23, Senate Republican deputy leader. I've been, had the privilege to work on a number of committees in the legislature in the near decade that I've been there. And I've had the pleasure to work with legislators from across the state that represent their districts on issues that are important to them.

And so that knowledge, if you will, and that work from, you know, creating the state meat inspection program to many other things has allowed me the opportunity to be the best candidate to retire Jeff Merkley in 20, in 2026. Like I said, this would be a wonderful thing. And I, you know, it's just that it seems that both the U.S. Senate positions have been like, you know, permanently ensconced in the, in the Democratic Party right now, which, of course, has had some real bad effects here, as an example. I've honestly thought that, and I've been told by many people in the know, Herman and others,

that unless there is a change in the Senate, in the U.S. Senate, all this talk about, you know, getting out in the woods or actually getting something productive done on public lands is probably a non-starter. Would you agree with that? I would agree. I would agree. And it's one of the reasons why when you look at not just Oregon-centric, and I passed legislation Senate Bill 872 in the 23 session bill that that says it, and it's Oregon's position of the federal government that we want more harvest, more meadowland restoration, more salvage logging, which I'd never thought I'd be able to get in Oregon statute, as well as more partnerships with our DFPA, CFPA, and Oregon Department of Four. Forestry. And remember in 17, then Representative Bonham and I, we passed the Good Neighbor Authority, which held us the Oregon Department of Forestry working with USFS and BLM to harvest timber off off federal lands. And now I have created through the Council of State Government's West the

Wildfire and Disaster Preparedness Committee, which is the 13 Western States from Wyoming to Alaska and Hawaii, eight co-chairs or eight Republican co-chairs. And I said as one of them of the 1180 Western states legislators where we're pushing the administration to front load the needed dollars so that we can get into the woods. So you're exactly right. And I'm doing the work now to do that. Is it too late? And the only reason to bring this up is it so much of the infrastructure and institutional knowledge of this industry, which is going to be needed because right at it. Right now what we do is that we, well, we feel morally superior by burning them each summer is what we tend to do here in the state of Oregon. But is it too late to really save it?

Not at all. I will never believe that. I mean, I am talking to timber owners and mill owners, if they knew that they had a steady stream of federal timber, they would be willing to invest in their company. I mean, if you look at the – but, I mean, it goes to – and I was listening to Warner early. and you guys were talking about education and people leaving the state. But we have to turn the straight around as well because you're in a situation where companies are leaving because of the high taxes. And I want you to, and I love for you to coin this, Bill,

but it's also the Oregon bureaucratic blue tape that we have. It's not red tape. Yeah, quit calling it red tape, right? Quit calling it red tape because it's blue tape in Oregon. And so, no, I don't believe it is. And right now we have, well, we have roughly, we import 25% of our raw logs from Canada. But meanwhile, when it comes to the landscape from the 10-year average from 13 to 23, 82% of the acres are burned on the federal lands and of the 18% that are burned on private,

15% of those acres are burned because of fires that come off federal land of private land. And of the 3% of fires that burn and start on private land, 98% of those are kept less than 100 acres than our manager stands. So the hypocrisy of the environmental for-profit, non-profits, left is out the window when you just have the let-it-burn policy, and it's resonating across the state. And if we want to build things here in Oregon, we need timber to do it, and we sequester that carbon for decades and generations to come. Would you go after the wildland, the fire manual that was put out about 30 years ago,

which essentially ensconced let it burn. We will burn these public lands. Every square inch of land out there has a burn plan on it, and if there is a natural ignition, we'll draw a little box around it and let it go out there, essentially using it for land management purposes. Is that something you could attack in the Senate? Oh, of course.

I mean, we flip it on its head. I mean, it goes against the left's environmental policy. You don't, I mean, our timber is God's gift to the planet, right? It sequesters carbon while creating the most resilient building material on Earth with a byproduct that's oxygen. And so you flip that policy on its head because we know that we can go in there and manage the resource to mitigate catastrophic wildfire. Look what happened in the Fremont-Winema National Floris in Warner and Senator Lenthicum's district, right? you went in there, you did the thinning prescribed fire and ladder fuel reduction, and that section survived. It survived. So we have the prescriptions to do it, and it will employ people in our woods again.

Now, Senator, I didn't want to, I don't want to take it all up with it, Timor, we only got up another five minutes or so like that. but what is the what is probably the number one policy or characteristic of Senator Merckley that you're going to be using here to set up dissatisfaction because to get a change you're going to have to not only get the Republicans get the Republican vote here but then it's going to be after Jeff he's pretty much ensconced in there what do you do how do you peel him away well how do you convince Oregonians to make a different a different choice here, you think? So we all know that Governor Kotech is one of the least like governors in the state.

Senator Merkley is not too far behind. So when we all know that across the board, and I've seen the polling, that even Democrats are entrenched against waste, fraud and abuse, especially fraud. They are. Okay. And so here you are, all this exposing of fraud, but it's, Merckley talking about Trump bad, Trump bad, Trump bad, but yet he's completely lost focus in Oregon.

And my campaign is all about putting Oregon first and Oregonians first. Now, our senators might sprinkle a little federal dollars around the state, but as you know, and Werner has brought resources back, we and the legislature do the same thing. But when it comes to policy, what is one policy that Senator, Merkley has moved the needle on for Oregon and Oregonians. I can't think of one. Exactly.

So, but when you look at my history and my policy, you can go to my legislative website and see those policies that I have helped champion the farm stand bill, saving our farms just this last session. And so when you're talking about the race against Senator Merkley, I am going to be able to build this coalition of not just legislators in this. state, but our gubernatorial Republican candidate and work with them as a coalition moving forward. And as the governor is talking about how poorly liked Governor Kotech is, I'm going to be talking about how poorly liked Senator Merckley is and bringing those two together because they, I mean,

kind of a one-two is what you're looking at. But as you know, Bill, I mean, being at the top of the ticket is a little intimidating, but having a credible candidate at the top of the ticket is going to help every Republican down the ballot. Who do you think is going to make that at this? Make that, are you talking about the gubernatorial race or the correct? Okay, yeah. So you have a situation where, again, as we're traveling around the state, you already see Governor Kotech is not campaigning against a Republican candidate.

She's campaigning against Trump, right? Um, Merkley is not campaigning against anybody yet. Of course, he doesn't know who to campaign against, but he's campaigning against Trump. And so we're going to actually put the narrative where it belongs, which is Merkley has, as the United States Senator has assisted in the policies that have put Oregon in economically in a ditch, have one of the poorest education, uh, uh, rates in the country. And so you have a situation where, again, the United States. state senator has a lot of influence when it comes to what can happen in Oregon and move in Oregon forward together. And yet, it has been the woke policies that they have been driving forward and not pushing back for all Oregonians that I'm going to bring to the table. Okay. I certainly hope you would do that. What's your campaign website? It is www.davaddavadavrocksmith for Oregon.com. Okay, very good. Final question I would have for you here. And like I said, we're not through the primary yet, but let's see how you do in there

and hoping you get this shot, all right, because I would love to see a change there. If you end up winning this and you end up becoming a U.S. Senator, would you promise to dress like this when you come to town hall meetings? You mean you don't want me in Levi's on a flannel? Well, no, because every time Senator Merckley comes to town, it's so insulting. You know, it's like he comes to town and he looked like he just rolled out of the out of the coastal campground and then decided to come in, oh, I'm going to look like the people here in Southern Oregon. It's just, I'm sorry, I just find it insulting.

Well, so I dress like this. This is, this is the. Okay, sport coat. Get a nice. Sport coat, good. All right. You do that and you already get a few points up just by doing that. This is, this is how I dress when I go to town halls. When I'm in the, when I represent my, well, all of you in Oregon, in the Oregon State Senate, I am tie and in a full suit because we need to represent you with respect. You know, it's about respect. Yeah, that's kind of what I was getting at there. It's very insulting. I don't know.

Maybe, of course, I've seen people come to town. They do the same thing. They'll be wearing a suit in Portland, right? Then they come here, and then it's like they just rolled out of the campground. My dress, Bill, is this if I'm here or if I'm in Portland. That's not the only thing, but I have to ask. All right. And state senator David Brock Smith,

and of course looking to become U.S. Senator, David Brock Smith, 855 at KMED and KBXG. Thank you very much, Senator. Thank you, Bill. Don't Portland, Southern Oregon. What works for Portland politicians doesn't work here, and I won't let them force it on us. I'm Duayne Younger, your Oregon State representative

from Josephine County and Grants Pass. In Salem, Southern Oregon is a national organization, And that's why my most important job I have isn't passing more mandates. It's being a strong voice pumping the brakes on bad legislation. I help leave the fight to protect your right to vote on the gas tax because politicians shouldn't raise your cost of living without your consent. That fight is saving the average Southern Oregon family about $500 a year. Next term, my job is clear to protect taxpayers, hold Salem accountable and keep more of your

money in your pocket. I'm Dwayne Yonker, and I always stand up for Josephine County at home and in Salem. I'd be honored to earn your vote. Paid for Yonker for State Representative, PAC ID 23071. Ronda talks about her experience with Klausur drilling. Kevin came right out. The thing that really stood out to me, we could see the years of experience in the quality of their work. And it just showed us what great communication that they have. I wouldn't hesitate to recommend Klausurwell drilling. They were great to work with. Klausur drilling has the experience and the equipment to handle the most challenging conditions.

Visit Klausurdrilling.com. That's Klausurdrilling.com. Take the Long Way Home was one of four hit singles off Super Tram's 1979 album Breakfast in America. If you find yourself losing your sanity and taking the long way home because of growing cracks in your ceilings and walls, give Millette Construction a call for a free episode. estimate to fix the damage and correct your foundation problem. Stop thinking you'd never see what you want to see because your home used to be so nice. With Millette's help, it can be again.

Visit Millet Construction.com. Thanks for coming to the three-day plant sale at Crater High School greenhouse. Let's run through the roster. Perennials. Here. Annuals. Sir, yes, sir. Hanging baskets.

Wee! Vegetables. Vegetables. They're coming, sir. It was league night at the salad bowl and they're running late. Okay, show off those leaves and stems and make us proud. It's the three-day plant sale at Crater High School, April 28th through the 30th. From 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. All proceeds benefit the Crater High School Horticulture Department.

It's simply unbelievable. Hi, I'm Deb with Father and Son Giori, and I'm on KMED. Unbeleafable. Okay. Oh, got to love that. All right, I'm not going to have any more time for calls today, but we'll make sure that we have more of an open phone segment because it'll be conspiracy theory. Thursday tomorrow. By the way, State Senator David Brock Smith running for the Republican nomination for U.S. to be U.S. Senator David Brock Smith. He's going to be at

the Jackson County Republican Party headquarters. We know 112 was a North Front Street, you know, in Central Point. At 10 o'clock. 10 o'clock is when that opens if you wanted to stop in and say hello and find out what's going on with his campaign. At 11 o'clock, we have

Republican candidate Ed Deal who was going to be at NAMIS. at Namas Winery in talent, and I believe, what is it, five to seven, I'll check that. I'll put it up on my show blog today. He'll then be at Edenvale a little bit later, okay? See tomorrow. Conspiracy Theory Thursday. Every month, it feels like your money doesn't go as far as it used to.

Groceries costs more, gas costs more, and property taxes keep going up. For many families in Josephine County, it's getting harder to keep up. John West understands that because he's been working alongside you, serving this county and listening. He believes government should make life easier, not more expensive. That's why John has a plan to lower property taxes by...