Bill Meyer Show Podcast - Sponsored by Clouser Drilling www.ClouserDrilling.com - 07-01-26_WEDNESDAY_6AM

Episode Date: July 1, 2026

07-01-26_WEDNESDAY_6AM

This hour of the Bill Meyer Show podcast is proudly sponsored by Klauser 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. Okay, here we go. Wheels up Wednesday, July 1st, 2026. Day before everybody starts heading out for July 4th weekend. I'll be out on Friday, by the way.

The O'Connor & Company show will be filling in or probably whoever's filling in for O'Connor. Yeah, you know how that ends up going here? Well, so now we are out of Pride Month. Now, June was Pride Month, right? That's what we were told again and again and again and again and again and again and again because, well, reasons and we're Oregon, right? We know that. And so I'm thinking, all right, Pride Month is over.

Oh, no. Oh, no, it's not. I got an e-bail overnight from the Northwest Mental Health, management services. Northwest Mental Health.org. And it said that July is Disability Pride Month. No, I'm not kidding.

Here, I'll hold it up to the Facebook Live camera. There it is. Now, it's printed in black and white so you don't see the rainbow flag behind them. But, yes, July is Disability Pride Month for LGBTQ, celebrating inclusion and acceptance community. And this month, Northwest Mental Health Management Services, we celebrate the incredible individuals, families, advocates, and direct support professionals who make our communities stronger every day.

So remember, don't put away the pride flag yet. No, you have to celebrate the mental health of LGBTQ now, too, and have pride in that. I wish I were kidding about it, but it's just like, oh, you've got to be kidding. You can't get away from it. Hey, you know, I'm going to be talking with someone from a lawyer from the Pacific Legal Foundation. You know, they get involved in a lot of property rights. In fact, that is really what they do, property rights lawsuits. And a couple of them will be talking about.

But one of them is that community over back east on the eastern seaboard that has told everybody, no, no, no, don't fly the American flag. You fly the American flag. You could be interfering with the endangered speech. the birds flying in there. They're involved in that case, among others, and we'll talk about it. But I'm wondering if, you know, what happens if you try to fly the pride flag over in Maine or Massachusetts or something?

You say, you better take that down because, you know, remember, it's Pride Mental Health Month. Oh, my gosh. The Island of Missed Humans are, it's quite an interesting bunch, okay? Anyway, what else? You know, speaking of the Island of Missfit Humans, the Victory for biology happening yesterday in the Supreme Court, upholding the rights of states

to protect women's sports. Now, this does not include Oregon. There are 27 states, though, that had laws out there to protect women's sports and keep it from dudes and dresses and saying, hey, you know, I want, you know, I want to destroy your daughter's chance

at, you know, getting a sporting scholarship, right, as I clean up in softball or whatever it is that, you know, some dude and a dress who claims to be a female does. But anyway, Yeah, that happened. So 27 states will continue to be allowed to protect them. A state like Oregon, I don't think anything's going to change because, well, once again, they sent out emails. Now it's Mental Health Pride Disability Month. I mean, anyway, but that is what's going. So that was a pretty good one. A good decision. And Clarence Thomas, of course, had some good things to say about that. And let's see. If I could just see this here. Cavanaugh wrote the opinion. The courts holding today is straightforward.

The Equal Protection Clause allows schools to maintain separate teams for female and male athletes. Schools may determine eligibility for women's and girls' teams based on biological sex. That policy is constitutionally justified by the vitally important interests in safety and competitive fairness, which of course makes a lot of sense. Then you have Justice Thomas giving some nice moral clarity. Men and boys with gender dysphoria are not. not women or girls, even if they believe that they are. Now, I know that Clarence Thomas is not a biologist, but we'll take his opinion to the bank on this one.

Sex is an immutable biological characteristic. It is binary, and man and woman, boy and girl are the terms that correspond to adults and children of each sex. Works for me. It won't necessarily change things in Oregon, at least not right away. I think we may be kind of at peak transgender nonsense. So I don't know. Maybe the left coast and the East Coast will be the hotbeds of child mutilation and screwing up the sports teams in order to do this. I don't know.

Maybe the pressure from the other 27 states that you're allowed to protect them will get maybe people in Oregon wondering, hey, why isn't our legislature protecting girls in sports, right? So we have that. But once again, though, happy Pride Mental Health Month from the Northwest. It's kind of ironic that they're taking it from the mental health side of things. All right. What else do we have going on? Jackson County Jail closing the basement today, cost cutting.

Yeah, we knew this was coming up. Look for some sort of jail district that is going to be coming out of the county. At some point, they'll probably try to see if people are willing to pay a little bit. a little more keep the jail open. I've noticed a lot of social media posts of people who just don't seem to understand the difference between a county service and a city service. I saw people who, I respect it, you know, putting up there, what do you mean they're closing the basement of the jail?

You know, what is it? You know, they're going to be building a, they want to be building a baseball stadium in Medford and we're a closing part of the jail? You have to understand. No, that's a different. mafia. It's the Medford Mafia that's in charge of wanting to build the baseball stadium, City of Medford. Jackson County Jail is run through the county. And that's that $2.1 per thousand. That is the basic levy. And that pays for the county sheriff. That pays for the jail.

That pays for all the other services here for Jackson County. That's the way that goes. and so other than the library and RBTD, you know, various other things like that. Okay, those are separate taxing districts as it were. But yeah, no, it's different. Medford, Medford can do its own nonsense. Jackson County has to take care of the entire Jackson County, and that is the service. All right? So I don't know.

Are we going to go to like law enforcement districts? And I know last time when they tried to get a new jail built, just got crushed. voters just crushed it. I don't know what they're, what they be thinking this time around. But yeah, everything costs more. And, of course, all those big fat raises are handed out to all the unionized employees, et cetera, et cetera.

So, you know, where do you go on something like that? There's, you know, you have the tax, the tax assessments going up at two and a half, three percent a year, maybe on the high side. And then your costs for employees and power and everything else are going up, 78% per year. Something's got to give. So look for a few more people just being arrested and then let go right away because we have 62 fewer bets. Got a bear. It's wandering around East Medford.

Patrick ended up by emailing me yesterday. He saw the bear and it was, okay, who is calling me while I'm on the air? Mikey, love you. Okay. Can't talk to my brother. It could be a but dial for all we know. It's my brother. Anyway, wandering bear between Eastmanfred and Phoenix. Listener told me east side of foothills is where he saw it yesterday. Patrick Huggins ended up writing me about that. It appears to be a pretty skinny bear, older bear, not eating well. Probably has bad teeth, is what the wildlife biologist are thinking, just to kind of stay away.

So that's what we're looking at right now. Some of our local headlines there. We'll have more coming up at 630 News. Good morning, KMED. It's wheels up Wednesday. Hi, who's this? Good morning, Bill. It's Vicki from the Applegate.

Vicki and the Applegate. How are you doing this morning, darling? Good. It's a little chilly, but it's nice. I'd rather have it that way than 70 degrees in the morning. By the way, happy Pride Mental Health Month, okay? Does this mean that they're going to get the therapy they need? That, I can't say.

But we're just supposed to be supportive and praising, and whatever you do, do not take down the Pride flag. time is for mental health pride. Okay. Okay, well, what about normal people stress month? Normal, normal is a bigoted term. You're not supposed to use that. Well, I'm not against anybody, but I don't think that they need two months out of the

year to celebrate their issues. Sorry. Well, no, pretty soon it's probably going to be every month. It's probably, let's see. Now, you go from Mental Health Month, Pride and Mental Health this month. what would be next year or next month? In month it could be pride in, well, it's the pride community celebrating the immense bravery of dealing with the hottest temperatures of the year. You know, it could be like, you know, temperature pride or something, something like that.

Oh, M.G. And I just wanted to mention on the jail, maybe, I think that they should have built a new jail. a long time ago because this valley has way more crime than it did back in the 80s when I lived in town. And maybe the voters will finally, you know, see that we need a new jail. Well, you know, run a jail. I think that Danny Jordan, if I'm just spittballing off the numbers here from when Danny Jordan was talking at that meeting the other day with the Chamber of Commerce, they had their meeting over at the country club. I think to run a jail, is it for either 10 or 20 years?

It's about a billion dollars. It is a lot, a lot of money. Right, but don't they get subsidized by the government? No. Each prisoner that they have. I mean... Not really. I actually went to...

I didn't go to court for my... myself, but I went into the courthouse. And I'm telling you, Bill, every single case was carried over. Every single case. Not one of them was dealt with on the day that they were supposed to deal with it. I just was amazed. It's like you're letting these people back out on the street. And there's no consequences.

I mean, I was blown away that not one person dealt with. why they were there. It was crazy. Well, you know, it's not that the county wouldn't like to do something like this, but the county just can't say, hey, we're going to force you to pay for a new jail. These can't do that. You have to take it to, you have to take it to the people, people turn it down. And it is an incredibly expensive operation. It is one of the most expensive, one of the most expensive, one of the most expensive law enforcement things that we do here. And that's why people have been have been reticent to approve it because it would mean a very big tax increase in southern Oregon at a time when a lot of people are feeling a bit strained on such matters.

Well, the crime, though, Bill, I mean, it is skyrocketed. Well, that's irrelevant to the reality, though. Well, people will get, people will get, now I know that we have sheriffs here in southern Oregon that say you can't put a price on law enforcement or you can't put a price on public safety. Oh, yes, you can. All right? And I think they're versions of

public safety and I mean, they're got brand new like cars and how much did they spend to build the new Medford Police Department. That's, no, you see, you're confusing apples and oranges again. Oh, I don't know. That is a city

service. It has absolutely nothing to do with whether Jackson County can build a new jail. Nothing. The two, I have nothing to do with one another. The city of Medford, let me just explain the way the city of Medford does it. They raise your utility fees as they decide to hand out fat raises and all the rest of it. In fact, the utility fees, since it is July 1st, just went up. But let's see, from 7653 to 8591 a month for every household in the city of Medford, every single family.

So, you know, and yes, it's unpopular, but they can just do it without, you know, just a majority vote of the council is all that takes. Well, maybe that's why we can't afford a new jail because everybody's getting raises. But you have to understand. But you see, you're criticizing the heroes. What am I going to do with you? Now, you know, I'm just teasing you, okay? I know, but you know, we all have our opinions, and that's what makes America great.

You can agree to disagree. Yeah, but the one thing, just understand, whatever the city of Medford does has nothing to do with whether the Jackson County Jail ends up by getting expanded or is funded correctly. Completely separate pot of money, okay? All right. Thank you very much. But like I said, just like what Vicki did right now, that was the sort of stuff that I was seeing on social media. It's like, guys, it's a different pile of money.

It's a completely different line item on your tax bill. Completely different. Just the main tax levy for the city of Medford to live inside the Medford. city of Medford tax mafia is $5.30 per thousand. I think that's what they charge real estate. I think it's roughly about that, about $5.30. That's more than double Jackson counties. Jackson counties is $2 in a penny, and it's been that way forever.

Josephine County was what, $85, 90 or something. They got really kind of screwed because then timber went away. And gosh, they, you know, been in the world of hurt. And so they ended up having to do a sheriff's levy. all this other stuff. Now they're talking about maybe doing a law enforcement for the juvenile, for the juvenile jail because everyone's running out of other people's money. So just remember, it's not the same. What the city of Medford or the Ashland or anybody else does, it has nothing to do with whether or not the Jackson County Jail is fully funded. Okay?

All right. 626, KMED. This is the Bill Meyer show. Did you know that SISQ pump service does much more than service pumps? In addition to providing and pump installation and repair. SISQ Pump installs water systems and storage tanks, water filtration systems, plus conducts real estate well inspections and flow testing. And with their drilling division, they can consult and drill your well, too. At SISCU Pump Service and Rotary Drilling Company, you can have one company manage your water project from start to finish.

Serving the Rogue Valley for over 50 years, visit syscupump.com. When it gets late, it gets weird. Sure. It gets weird. Hi, I'm Stephen with Stephen Westwell. And I'm on KMED. 628 wheels up with Eric Peters coming up here in the next few minutes. Ranger is here. Ranger, you had a question about the Jackson County Jail.

Yeah, they're closing the basement part of it today, 62 beds. And it's cost-cutting. They have to stay within the county's budget. But what are you thinking? Well, I think Old Mexico would be willing to contract to take care of all these people, and they would have no problem. They can handle it. Well, probably, so you pay Mexico and pesos, I guess, in order to handle the overflow.

You know, it sounds fun, and it kind of sounds like the Trump administration when they were talking about, you know, sending some of these people out of the country to say, hey, just go. Go over here. We're going to send you someplace. I think the challenge you would run into is trying to do trial meetings, and there really wouldn't be easy access. if you're talking about someone who's in the Jackson County Jail awaiting trial. That would be kind of tough, but that's certainly a creative way of looking at it, though, Ranger. Okay? Okay.

Yeah. But you know how it goes? There's always a reason, yeah. Yeah, we'll send you to Tijuana, send you to Tijuana and then set up a Zoom meeting with the judge every time you have a meeting. But you know to what Vicki was speaking about, how a lot of things seemed to be continued, I was trying to find out information on that former Eagle Point School District employee. Remember the woman who ended up his charge with, you know, luring a minor, you know, having sex with a minor, I think is what is Amanda Leonardo.

Remember her? And I remember reporting a few weeks ago that she was going to have a hearing on Monday because they were talking about revoking her ability to be out of jail or not in jail, revoking the bail or the bond or whatever it is because allegedly had a contact with a minor and she wasn't supposed to do this as part of the pre-trial release. And now I'm not an attorney, so I'm going through the Jackson County Circuit Court calendars and things like that. It appeared there was some sort of a hearing. And I think if I understand it that it may have been continued to July 10th, I believe, if I'm interpreting that. that calendar entry.

And so don't take that to the bank. I'm just telling you what I was reading. And maybe because I'm not on the turning, I'm not reading this properly. I'll have to do a little more study on it. But that's kind of like what Vicki was talking about. They're always continuing cases, probably because of the lack of evidence,

maybe lack of help. And who knows? And yeah, these are real issues. And we're going to have a pallet cleanse here and switch gears entirely. Coming up in just a minute, Eric Peters will join me from EPautos.com, and we'll take your calls and talking about the open road. Oh, now they have robots building devices. Eric just put that article up.

We'll talk with him about it as we dig into wheels up coming up after news. Rule number one, if you're looking to sell a home, choose a local real estate agent. Hey, it's Lars. And why? It starts with an overall knowledge of the area. But even I think in a hundred degree weather, pretty impressive. The Roe Gardner is sponsored by Grange Co-op. Saturday's 10 to noon, Sunday morning encore at 9 on KMED.

You're hearing the Bill Myers Show on 1063 KMED. Shout it out. Yep, Eric Peters, Automotive Journalist and Genius at E.P.O.O.S.com for the first Wednesday of July, July 1st. How you doing, Eric? Welcome back. I'm good, Bill. I'll take occasionally coherent. How's that? Okay, coherent would be fine. Well, coherent is good. Coherent is good because, you know, you listen to a lot of the Congress critters are just going, oh boy, there's not a lot of intellectual heft there. You just know it.

And that's very, very sad. Okay. Hey, Eric, you have an article you just put up there. And, you know, because we're all told that the future of the world is that we are to sit back and robots will take over all the heavy lifting. And we will just all get wealthy from it. This will be the plan. And, well, one of the first places that it's happening. is in the automotive building world and General Motors is all over this. In fact, the article is

called devices building devices. Tell me more about these. What are the collaborative robots that they're calling them? Yeah, that's the term. I thought it was kind of, you know, I like to be snarky sometimes with the headline because I think it helps to spread information when it's fun information at the same time. And yeah, they call them collaborative robots or co-bots for short. And they're, you know, they're essentially human anthropomorphic-like robots. They're not like the industrial robots that everybody's familiar with that are gigantic jigs, you know, that the chassis comes down the line. They're doing spot wells and all of that. These are things that are specifically designed to do fine work with humans adjacent. You know, so the thing next to you isn't your

co-worker, it's your co-bot. And, you know, clearly piece by piece, they're trying to get rid of the human workers and replace them with the co-box. And of course, a lot of people will immediately say, well, Eric, just being a Luddite. He's, you know, like the people who are complaining about the Well, I know, but didn't they just fire? Didn't General Motors just fire a thousand humans out of that factory? Well, exactly. And the thing is, you know, these are thinking machines to borrow a line from Frank Herbert and his wonderful novel, Doom, where he talked about humans ultimately being enslaved

by thinking machines that were controlled by a technocratic elite. Hmm, that kind of seems to me to be exactly the situation that's developing. And, you know, this idea that we're all going to have kind of this elysium where we don't have to do anything anymore and we'll just be given money and able to buy things that we want and need. And this is coming from the very same people who told us two weeks to stop the spread. You know, these are, they think these people who have been doing everything they could conceivably do to make the pyramid even taller and to reduce the number of the people at the top of the pyramid are somehow going to give us our independence, which is what it would be.

You know, if we didn't, if none of us had to work and didn't have to worry about money anymore, we wouldn't need these technocratic elites anymore. And you think they're going to facilitate that and shepherd that along? I don't know. Maybe we are going to have that technocratics. And I always term it Star Trek socialism, you know, and that the only thing we have to invent is the replicator. But we'll have the AI doing the replicating.

And then as Captain Picard once said, well, nobody has to work because everybody has provided all that they need. They can do more important work and interest. That's how it always gets sold. And, you know, I don't know. You have Elon Musk that is talking about, you know, now Elon Musk is not exactly what you would call a socialist. He's definitely a, you know, fascistic grifter. I mean, we know that.

All right. When I say fascistic, I'm not talking about goose dipping. I'm talking about, hey, cozy up to the government and, hey, what kind of grift can I get out of you? Oh, for the electric cars, great. We'll sell carbon credits. You know that story. told that a lot. But even he is saying and has been saying quite loudly, you're going to have to go with universal basic income and it's going to have to be a lot of universal basic income, not just

a cheesy, you know, cheap but universal basic income. That's what he's been saying. And I'm not so sure he's not correct. What do you think? Well, I think going back to what you said a moment ago, kind of begged a question, provided for us, by whom? I mean, ultimately, if something is provided by somebody else, then that somebody has control over you, don't they? They control the strings. I'd rather work for my living and earn my money. Yep. And it be under my own control than it become a kind of a dole. Look at people who are now elderly independent on their social security dole. You know, I mean, they're basically become, they've become clients of the government because they're not able to earn an income anymore because they're too old. They can't work. They

can't get a job. So, you know, they had this money taken from them all throughout their working lives. And now they basically have to take their cap off and go begging for alms every week or every month. And I don't want to do that. Well, the begging for alms is actually through the voting process because, you know, social security. Well, of course, I know that social security, what, 2030, 2032 is in a sporty or financial shape, though. But people who are on social security vote and vote hard, apparently. Yeah. And I don't, I'm not criticizing them. You know, they've been forced to be very clear. I'm simply stating that they are dependents. That's the bottom line. Whereas if you had money in the bank, I'm just using this to make the point,

if you had a nest egg of your own that was entirely under your control, it was legally your property, you could access it as you needed. That's an entirely different thing. All of a sudden, you are independent from these people who want you to be dependent upon them. The article is devices made by devices. It's very, very interesting. Eric Peters at EPATOS.com. Eric, I wanted to talk to you a little earlier now about the Mazda CX30, which is your current review this week. And I really like this car. In fact, if I was going to sell my van again, sell my PT and maybe buy it on the car, I'm thinking about getting that. And it doesn't seem to be all that expensive, really.

And there seems to be a lot of value for it. And it actually still has a transmission, an automatic transmission. I thought those were illegal these days. Well, specifically, it doesn't have a CVT automatic. And yeah, you know, it's not just that it's an affordable small crossover in terms of what it costs to buy. I think the more important thing is what it's going to cost you down the road. It has a non-turbo-charged 2.5-liter engine, which is appropriately sized. You know, it doesn't have one of these little 1.5-liter engines.

It has to have a turbo because otherwise it wouldn't make enough power to adequately move the vehicle. Well, think about those GM vehicles they've been having trouble with. are they like one point the Buick's the 1.2 and 1.3 liters. Yeah, the 1.2 and 1.3 liter three cylinder engines that are turbocharged to move around a 3,800 pound vehicle. And they have to be. You know, that's a motorcycle sized engine. I've got a motorcycle that's got a bigger engine than that. I mean, it's fine in a 400, 500 pound bike. It's not so good in a 3,400 pound car. Yeah, exactly. So, you know, you've got a 2.5 liter engine that's not under pressure, literally, because it's not turbocharged. and it's paired with a six-speed automatic, which is not a CVT automatic.

CVTs are just not as reliable long-term as conventional automatics. It's just an inherent problem with the design. They were fundamentally created because they were a way to squeeze out a little bit more mileage. It wasn't really of any great value to the car buyer. It was a compliance device, you know, engineered to help manufacturers cope with that. Well, the reason that the Mazda still has a conventional automatic is because the current model is basically the same as the 2020. So it's about six years old. So time hasn't caught up with it yet, which is great.

You know, another thing about it, it doesn't have a gigantic huge tablet touchscreen in it. It's got a little LCD display, but, you know, it's in the background. And you don't have to tap and swipe it to control basic operations. So, yeah, like you, I really like this little car. And if I were in the market for a useful little family knockabout car that's also fun to drive, I'd be looking at this one. Yeah, and you were mentioning that Mazda has not succumbed to as much of the Nanny State SpyTech, Is that the case with this one, too?

Oh, yeah. For example, it does not yet have the feature, Airfingers quotes, that so many current model your cars already have in anticipation of that mandate that's going into effect in 2027 that cars have some form of distracted or drowsy driver warning system, meaning that they have cameras that watch you constantly while you're driving to see if you're not paying attention. Mazda hasn't put that in its vehicles yet. They'll have to next year, unfortunately, because it's a federal requirement. And some of the other systems that do come in the vehicle.

but like the lane keep assist, you can turn it off. And it doesn't have stop start. You know, so many things to, thank goodness. So many things about this car to like, you know, but it's not going to last very long, unfortunately. It's probably going to get updated next year or certainly the year after that. So if you're looking for something that's in that class vehicle, a small crossover that potentially is a good family car because even though it's small,

you know, it's got a pretty decent amount of cargo room and backseat room. So it's viable in the way that a compact sedan isn't. As a family car. But the point being, like you had mentioned, it hasn't been updated since 2020, really. Yeah. But that's a good thing. That's the reason why, you know, we're still able to enjoy this car and actually still drive the car, actually drive the car and not be a nag to death. So I just thought that there's a really interesting review on EP Autos.com, the 2026 Mazda CX30.

Now that, this is a question that I've wanted to fire at you. I think maybe we talked about it and maybe you wrote about it one time. what happened to color in cars because Linda and I were sitting in a parking lot the other day and you know or you're having a you know snacking on some snack wraps or something like that and and we were noticing every car in truck that went fine black white gray black white gray may oh and if it's going to be red it's not red it's maroon really maybe you see a maroon occasionally, an occasional putty blue, you know, that sort of thing, but black, white, black, white, gray, you know, it's like, what happened?

Well, colors became expensive. They became optional. Like, yeah, if you, a lot of the manufacturers, if you look, you know, look at the specs, you'll find that the standard color is typically white or black or gray, but if you want something like metallic red, it's going to cost you $800 extra. It's a big ticket option now. Really? So a lot of people say, yes, I'm not going to buy it. And they just go with it.

And I think psychologically, too, we just sort of live in a more bleak time, frankly, a more Soviet kind of time. Cars have become appliances for the most part. And, you know, you don't really pay much attention to what color your refrigerator is. You know, you're buying a fridge. So it's going to be silver or white or maybe black. Oh, yeah. I forgot silver. Silver.

Silver is the other one. You know, black, white, gray, silver, black, white, gray, silver, maroon, putty blue, black, white, silver. Okay, everywhere. Okay. All right. That explains it. I thought maybe there was like there was a, you know, enforcement. Well, kind of thing. When I was looking at getting a car, in fact, I looked at other Mazda's because you have had good things about Mazda's. And I've ever tried to build it. And you're right, the only time you could get a really nice color

is that you had to go to the high-level trims, if I recall correctly. Is that what they're all doing? Yep. Well, that and again, just charging you extra. And I think the reason that they're charging extra has got to have something to do with these environmental compliance costs because, you know, metallic paints, for example, might entail more cost to apply. So, you know, they're passing those costs on, you know, onto the buyer. Okay. I just know that if you were to look at the highway, go back to when you or I were growing up, you know, you would see, you know, flaming reds and oranges and really bright blues and just just amazing color choices out there for a long time. And it seemed to be pretty something,

something pretty common. Oh, sure, it was a tremendous palette. In fact, it wasn't just the exterior. It was also the interior. In a lot of cases, you could mix and match. You know, there was a tremendous variety. You could choose, you know, whatever the color you prefer on the outside. And then you could pick an interior color.

And there are typically five, six different choices that you can go with. Yeah. Well, I'm talking with Eric Peters this morning. If you want to talk with him, maybe pose a question or maybe a comment on anything else we're kicking around about on the road. 770563 in two minutes. We're right back at it on KMED. Coastal just what the country needs.

Celebrate the land of the free. Always free. Call 541-295-4-404. Good morning. This is News Talk 1063, KMED. And you're waking up with the Bill Myers Show. It's 10B47. Eric Peters, Automotive Journalist with me from APAotos.com.

Taking your call. It's always fun now. Let's go to Terry, Terry, on the CX30. We were just talking about that. That's this week's review. Go ahead. Yeah, well, my son just turned 16, got his license, and that's the first car he got. It's like a 20-23, I believe.

And I was just, yeah, here's what he thought about a first car for a kid like that. Yeah, excellent. And, you know, the thing about it, you know, the only thing that I would, if I had a wish list that I could, I could have Mazda grant, would be that they would allow you to have the manual transmission with the car. Functionally, it's very similar to, if you remember, Mazda used to have a vehicle call the Speed 3, which was based on the three sedan and the three hatch. And it was one of one of these little hot, hot rod, little hatchbacks that had a turbocharged engine and had a six-speed manual transmission. It was all kinds of fun because it was front wheel drive. So you could leave some

black patches on the road and everything. This thing actually has an available turbo engine that's almost as powerful, 250 horsepower, which is down about 13 from the old speed 3, but it's all-wheel drive and it's automatic. So it's a much more civilized and controlled kind of performance. And you can one under the radar more effectively than you could in the speed three. Terry, I'm just curious, the one you got for your son, is it a turbo? Or what's the very... No, it's just standard. I don't even know what engine has got in it, but yeah, it doesn't have a turbo.

And then the only other funny thing about it is I sat in the backseat for the first time a couple weeks after he got it, and he turns the radio on. And I'm all, it doesn't sound like there's speakers back here. I was about ready to take it back and say, hey, the speakers aren't working back here. Could you look at him? And if you don't have the upgraded system, all they have is front speakers. There are no rear speakers in the door for that thing. No kidding.

Yeah. Well, that's not the case with the current model. I thought it was something wrong, but that's how they come. Okay. Well, he did say, though, it's not the case with the current one. But, Terry, thanks for sharing the story there. Eric, we have Tracy in Mount Vernon. And Tracy, this had to do with Cars Reading the Road again.

You talked to Eric about that the other week. Go ahead. Sure. Sure. First off, Happy Canada Day. The second thing, my favorite color and the classic car. is from the 1960, sort of a burnt orange, burnt yellow, and they've never been able to replicate it. And there's always the car of the muffled car car.

And a quick third thing. I was in Bellingham the other day, and there was a line of 12 Van Goggins. Apparently, some guy has a rebuilt shop there, and Vanigan owners would drool. Oh, no kidding. No, okay. Yeah. Thanks for letting us know. I appreciate that.

Okay. Now the main thing. So it turns out my car reading, the electronic reading of signs is a little more complicated. And your listener the other week gave a good clue that it was reading off a database. So it's really a two and perhaps a three-stage process. First, the car electronically attempts to read the road sign. And that's from the live real-world situation. If it doesn't read correctly or it thinks there should be something there,

it then goes into the database that is a lat-long location database where there is supposedly a road sign. What I don't know yet is if it's because I was on a pre-programmed route, something that I'd already loaded in, so that the car's computer could reach into the speed database, the speed road database. I'm going to test that scenario out, but it turns out to be a very complicated process. It's not as simple. Read a sign, move on. It has a fallback. All right.

So, Eric, Tracy is doing some research here for you for the good of the order here. Well, you know, I mean, I think the take-home point is it ultimately these technologies are specifically designed to keep real-time monitoring of your speed and to correct you ultimately and perhaps even punish you for each instance of speeding. And by the way, for the caller, my 76 transam has painted carousel red, which is kind of a, sort of a burnt orange color that's similar to Chevrolet Hugger orange, but it's not the same thing, and it's one of my favorite colors also. Good stuff. All right. All right.

Thank you. Hey, thank you very much, Tracy. Wild, let's see, wild, wild, wild salmon, wild west salmon is here. How you doing, Steve? Welcome. Hey, well, the reason I said that is I was thinking about what you guys were talking about with robots building robots and our problem with the jail. So why can't we have the jail built by robots? I mean, you know, they've got 3D printed buildings now,

and robots could do that. It would save a lot of money for labor. Yeah, let me make sure that Eric understands where we're coming from this. Eric, before you came on, I was talking about how the basement of the Jackson County Jail, which was built 46 years ago, was closed as a cost-cutting measure, and it wasn't that big of a jail to start with. and taxpayers have been reticent at taxing themselves insanely to build a new one. So that's what Steve is talking about.

So I guess, Steve, you were looking at the robots building robots. Well, how about robots just guarding the inmates? Well, that was the next step, you know. The cost is perth. And so just building the jail is a big expense. But if you look at over time, the labor part of it is a huge thing. So I think the robot thing would be great. Okay, I appreciate the call, Steve.

Boy, I'll tell you, I can hear some squawking from the public employee unions right away on that, couldn't you, Eric? Well, Bill, my squawk is going to come from, I see that as sort of the Battlestar Galactica scenario. You know, we're the silons. I don't want to be guarded by a sylon. I don't want to have robots acting as enforcers of anything. That's a terrifying prospect. But you know what you were talking about in devices made by devices, is that these are supposed to be. collaborative robots. So you're on the line and you have your robot buddy next to you and they even

try to make it look humanoid. Yeah. I mean, it has arms and it has, you know, almost hands, digits, things. It can do fine work and manipulate objects. And, you know, ultimately, you know, the scary thing is that it's not just sort of the, you know, the Neanderthal brute physical labor that's going to be replaced. Musk talks about this all the time. In the end, you know, AI with robotics will end up replacing highly trained specialist people, engineers, scientists, even creative people. I mean, you've got you've got the thing now where it can auto generate a movie, you know, using images of famous actors that are indistinguishable from the actual actors actually performing the role. They could do our show. You could have, you know, an AI, Eric, and an AI bill

having a conversation about cars. Yeah, well, you and I are on universal basic income, I suppose, and going out and enjoying our state-provided gruel. Okay. Have you noticed that society wasn't really asked if we wanted this? Yeah, I think that's a key key question to ask. There's so many things of a piece, including obviously the thing that we talk about often, all of this assistance technology that's just being foisted on us in this monitoring technology. Most people don't like it. In fact, I've yet to encounter a single one of my readers or people that I talk to on the air. We say, yeah, I like that. I'm very happy to have cameras watching me and microphones in the car listening to my conversation. And the steering wheel nagging me to steer a certain direction.

Yeah, nobody likes this. And yet all the cars have it. Why? Why is that? I mean, very clearly, we're being nudged to use that term in a certain direction. And, you know, that begs the question by whom and toward what ultimate and purpose. And I don't think it's a good one. That brings me to the other article, which you write about independence, you know, what are we really independent of? And I have, thought about such matters as you have for a number of years as we're up on our 250th birthday of what's left to the republic, you know, that kind of thing. And I wonder if there is a future for real freedom, because it has been something which has corroded, I think, a bit and bit in generation. And I know people just say, okay, Bill, you're going to be 65 here in a few weeks. Okay, boomer. I get it. But no, arguably, I lived a much freer life when I was growing up than my children did.

And their children have, you know, that you know what I'm getting at? I mean, just realistically. It's not just, you know, an old guy looking back and, you know, whimsically and nostalgically at the past. It's an absolute fact, particularly with regard to personal freedoms. Just the little individual choices that we were able to make on our own when we were young. Like if I want to wear a seatbelt, nobody was going to hassle me about it. I could if I felt like it, you know, or, or, right. wearing a helmet or not.

And all these little things that together end up adding to this just cloistered, suffocating, constantly being parented by authority at every turn. And, you know, objectively speaking, we are less free. And I think that for the most part, people do want freedom. You know, I think it's sort of an instinctive thing that people do crave. And what I get concerned about is that younger generations have no idea what was lost. Just like maybe I had no idea what was lost from my. parents generation, you know, really to a certain, to a certain extent. The ability to not be

hassled so much. And let's even take, since we're talking about cars, I've told you before that as a 17-year-old, I was a hellion in that 1970 Monte Carlo or the 1969 Cadillac. What 17-year-old boy wasn't? Well, exactly. But routine, 110, 120 mile per hour driving, right? And I would do this. This was rural Ohio, a very little. little very few people, kind of open roads and, you know, that kind of thing. And that's the way it was. No, it wasn't probably wise. And I also have to admit, though, a lot of my friends were that way, too.

We also buried a few of my friends in high school back at that time. But I will say that I think that we were more risk takers. There was just more risk taking in general. And it's like now personal liberty and freedom is defined as, okay, what member of the Island of Misfit Humans, LGBTQ2 Spirit plus plus plus plus plus can you do and you go out there with your crazy blue hair and wave your pride flag. You know what I'm getting at? It's like there's just been a strange, a strange morphing of what Liberty has been all about. I think it's fair to say that people aren't allowed to grow up anymore. You know, when we were kids, we would take risks. And

sometimes we would pay the consequences for taking foolish risks. You know, maybe I'd jump, jump my bike off a ramp and I was going a bit too fast and I crashed and, you know, I smashed myself up as a result. And I learned, be more careful. Now, you know, risk is being withdrawn in the name of safety. So we're all cosseted and everybody's afraid. Notice that. You and I, when we were growing up, and people weren't afraid of everything. It seems to me today that this fear is almost, it's almost, it's been instilled and it's become

characteristics. Everybody's afraid. I mean, even, oh, it's going to be hot today. Oh, my gosh. The heat dome is coming. Oh, you better be, well, make sure and put on your sunscreen and stay hydrated. You have to be reminded by that, right? Yeah.

And, you know, there was something that felt good about learning how the world works and coping with it. Even if sometimes you busted your knee, you know, you grew up. You became an adult. You understood how to evaluate the external world and make a rational decision about your actions. But yes, sometimes people died or were severely injured too. And I understand that. But I think that we as the people, we, the people, have lost. something in this withdrawing of risk everywhere you go, in every aspect of life,

and this co-parenting by the government and or the regulatory state, everywhere you go at all times. I completely agree with that. And so I thought your independence article was just spot on, and it's something to consider. And, you know, where are the people, where are the future generations that will hold that will hold government accountable as an example. And I happen to think, I happen to think that the rise of, of the socialist drones that have been

winning in a lot of elections are kind of an reaction to this. It's like all risk needs to be removed. I'm here. I'm a socialist. We're going to, you know, we're going to make it happen. That kind of thing. It's certainly in the majority view right now, you know, real freedom, the kind of thing that you and I are talking about is in the minority view.

But it doesn't mean we can't transmit it to the future generations, to, you know, to our kids, to other, the young people that we know. to talk about it. It may take a while to reassert itself, but I do think human nature is immutable in the sense that ultimately all of us crave autonomy, the freedom to decide and to chart our own course in this life instead of just being a passive sack that sits there and gets told what it's allowed to do. Makes me wonder if the real war we see coming, everyone talks about coming civil war. You know, you'll see the blogs that bleed that kind of stuff. So I wonder if it's going to be the war against the machines.

If that's where people will be. If this nightmare scenario, I hope that this whole AI thing is overworn and that really we're not headed for some sort of a Terminator slash Dune, you know, War of the Thinking Machines kind of scenario because that will be a nightmare scene far eclipsing anything that has ever happened thus far in human history. Well, it's a good talk. I always appreciate you coming on, Eric, and enjoy the Independence Day celebration here, whatever we're independent from on Saturday for sure.

next week I sent you an article about Toyota's Solid State Battery Technology. We didn't really have time to talk about that today, but I would love to dig more into this. They're calling this a game changer, and they could be right about certain things that, I mean, massively increased and speeded up charging. And I think one of the best parts about the Toyota battery, which is in their lab right now, but I guess they're going to bring it out, is that it doesn't set the whole house on fire if there's a problem. You know, it's not going to burn your house up. like the lithium ions are doing, you know, these days that we've heard so much about.

So why don't we talk about that next week, okay? That sounds great, but looking forward to it. Thank you, Eric. E.P.O.O.S.com is the website on KMED and KMED HD1, Eagle Point, Metford, KBXG, Grants Pass.